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Summary: An original model for the future of our educational system?
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Reporting from research involving over 1600 in-depth personal interviews, Prof. Light presents fascinating information on what works and what doesn't in our educational system.
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Though apparently intended for college bound students in planning for and choosing a college, it also has the potential to benefit teachers, school counselors and administrators, legislators and parents, through important insights that can positively shape the manner in which we choose to educate our children.
:College bound students learn from the book's presentation of the voluminous experience of others in most aspects of college life. They learn how to prepare themselves so they can get the most benefit once they enter college, and how to take advantage of the most useful tools for succeeding.
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Prof. Light's meticulous research is the fruitful result of collaborations over many years, and is reported to already have influenced many colleges in forming their curriculums and attending to their student body's learning needs.
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I recommend it as required reading for college bound students and for anyone interested in making our educational system more effective.
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Summary: making the most of college: students speak their minds
Review: A Book About College Life Unlike Any Other. Reading this book actually made me a bit emotional. I bought it as a gift for two nephews now at two colleges. It is the best gift I could have given them. I say emotional because if only I had known some of the simple ideas and suggestions that Light offers in this book, I myself would have done lots of things differently many years ago when I was a student. Well, too late for me now. Since I now do some teaching, I have followed Light's work on improving college life for many years. In fact, his two publications that he distributes for free that were written in the early 1990s give all the statistical and scientific technical back-up for his findings in this, his new book. Yet I am a lot less interested in the details of his survey and interview response rates, and stratified random samples, and other such technical back-up, all of which are in his earlier reports that he mailed to me for free when I requested them, than in his substantive findings and suggestions. That is why both of my nephews love this book and have made active choices at their colleges already, by using it. Light offers an enormous number of actionable suggestions in this book. Some are for students. Others are for faculty. Here are those that my nephews, as the current students (I am the old guy in the family) found most useful and actually acted upon this term: 1. Choose courses that at least try to link rigorous and abstract ideas, say in economics or political science or history, with something the kids personally care about. One of my nephews changed the economics course he chose at his college. He found a new one that deals with labor issues, and that is what happens to interest him. 2. Find courses that require some writing. Yet where the professor doesn't assign a long, final paper - - rather he or she assigns a series of shorter papers so that my nephew is able to make, in Light's terms, "some mid-course corrections" that actually lead to improvement and substantive learning. My other nephew did just that when choosing a world history course. It requires him to write just a two page paper to hand in each week. My nephew was a bit stunned when the professor mentioned Light's book, and said he found the suggestion for many short papers with some feedback to the students a compelling idea, which he had decided to implement. 3. The third point is my own, not from my nephews. At a time of political correctness that often drives me crazy, the author obviously made herculean efforts in preparing this book to strike a fair-minded balance in his three chapters about "how students can make the most of the new racial and ethnic diversity on so many campuses." It is not left wing or right wing - - just thoughtful. It sure made me thing hard. And the students' anecdotes about the good and the not so good about diversity, are riveting When I started the first chapter, I expected to see some left wing drivel. I was wrong. I honestly couldn't even figure out Light's own, personal politics as I read through his suggestions and dozens of anecdotes about racial and ethnic diversity. What I did figure out is that there are a handful of very specific things that my nephews could do, and that hopefully their campus leaders WILL do, to benefit from the diversity on their campuses. Whether it is a summer mailing that brings students from different backgrounds together to discuss a common reading (I wish that common reading were the common sense ideas in THIS BOOK), or implementing a policy of "inclusion" wherever it is possible, or several others in the book, I just hope my nephews' Deans get and read this. One last thought. I express admiration whether it is to Light or to his editors for the quality of the writing. It is stunningly crisp and clear. Lots of active verbs. Crisp, short, easy to understand sentences. Fun to read. Having seen his earlier, more statistically based work on this same area, I would not have guessed he could pull this off. This book is just unlike any other, and my nephews have both benefited big time.
