Talk:College/Archive 1

Archive 1

Comment

This article hugely overcomplicates the subject and needs rectification. As stated in section 6, there is just too much detail. Personally, I would go as far as saying that this should just be a disambiguation page linking to articles for the various meanings of the word. As it currently stands, this article is of no use to anyone who wants to understand the differences in usage of the word across the world. I think there are a number of different options for this page:

• Make it a disambiguation page to articles dealing with each meaning of the word.
• Make it so it is only about undergraduate colleges/universities in the USA, with a link to a disambig page for other meanings.
• Make it so it is about all meanings except for undergraduate colleges/universities, with a link saying 'For undergraduate instituions, see university', and extend the university article.

Abc30 19:51, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I think this page should focus on the old college-within-a-university type of institution (the Paris and Oxbridge type), as that is the origin of the other meanings. The other types of colleges could be given their historical background here but expanded on other pages. (I also think this discussion should be moved back to the bottom of the page.) up◦land 14:27, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

(I moved it to the top of the page because it was going lost and unnoticed at the bottom, and it was perhaps unclear as to what the template messages referred to. I agree it should be at the bottom, but perhaps it can remain here until a decision on this matter is reached.)Abc30 16:28, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

• I just saw the page for the first time, and I thought it was excellent as is, and quickly answered my questions. If any areas need more detail, an article in that area can be added. No need for a disambiguation page, and certainly no need to focus on a particular country. Nfitz 16:22, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Lifestyle

We all know the only reason for going to college are frat houses. If you sigh up be prepared for boobs and boose 24/7. Principle Kewin.

I suppose the answer is already in the article. :P Wshun

I actually couldn't find it and still can't. You got to understand that it is not that obvious to people who have grown up with a completely different education system. Hehe I remember when a German born student tried to explain how the German educational system worked in a class. Noone understood what he was talking about and one hour later he gave up. :-) BL 00:09, 4 Sep 2003 (UTC)

What kind of answer do you want? In USA, all universities and some senior high schools are colleges; In Canada, colleges are somewhat between high school and universities. A college grants diplomas or it acts as a gateway to university. In UK and HK, "college" just means "educational institution" and so it is meaningless to ask how it relates to the education system. -wshun 00:30, 4 Sep 2003 (UTC)

In case someone else is reading this discussion and trying to make sense of it: right now in the US, a lot of colleges are changing their names to "University" because it sounds more "prestigious". At the same time, certain colleges retain the term "College" to show that they don't need to make themselves sound more prestigious. The meaning, however, is the not really any different - a college generally only offers undergraduate degrees, but they are identical in value to the undergraduate degrees (Bachelor's degrees) offered at a university (and I don't know about other countries, but they are certainly the same as similiar degrees in Canada). College is absolutely not easier than university in the US - actually, a lot of the time, a small, selective college will have more difficult classes than a large university. Aranel 02:43, 2 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Just for the record, I think there is nothing wrong with the fact that this article is (still) basically "the usage of college in each dialect of English language" (as pointed out at the top of this page), since it acts as a kind of disambiguation, both culturally and linguistically, that other articles can refer to. - IMSoP 13:12, 28 Jan 2004 (UTC) In topics with a historical vector to them, an alphabetical order isn't the most useful. I'm rearranging the article the better to show how the term evolved. I realize that this could perhaps seem UK/US-centric; but I don't see how this can be avoided. Doops 04:36, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)

India

With all due respect if the only thing that can be written under this heading is "University is generally used." then it might as well be deleted, or be placed under a more relevant heading. Djegan 21:54, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)

A line describing the IITs (though probably correct) deleted as it is irrelevant to the topic under discussion

