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Junior college

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The term junior college refers to different educational institutions in different countries.

India

In India, most states provide schooling through 12th grade. Maharashtra, Odisha, Assam, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka however, have a system of junior colleges where, after taking the 10th grade board exams (see SSLC, SSC), students have to apply to junior colleges to complete their 11th and 12th grades. Junior colleges are also referred to as Pre-University Colleges (PUC). Junior colleges are frequently co-located with degree colleges.

Prominent junior colleges in Mumbai include St. Xavier's, Kishinchand Chelaram, Jai Hind, Bhavan's, Ruparel, Mithibai & Ramnarain Ruia. Prominent junior colleges in Bangalore include Christ Junior College, St. Joseph's College, Vijaya College

Pakistan

Main article: Education in Pakistan

In Pakistan, all provinces provide schooling through 12th grade. The Junior college is known as Intermediate college in Pakistan. After successful completion of Secondary School Certificate the students apply for junior colleges. The students receive Higher Secondary School Certificate after completion of Intermediate college. Most Junior colleges in Pakistan are located close to degree colleges.

Japan

See also: List of junior colleges in Japan

United States

See also: List of junior colleges in the United States

In the United States, a junior college is a two-year post-secondary school whose main purpose is to provide academic, vocational and professional education. The highest certificate offered by such schools is usually an associate's degree, although junior college students may continue their education at a university or college, transferring some or all of the credit earned at the junior college toward the degree requirements of the four-year school.

The term junior college has historically referred to all non-bachelor's degree granting post-secondary schools, but over the last few decades many public junior colleges, which typically aim to serve a local community, have replaced "junior" with "community" in their names. This may give the impression that a junior college must be a private school, but only a small percentage of two-year institutions are private.[1] The first "successful and persistent" junior college in the United States was the Auburndale Female Seminary founded by Edward Lasell (now called Lasell College), which offered a two-year college education as early as 1852 (in 1989, however, it began offering four-year bachelor's degrees and no longer offers any two-year degrees).

Cultural connotations

Junior colleges in the United States have long had to contend with a reputation for low academic standards. The concept can be traced back 100 years to the original public junior college, Joliet Junior College, which was set up in a high school as the equivalent of thirteenth and fourteenth grades in order to prepare qualified students for the final two years of college.[2] To some extent, this is inherent in the junior college mission of providing practical education to students who for various reasons fall outside the typical profile of a four-year college student (for example, someone who has graduated from high school and spent several years working in a relatively unskilled job). Over the years, such colleges developed a reputation as schools of last resort.[3] According to federal statistics, 42% of public community college freshmen take remedial courses.[4] However this does not necessarily affect their future transfer prospects: a junior college graduate with good grades can generally transfer to a four-year school and go on to obtain a full bachelor's degree; and there is a growing movement of students who are attending junior colleges to save significant sums of money in the first two years of a four year education.[5]

Athletics

Certain junior colleges also serve as incubators for college athletes, particularly in basketball and football; in sports parlance, they are often referred to as "Jucos".[6] A talented player who would not meet the academic standards of a major college program may be able to play for two years in junior college, establishing an academic record in the process, and then transfer to a major college.[6] This process has occasionally resulted in scandals, often involving the academics of the student athletes.[6]

Military junior college

In the United States, a military junior college is a military-style junior college that allows cadets to become commissioned officers in the armed forces reserve in two years, instead of the usual four. The students must still go on to complete a bachelor's degree before serving as regular officers on active duty.

There are currently five military junior colleges:

Singapore

In Singapore, a former British colony with a hybrid Anglo-American system of education, a Junior College (JC) refers to the most selective institution of learning available after high school / secondary school graduation.

Unlike the connotation of inferiority associated with a U.S. junior college, a junior college in Singapore is associated with academic rigour, extreme academic competition, highest intellectual calibre, socio-economic supremacy and elite social prestige (as compared to graduates of the Polytechnic system, which are considered to be laxed in academic standards). The Junior College, when applied to the Singapore context, refers to an institution which offers what is equivalent to a sixth form college in the United Kingdom, targeting only the top 10 to 15 per cent of all high school / secondary school graduates. Entrance, at age 16, is extremely selective and most competitive, recruiting top students and scholars from all across the Greater China, India and ASEAN region.

Entrance is based strictly on Cambridge GCE 'O' Levels Examination success or heavy donations to the specific Junior College through tax-deductible family legacy connections. Junior Colleges in Singapore are a natural academic path for those preparing for competitive entrance selection to Tier 1 international universities, or as a natural path to Singapore and regional universities.

Due to heavy subsidies by the state, a generous scholarship system, and a consistently high international standard, Junior Colleges in Singapore often attract the highest number of expatriate students from across Asia and the world. One often finds here children from the expatriate community in Asia, either as transfers in and out from international, American and British schools throughout Asia and the world, or Singapore equivalents of The United World College, Canadian International School or The Singapore American School, or children of well-heeled families otherwise in various states of transit in Asia. This is especially prevalent in the top Junior Colleges such as Victoria and Raffles.

Many graduates of Tier-1 Junior Colleges (Victoria Junior College, Raffles Junior College, Temasek Junior College and Hwa Chong Junior College) in Singapore who do not go on to obtain professional credentialing (professional training and licensing as a doctor, lawyer, architect or accountant) in international or local universities often enter directly into leadership positions in the most competitive of the liberal professions (e.g. real estate, hotel management and hospitality).

After several years of professional work experience, junior college graduates often become Entrepreneurs or complete MBA degrees from top overseas universities to become Founders and Directors of Singapore Exchange-listed companies or medium-sized family and clan-controlled businesses, as opposed to the dual system of industry in government-controlled corporations known as GLCs (Government-linked Corporations) dominated by top Government scholars and academics who graduated as elite scholars from Anglo-American and European universities.

