Posted on 10/16/2017 9:33:47 PM PDT by sparklite2
All of these protests and disruptions have two things in common. The first is a student body that is increasingly fanatical, irrational, unhinged, and dynamic in the worst way possible. Just a few short years ago, even the most militant and zealous student-activists needed some sort of catalyst to muster the energy to protest. Today’s protester students—bored, underworked, overly stimulated by progressive media, and convinced they are living in a social carbon-copy of Montgomery, Alabama, circa 1962—cannot be bothered with all that waiting. If they can’t find something real to protest, they’ll make it up.
The second common feature to these protests is no less pervasive but far more frightening: college administrations who, through their own obsequious cowardice, have become utterly powerless against the activists running amok on their campuses.
---- Marlon Brando, Rebel Without a Cause, 1953
It’s time for a “tea party”. One university at a time.
Americans have all drank the kool-aid that says our kids (all of them) have to go to college to have a good job.
we need our youngsters to do things for themselves, work hard and succeed.
Instead our kids think that only college can give them a path to financial success.
Actually, “The Wild One” ...
Actually that’s from THE WILD ONE. Brando’s biker film.
I don’t understand why college costs are up 100%+ when technology should be reducing the costs.
1. Online courses. Recorded lectures. Go to a monitored location to take the actual test.
2. Books should all be online and included with the cost. Instead, it’s a major scam - $100-200 for a text book that’ll be ‘updated’ (made obsolete) within 6 months.
3. Make student debt private and dischargeable in bankruptcy.
“So you want $200,000 and you got into Yale. Great? What’s your major and what’s your plan to pay back our money?”
“Gender studies and....”
“NEXT!”
Yep, without a cause. They know they will die in vain. It is not a revolutionary act to be a lazy loser demanding freebies. Type of people like that are a dime a dozen.
Yep, NFL, Planned Parenthood etc...
Damn, I thought I corrected that. Thanks.
We aren’t paying for it. We are going deeply into debt for it.
the inmates are running the aSSylums now- that is what happens when you spare the rod and spoil the child in the name of ‘rights’
have to disagree about online courses and online books.
Too many profs say one thing, but the look on their faces say something totally different. therefore physical classroom.
as for online books, reading online for prolonged periods is something I cannot do, nor can many others. therefore physical books please.
Student loans should be from a private bank, (which I think is your last point) there will be almost no one going to college, which is as it should be.
Right now, due in part to college degrees, we have too many chiefs and not enough Indians, as they say.
Paperwhite Kindle looks like paper. Easy to read. If you have a PDF file, you can print out whatever pages you want.
That’d save about $4-5k per year for students.
For lecture hall classes — 200 to 300 students listening to Psych 101 or History 101, etc. A ‘live experience’ is needed?
Absolutely not.
I’ve listened to dozens of online courses from The Great Courses. You can watch on video or just listen to the stream audio.
Instead of ‘hit or miss’ you can also get the top professors on different topics — all rated and vetted by students — and get the best of the best teaching these subjects.
Professor numbers can be cut in half. The buildings aren’t needed either other than to do testing.
You could EASILY cut the cost of college by half or more. Maybe more.
Look at the studies on what graduating college students know. We’re graduated ignorant SJW.
We also need to relocate the students off of the SJW college dorms and let them commute from home or less expensive housing.
Colleges are a scam. Parents are spending way too much money. Prices go up despite technology. We’re funding the anti-American institutions that are graduating the next generation of socialists and anthem kneelers.
Online courses : many lectures are recorded and/or streamed live in 1080p ... You’d probably have a better seat than those in the “studio audience” :-).
E-books vs real thing : there are technologies like e-ink that are much easier on the eyes than tablets or desktop LCDs. You can also print what you want to read. Overall, if education was the primary concern, books for the basic freshman and sophomore level classes could cost very little these days ... However, the college’s don’t even attempt to negotiate prices let alone publish their own ebooks to help curb costs.
I agree with the chiefs/Indians analogy ... Many people that would thrive at a tech school are pissing away tens of thousands of dollars a year in potential earnings going to a college and getting a degree in something worthless with low earning potential.
Yes, this myth of college as career savior has to go.
Good comment.
You both make good points, however, I will respectfully disagree.
TigerClaws, as for your ‘lecture hall’ courses. The only
‘live’ class I ever had in such an environment was Chem 101.
None of my other classes ever had more than 35 students in a
single class. I received my BA History in 2013.