Cultural bias

It seems that at many points in this article a non-US author has inserted his views about the American system into the article. In the contrast section between the two terms the writer seems to have a rather down-the-nose look at American colleges and universities. I don't see any need for making one seem better than another. Bias shouldn't be a part of the Wikipedia. Does anyone else read this as biased? Scm83x 06:57, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Well, when the whole purpose of a paragraph is to contrast two different points of view, then we can't really submerge those points of view altogether! But perhaps you're right and that section sounds a little judgemental; if I get the chance I'll try rewriting it. At any rate, though, I just wanted to let you know that, in fact, I was that paragraph's original author — and not only am I American myself, but I also vastly prefer the US educational system; I certainly wasn't looking down my nose when I was writing the ¶. I've just always found that few people in the rest of the world really understand how our system works — and, of course, few Americans understand how the rest of the world's does either. Doops 07:40, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Great; appreciate it. Also, the line that states that American students spend much of their time separated from their major field of study is not exactly true in my experience. While perhaps the first two years may have some more general courses, the second two years are certainly dedicated to the major field. It seems that the modifier 'most' is a little too much, at least in my experience at The University of Texas at Austin. Scm83x 15:56, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• It doesn't seem culturally biased to me. Admittedly i am British (and proud of it!), but it seems to do the job. Where i do object is the fact that it seems to be more about the entymology of the term, but fails to make this explicit in the introduction. Pydos 13:31, 1 September 2005 (UTC)
• I don't see how Singapore falls into the English speaking world.And so do India.Their rate of speaking in english are no better than the countries listed in the non-english speaking section.Perhaps they consider themselves men of the west.

Poll on University Naming Conventions

A new survey has been created to assess consensus with respect to university naming conventions, specifically regarding the usage of terms like "University of Texas" vs. "University of Texas at Austin". The poll addresses this issue both in the specific case of the "University of Maryland" and proposes an amendment to Wikipedia:Naming conventions which could impact a large number of additional pages. It doesn't directly impact this page, but I figure that people editting here may be interested in the topic. Dragons flight 17:52, Mar 27, 2005 (UTC)

Colleges in UK

2 points:

• Sixth Form Colleges are AFTER Secondary Education. Secondary Schools (11-16 usually) are compulsory, 6th form (usually 16-18) is not.
• A primary school near to me (4-11 year olds), is "Burwell Village College (Primary)", and the local secondary schools are all named similarly: Soham Village College, Bottisham Village College, Witchford Village College. Just thought I'd mention it - JVG 06:18, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

You wait JVG, it gets better...what about the Yale College Wrexham vs Yale University wrangle? sheer chaos Pydos 13:34, 1 September 2005 (UTC) Isn't Yale university in the USA? Basically, any academic institution of any level in the UK could have "college" within its name... the Beechurst section of Soham Village College was originally a grammar school by the way - JVG 17:56, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

• Yup. Hence my point about the lawsuit (and why i added the link to Yale College Wrexham). Good point about the use of 'college' as a title - by the strictest etymology it can work (co - leg ...with laws...sounds like a school to me!) Pydos 09:22, 7 September 2005 (UTC)

Talk about too much detail...

This article is too detailed, in a "can't see the woods for the trees" manner. *Why* are there individual sections for British universities? They should be mentioned if notable, but an article on "colleges" should *not* start going into detail about specific colleges unless they're very special. The whole thing is unnecessarily detailed full-stop. I don't see how a general article about the nature of "college" needs to be anything more than half its current length at the very most. I'm sure if someone had the time, they'd find out that much of the information was similar across multiple entries and consolidate it. Wish people would do that in the first place... Fourohfour 12:39, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

Not only are there to many trees to see the wood; there is also the problem that the article is largely an extended dicdef, discussing the use of the word "college" rather than colleges as a type of institution (or types of institutions) in a historical perspective. Interestingly, Paris isn't mentioned once in the article, even though the history of colleges begins there. I'll try to add a little more history to this article. Maybe we can move some stuff to separate articles on colleges in the UK and the US. up◦land 15:11, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

Definition from 1913 Webster's

My dictionary tooltip extension for Firefox gives me this definition from Webster's for "College":

College \Col"lege\, n. [F. coll[`e]ge, L. collegium, fr. collega colleague. See Colleague.]

1. A collection, body, or society of persons engaged in common pursuits, or having common duties and interests, and sometimes, by charter, peculiar rights and privileges; as, a college of heralds; a college of electors; a college of bishops. [1913 Webster]

Why do I think I should mention this: I think its useful since it doesn't define "college" = educational institution, but gives the word the wide, general meaning. Concerns about Wiktionary aside, I think it will allow people to know where the word came from. Maybe if someone could work this in (preferably near the top) it could be useful. Then again, I could be bold and do it myself, but seeing from the above discussion, I think I'd rather hold off and let someone else do it! Greentubing 09:06, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Um, the article already begins by noting this fact. But I'll add examples to make it clearer. Doops | talk 06:48, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

