CFB51 College Football Fan Community
The Power Five => Big Ten => Topic started by: Riffraft on April 01, 2020, 10:55:47 AM
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We didn't have AP when I was in HS, just 1-2-3 level courses. My kids' HS had both AP and IB classes. They were interestingly different, the IB teachers had to be specifically certified for teaching that. My son took three years of IB physics in HS. The chemistry teacher didn't have certification. IB also had a senior level course called "Theory of Knowledge" which was pretty interesting, to me.
We had a lot of European/French families in out district.
When didn't have AP when I was in HS, I actually had what they called in those days concurrent enrollment at Ohio State. Spent half my day in High School and took my calculus classes at Ohio State. I had taken all the advanced math classes that the high school had to offer halfway through my junior year. Highest they went was pre-calculus.
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I started at UGA summer quarter. I figured it would enable me to find my way around (and it did). I liked summers, they were laid back and uncrowded etc., so I went the next summer, and the next. I discovered I was short two liberal arts courses, so I had to do a fourth summer and took German Translation, which I needed for grad school, and Psych 101, which was a hoot, a really interesting class with a bunch of freshmen. And I did some independent study chem thing which was an auto A.
I headed to grad school about a week after I finished classes. The first day at UNC we took exams all day for placement. I stumbled into a bar downtown and wanted a gin and tonic only to learn in NC at the time they couldn't serve liquor in bars.
UNC was something like UGA but in a much smaller town with MUCH less "night life". There were only two bars worth spit in the whole place, there were a few more for townies that students didn't go to. I kept looking for the "other bars".
And of course in grad school you go year round anyway.
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Our HS AP Calc teacher was a great guy, and I think we had all the brainpower in my graduating class in the AP2 class. Of the 16 of us in the class, 15 of us either got a 4 or 5. Good stuff.
I got routed into the liberal arts calculus route, which was different from engineer calc in that engineer calc had us working with and familiarizing ourselves with computer programs that would frequently be used down the line. Two of the three calc professors had completely useless lectures. When it came to matrices, the class required us to grind through a system of equations. Ugh.
Computers?? When I was in high school, I was using a slide rule until my junior year, when I spent $200 on a Texas Instrument SR-50 calculator. It would actually do high scientific functions, Trig, Square roots, Factorials
First experience with a computer was in College where we had limited use of the school's computer (only a certain amount of computing time for the semester then you were charged for any overage) and we punched up data cards to run a program. Nothing like having a stack up 200 or so cards and dropping them on you way to having them run in the computer and having to sort them out. Or making a typo when typing the punch card up. No back space, no delete. throw the card away and start again.
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I started at UGA summer quarter. I figured it would enable me to find my way around (and it did). I liked summers, they were laid back and uncrowded etc., so I went the next summer, and the next. I discovered I was short two liberal arts courses, so I had to do a fourth summer and took German Translation, which I needed for grad school, and Psych 101, which was a hoot, a really interesting class with a bunch of freshmen. And I did some independent study chem thing which was an auto A.
I headed to grad school about a week after I finished classes. The first day at UNC we took exams all day for placement. I stumbled into a bar downtown and wanted a gin and tonic only to learn in NC at the time they couldn't serve liquor in bars.
UNC was something like UGA but in a much smaller town with MUCH less "night life". There were only two bars worth spit in the whole place, there were a few more for townies that students didn't go to. I kept looking for the "other bars".
And of course in grad school you go year round anyway.
I didn't take my German translation class until I was working on a PhD. The college I was at didn't offer it, I had to go to the university down the road to take it. That was so many years ago, I don't think I could translate a simple sentence, let alone a document.
I was a teetotaler in graduate school, so no bars for me. These days, there is nothing like getting home, grabbing a nice cold beer and relaxing out by or in my pool in the evening.
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I had taken 3 quarters of German already and this made 4. We were supposed to have 4 semesters of German, but they let my 4 quarters stand. I guess a semester is about as much as a quarter. It was either German or Russian back then.
Sometimes now when I'm trying to think of the French word for something, the German word pops into my head. I am often tempted to say bahnhof instead of gare when in France (RR station). My tourist level French gets me by but I don't understand anything they say back to me in the main, unless they respond in English of course.
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I had calculus in HS and started college in honors calculus. It was completely different stuff, I think we covered the basics on day one and then got into weirdness. We certainly were not learning how to differentiate some equation after day one. Some folks in there never had calculus in HS and managed to get by.
My HS calculus teacher admittedly was a bit old and weak.
I was one of those in the engineering college - kicked my arse - my high school class of 53 total students had about 10 of us in "senior" math. The HS math teacher was in her late 60's in 1981. That didn't help.
It also didn't help that my Calculus prof in college was from India and couldn't pronounce the word zero. Thick accent and very difficult to understand.
I have excuses....
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IU, when I was there, had not just an in-state quota, but a county by county quota, and I still think my freshman calculus class was just about as hard a class as I had, but I think it's sole purpose was to weed out some of those quota kids.
You almost felt bad for them. They were clearly the best and brightest from their small town, went off to Bloomington, and learned in about a week how far in over their head they were, sent back at Christmas embarrassed. Honestly, I get what they were going for with it, but I do wonder if it did more harm than good. How many of those kids had their confidence shattered beyond repair, whereas they could have succeeded in a non-Big Ten academic environment, and then been totally fine in their professional careers, where nobody cares if you went to IU or IUPUI or Anderson, or whatever. I remember peer reviewing one of them in my English class, and his his mid-term paper was literally a one page plot summary book report.
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Reminds me of my org chem class my second year. We started with folks sitting in the aisles, 185 or so in the class. We had 33 finish that year. The rest went to business school or somesuch.
The main class after that was PChem, and I took the higher level for majors, we had 6 students in it, 4 were graduate students doing remedial work. It was easy gradewise. The premeds were all taking the lower level course and clawing all over each other for an A. I heard it was really hard.
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This thread is off the rails. I'm part of that, sadly.
Take calculus to the stream thread.
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UT engineering didn't allow you to place out of engineering physics, or anything beyond the first semester of calculus. I got 5s on both, but only got credit for Physics for Physics majors, not engineering physics, and only the first semester of calculus.
Also placed out of history and literature, which I wish I hadn't because those would have been really great classes to take at the college level, but there's no way I would have graduated in 4 years if I hadn't, and back in those days, scholarship money ran out after 4.
Purdue has PHYS 152 (Mechanics) and PHYS 241 (E&M). PHYS 152 is basically one of the top weed-out courses for engineers at Purdue. So they're pretty adamant about taking it.
Therefore, you can't test out of it based on AP results. I *was* able to test out of PHYS 152 by taking the final (scored an 88, BTW, which is crazy that I remember that 25 years later!). I think they might have allowed me to do the same for E&M, but for EE majors they actually have PHYS 261, which is E&M for electrical engineering majors only. And there's NO way to get out of PHYS 261 if you're a EE. I remember one test in that class I scored a 59, which was an A with the curve.
Even worse was EE 311 (Electromagnetic Fields & Waves IIRC), which was PHYS 261 on crack. D is for Done, right? ;-)
So yeah, I was pretty proud of the fact that I got credit for PHYS 152 without taking it.
Calculus wasn't an issue. My "5" on the AP test was accepted for credit. The problem, though, when you test out of freshman calculus is that they put you in the "honors" version of multivariate calc. Instead of the ~200 people who normally take the class, it was a focused class for about 25-30 of us. Which means you're surrounded by literal geniuses. There was one kid in that class--and it's appropriate to call this college student a "kid"--who was about 12-13 years old if I remember correctly. I just wanted to get out of the first year of calc, not be the "slow" guy in honors multivariate calc!