Graduates of Tier-2 Junior Colleges (Anglo-Chinese Junior College, Catholic Junior College, Tampines Junior College, etc.) often enter Tier-2 Anglo-American universities or for the Chinese-educated, into the top universities in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Mainland China. Many others enter professional schools of Education such as NIE (National Institute of Education) or NTU (Nanyang Technological University).

Upon graduation, males join the military. For females from humbler families or in unfortunate family circumstances (such as death or terminal illness of a family breadwinner) where a delay or sacrifice in academic pursuits is necessary in order to enter the work force prematurely, for those who need to financially support their family upon turning 18, aggressive recruitment often comes from prestigious top international airlines in Asia (Singapore Airlines, Cathay Pacific).

There is no welfare support or social benefits dispensed in ultra-Capitalist Singapore where the cost of homeownership is dear, where high unpaid levels of mortgages are a rampant social fixture. An unexpected, early death of a parent can crippled a family and the ensuing mortgage payments can literally raze the typically small-sized Upper Class Singaporean family into financial destitution and utter ruination.

For the well-connected, direct work experience in family businesses, often gained from stints in Singapore Exchange-listed family businesses, complete the path of maturation a student takes into young adulthood, in preparation for taking over multi-national Corporate Director positions to continue family legacies.

Most graduates of Junior colleges in Singapore, who pass the Cambridge University "A" Level Examinations in England, attain the educational equivalent of that obtained by students who graduate from a French or Swiss-styled lycée, in that graduates of both types of institutions are ready for direct or advanced matriculation into a UK university and/or US college or university.

The Tier-1 Junior Colleges are commonly associated with high rates of academic pressure, social competition and personal stress due to the rigorous standards that need to be attained within 2 short years of intense competition for limited university places and scholarships.

Due to intense academic competition and social rivalry, unhealthy emphasis on prodigies and fast-track success, extremely unhealthy levels of mental stress are often placed on the creme de la creme.

Mental health issues such as insomnia, eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia are not uncommon. Severe depression and suicide ideation often plague the best and brightest. Worse still, due to severe social stigma, these are often closely guarded secrets and fatal skeletons in the closet.

The intensity of the Junior College in Singapore is a double-edged sword. On one hand, the creme de la creme consistently excel. The euphoria of the few brilliant successes who surpass all expectations to secure admission and scholarships to elite Ivy League and Oxbridge universities disguise the deep personal toll destruction has wrecked in many individual lives. Many sensitive and fragile adolescents have been pushed over to the brink to tragedies. Suicide rates in the Junior College have a history of grossly surpassing those of even top cram schools in Tokyo and Beijing.

Even though Singapore adheres to the British system, it is an independent former colony with an autonomous form of government. Consequently, Junior Colleges, instead of relaxing academic standards in secondary schooling in tandem with United Kingdom since the 1960s, have instead actively sought to increase its more insatiable intake of foreign students and scholars from the BRIC economies, especially China and India, to churn out research scientists for specialists for pharmaceutical conglomerates, resulting in even more severe competition and introducing even higher attrition rates for those preparing for university.

Junior College students in Singapore, as with students from all Upper Class education systems, are seduced at a tender age to imbibe and to conform to Corporatist Ideologies. They don official college uniforms, blazers and ties, akin to the social conformity imposed on the offsprings of the elite Ruling and Upper Classes in the British Grammar School system.

As a result, Singapore Junior Colleges severely restrain adolescent sexuality and delay socialization across social strata to emphasize the focus on intense academic and social rivalry within the Elite class to ensure the supremacy of the Elites. These schools are notoriously plagued by the same problems as top Tokyo cram schools and top French lycees - mainly an extremely high rate of adolescent depression and suicides. The Junior College in Singapore is the only known cram school in the entire English-speaking world.

Academic work completed with "S" level ("Special" level) credits or distinctions in programmes for the gifted such as "The Humanities Scholarship Programme" qualifies graduates for advanced placement into the junior or senior year of most U.S. colleges and universities.

As such, a graduate of the top Junior Colleges in Singapore, such as Victoria or Raffles, can complete an accelerated Baccalaureate degree in most U.S. colleges in only 2 years instead of 4 years, excepting highly selective institutions such as the Ivy League colleges which have more a stringent Advance Placement system.

Due to the excellent academic fundamentals received, graduates of Singapore JCs are also known to party and play during Year 1 in UK universities yet ace 1st Year University Examinations in Britain. Junior Colleges in Singapore serve as feeder schools for UK universities such as Oxbridge, Bristol, York and London universities and US colleges. Some graduates of lesser known junior colleges also secure scholarships from Scottish universities.

Graduates do not often enrol at Australian and New Zealand universities as these universities are widely considered as "last resort" universities for those from the less distinguished classes, school dropouts or post-1980s Polytechnic graduates who wish to enhance their degrees without regard for academic quality.

Quebec, Canada

See also: College education in Quebec

See also

References

  1. ^ ED327222 1989-12-00 The Survival of Private Junior Colleges. ERIC Digest
  2. ^ John Merrow, Community Colleges: Dream Catchers, The New York Times, April 22, 2007.
  3. ^ Beth Frerking, Community Colleges: For Achievers, a New Destination, The New York Times, April 22, 2007.
  4. ^ John Merrow, Community Colleges: A Harsh Reality, The New York Times, April 22, 2007.
  5. ^ John Merrow, Community Colleges: The Smart Transfer, The New York Times, April 22, 2007.
  6. ^ a b c Robert Andrew Powell, Community College: Tennis in a Parking Lot, The New York Times, April 22, 2007
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