Canadian professors

The Canadian section of the article says that "college professor" is less prestigious than "university professor". I think this is a bit confused. A professor is a professor. However, a college instructor is not a college professor or university professor. Instructors play a different role. Colleges do not award the title of professor to instructors. Only professors (who are experts in their fields, mentor students, do research, etc) are named professors. People who specialize in teaching are called instructors or lecturers. I think perhaps this section should be removed, since it's confusing issues.--Westendgirl 19:35, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Eroneous Information

In this article it claims that some of the most prestigous colleges in The United States of America retain the the title college just for historical reasons but offer a variety of higher degrees (graduate degrees). This is true for all the examples they list except for one, Wellesley College. This school offers only bachelor's degrees and is considered a liberal arts college. I will remove this school off the list.

Suggestion -- education timeline

I think it would be useful to include an illustration of the typical educational timeline in the related articles. I'm thinking about a horizontal bar, marked with "kindergarden", "primary school", etc along its width, including high-level education such as Master's Degrees, PhDs and the such, and color-coded as to identify the current topic, and maybe also the chronologically neighouring ones. I feel that would be the best illustration of the concept -- and it would definitely help non-native English speakers, such as myself, who are typically pretty confused about your understanding of "college" versus university/high school. What do others think?--Gutza ^{T T+} 04:10, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

British and American usage contrasted

I think this is a good section to have but...

Two outstanding features of the American version are universality and breadth:

two points, is outstanding meaning superior or just contrasting? Also in a section titled British and American usage contrasted is this implying the British system has no universality or breadth? This isn't a contrast!

Nearly half of all Americans attend at least one year of "college", so the word is more natural, less remarkable, than "university" might sound abroad.

44% of people attend university in the UK so I am not sure about this point.

At the more academic end of the scale, on the other hand, many American college students (especially at the most elite institutions) see "college" as a time of intellectual exploration which can be accomplished free from any need to prepare for the future,

Again if this is contrasting it appears to mean that in the UK this isn't true, I hope it is true in both!

Hence "college" is less dryly academic than "university" might sound abroad.

POV, uni is used in the UK without meaning dryly academic.

Furthermore, a great many students in American universities and colleges live either in institution-run dormitories or in neighborhoods dominated by student apartments. Hence the college years often involve a distinct kind of living arrangement between the family home and the first adult apartment.

Same in UK. I posting this here as I feel that it might be contentious if I just re-write this and I would like a US opinion on it first. Also I think that all the UK college info should be in one paragraph and will also change that unless there are objections. Rex the first ^{talk | contribs} 23:42, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

Strongly agree. The 'universality' of college/university experience is certainly not anything even near unique to 'the American system' (51.5% of school leavers in NZ move to tertiary education immediately), not is the 'breadth of study'. As for "college" as a phase in life between childhood and adulthood has become very important culturally in America, perhaps more so than in the rest of the world. and The American system [...] forces much less specialization and focus than is common in the rest of the world.? Unsourced POV, probably not true and almost certainly unverifiable anyway. --Dom 12:22, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

If you read through this discussion from the top, you'll see that we've all been wrestling with mutual incomprehension from the outset. I'm an American, and you certainly have my blessing to go ahead with a rewrite. -- Mwanner | Talk 13:53, 30 April 2006 (UTC) There is nothing incorrect about calling a university education "college" in the U.S. It is NOT colloquial, only different terminology. The tone as written now is both POV and somewhat disparaging of the U.S.--for no good reason.--Buckboard 07:32, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

I am not from the US and did not write that section so be bold and change it! I would point out that is seems that your institutions are members of Association of American Universities and I could not find many uses of college when referring to the university name. Rex the first ^{talk | contribs} 11:20, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

I added two sentences at the end of the first paragraph in the United States section to clarify the popular use of the word "college" in the US. It is the standard - indeed, the only - term used by Americans for post-secondary (non-vocational) education. After high school, Americans go to "college," never to "university." It seems a point worth explaining, given that this usage is not standard in many other English-speaking countries. 68.80.50.49 04:47, 25 September 2007 (UTC)essex9999

India formatting

Looks like someone has messed up the section "The rest of the English-speaking world" and put Singapore and NZ under India?