I also tested out of a year of history with a 4 on AP US History, but for that year to count I had to take one more history class. So I took "History of the Space Age" which was pretty cool at a place like Purdue.
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I was one of those in the engineering college - kicked my arse - my high school class of 53 total students had about 10 of us in "senior" math. The HS math teacher was in her late 60's in 1981. That didn't help.
It also didn't help that my Calculus prof in college was from India and couldn't pronounce the word zero. Thick accent and very difficult to understand.
I have excuses....
My college Calc professor was an older German gentleman that had lost a leg in WWII. He used crutches to get around the classroom. He also had a very hard German accent.
In the classroom, there were blackboards all the way around the room. He would get started solving equations and make his way around the room about 2 or 3 times before the end of class. All the while I was wondering how in the hell I was ever going to learn anything, but he was very good about helping students that asked in his spare time.
I also had him for Linear Algebra. I still don't really understand what that was about. I always referred to it as the love child of Calculus and Physics on a drunken holiday.
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Reminds me of my org chem class my second year. We started with folks sitting in the aisles, 185 or so in the class. We had 33 finish that year. The rest went to business school or somesuch.
The main class after that was PChem, and I took the higher level for majors, we had 6 students in it, 4 were graduate students doing remedial work. It was easy gradewise. The premeds were all taking the lower level course and clawing all over each other for an A. I heard it was really hard.
I think most programs have that "weeding out" course. At OSU at that time it was Thermodynamics.
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I'm asking again.
Take it to the stream thread.
Man... If only someone around here was a moderator, and could move posts?
I don't know where we'd find someone like that...
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I don't think we can MOVE posts.
I can definitely REMOVE posts.
Maybe @Drew4UTk (https://www.cfb51.com/index.php?action=profile;u=1) can weigh in.
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Well I was being a little flippant ;-)
But we keep responding because this is where the conversation is. It wouldn't take much--move the posts from the last page or two [nobody will go read/respond back farther most likely], and then the conversation will pick up there.
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I don't think we can MOVE posts.
I can definitely REMOVE posts.
Maybe @Drew4UTk (https://www.cfb51.com/index.php?action=profile;u=1) can weigh in.
I think we can use "split" function to move posts to another thread, but perhaps it's only to a new thread? I dunno, I've never used it before.
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Please do.
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OK, that caught most of the last couple of pages.
Are you HAPPY now, mein badger?
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I'm never happy. But I'm not as pissed, so thanks.
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Well done.
Anyway, I'll never forget my calc 3 prof trying to explain infinite demential calculus. It was, not super great, but it was his passion.
In retrospect, I wish I'd jumped on econometrics earlier. I kept putting it off, and by the time I considered it, those skills were just a mess. (I also tried a game theory class which was well ahead of my skillset)
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I didn't do any game theory until I returned for my MBA. I really enjoyed that stuff, while most of my counterparts thought I was crazy.
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It will be interesting to see if/how the rise of online education changes what gets taught, including as it relates to math.
I do analytical work and haven't used Calculus or any advanced math at all in my career. Thankfully, too, since I didn't do well in those courses. Even in most of my economics courses (which I majored in) didn't involve complex math. I barely used it in my graduate program, either, despite taking quantitative courses, though some of those involved statistics.
Conversely, I'd argue a lot of people would be more productive if they just understood how to effectively use spreadsheets and databases - Even just how make pivot tables, some basic formulas, and writing queries (nothing like coding or anything like that, which I don't do either) - which could simplify or even automate routine work (to be sure, some people just don't want to happen and would rather do the same BS work every day).
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When didn't have AP when I was in HS, I actually had what they called in those days concurrent enrollment at Ohio State. Spent half my day in High School and took my calculus classes at Ohio State. I had taken all the advanced math classes that the high school had to offer halfway through my junior year. Highest they went was pre-calculus.
I did that my senior year. Got out of HS every day at 11:15, and had a four hour college course that only met one night a week. It was awesome.
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My wife is (still annoyed) that I haven't earned a credit of math since a first semester Statistics course in Sr. year of High School.
FWIW, the teacher was one of these guys who was way way too smart to be teaching high school kids, Columbia grad., apparently pals with Art Garfunkel, but man was he socially awkward, and drove a powder blue late 80s/early 90s Toyota Celica. He was probably 5-8, sort of humpty-dumpty body type. He was always spotted fishing at a Lake in town.
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I was told there would be no math
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My wife is (still annoyed) that I haven't earned a credit of math since a first semester Statistics course in Sr. year of High School.
FWIW, the teacher was one of these guys who was way way too smart to be teaching high school kids, Columbia grad., apparently pals with Art Garfunkel, but man was he socially awkward, and drove a powder blue late 80s/early 90s Toyota Celica. He was probably 5-8, sort of humpty-dumpty body type. He was always spotted fishing at a Lake in town.
What'd you have before statistics, because statistics ain't math. Just sayin'.
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Well done.
Anyway, I'll never forget my calc 3 prof trying to explain infinite demential calculus. It was, not super great, but it was his passion.
A sort of interesting Freudian typo?
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Statistics are mathematical.
The study and analysis of statistics, on the other hand... :)
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Numbers manipulation.
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There are three kinds of lies ....
attributed to Benjamin Disraeli, BY Mark Twain.
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A sort of interesting Freudian typo?
HA.
The thing that was weird was it was just not in any of the supporting material. You had this prof that was like "I'm interested in this, and away we go."
Looking back, I wonder how I would've treated this stuff with a non 18-year-old mind. I was still so close to high school and so interested with "what's on the test?" As a super senior, I tried to audit a class in behavior econ. Well, I took it, and then was told half the grade was a test and paper in the final two weeks of spring. That was dropped quickly. The auditing plan came to an end after the third week of walking up a hill at 7:50 a.m. with Feb. lake wind whipping in my face.
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As a super senior, I tried to audit a class in behavior econ. Well, I took it, and then was told half the grade was a test and paper in the final two weeks of spring. That was dropped quickly. The auditing plan came to an end after the third week of walking up a hill at 7:50 a.m. with Feb. lake wind whipping in my face.
Would you say that dropping it was a case of revealed preference? :)
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Would you say that dropping it was a case of revealed preference? :)
HA, but more just a cost-benefit analysis and preference for not getting an F.
If I told you 50 percent of your grade in a challenging class you didn't need to take would be decided in your final week of college, in the midst of sunny spring when you'd be saying bye to friends, prepping for family to visit and with a student union that sells beer next to a lake ... I guess I did reveal preference.
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I remember those walks around that campus, with the wind whipping. All of my class days started at 7:50 AM. Good thing I was mostly done with all of my classes by Noon, so I could go to work.
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I remember those walks around that campus, with the wind whipping. All of my class days started at 7:50 AM. Good thing I was mostly done with all of my classes by Noon, so I could go to work.
Hmm, I thought you stacked classes so you could work on off days and lived in Chicago?
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Hmm, I thought you stacked classes so you could work on off days and lived in Chicago?
I did. My classes were on Tuesdays and Thursdays. On those days I worked for the Wisconsin DNR part-time. I also did an independent study course while working at the DNR, involving Dam failure analyses and such. I got 3 credits for that course, and got paid. Of course they paid for shit, but, it helped.
If Chicago needed me, I'd drive down Tuesday night so I could work Wednesday. That happened about half of the time, even through I did have one Wednesday class along the way. I missed that class quite a bit.
