Making CEGEPs more (ir)relevant?

The recent announcement made by the Quebec government that the standard for acceptance into CEGEPs ought to be scaled down should not shock anyone. "High school students who don't pass all their classes should be allowed to attend college anyway," the education minister has said. Well, why not? Why not drop the pretension once and for all that the majority of these places, the public ones specifically, actually serve much of an academic purpose.

Dropping the standard in CEGEPs would actually not be a bad idea, if CEGEPs had more clear standards within them. Such a policy truly would offer students that may have done badly in high school a second academic chance. But usch is not the case. The result is likely to be a deferral of the high school drop out problems that the minister seeks to avoid with the new policy right to the CEGEPs. How exactly this is advantageous to Quebecers is not clear. Except that it removes a whole segment of drop outs from the high school stats. Politically, not a bad way to improve the numbers.

Government proposes changes to CEGEP programs