(PRWEB) March 03, 2015
With only about a third of U.S. students completing a Bachelor's degree in four years, and the U.S. ranking a mere 16th out of 30 developed nations as a producer of college graduates, college completion has become a serious issue. Yet the real reasons for students not graduating or taking longer have remained enigmatic. Scattered studies and popular theories like modern students are “unmotivated” or “not college material” have not adequately explained the real reasons why students don't finish. Most of these are not based on real-life work with students, let alone the bright ones who should have succeeded but did not.
College Strategy Blog is dedicated to these real-life reasons why students are having problems or not graduating from college. It is owned and written by a professional who works directly with bright but struggling students, and he writes based on his experiences with them at colleges across the U.S. “A surprising amount of my work has been with students who earned good GPA's in high school, had strong SAT scores, or even earned AP credits,” says Pittsburgh consultant Jeffrey Ludovici, M.A., owner of the site and author of dozens of articles. “Many people would be surprised at the real reasons why students begin to do poorly in higher education, and if these top students can have problems then any student can.” The reasons for college problems may not be as apparent as people think, as Jeff has found out, and many surprises can be encountered when working with students to uncover problems.
Jeff, who began his work in 1997, has begun to identify exactly what has been happening. “The impact of having extended attendance times or not completing college is very clear,” he says, “especially on young men.” Jeff is referring to a study by the Pew Research Center that documented a major change across the U.S. in terms of earnings, education, and even marriage. This study found that, in a role-reversal to the 1940's and 50's, it is now young women who are the college degree earners in the U.S., with young men having lost ground in both earning credentials and later career earnings. Jeff has also noticed that there can be a cycle to college problems, and has also written about how parents and students can break it in order to move forward.
College Strategy Blog contains articles based on knowledge gained from directly working with students who have done poorly or are even failing in college. Jeff writes about topics such as how college failure can repeat itself, can cause students to achieve below their parents, and how it is usually multi-factorial in nature. He also gives updates about the program he runs in which he works with students to help them improve their academics. Jeff holds undergraduate and graduate degrees in clinical psychology, and is the former Director of a program that served hundreds of young adults, so he has approached this problem with a trained eye. He has begun to share his knowledge of how to help students having problems at a variety of colleges in a 220 page book he completed, which he has turned into an online course. “Improving Academic Underperformance® In College” describes the enigmatic phenomenon of bright students going to college and not working up to their potential, then discusses key factors that must be addressed to help them improve. The book and online course, completed in November of 2014, is now available in electronic format at the learning section of his website. It is complete with section quizzes and a 76 question student self-assessment, making for a total of 134 questions with explanations for correct answers that are all downloadable after completion for the user to keep as their notes. The learning section also has advanced articles, up to 18 pages long with downloadable quizzes and answers, on select topics such as options that many colleges offer for correcting bad grades and strategies for students with a low GPA to consider if trying to transfer.
What makes College Strategy Blog so unique is that it is written by a qualified professional who actually works with bright students who are having problems, and not by a journalist or purported “expert” that has no experience with them. Some may hold themselves out as such yet don't have the credentials and experience to support that claim, where Jeff writes from the perspective of someone who deals with the issues daily. “I'm always surprised by the experiences that parents and students tell me about when they were looking for help, and I can see the obvious problems that were missed” he notes.
About Us
College Strategy Blog is owned and run by Jeffrey Ludovici, M.A., LLC, a higher education consulting practice based in Pittsburgh, PA. It helps students, parents, professionals, and colleges uncover the real-life reasons why students do poorly in higher education then provides solutions. For more information, please visit the collegestrategyblog.com and learning.collegestrategyblog.com websites.