I'd drive down every Thursday night so I could work Friday, the weekend and Monday. That job paid well, and covered my health insurance. The boss was really cool to allow me to do this. I did an independent study course for him too, on rainfall frequency analysis. Got 3 credits for that one too.
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I tapped out of math after Trig in 11th grade. In those days, state law required 3 full years math, not 4, thus I had no interest in calculus.
I was much more into English Arts and History. Both offered AP.
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Illinois required 2 years of math and 2 years of science when I was in HS. Clearly not enough.
I did 3 years of each, then graduated early so I could start college.
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I did. My classes were on Tuesdays and Thursdays. On those days I worked for the Wisconsin DNR part-time. I also did an independent study course while working at the DNR, involving Dam failure analyses and such. I got 3 credits for that course, and got paid. Of course they paid for shit, but, it helped.
If Chicago needed me, I'd drive down Tuesday night so I could work Wednesday. That happened about half of the time, even through I did have one Wednesday class along the way. I missed that class quite a bit.
I'd drive down every Thursday night so I could work Friday, the weekend and Monday. That job paid well, and covered my health insurance. The boss was really cool to allow me to do this. I did an independent study course for him too, on rainfall frequency analysis. Got 3 credits for that one too.
So you could cram a full engineering course load into eight hours a week plus independent studies? Call me impressed.
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I had some really cool professors. They knew my deal and they helped me.
I took a hydrology class and a hydraulic machines (pumps, turbines, etc.) class without ever attending a single lecture. Those met on Mondays and Wednesdays. There were some other classes that my advisor allowed me to take through the UW Extension.
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I loved calculus and took an extra two quarters of it that I didn't need to as electives, one of which was an obvious "weed out" course.
Of course I haven't used it since. So today I'd be hard pressed to even solve a simple derivative.
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I loved calculus and took an extra two quarters of it that I didn't need to as electives, one of which was an obvious "weed out" course.
Of course I haven't used it since. So today I'd be hard pressed to even solve a simple derivative.
Nah.
Solve the derivative for X^2.
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I had some really cool professors. They knew my deal and they helped me.
I had a couple cool profs, but they weren't found in the engineering college
elective crap
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My final quarter I took Psych 101. It was summer. Nearly all the class were first quarter freshmen. The professor was excellent, the topic was very interesting to me, and they had extra credit experiments you could do that also were fascinating. I actually was reading the text book because I was interested, not to make a grade. Needless to say, I "did well". The prof would announce the grades and they'd be 98, 78, and 65.
After about 3 incidents, some freshman raised his hand and told the professor that it wasn't FAIR having this senior in the class (I sat in the back and didn't look 16 like the rest of them). The professor told him "Son, life is not fair, and I'm here to teach you about life."
I wanted to applaud.
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Statistics don't lie; people lie.
But I digress. When I was a high school student one would take AP courses primarily to get ahead of required college courses. Nowadays kids take AP courses to improve their GPA to improve their chances of getting into selective universities. If one is truly interested in getting ahead on college courses, the local junior college--if there is one available--is the best bet. But kids in suburbs like mine don't do that as often because those courses don't improve the high school GPA which is the ticket to the selective university. It's ridiculous. Not least because the AP courses aren't as good as most of the junior college courses.
This is a subject that strikes a nerve for me.
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I loved calculus and took an extra two quarters of it that I didn't need to as electives, one of which was an obvious "weed out" course.
Of course I haven't used it since. So today I'd be hard pressed to even solve a simple derivative.
I enjoyed it, but I didn't take anything beyond what was required. I was busy enough with my engineering curriculum!
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Statistics don't lie; people lie.
But people really like to lie using statistics.
It makes the lies seem "official." :)
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hah, the phrase "selective universities" strikes a nerve for me
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Everyone knows that 98% of statistics are made up on the spot.
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hah, the phrase "selective universities" strikes a nerve for me
My AP US History teacher is one of the favorite teachers I've ever had. He was also probably the most challenging teacher I had in HS.
During "back to school night" or whatever they called it, my mom was in his presentation and he said "I am going to give your kids more work than they can possibly handle. I'm going to give them the kind of workload as if they have no other classes. I'm going to do this to teach them time management."
She said later that what was going through her mind was "Oh no... These are kids who will absolutely KILL themselves to do the work and get it done. This is going to crush them!"
It didn't crush us. In fact, it taught us an amazing thing about the ability to dig deep and get things done--lessons that I'm sure helped all of us when we got the real workload of college and then [hopefully for every one of his students] when they got into the real world.
Those "highly selective universities" like to tout their graduation rates, as if every one of their students weren't the sort of high achiever AP type of students who would sooner die of exhaustion than disappoint their teacher. The less selective universities have lower graduation rates, but they offer opportunity to anyone willing to work for it, with the knowledge that some of them aren't as willing as they thought they were.
Harvard grads have better overall outcomes than Ball State grads, and a lot of people think that means that your education is better at Harvard than Ball State. Instead, it's more due to the fact that the only people Harvard admits are the types for whom Ball State wouldn't even rate "safety school" status.
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hah, the phrase "selective universities" strikes a nerve for me
Fair..."highly selective?" "So-called 'elite'?"
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Statistics don't lie; people lie.
But I digress. When I was a high school student one would take AP courses primarily to get ahead of required college courses. Nowadays kids take AP courses to improve their GPA to improve their chances of getting into selective universities. If one is truly interested in getting ahead on college courses, the local junior college--if there is one available--is the best bet. But kids in suburbs like mine don't do that as often because those courses don't improve the high school GPA which is the ticket to the selective university. It's ridiculous. Not least because the AP courses aren't as good as most of the junior college courses.
This is a subject that strikes a nerve for me.
Me too. Big Time.
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I enjoyed it, but I didn't take anything beyond what was required. I was busy enough with my engineering curriculum!
Linear and Matrix was an elective for me. I still hate myself for that.
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I'm highly selective about what I allow to strike a nerve with me.
My general notion is that there are a handful of universities that really stand out on a resume in a positive way. Even pretty good ones don't really garner attention when a hiring managed is scanning what could be one of 500 such documents.
And of course seeing Harvard doesn't mean the candidate is really that competent. I've seen some pretty nice resumes with high GPAs associated with candidates who apparently forgot anything they learned in college. Memorize and forget.
I THINK they wanted med school and didn't make it and now had to try and find a real job.
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My AP US History teacher is one of the favorite teachers I've ever had. He was also probably the most challenging teacher I had in HS.
I took a Civil War battles class to fulfill a requirement. Same thing best/hardest prof I ever had. I nearly killed myself writing the final paper. But I did every single assigned reading, sometimes twice, and the class discussion was outstanding.
The girls liked him too, nicknamed the Silver Fox
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But people really like to lie using statistics.
It makes the lies seem "official." :)
People become pleased with themselves for understanding stats and manipulating them towards their desired outcome. Genuine understanding of stats is knowing the valid from the invalid and having the ethics to share undesirable outcomes.
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That's where it gets screwy and makes most people toss out all stats...which hinders things.
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To understand any statistics, you need to understand the controls. If you can't get that information, don't bother.
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Linear and Matrix was an elective for me.
I'll have to look those two up
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a difference between stats and polls or surveys
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I'm working on a survey right now.
Very tough boundary, in an area where there is not a lot of monumentation for property corners.
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section markers?
other benchmarks?
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Benchmarks are for vertical measurements. This is all horizontal.
