Topic: College is a waste of time and money
started by: Leisher
Posted by Leisher on Jul. 30 2010,13:46
I've been saying that for years, but now < a new book says the same thing. >They're businesses, not schools of higher learning.
Posted by TPRJones on Jul. 30 2010,22:06
The first section of the article is 100% truth. I was discussing that with one of our faculty yesterday. But then he starts to fail in the second part.QUOTE
Among the examples of unnecessarily vocational degrees listed in the book -- due to be published on August 3 -- are ornamental horticulture, poultry science and ceramic engineering.
The first one does sound like crap, but those other two are valuable fields. Poultry Science leads to advances in factory farming and the quality of the chicken that ends up on our tables, and without Ceramic Engineering and the other material sciences we wouldn't have much of a space program.
QUOTE
"All undergraduate education should be a liberal arts education where you think about the enduring ideas and issues of the human condition," Hacker said. "After that, go on to law school or study dentistry -- you have plenty of time."
And here he goes completely off the rails. Liberal arts education is not the way of the future, and it's not the right choice for the majority of college students. Technical Education is the way to go for most of them. That's where they can actually learn useful skills that will lead to a solid career. Not everyone is going to be a doctor or a lawyer, after all. 68% of students that pursue a liberal education end up failing out of college without anything to show for it, and the majority of graduates with a liberal education end up in jobs they didn't need their degree for anyway. Less than 20% of students who attempt a four-year degree end up getting their money's worth.
He's seeing the right problems, but his solutions are just as wrong-headed as the people he's writing about.
Posted by Troy on Jul. 31 2010,08:48
Actually those three degrees he chose seem very likely to get jobs to me. He could have chosen waaaayyy better shitty degrees, like "Medieval History" or "Ancient Sanskrit" Poultry is obvious, any kind of engineering means the student is taking physics and high level math courses out of the yingyang and as for ornamental horticulture, while the work isn't glamorous, the person would end up working at a lawn care business, doing higher end yard layouts and and what not.
I'm sure other schools are different, but my Liberal Arts degree from UNC has opened up a ton of doors to me. It also manages to remain one of the cheapest schools to go to (providing you have instate tuition).
Posted by TheCatt on Jul. 31 2010,10:06
QUOTE
"All undergraduate education should be a liberal arts education where you think about the enduring ideas and issues of the human condition," Hacker said. "After that, go on to law school or study dentistry -- you have plenty of time."
WTF?
Look, I have a liberal arts education, and that would have done a great job of qualifying me for... graduate school. Serioulsy - law school? We have too freaking many lawyers already.
We need engineers, and scientists. Not more lawyers or dentists. I agree that college could be better (and high school, and middle school, and elementary school), but saying that college shouldn't teach people skills just makes it worse.
Idiots.
Posted by Malcolm on Jul. 31 2010,11:14
QUOTE
They praise Notre Dame for promoting concern for the common good and Massachusetts Institute of Technology for treating part-time teaching staff well.
First off, fuck Notre Dame. Second, double fuck MIT. Every dude that I've ever met that got a degree from MIT is either (i) an arrogant dickwad of a hack engineer who had to have bribed his way through his coursework or (ii) nerds who have science ADHD to such a degree as to be functionally worthless in any real working environment.
While the modern U.S. university system is fucked, doing what these two ass-clowns suggest would just give you a different kind of fucked for reasons cited previously in this thread. I met a dude who had gotten his associates degrees in liberal education or some other such bullshit.
I asked him, "So, what exactly does that qualify you for?"
He replied, "Going back to school and getting another degree."
Posted by TheCatt on Jul. 31 2010,11:21
This fits well.What universities give people, versus what they want/need:
Posted by TheCatt on Jul. 31 2010,11:23
But, as to their argument that liberal arts is so great, I say this:
As someone who GOT a liberal arts degree, but only got a job by doing computer science, I agree completely.
Posted by Troy on Jul. 31 2010,11:26
(TheCatt @ Jul. 31 2010,11:23)
QUOTE
But, as to their argument that liberal arts is so great, I say this:
As someone who GOT a liberal arts degree, but only got a job by doing computer science, I agree completely.
As someone who GOT a liberal arts degree, but only got a job by doing computer science, I agree completely.
I think I've said before, but it's this but replace Perl with the Adobe Creative Suite for me.
Posted by Malcolm on Jul. 31 2010,13:19
(TheCatt @ Jul. 31 2010,13:21)
QUOTE
This fits well.
What universities give people, versus what they want/need:
What universities give people, versus what they want/need:
I think I'm going to hire some people to tag that all across the U of M.
Posted by Leisher on Aug. 03 2012,11:06
< Colleges freezing and lowering tuition. >As it turns out, there is a limit to how much people will pay for college.
In a better world this would be the snapping back of the rubber band, and we'd return to only people whose careers NEED extended education going to college.