Also part of the problem this country has is the current
generation do not communicate person to person, face to face
any more. It is the technology that has caused this, more
technology along these lines will only make the current
situation worse, in my opinion.
Thank edh & TigerClaws for your views and opinions, I respect them.
It is bedtime, and I wish you both a good evening FRiends!
txnativegop
Thanks! FRiend! :^)
Everything you say is true.
Think of all the wasted money that could be diverted away from college and put into technical schools that teach you what you need to know.
I hear you on The Great Courses, many of which are quite good.
I learned computer programming completely on-line. Never took a course. Even found a fabulous on-line community that would help me answer questions for free.
What could be done is to have a peer group that works together on the same knowledge domains. They do independent work and meet occasionally, with a domain expert.
So much could be done. Next generation learning is desperately needed and will arise as entrepreneurs step up to deliver. But killing the ridiculous Federal support of SJW training is the first step.
I agree with a lot of what you suggest here, but there does need to be some actual physical class and lab time. In fact, that’s a huge part of the problem. Students simply sit and listen, then regurgitate what they’ve heard. Many don’t even show up for class — they buy notes from services that have people attend class, record the lectures, create the notes and sell them. Or they get notes or recordings from their friends. Hell, all that has been going on since I was in college way too long ago.
There needs to be a mixture of lecture, lab, and an interactive classroom. In fact, labs need to be expanded to include non-science classes. To that end:
— tenure needs to end; Marquette is trying to fire a guy solely for being a conservative; other schools will follow soon, so tenure doesn’t protect anything other than fat assess polishing office seats
— can’t afford tuition? No problem. Work on campus. There were few, if any jobs, other than high level staff or faculty, that couldn’t have been performed by students just as well as support staff when I was in college — and now. I never understood why colleges hire support staff (secretaries, etc.) who only had a HS education (if that) while I and one or two other students could do that job better and possibly cheaper.
— major specific labs that, while working under a masters or PhD candidate, do productive things; if they can’t do anything productive, maybe that’s a hint the major itself is worthless
— return of the great books/classics and primary sources. Why buy a textbook that “analyzes” American History without printing the actual DOI or constitution/AOC when you can get all that online and talk about it in class?
— Require Physical Education and Personal Finance EVERY SINGLE SEMESTER.
Obviously, none of this will happen as long as the left controls education. They need people fat drunk, and stupid.
1. Don't show up for class, buy notes, etc... Going the full package on this can buy some party time during the freshman year but that is about it. It's a quick flunk out much after that. Of course, a person going full out on this gaming of the system may well have spent their college fund the first year anyway from all the partying. I used a recorder though many of my STEM related classes. Wonderful tool then and still is.
2. Mix of lecture, lab and interactive including non-science classes.... I think I had all this including non-science where it was compatible (such as language). I did have one “interactive” based class as a freshman that was a disaster. Try analytical geometry on a freaking VT-100 monitor sometime. I have no clue what I did to get a B in the class because learned nothing and repeated the class after transferring to a different university. Despite that caveman era experience, I am a big proponent of on-line learning and the best examples of this are awesome alternatives to the conventional classroom. Towards the end of my professional career a few years ago, I was spending as much as 80 hours a year in online training and testing to maintain a variety of certifications.
3. Tenure.... Tenure can certainly be abused and has been. It should be based on a written contract related to scholarly, classroom, research and performance metrics that can be quantified. There has to be a no hassle way to weed out low performers.
4. Can't afford tuition.... It's BS how expensive tuition/books/fees have become. IMHO, it's largely due to administrative bloat, laziness and political correct featherbedding of whole departments. In particular, the humanities areas are out of control.
5. Jobs, work.... Every job on campus from secretary/clerk through grounds keeping should be students. Period.
6. Major research labs (and programs and departments and majors) need to do something productive.... Similar to the tenure contract above, plainly stated written metrics are needed to measure performance and low performers closed up.
7. Return to the classics and primary sources.... Yep, nuff said with respect to lower level classes. This sets the baseline to compare contemporary writings to, which is appropriate for higher level classes. Heck, my 7-12th grade education had us into the classics with respect to literature and primary sources with respect to Civics.
8. Require PE and personal finances... I think I understand where you're coming from on this but I would put a different twist on this. Say as a 1-hour credit, mandatory freshman orientation class. I would focus this on two topics, 1) stress management and 2) this is expensive, don't blow it.
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