My mother was a secretary at a regional bank that no longer exists thanks to Obama. That was before I was born. After that she worked in the local school administration as I was in HS. She was responsible for me taking typing. I probably would have shown more interest initially if someone had pointed out to me it was going to be me and a dozen girls - I was tempted to take it twice.
Ironically, at the time there was a teacher in my HS who was head of the science department. “Typing” was just starting to morph into “keyboarding” and he was instrumental in getting that entire class dropped from the curriculum. His reasoning? We’d all be talking to computers shortly and typing would be unnecessary.
This was the mid 1980s. Aside from the fact that here we are, 30+ years later, and it still is just starting to be practical to speak to computers, what in God’s name would you do in an office full of people if they were all talking to their computers simultaneously? It’s totally impractical. At least 20 classes of students who could have benefited from typing were denied the opportunity because of one idiot in a position with a bit of power and influence. Such is public education.
Anyway, it’s been a huge help in my career. Mom thought I would need it for research papers, but it turns out I never really had to do one in college (started in engineering, ended up in business). But it sure helps with business reports and all the typing I have to do for configuration and coding. Some of the two finger guys are pretty amazing after 30 years of practice, but I can still run circles around them when it comes to typing anything more than a few lines at a time, and I don’t have to look at my hands.
what in God’s name would you do in an office full of people if they were all talking to their computers simultaneously? It’s totally impractical.
people in offices instead of cubicles, and close the door.