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Summary: Interesting Approach
Review: As a NJEA educator from New Jersey who is frequently advising students about college, I find this book to be a very useful piece of work by the author. It goes without speaking that it would be well written, and it provides interesting anecdotes. The only missing link is that it does not really get into making the reader understand the, dare I say it?, "philosophical" importance of higher education to the needs of both the individual and America. I recommend a book called "WEST POINT", by Norman Thomas Remick, that in plain language brings the real importance of higher education into clear focus for any high school student or teacher. That aside, "MAKING THE MOST OF COLLEGE" is a very interesting approach and a superlative 5 star effort by Mr. Light.
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Summary: Not really for students...
Review: As a professor, I found the book excellent, both for its many insightful suggestions and as a reminder of the student experience. If I were evaluating this book for faculty, I'd give it five stars. But the book's title and marketing indicate that this is a how-to book for college students. That's deceptive: It is a summary of findings by Harvard's self-assessment team. Suggestions for students are good when they come, but they're spread between suggestions more useful to college faculty and administration. As an example, one idea is to schedule discussion classes just before dinner, so that students in the class could eat together afterward and possibly continue discussion. That's a great idea for administrators, but students can't make much use of it. The book would be stronger if it were separated for the two potential audiences. The book also suffers from not being up-front about its origins: It summarizes findings of an assessment project at Harvard, but you won't find it described until you reach the appendix. I realize that fewer copies would be sold if they admitted this in the introduction. But until I reached the appendix, where the project's major questions were finally described, I was left wondering why the book's organization was so lopsided. Particularly, the part on campus diversity was much longer than I expected; it wasn't until I reached the appendix that I learned why. (The appendix was one of the best parts. In fact, I recommend reading it first.) I'd certainly recommend the book to faculty and administrators from any college. The work is clearly based on extensive, well-done interviews, and the analysis is both well-organized and rich in ideas. Just recognize it for what it is.
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Summary: A must read for college bound families
Review: As an admission officer for a selective liberal arts college, I know I am biased about this subject, but this truly is a great book offering insights about an effective four year college education. Professor Light does an excellent job of weaving a tapestry of tales from college students about the seminal events of their collegiate experiences. Having just read the Game of Life and The Shape of the River which were primarily statistical analyses, the first hand account style was both fresh and easy to comprehend (although some empirical data would have been nice). The chapters on interaction with faculty are problably the most useful for families and prospective students, while the final chapters on diversity are most applicable to colleges themselves. Of course what other colleges have the ability to shape a diverse class like Harvard? Some of the ideas presented are great for schools who are 20-30% multi-cultural. Students and families who take the key lessons from this book to heart and utilize it when selecting a college will find an institution that will be value-added and will make a difference in the student's life.
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Summary: Further Good Advice
Review: Bought the book, "West Point" by Norman Thomas Remick, to understand the real importance of higher education to America, as another reviewer suggested. THEN read "Making The Most Of College". Worked for me. Completely revolutionized my thinking about college.
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Summary: Connect Courses, Professors, Advisors, Life, and Students!
Review: Having heard one university president state that his school's approach to optimizing college was to "find good students and neglect them," Professor Light was stung into researching what makes college memorable, helpful, and stimulating. His method was to conduct hundreds of one-to-three-hour in-depth interviews with graduating seniors and alumni of Harvard College over ten years. He personally conducted over 400 of the interviews, and his trained students did the rest. As a statistician, he was then able to take the richness of the responses and turn it into quantitative observations. These observations revolve around the questions of: (1) ". . . what choices can students themselves make to get the most out of college?" (2) ". . . what are the effective ways for faculty members and campus leaders to translate good intentions into practice." The weakness of the study is that Professor Light argues that the results apply to other colleges, as well, because others have told him that these conclusions make sense to them and he hears similar responses at other schools he visits. That point is clearly debatable. Also, the right answer for one student may be quite different from a good answer for another student. Such analysis should not be carried too far beyond its sample base! The best part of the book is that there are lengthy quotations from students about epiphanies that they experienced. I see the main application of this book to be raising choices for students, professors, advisors, and administrators. Whether anyone takes these choices or not, they at least will have avoided making self-limiting decisions by default. The book is full of stimulating ideas. Let me share a few with you. (1) Students who "make connections between what goes on inside and outside the classroom report a more satisfying college experience." "Good advising can have