The sections in this area are not well monumented, and as a result, the property boundary markers are not very accurate. This is going to take me a long time to resolve, and since I cannot go do any research at the recorder's office, that makes it even worse. I have to rely on the recorder, which I do not like. They are generally just political hacks.
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yup, while in college, I was a rod man for the county.
dug many 3-4 foot deeps holes in the middle of a gravel road intersection looking for section markers - by hand
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yup, while in college, I was a rod man for the county.
Context is important. Don't just want to say "I experimented with being a rod man in college" in a vacuum
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So many jokes went through my head when I read his post...
...I just decided to let it go by.
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There is no such thing as "rod man" or "instrument man" in land surveying anymore. All operations are done with a single person, operating GPS and robotic instrumentation.
Except the government "surveyors", or course. They are probably still running with 6-man crews.
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So most guys who used to be rod men, now have to go solo. Such is married life I suppose
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Except the government "surveyors", or course. They are probably still running with 6-man crews.
The only government crews that get anywhere near 6 nowadays is in construction on days when you need 3000'+ of concrete pavement staked out, the string line crew is breathing down your neck, and there is a second crew brought over from another job to help out.
Incidentally, the end of the month will feature my 10th anniversary of working at MnDOT. Going from temp laborer to senior engineer is an interesting journey.
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That is seeing the business from the mail room to the penthouse. Almost.
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well, this was a government job and back in the early 80s.
Woodbury County Engineer's office - Survey crew - most days 4 of us
summer job while in college
didn't pay much but I got plenty of hours and plenty of sunshine and fresh air
also did inspection - slump tests, broke beams, cooked rocks on the stove, concrete air tests, pile driving resistance load bearing calcs
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Private = efficient.
I worked for was employed by IDiOT. I know how shit works.
Or doesn't.
We have a one person crew on our sites. They don't need 3 babysitters to tell the backhoe operating engineer worker to back the F off.
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We often see city crews with one dude digging and 5-6-7 dudes watching, usually on the cells.
In France, we'd come across stretches of freeway with a lane blocked off and nobody anywhere in sight, so I told the wife they were invisible workers.
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was my one and only government job
wasn't tough to be the #1 go getter on the crew
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I was a drafter at IDiOT. I started in what would have been my senior year of HS.
Old dudes used to pat me on the back and tell me to slow down. What I was working on (on a Monday) needed to last until Friday. What a mess.
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I'll have to look those two up
It's typically one class. At UT, it was called "Matrices and Linear Algebra."
Ah, here it is. It's now called "Linear Algebra and Matrix Theory". M341. Which means Math Department, 3 hours per week, in the "4" series which is sophomore/junior level stuff. The 1 just means there might be other Math 34X classes that come afterward.
https://web.ma.utexas.edu/users/og/TEACHING/M341/syllabus.html
(https://web.ma.utexas.edu/users/og/TEACHING/M341/syllabus.html)
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I really enjoyed it. Matrices, Eigenvalues, Eigenvectors. Interesting ways to simplify complex problems. It's related to the same kind of transforms I loved (Fourier transforms, Laplace transforms) because they turned complicated differential equations into simple algebra ones.
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I was a drafter at IDiOT. I started in what would have been my senior year of HS.
Old dudes used to pat me on the back and tell me to slow down. What I was working on (on a Monday) needed to last until Friday. What a mess.
after college a few years, I was drafting in a large engineering dept. The county drafting position came open after a retirement. The engineer offered me the position and was shocked and upset when I didn't accept.
I didn't want to slow play my career away and make average at best salary.
I recommended a friend that worked next to me in the dept. That was over 30 years ago. Bob is still there. Good for Bob. I'm sure his IPERs account is full and he will retire comfortably some day
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yup, while in college, I was a rod man for the county.
Hey live like you wanna live
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don't think I could pull it off today at my advanced age
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It's typically one class. At UT, it was called "Matrices and Linear Algebra."
Ah, here it is. It's now called "Linear Algebra and Matrix Theory". M341. Which means Math Department, 3 hours per week, in the "4" series which is sophomore/junior level stuff. The 1 just means there might be other Math 34X classes that come afterward.
https://web.ma.utexas.edu/users/og/TEACHING/M341/syllabus.html (https://web.ma.utexas.edu/users/og/TEACHING/M341/syllabus.html)
Ah 3 hrs a week my kind of class load,provided that's it
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also did inspection - slump tests, broke beams, cooked rocks on the stove, concrete air tests, pile driving resistance load bearing calcs
Wha...
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aggregate stuff, water content?
can't remember, twas early 80's
one of the real civil guys here could probably tell you
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Early '80s is not the problem twas the Budweiser or Busch Lite in those daze
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It's typically one class. At UT, it was called "Matrices and Linear Algebra."
Ah, here it is. It's now called "Linear Algebra and Matrix Theory". M341. Which means Math Department, 3 hours per week, in the "4" series which is sophomore/junior level stuff. The 1 just means there might be other Math 34X classes that come afterward.
https://web.ma.utexas.edu/users/og/TEACHING/M341/syllabus.html
(https://web.ma.utexas.edu/users/og/TEACHING/M341/syllabus.html)
Same as Madison.
https://www.math.wisc.edu/341-Linear-Algebra
Math 341: Linear Algebra
Student Body:
The audience for this course consists mostly of math majors, and students in sciences and engineering who need a proof-based course in linear algebra
Background and Goals:
Emphasizes the understanding of concepts in linear algebra and teaches to write and understand proofs in mathematics in general and in linear algebra in particular.
Alternatives:
Math 340 for less theoretical students, Math 375 for Honors students
Subsequent Courses:
5XX-level courses in Math
Course Content:
1) Vector Spaces. 2) Linear Transformations and Matrices. 3) Elementary Matrix Operations and Systems of Linear Equations. 4) Determinants. 5) Diagonalization. 6) Inner Product Spaces.
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The term "linear algebra" sounds so innocent.
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The term "linear algebra" sounds so innocent.
That's what I thought before I took the damn course. "Holy crap" is what I thought after the first lecture.
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Early '80s is not the problem twas the Budweiser or Busch Lite in those daze
“Budweiser Light,” came out in 82, I suppose Busch Lite wasn't far behind
Bud Heavy, tequila, scotch, bourbon, and vodka were the problem
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Ah 3 hrs a week my kind of class load,provided that's it
3 hours per week, ha! That's just instruction time in-class.
I had a computer lab in college called EE345L. Its other name was EE2045-Hell. If you spent fewer than 20 hours per week on that one class, you were likely to fail it.
That semester I was taking 16 hours of school, including that lab and one other. I pretty much didn't see my roommate or anyone else for 4 months. Well, aside from the TAs and lab aids, of course.
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That's what I thought before I took the damn course. "Holy crap" is what I thought after the first lecture.
Good times. Loved that class! :) It was way easier than DiffEQ anyway.
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Really? I thought DE was much "easier" in comparison.
Weird.
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My first semester of grad school we all took a course called "Bonding". Simple enough, right? I seriously did not understand 90% of the lectures, and couldn't figure out what the book said much either. I would look around the class and no one else seemed plussed, I figured my graduate career was going to be a short one. First test, I made a 57 or somesuch, and was third highest grade in the class. Huh.
The irony of course is that later I got pretty deep into "bonding", but I didn't learn much of anything about it from that class. I finally read Pauling's book "The Nature of the Chemical Bond" which is remarkably well written and coherent and it started to make sense.
Incidentally, what they teach in freshmen chem is all lies, lies I say.
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Really? I thought DE was much "easier" in comparison.
Weird.
Different skill sets IMHO.
