Back to C basics
Toni Merriss
Issue date: 3/8/07 Section: Opinion
As I sat in the TMB auditorium Monday, I was haunted with flashbacks from high school and taking the ACT. For weeks, nightmares of my college applications coming back stamped with DENIED across them had me actually studying. I remember waking up early only to go sit in a room with 200 other students who were just as excited as me to be there and trying to remember anything and everything any teacher had ever taught us. But wait! I suddenly remembered that I was already in college, so what was I doing taking another test just like the one that most high school students dread?
The CBASE, otherwise known as the College Basic Academic Subjects Examination, is required for all JSU students to take before graduation. The most interesting part? The score a student receives does not affect whether they graduate or not. Basically, the CBASE is an evaluation of a student's ability in "general education."
The test is composed of four parts: English (reading and literature), mathematics (general math, statistics, algebra and some geometry), science (life and physical sciences) and social studies (history and social science). You are free to complete the sections in any order you choose, but I was not too worried about it so I just went in the order they were in the booklet.
The accreditation agency for JSU, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS), requires the university to evaluate the level of their educational goals and whether they are being met. The results of the CBASE serve as a way for the administration to see if those goals are being fulfilled.
Now, people may call me crazy (and I certainly would not blame them), but in my opinion, the timing of this test is horrible. Although students are given 45 minutes to complete each section, that is not what I am talking about. I am instead referring to the time in a collegiate career that the university chooses to administer this test to students. I am a senior, and granted, I am a non-traditional student, but the last time that I had a basic math class was years ago. Trust me, I do not remember much! I already know that I did not do well on that portion of the exam, and that has nothing to do with the teachers we have at JSU, although my poor math skills are very much going to be a reflection on them. So in advance, I would like to apologize to the math department . . . and maybe I should throw in the history department as well because like math, it has been a while for me.
The CBASE, otherwise known as the College Basic Academic Subjects Examination, is required for all JSU students to take before graduation. The most interesting part? The score a student receives does not affect whether they graduate or not. Basically, the CBASE is an evaluation of a student's ability in "general education."
The test is composed of four parts: English (reading and literature), mathematics (general math, statistics, algebra and some geometry), science (life and physical sciences) and social studies (history and social science). You are free to complete the sections in any order you choose, but I was not too worried about it so I just went in the order they were in the booklet.
The accreditation agency for JSU, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS), requires the university to evaluate the level of their educational goals and whether they are being met. The results of the CBASE serve as a way for the administration to see if those goals are being fulfilled.
Now, people may call me crazy (and I certainly would not blame them), but in my opinion, the timing of this test is horrible. Although students are given 45 minutes to complete each section, that is not what I am talking about. I am instead referring to the time in a collegiate career that the university chooses to administer this test to students. I am a senior, and granted, I am a non-traditional student, but the last time that I had a basic math class was years ago. Trust me, I do not remember much! I already know that I did not do well on that portion of the exam, and that has nothing to do with the teachers we have at JSU, although my poor math skills are very much going to be a reflection on them. So in advance, I would like to apologize to the math department . . . and maybe I should throw in the history department as well because like math, it has been a while for me.
Be the first to comment on this story