a profound impact." My favorite story was a young woman who was a ballerina. She was experiencing many injuries as were other young women. With advice, she ended up doing research projects on how animal bones and bone development are affected by physical stress. To her surprise, she developed a career interest in becoming an orthopedic surgeon who worked on this kind of issue. (2) When starting college, many students need to develop much better time management and study skills. Of especial importance is spending long enough on each task in one sitting. Grades do not seem to be negatively affected by up to 20 hours a week of outside work or extracurricular activities, except for intercollegiate athletics. (3) Get connected to other students in as many ways as possible, including studying with others after preparing your own work, taking smaller (less than 16 student) classes, and having roommates with different backgrounds from your own. (4) Get mentoring from professors and advisors to help with seeing how you allocate your time, asking better questions, improving your writing, communicating more precisely, learning the tools of your discipline, adding the insights of other disciplines, and working on the professor's professional research and writing. (5) Be exposed to cultural, religious, and belief diversities to help you evaluate your own background, and to develop a more open attitude towards others. (6) Take as much science and as many foreign languages as humanly possible. (7) Administrators should intervene in organizing student lives in order to actively create these types of experiences. Having been a Harvard undergraduate many years ago, I certainly agree that these observations reflect my own experiences there with one major exception. My extracurricular activities never had any connection to my class work, and I can see now that that was a major missed opportunity. On the other hand, I did get experience in solving business problems as an undergraduate in my extracurricular activities that have served me well in my professional career. But there was no opportunity then to take that hands-on learning into the classroom. To his credit, my senior tutor did ask me to help him look at starting a business after I graduated. So Harvard College must have improved in this way since then. I'm glad. I hope that all college and universities will undertake their own versions of this research (apparently at least 20 schools have done so already). In that way, parents and students can increase the likelihood that their major investments in time, effort, and money will create the most positive influence possible. Well done, Professor Light! After you read this book, I suggest that you share it with a high school junior. These insights will mean even more if they can become part of the process for selecting a college or university to attend. Follow the trails of curiosity and excellence wherever they take you!
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Summary: A faculty member at Marian College loved this book.
Review: I am a biology professor at Marian College and read this book hoping to get some ideas for retaining more students in biology. I heard Richard Light present his ideas, and the book confirmed the many excellent ideas that he presented.
At our college we worry a lot about student retention. And Light's ideas in this book for increasing retention, especially in a very small liberal arts college like mine, which is so different from a Harvard, were absolutely compelling. I would recommend this book as required reading for all faculty who teach undergraduates. While the research may have been based at Harvard University, it couldn't be more obvious that the book presents findings that are useful just about everywhere. In fact, my college has a retention rate of about 50 percent. It is emphatically not an Ivy League School. Yet I will be using Light's suggestion of the "one minute paper," and various other suggestions from this enormously impressive book, to engage my students moire vigorously with biology. It is a great read for a faculty member. Full of suggestions for both faculty and students everywhere, that are pretty easy to implement.
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Summary: College freshman from Birmingham finds this book helpful.
Review: I am just starting freshman year here in Birmingham, at UAB, and plan to major in math. I expect this will be hard. The suggestions in this book, which was recommended by my high school college counselor over the summer, have given me several ideas about how to succeed in freshman year. I plan to get to know at least one professor each term, plan to choose classes that have many short homeworks instead of one long one, and plan to track how I spend my time, and plan to work in study groups outside of class. I just hope other students are willing to do this too. This book seems to have many practical suggestions for me as a new college student, and I enjoyed reading it.
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Summary: Excellent book for well prepared students.
Review: I found this book a valuable addition to readings we will assign to our graduating seniors. In my role as Head of an Independent Day School, we like to assign our students a common reading for all our older high school students to discuss. This book fills the bill in a great way. It is full of ideas, some of which seem a bit obvious at first glance. Yet when I ask whether we at our high school are actually putting these ideas into practice, I realize we are only using a few. Starting this year we will implementing several of the author's ideas, ranging from studying in groups outside of class to more specific instructions for how to revise papers. My guess is other schools with students who will be attending many different colleges, especially stronger colleges, will be able to put many of the excellent ideas from this book into practice. The author's arguments seem well documented. It is well worth reading for any good student, and probably for their parents too. I will be asking our faculty members, and all seniors and juniors, to read it this coming year.
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