I thought DE was "easier" as well, because wrapping your brain around linear algebra is just a whole different thing.
That said, anyone who was an electrical engineering student IMHO had an easier time wrapping their heads around linear algebra because we were also taking classes in our EE curriculum which used linear algebra. When you can recognize how what you're doing applies to a different discipline to make it easier to solve problems, it helps a lot.
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Yeah, I had nothing to relate to linear algebra. That's probably it.
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“Budweiser Light,” came out in 82, I suppose Busch Lite wasn't far behind
Bud Heavy, tequila, scotch, bourbon, and vodka were the problem
Good to see you were multi tasking even then,was that Linear or Matrix,I'm cornfused
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after college a few years, I was drafting in a large engineering dept. The county drafting position came open after a retirement. The engineer offered me the position and was shocked and upset when I didn't accept.
I didn't want to slow play my career away and make average at best salary.
I recommended a friend that worked next to me in the dept. That was over 30 years ago. Bob is still there. Good for Bob. I'm sure his IPERs account is full and he will retire comfortably some day
Bureaucracy and inefficiency is definitely worst in the government, but it's pretty bad in utilities, among other sectors, too. It's a shame for the economy among other ways that there's so much that large companies could be doing but don't while there's so much that entrepreneurs and small businesses want to do but can't.
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Bureaucracy and inefficiency is definitely worst in the government, but it's pretty bad in utilities, among other sectors, too. It's a shame for the economy among other ways that there's so much that large companies could be doing but don't while there's so much that entrepreneurs and small businesses want to do but can't.
I've been saying things similar this for as long as I've been in business - almost 20 years now. I never say "can't" because that is resigning to defeat before even trying. But man, there are a lot of hurdles to overcome.
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I've been saying things similar this for as long as I've been in business - almost 20 years now. I never say "can't" because that is resigning to defeat before even trying. But man, there are a lot of hurdles to overcome.
For sure. The sad thing is that there are a lot of employees who work in these easy jobs doing the same BS every day and just don't care because they have job security and a decent paycheck. There's simply no incentive to be more efficient.
I do think that the corporate world will eventually decline and entrepreneurs and startups will grow faster as new technologies change how the world works. We're already seeing this in a way right now with many companies being forced to adopt remote working whether they wanted to or not. That's just one part of it, but this article covers it pretty well. Cybersecurity is definitely the biggest potential issue:
https://www.techradar.com/news/remote-working-could-put-an-end-to-the-office-as-we-know-it (https://www.techradar.com/news/remote-working-could-put-an-end-to-the-office-as-we-know-it)
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I told my partners yesterday that they need to reconsider our model. We are successfully working remote now.
Why do they need to keep paying $15K/month for office space? Just get one little office for a couple of people. Everyone works remote and only comes in if they have to host a meeting. Most clients make us go to them anyway, so meetings in our office are rare.
It makes no sense to keep two big offices.
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Statistics don't lie; people lie.
But I digress. When I was a high school student one would take AP courses primarily to get ahead of required college courses. Nowadays kids take AP courses to improve their GPA to improve their chances of getting into selective universities. If one is truly interested in getting ahead on college courses, the local junior college--if there is one available--is the best bet. But kids in suburbs like mine don't do that as often because those courses don't improve the high school GPA which is the ticket to the selective university. It's ridiculous. Not least because the AP courses aren't as good as most of the junior college courses.
This is a subject that strikes a nerve for me.
I am familiar with what you are describing, SF, but my experience is different.
I teach AP U.S. History at a suburban HS--one of the best public high schools in the state--and this year I also began teaching AP Research, which is the 2nd year of the 2-year AP Capstone program.
And I've taught U.S. History at the local JC, Tulsa Community College.
My AP U.S. History course is much more rigorous than what I taught at TCC.
However, the numbers of our students enrolling in AP classes have been declining over the past few years, as more and more kids are doing the concurrent-enrollment thing at TCC. But, surprisingly, the enrollment numbers for AP history courses for next year took a jump this spring. I've got 92 kids enrolled for AP USH next fall. We're trying to keep class sizes under 25, so that puts me at 4 AP USH classes plus an AP Research class. I may not get to teach the brand-new elective class I've been working up--Military History.
Or I may get six classes and no planning period.
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My AP US History teacher is one of the favorite teachers I've ever had. He was also probably the most challenging teacher I had in HS.
During "back to school night" or whatever they called it, my mom was in his presentation and he said "I am going to give your kids more work than they can possibly handle. I'm going to give them the kind of workload as if they have no other classes. I'm going to do this to teach them time management."
She said later that what was going through her mind was "Oh no... These are kids who will absolutely KILL themselves to do the work and get it done. This is going to crush them!"
It didn't crush us. In fact, it taught us an amazing thing about the ability to dig deep and get things done--lessons that I'm sure helped all of us when we got the real workload of college and then [hopefully for every one of his students] when they got into the real world.
Those "highly selective universities" like to tout their graduation rates, as if every one of their students weren't the sort of high achiever AP type of students who would sooner die of exhaustion than disappoint their teacher. The less selective universities have lower graduation rates, but they offer opportunity to anyone willing to work for it, with the knowledge that some of them aren't as willing as they thought they were.
Harvard grads have better overall outcomes than Ball State grads, and a lot of people think that means that your education is better at Harvard than Ball State. Instead, it's more due to the fact that the only people Harvard admits are the types for whom Ball State wouldn't even rate "safety school" status.
I've read some analysis saying that the Ivies aren't any harder than good (not elite) public universities. The hard part is getting in. Then, basically, everybody passes.
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I've read some analysis saying that the Ivies aren't any harder than good (not elite) public universities. The hard part is getting in. Then, basically, everybody passes.
When you put it that way, you make it sound like they're not working towards passing... I don't want to create the idea that they're getting in and then everything is just handed to them...
But I agree, I doubt the difficulty of the curriculum is different than good public universities.
Where I think the Ivies are different is in a couple of places:
- As stated, the type of people admitted are the high achievers who aren't likely to screw up.
- Because of the small size of the colleges, there is a lot more opportunity to indivdually watch for students who need special assistance or are lagging, and those students get support they might not get at a large public university.
- Smaller groups may have more individual/instruction and generally more support per student than at a big public.
- The universities pride themselves so much on graduation rates that they are actively trying to not allow students to fail.
At Purdue, plenty of people failed out. The university had plenty of support if you went looking for it, but they weren't looking for you to shove that support down your throat and make sure you succeeded. I think the Ivies are doing a lot more of that.
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The problem with community college courses are that many of the more selective schools don't accept credits from them unless it's a public university in the same state.
For example, when I was at Michigan, I definitely noticed that a lot more instate students took summer courses and/or already had credits from their local community college so that they could get a better grade in what would otherwise be a weed-out course (chemistry, calculus, physics, etc.) and so that they could take fewer credits during the regular school year..... Being from PA, that wasn't an option for me.
I suspect this pandemic situation will accelerate the rise of online education, especially at college level, as has already been happening for masters programs, including the one I went through. I would think that would make community college courses much more accessible to high school students, college-age student, and older adults who are trying to change or improve their careers. Time will tell, though.
There's definitely an inverse correlation between admissions selectivity and graduate rates. I think that's pretty self-explanatory. This site shows it pretty clearly: https://oedb.org/rankings/graduation-rate/ (https://oedb.org/rankings/graduation-rate/)
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The problem with community college courses are that many of the more selective schools don't accept credits from them unless it's a public university in the same state.
