The recently published book “Academically Adrift” by sociologists Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa paints a grim picture of student higher learning. Two thousand and three hundred students in 24 institutions were tracked throughout college and tested three times for writing ability and reasoning skills. Only 55 percent had improved during their first two years, and as seniors that number had only increased to 64 percent. The bottom line is that 36 percent of those seniors showed no improvement in writing or critical thinking as a result of their college educations. The essay test used to measure their learning is the College Learning Assessment, subject of some of my recent columns. Designed to measure students’ ability to problem solve, the CLA asks students to answer a question based on a series of documents that can range from informal e-mails to newspaper articles to technical drawings and graphs. They must evaluate the merits of those documents, and compose a reasoned argument in response. (One sample question uses documents related to a small plane crash and asks students to make a recommendation to an employer thinking of buying a similar plane.)