I use the word "narrowly" because it's a school's use of a broad smorgasbord of classes to fill its requirements that, in part, can contribute to a low score. As noted in a Washington Post opinion piece by Kathleen Parker, the University of Wisconsin at Madison, for instance, allows students to take a course on TV to satisfy a humanities requirement. (Those sorts of standards earned the school a "D" in the ACTA ratings.)
The ACTA looked at requirements in composition, literature, foreign language, U.S. government or history, economics, mathematics, and science. Some of its main findings: Only 40 percent of the more than 700 colleges scored a B or better, meaning they require four of these subjects; economics is not a requirement at 95 percent of the schools; only 60 percent require mathematics; and public schools get better scores as a group than private ones.
Lastly, here's what could be some good news, given the economic climate: According to the ACTA ratings, the average tuition at the schools that earned an A is just north of $13,000. That's a paltry sum compared to the $28,000 shelled out each year by attendees of the F-rated schools.
Some other elite schools who fared poorly in the ACTA ratings include: Berkeley (F), Dartmouth (C), Harvard (D), Penn (D), Princeton (C), and Stanford (C). On the other hand, the ones that earned As, include: Baylor, Brooklyn College, East Tennessee State, Kennesaw State, Texas A&M, Arkansas, and the U.S. Military and Air Force Academies. You can see all the ratings on a site ACTA created called What Will They Learn?
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