For example, when I was at Michigan, I definitely noticed that a lot more instate students took summer courses and/or already had credits from their local community college so that they could get a better grade in what would otherwise be a weed-out course (chemistry, calculus, physics, etc.) and so that they could take fewer credits during the regular school year..... Being from PA, that wasn't an option for me.
I suspect this pandemic situation will accelerate the rise of online education, especially at college level, as has already been happening for masters programs, including the one I went through. I would think that would make community college courses much more accessible to high school students, college-age student, and older adults who are trying to change or improve their careers. Time will tell, though.
There's definitely an inverse correlation between admissions selectivity and graduate rates. I think that's pretty self-explanatory. This site shows it pretty clearly: https://oedb.org/rankings/graduation-rate/ (https://oedb.org/rankings/graduation-rate/)
So, high selectivity ~ low graduation rate?
I think you mean low acceptance rate ~ high graduation rate, yes?
That website ended up taking me to a degree planner for SNHU. No comparison of selectivity/grad rate that I could see.
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How much difference is there between being in a class with 400 people and a live professor and watching a canned lecture on line with no questions?
Even classes of 10 folks often generate no questions.
Imagine the CGI one could employ to illustrate various functions and phenomena.
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So, high selectivity ~ low graduation rate?
I think you mean low acceptance rate ~ high graduation rate, yes?
That website ended up taking me to a degree planner for SNHU. No comparison of selectivity/grad rate that I could see.
Yes, sorry for the confusion. Scroll down a little and you'll see the list with graduate rate, acceptance rate, among others...
It's easier to see the correlation sorted by https://oedb.org/rankings/acceptance-rate/ (https://oedb.org/rankings/acceptance-rate/)
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Yes, sorry for the confusion. Scroll down a little and you'll see the list with graduate rate, acceptance rate, among others...
It's easier to see the correlation sorted by https://oedb.org/rankings/acceptance-rate/ (https://oedb.org/rankings/acceptance-rate/)
Ah, yes, thanks! Very interesting site.
Implied is the idea that the schools with uber-low acceptance rates are in competition with each other in that category. So they recruit many students--very good students--to apply, so that they can be rejected and make their numbers look "better." I that is the case.
I will say this, the nicest rejection letter I've ever seen came from Stanford to a student of mine two years ago. He was/is a brilliant student (son of Mexican immigrants and the first in his family to go to college) who ended up going to OU because the more elite schools he was accepted to didn't impress him in one way or another.
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The problem with community college courses are that many of the more selective schools don't accept credits from them unless it's a public university in the same state.
For example, when I was at Michigan, I definitely noticed that a lot more instate students took summer courses and/or already had credits from their local community college so that they could get a better grade in what would otherwise be a weed-out course (chemistry, calculus, physics, etc.) and so that they could take fewer credits during the regular school year..... Being from PA, that wasn't an option for me.
I suspect this pandemic situation will accelerate the rise of online education, especially at college level, as has already been happening for masters programs, including the one I went through. I would think that would make community college courses much more accessible to high school students, college-age student, and older adults who are trying to change or improve their careers. Time will tell, though.
There's definitely an inverse correlation between admissions selectivity and graduate rates. I think that's pretty self-explanatory. This site shows it pretty clearly: https://oedb.org/rankings/graduation-rate/ (https://oedb.org/rankings/graduation-rate/)
I call bulljive.
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I also think bachelor degrees are overstated in their value, minus specific majors in the STEM categories.
And speaking of STEM...
The local HS district here now calls it STEAM.
The A is for "arts".
One of those is not like the other, from a job standpoint. But, the teacher unions are gonna union.
Just wait. It will catch on nationally.
I'm glad I'm "old".
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I also think bachelor degrees are overstated in their value, minus specific majors in the STEM categories.
And speaking of STEM...
The local HS district here now calls it STEAM.
The A is for "arts".
One of those is not like the other, from a job standpoint. But, the teacher unions are gonna union.
Just wait. It will catch on nationally.
I'm glad I'm "old".
You know, Badge, you're getting into a subject here that can go pretty deep.
What does it mean to be educated? Does it mean that you have acquired a skill that is currently in demand in our economy, or might it also include other, different things?
I think that the problem with "liberal arts" majors might lie more in the way they are being taught than in the fields of study.
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You know, Badge, you're getting into a subject here that can go pretty deep.
What does it mean to be educated? Does it mean that you have acquired a skill that is currently in demand in our economy, or might it also include other, different things?
I think that the problem with "liberal arts" majors might lie more in the way they are being taught than in the fields of study.
Yes, I understand that and I was hoping you would reply.
I'd like to respectfully ask for time to respond further, as I've had a few pops.
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The extra "facts" I learned in grad school were relatively unimportant. (We only had one year of classes anyway.) The basics for how to approach and solve a problem was the Main Thing. Sounds trite now that I say it.
I guess we did have 3 semesters of classes, but the third semester was only one or two classes as I dimly recall now.
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Master's programs are supposed to be career-oriented as mine was. I didn't necessarily learn a lot more because it covered a lot of energy and analytical subjects I already knew a lot about, but it has been helpful in other ways.
College degrees can be career-oriented (engineering, nursing, music), but that's not the whole point of it. I'd argue most college students don't really know what they want to do with their careers (I certainly didn't) or change their mind multiple times even if they think they do, so making majors career focused is kind of pointless. Internships exist for college students to see what professions they're interested are really all about.
If you want a career that doesn't require a substantial amount of education then you can get that at a community college.
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Master's programs are supposed to be career-oriented as mine was. I didn't necessarily learn a lot more because it covered a lot of energy and analytical subjects I already knew a lot about, but it has been helpful in other ways.
College degrees can be career-oriented (engineering, nursing, music), but that's not the whole point of it. I'd argue most college students don't really know what they want to do with their careers (I certainly didn't) or change their mind multiple times even if they think they do, so making majors career focused is kind of pointless. Internships exist for college students to see what professions they're interested are really all about.
If you want a career that doesn't require a substantial amount of education then you can get that at a community college.
Yes, and in some places, like here, it wouldn't cost you anything to do so.
https://www.harpercollege.edu/about/promise/index.php
We created this for a reason. We need people to fill jobs that are openly hiring. Healthcare, manufacturing and logistics are hot openings. Kids can also do their 2 years, and then transfer, if they choose.
The result of this program is that the kids coming into college are sitting at about a 3.4 GPA average (versus 2.7 for kids who are not in the program) and they are coming in with 9 college credits (versus 3 for kids who are not in the program). The program is working.
I still see parents pushing their kids into 4 year colleges, because that's what you're "supposed to do".
It's BS. We need more people to realize that a 4 year degree is not needed for everyone. It just isn't.
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I still see parents pushing their kids into 4 year colleges, because that's what you're "supposed to do".
It's BS. We need more people to realize that a 4 year degree is not needed for everyone. It just isn't.
I always find this part fascinating because of how college has become a certain kind of social institution. It became drilled in as something aspirational if you were from a family without much college background and a stage of life if you did. And in truth, it's a level of theoretical structure in a time when people mostly need structure.
I know there was a stretch (and it might still be going) when nursing was a super popular community college major. At some point the economic side will catch up, as will the idea that living at home while you do it isn't a bad thing. But it will take reshaping ideas about what happens when you end HS and turn 18.
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IN Europe, about 35% of HS grads go to college.
In the US, the figure is almost double that.
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Much of it is very wasteful. All that student loan debt for a degree that doesn't get you the income to pay that debt?
What could go wrong?
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IN Europe, about 35% of HS grads go to college.
In the US, the figure is almost double that.