Licensed to Go to College

As the students get an excellent education, college is licensed for adults ONLY, and minors are NOT allowed to start college yet. --PJ Pete (posted 01:38, 2 September 2006)

What? Plenty of people start college before they're 18 (in the U.S., where the age of majority is 18). /blahedo (t) 15:16, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Skipping a grade is difficult, and you need to be smart enough to do it, but commonly when people skip a grade, school will be a lot harder for them. --PJ Pete

Many people I know, both friends that I had in highschool and friends that I have here at my college, are or were taking college classes before finishing their secondary education. Nyttend 19:46, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Etymology incorrect

Although I like the given etymology, I believe it is wrong. It states, "con-, 'together' + leg-, 'law'" as the origin. Combining several sources, I have found the origin to be ME < OFr collége < L collegium "community, society, guild," members of which are collegae, sing. collega "colleague" < com- "with" + leg, stem of legare "to choose, depute, send as emissary, bequeath." Can someone with a greater linguistic background either back me up or disagree? 74.32.149.204 02:49, 16 January 2007 (UTC)Magnesian Phoenix

Blog link

I'm not sure of the policy; is it appropriate to have that link to the "College Kid" blog in the article at all? I cut it from the text where it stuck out, and someone re-added it to a "See Also" list. Hmm, on reading the site it doesn't seem appropriate for a link here at all ("keys in jello?"), especially not first in the list, so I'm going to make a judgment call and cut the link. --Kris Schnee 08:35, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Citations

As for citations of secondary schools being named colleges in Ontario, you can buy a Chinese newspaper (or try Today Daily News) and read over the ads, or maybe walk around the city. There are many, and any Torontonian can attest that this is true. But as for citations, how do you want us to cite such common sense?—Gniw (Wing) 08:03, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Ok, maybe a list of all private secondary schools known to the government with the name "college" in their name would satisfy the citation-hungry editors. As of today, the list is 59 entries long, just counting Ontario—this is more than even what I expected. Really, I can't understand why the push for citations for such well-known facts (when such things tends to be undocumented in the first place).—Gniw (Wing) 04:16, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

College is neccessary for a sound mind

Source for information about educational system in France

The book Twentieth Century French Philosophy by Alan D. Schrift (Blackwell Publishing) contains a 21-page section called understanding French Academic Culture which explains the history and organisation of the French higher education system; the text is aimed specifically at an English-speaking audience who may have heard of some of the institutions (Sorbonne, College de France...) but who may not know exactly how these are related, and to what kind of British/American institution they could be compared. This could be used as a source to flesh out the paragraph on France.213.118.60.4 19:19, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

British and American usage contrasted

This section reads as if the American system is superior to the British one... hence the pov tag. I only actually read that section, so I don't know if the rest of the article has any pov problems, but I'm going to assume not (or it would probably be tagged already. D4g0thur 07:40, 26 April 2007 (UTC) I'm deleting it, because the differences are already explained in the body of the article and it reads very poorly. If anyone wants to restore it they can explain why here. (Justinboden86 02:40, 1 June 2007 (UTC))

Merely meant to hit Rollback - not RV Vandalism. Just got alarmed when I saw a big chunk removed without an edit summary. --Ozgod 02:46, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Fair enough...was my mistake. (Justinboden86 02:55, 1 June 2007 (UTC))

I agree that over the years the section had become both bloated in size and illegible in style; but I think that an edited version is useful to have. It does contain information not discussed elsewhere, viz. the US's odd idiomatic use of the word "college." Doops | talk 04:11, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Removed the section again, and inserted the information into the article. It still sits poorly and uses unencyclopedic language i.e. 'In short:...' (Justinboden86 04:39, 4 June 2007 (UTC))

Well, on the minor point, I disagree: "in short" is perfectly encyclopedic language. On the major point, I'll reread it again tomorrow and see. I fear that incorporating it in the overly-long UK and US sections it will get lost; having it separate -- brief and too the point -- was useful, since readers often skim articles rather than reading the whole thing. Doops | talk 05:15, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Croatia

I deleted the section on Croatia because
1. the term is simply not used in Croatia
2. the information on how long the degrees last is outdated, incomplete and in some ways flat out wrong
3. the sentence "Croatia is a changing..." made me go WTF?
4. the rest of the section goes on about the University of Zagreb giving irrelevant (for this article) information (not to mention that it ignores the other universities)
161.53.170.16 15:05, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