The US might have more college dropouts, so it's actual education attainment isn't that great relative to other countries:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_tertiary_education_attainment
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_tertiary_education_attainment)As you can see, the US ranks below number of countries in terms of attainment of associates, bachelors, and graduate degrees..... Interestingly, Russia ranks first (US 4th) for college degrees by 55-64 year olds at the time of the study (so now they're 61-70).
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We do have more drop outs, and people taking 6-7 years to "finish". That is part of my point. We send people with below average education ability to college, a lot of them. Europe doesn't (except by error). The students get "streamed" pretty early on in K-12 and it's tough to move up a stream.
We also spend more per student K-12 than other larger European and Asian countries.
We have an egalitarian approach that "everyone" should go to college.
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I'll just add a couple of cents here.
I agree that a 4-year college degree is not necessary for everyone. I'll add that IMO the push to make it such has resulted in a corresponding dumbing-down of high school.
I know that our suburban HS in the Tulsa Metro Area is not unique in this, because to a good degree it's mandated by the state, but the emphasis is increasingly on ensuring that our graduates who are not going to college are "career ready," meaning that they have skills that are in demand in the (mostly blue-collar) workplace. The drive for this is accompanied by a reduced emphasis on liberal arts, humanities, etc. What we are losing (or maybe "not attaining" would be more accurate) is the appreciation for things beyond job skills.
Things like: What does it mean to be a citizen in the United States of America? What do we owe our society, and what does our society owe us? And why? And who says so? And who has different answers, and what are they?
Along with an appreciation for art, music, literature, etc.
We haven't done much if we graduate kids from high school who are not going to college and all they know is how to be an auto mechanic (because they took auto mech classes at the local "tech college") because nothing else they encountered in the K-12 curriculum has stuck with them. Not that there is anything wrong with being an auto mechanic. We need 'em, and they need to be more and more technically savvy as they deal more and more with computers. I'm right there with Mike Rowe on emphasizing all the dirty, unglamorous jobs that are legitimate career paths.
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Dirty jobs? WTF does that mean??
Manufacturing is not dirty. It is automated, and mostly STEM based. You don't need a degree in "Classics" to work in that industry. You need a 2 year program, and you can start at $65K.
RIGHT. NOW.
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it's one thing to be trained to do a job in manufacturing
it's something completely different to be educated
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For me, the vast majority of my "education" was done on my own, not in school. At best, school enabled me to have the tools to teach myself and learn on my own. I was always curious, to the point it got me in trouble in school. I like knowing how things work. I remember asking my mom how a refrigerator made things cold inside. There is a really neat answer of course that I bet few Americans have any clue about.
My neighbor was shocked to learn that our heat pumps need Freon both to cool AND to heat. (Not my physics professor neighbor of course, the other one.)
I made my first astronomical observation on my telescope tonight of the moon. The wife thought it was really cool. With one lens, the moon fills more than the viewing portion of the scope. We don't see stars here for obvious reasons. There is a comet coming in that COULD get interesting but probably won't.
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There is a comet coming in that COULD get interesting but probably won't.
The Corona Comet I suppose,can't catch a break
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I took astronomy one quarter for an easy A (which it was). Fortunately, there were a bunch of education majors in our dorm also taking it and they relied on me for tutoring. The good news is they were all female and all very attractive. I ended up almost marrying one of them , well almost getting engaged anyway.
I recall running down the hall past them making a constant shrill noise to demonstrate the Doppler effect, which none of them could grasp. That was fun tutoring.
The professor was pretty funny, but I don't think I learned a single thing in class. I only attended because it was right between two other classes and it made no sense to go back to the dorm, and he was entertaining.
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and the young ladies in the class
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Dirty jobs? WTF does that mean??
Manufacturing is not dirty. It is automated, and mostly STEM based. You don't need a degree in "Classics" to work in that industry. You need a 2 year program, and you can start at $65K.
RIGHT. NOW.
Mike Rowe is talking about jobs that--at the really "dirty" end--involve sucking sewage out of porta-potties and the like.
And I wasn't advocating degrees in classics. I was advocating the idea that kids need to leave high school with more than just a job skill.
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We do have more drop outs, and people taking 6-7 years to "finish". That is part of my point. We send people with below average education ability to college, a lot of them. Europe doesn't (except by error). The students get "streamed" pretty early on in K-12 and it's tough to move up a stream.
We also spend more per student K-12 than other larger European and Asian countries.
We have an egalitarian approach that "everyone" should go to college.
Yes, we do. Pure "lack of funding" is not the big problem in public education. What we do with that funding is the big problem.
Just like in every other government program, including--re the budget discussion on the other thread--our national defense programs.
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Plenty of folks are not interested in, well, culture. You can have them sit through a class on the classics or whatever, and it does zero good with very few exceptions. Some think we should teach things like how to budget in HS. OK, practical, and certainly a lot of folks may NEED that training, but would they pay attention any more than most did in Health class back in HS?
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I was advocating the idea that kids need to leave high school with more than just a job skill.
Hotties phone numbers for instance
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Mike Rowe is talking about jobs that--at the really "dirty" end--involve sucking sewage out of porta-potties and the like.
And I wasn't advocating degrees in classics. I was advocating the idea that kids need to leave high school with more than just a job skill.
You don't need a degree for that one. That's for sure. That is truly a shitty job.
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Plenty of folks are not interested in, well, culture. You can have them sit through a class on the classics or whatever, and it does zero good with very few exceptions. Some think we should teach things like how to budget in HS. OK, practical, and certainly a lot of folks may NEED that training, but would they pay attention any more than most did in Health class back in HS?
Where did courses on "classics" get into the discussion? I never mentioned them.
I blame it on Badge.
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For a start, I'd like HS grads to know on what continent the Missippi River is located without having to resort to Google to find the answer.
Which countries were our allies and which our enemies during the two World Wars would be a good thing too.
Knowing that Mark Twain, Herman Melville, Willa Cather, and Ernest Hemingway are American writers would be nice.
There's a difference in knowing something and knowing how to find out about it.
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This conversation is missing a major culprit: standardized testing. Our reliance on automation is victimizing the educational system, too. Everything is multiple choice, which inflates scores (but hey, they can be graded in 30 seconds by a machine!).
.
Test prep, teaching to the test, funding tied to test results......it's all a big part of the broken wheel.
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For a start, I'd like HS grads to know on what continent the Missippi River is located without having to resort to Google to find the answer.
I'd like them to be able to spel it correctly also, either the state or the river, if not both.
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Back in the day, I was a TA for four years in grad school because my professor lacked funding for my project. Each year you taught sort of earned you an advancement in the level of labs you had, so for two years I taught the senior lab courses. These were mostly kids going to med school, probably 2/3rds of them.
I had a quiz before we went to the lab and I'd have an extra credit question that had nothing to do with chemistry, it was usually history. I recall once asking when the US Civil War started, I was prepared to give credit for anything within say 5 years. I had answers like 1920 and 1542 and 1608, all over the map.
These were the top students, pretty much, at a university ostensibly in the top five of public schools in the nation. Most of them were "what do I need to do to make an A"? types. I did have one guy who was a TRUMPET major, seriously, one of my best students ever. He said he just liked chemistry.
The responses to similar questions were similarly "lacking" for the most part.
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Where did courses on "classics" get into the discussion? I never mentioned them.
I blame it on Badge.
I was just using it as an example of a major that won't get you very far, on its own.
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I was just using it as an example of a major that won't get you very far, on its own.
Oh, yeah. There are plenty more of those.