College in American English usage

Although the article touches briefly on the subject, I believe additional information should be provided for non-American readers to understand the exact meaning of the terms "college" and "university" as used in the US. As I understand it, the historical universities in the US (i.e. Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia etc.) started out back in colonial times as "colleges", patterned after their Oxbridge counterparts and offering bachelor's degrees only. By the end of the 19th century, most of them had added a "graduate school" which, unlike the college properly, would offer advanced degrees, especially the new research doctorate (Ph.D) imported from Germany. As of today, that is still how most older universities in the US are organized. Undergraduate students are usually enrolled in the university's "college" (e.g. Harvard College, Yale College, etc.), where they study for a 4-year bachelor's degree. Students who already hold a bachelor's degree are enrolled instead either in a so-called "professional school", which awards degrees in medicine, business or law for example, or in a "graduate school", which awards master's and Ph.D degrees. Following the original Harvard/Yale/Princeton (HYP) usage, institutions of tertiary education in the US that still grant bachelor's degrees only are also referred to as colleges. In several "modern" U.S universities, i.e those founded in the 19th or 20th centuries, a "college" (sometimes also called a "school"), rather than referring to the undergraduate section of the university only, may refer instead to an academic division comprising different departments grouped by field of study (e.g. the College of Engineering, the College of Fine Arts, etc.), pretty much like a "faculty" in Oxbridge or, more generally, UK usage, and usually awarding both bachelor's and master's/doctor's degrees. Toeplitz 13:53, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Experimental Curricula

I added Marlboro College to the list of experimental schools. I'm not completely familiar with the histories of all the schools mentioned, but I'm fairly sure that Marlboro was one of the first, and so ought to be on the list. Additionally, I suspect that the entire mention of experimental curricula belongs on the page about liberal arts schools, rather than as part of the difference in definitions for the word college. User: Snyrt —Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.192.68.117 (talk) 19:41, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

Question

Hi, I'm sorry for asking this and interrupting the discussion, but I've never understood how colleges work and by reading this article, I just got confused. I really wanted to know this, so I would greatly appreciate it if you could answer my question. When you finish high school, then you go to college. After you've been to college, do you have the degree to have a profession (lawyer, journalist, physician, scientist)? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.81.12.129 (talk) 23:10, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Where's sources?

Sources? You gotta be kidding me. This is not an academic historical or scientific theory. Its fact. What are you going to source, the Governments education out lines? This article is being built on the experience of many individuals, hence the discussions! Tourskin.

Indeed. I find the recent push for sources bordering on the ridiculous. I did manage to find listings in government web sites for the part of the article that I know… (I live there and they don't believe what I see with my eyes, it's almost an insult…)—Gniw (Wing) 04:27, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

As a new college (actually it's called a university) student, I find sources to be very helpful. When writing papers in high school, teachers would not allow us to use wikipedia as a cited source-I don't think academia respects it on that level. Having the links to sources at the bottom of the page allows me to use those sources, however, which causes wikipedia to be useful even in university papers. Fleh6390 (talk) 18:13, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Interlanguage links

Can someone sort out the Italian and Spanish links, there are three of each in this article. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:30, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Interestingly they all link to different articles - I'm going to ask a question at the Village Pump about what is best practice in this situation. --Neo (talk) 12:55, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Hello, I use this website a lot but when I typed up college I wanted to know five interesting facts about it. Not what kinds or people, What you have to do, things like that. put them down please. This is a really big problem with your college definition. Hopefully you will change it. I need this for school Monday and I can't if you don't have anything interesting down. Sorry about the complaint but you need to do it. PLease Wikipedia! BY: Tracy from: Ohio —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.160.89.153 (talk) 04:01, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Degrees?

Where can I find information about each of the college degrees (Associates, bachelor, master's, Ph D., etc.)? 71.236.95.5 (talk) 21:10, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Information Tehnology

In the present scenerion Information Industrty is the booming industry in the world. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.163.25.57 (talk) 08:10, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

New Zealand usage

It would be good to have more detail here. The word "College" is used in names of high schools in all parts of the country. Its use as a general word for a secondary school is less widespread. As the article notes, it is not so used in most of the South Island, (the possible exception being the northern part of the island). In Taranaki, on the west coast of the North Island, "college" is not used as a general term for a high school, and I suspect the same is true of other North Island provincial areas. I have always associated the use of the word to mean "high school" with the southern part of the North Island – Wellington, Horowhenua, Manawatu, perhaps Wairarapa. I would be interested in any information that can be supplied on usage around Auckland and in other North Island areas. Koro Neil (talk) 12:32, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Archive 1