And then there is the problem of solid majors (or grad degrees) in fields that just happen to be overloaded with qualified applicants.
So, back to "education" (as opposed to "training"), is the ideal college education one that is strictly transactional? You pay $x for it and you may expect $y annual income in return?
I'm tossing these questions out at the same time I agree with what seemed like your main point--that we send too many kids to college, that many of them are wasting their time and money there.
Your example upthread of the community college education that can net you a $65k starting salary strikes me as an example of where someone can get trained for a certain professional track, but who has not been educated in the sense that "education" at least once meant.
I "feel" pretty well educated in the liberal arts. But I know that I have huge gaps in the other end of my education. I should have been required to take more math and science. I wish all the time that I knew statistics. I wish I had had to take more foreign language courses and/or demonstrate some foreign language proficiency.
Then I would feel more fully educated.
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I think you can educate yourself in the liberal arts. You can teach yourself a foreign language too. Maybe math??
(I know I needed to see the professors work problems to understand properly.)
Unless you have access to labs and other expensive equipment, you can't teach yourself science, engineering, etc.
As for a manufacturing degree, what you'd get is an Associate of Applied Science.
https://www.harpercollege.edu/academics/manufacturing/manufacturing-technology/index.php
There are a good number of certificate programs too, that could set you up for a good job after only one year.
I'd call those training, for sure. The AAS has some breadth in the program.
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I think you can educate yourself in the liberal arts. You can teach yourself a foreign language too. Maybe math??
(I know I needed to see the professors work problems to understand properly.)
Unless you have access to labs and other expensive equipment, you can't teach yourself science, engineering, etc.
As for a manufacturing degree, what you'd get is an Associate of Applied Science.
https://www.harpercollege.edu/academics/manufacturing/manufacturing-technology/index.php
There are a good number of certificate programs too, that could set you up for a good job after only one year.
I'd call those training, for sure. The AAS has some breadth in the program.
Yes. I've done that to a good degree, my graduate degree in "History" notwithstanding.
Our local community college, which is free for any H.S. graduate in the county with a "C" average, with all its multiple campuses and nice symphony orchestra, is academically non-rigorous. I've taught U.S. History there as an adjunct instructor and, as I was telling SFBadger earlier on this thread (I think), my AP U.S. History course requires far more of the students than that one did.
It's possible that some of its other fields require more, but I understand that if you really want to learn, for example, nursing, you're better off going to the the local "tech" college than the CC.
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I think it's also worth pointing out that there are some professional jobs that don't have much if anything to do with academic programs that are available at various levels (be it community college, undergrad, or graduate / professional programs). I suspect that will be increasingly true since the job market evolves much faster than academic programs do.
To be sure, some of those are simply jobs that didn't used to require college degrees and now generally do (secretarial type roles, some HR roles, some sales roles, etc.).
Of course, people with degrees that are the least relevant to any career are probably more likely to go graduate school, anyway. Also, plenty of people change careers so their college degree has nothing to do with their graduate degree.
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I think it's also worth pointing out that there are some professional jobs that don't have much if anything to do with academic programs that are available at various levels (be it community college, undergrad, or graduate / professional programs). I suspect that will be increasingly true since the job market evolves much faster than academic programs do.
To be sure, some of those are simply jobs that didn't used to require college degrees and now generally do (secretarial type roles, some HR roles, some sales roles, etc.).
Of course, people with degrees that are the least relevant to any career are probably more likely to go graduate school, anyway. Also, plenty of people change careers so their college degree has nothing to do with their graduate degree.
I don't know if you have any stats or not, but I wonder what types of degrees correlate to success in switching careers. I think it's likely that "generalist" degrees do, but then maybe that because such degrees don't prepare one very well for any particular career path.
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Engineers generally don't go to grad school. For example, my program required 147 credits, compared to 120 for most. That's grad school right there. Then you have to wait 4 years as an engineer-in-training before you are permitted to take the PE exam. Not many have the time nor patience for grad school.
As for tech schools versus community college, we don't have that. They are one in the same in Illinois, generally. The nursing program here is great, and through a partnership with NIU, they can do most of their BSN on site, since that is what most hospitals want these days. I guess the RN alone no longer cuts it.
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Engineers generally don't go to grad school. For example, my program required 147 credits, compared to 120 for most. That's grad school right there. Then you have to wait 4 years as an engineer-in-training before you are permitted to take the PE exam. Not many have the time nor patience for grad school.
Yet in the last several years, ASCE has been pushing Masters degrees for their membership. Unless you're going into academia, it's not worth the money. At least it wasn't when I looked into it 12 years ago, and I doubt the cost-benefit balance has improved since then.
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Engineers generally don't go to grad school. For example, my program required 147 credits, compared to 120 for most. That's grad school right there. Then you have to wait 4 years as an engineer-in-training before you are permitted to take the PE exam. Not many have the time nor patience for grad school.
As for tech schools versus community college, we don't have that. They are one in the same in Illinois, generally. The nursing program here is great, and through a partnership with NIU, they can do most of their BSN on site, since that is what most hospitals want these days. I guess the RN alone no longer cuts it.
I assume this is because they often feel they're already masters of anything that matters and will often tell you soon after meeting you. :)
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I don't know if you have any stats or not, but I wonder what types of degrees correlate to success in switching careers. I think it's likely that "generalist" degrees do, but then maybe that because such degrees don't prepare one very well for any particular career path.
At the basic sense, the key thing that you should be learning in high school, then expanding in college, is the same thing regardless of your major:
- Identify a problem in front of me.
- Learn what I need to learn in order to effectively make decisions about that problem.
- Make the best decisions based on the known information.
That's it. There are certain disciplines--engineering being one of them--that it's nearly impossible to do certain portions of it without the right background. While it's *possible* to learn the necessary skills without college, it's exceedingly difficult. But that doesn't mean that background makes you unsuitable for other careers.
But the truth is that most of the information you need to do a job is learned on the job. Because even in a very specific field like electrical engineering, the curriculum is still "generalist" until applied to the specific products and industry that you're in.
I think the best way to predict ability to switch careers midstream would be two things: raw IQ, and the right emotional/social balance for the target career. Because if you have both of those, you can learn anything you need to learn on the fly.
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I assume this is because they often feel they're already masters of anything that matters and will often tell you soon after meeting you. :)
Well...
...yeah.
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At the basic sense, the key thing that you should be learning in high school, then expanding in college, is the same thing regardless of your major:
- Identify a problem in front of me.
- Learn what I need to learn in order to effectively make decisions about that problem.
- Make the best decisions based on the known information.
That's it. There are certain disciplines--engineering being one of them--that it's nearly impossible to do certain portions of it without the right background. While it's *possible* to learn the necessary skills without college, it's exceedingly difficult. But that doesn't mean that background makes you unsuitable for other careers.
But the truth is that most of the information you need to do a job is learned on the job. Because even in a very specific field like electrical engineering, the curriculum is still "generalist" until applied to the specific products and industry that you're in.
I think the best way to predict ability to switch careers midstream would be two things: raw IQ, and the right emotional/social balance for the target career. Because if you have both of those, you can learn anything you need to learn on the fly.
Good points there. The "key thing" isn't the same thing, but sort of tracks alongside "be able to think critically."
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Yet in the last several years, ASCE has been pushing Masters degrees for their membership. Unless you're going into academia, it's not worth the money. At least it wasn't when I looked into it 12 years ago, and I doubt the cost-benefit balance has improved since then.
ASCE is being infiltrated by academia types. Too much for my liking. I'm no longer a member.
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well, that statement should play well on this thread
academia types