Conference quark::human_relations-v1

    It depends on what you are attempting to teach the student. 

    If you are doing a science subject I think that you could definitely
    reduce the time it takes to teach a student. I learned many things that
    later proved to be completely useless, an example was calculating the
    amount of coal required to fuel a ship across the Atlantic, this is
    calculation I have never once been asked to make in my professional
    life. 

    They also tend to teach well behind the state of the art. In this area
    we were taught all about vacuum tubes and little about the transistor.
    Later classes learned about the transistor and not the integrated
    circuit. So I think that there is a lot of fat to be trimmed away in
    the sciences. The courses could be made much more concise and relevant.

    As to the Arts. Well I reckon that they are mainly a waste of time and
    money. Admittedly there are a few who intend to spend their lives in
    the field in which they studied, but most seem to end up doing ordinary
    jobs. Particularly in America I think that an Arts degree is just a
    status symbol and proves very little about its holder.

    I think that Arts degrees should be made available on evening study,
    which could be combined with earning a living.

    Jamie.

    They also learn to grow up and make their own decisions...
    
    For alot of people, it's their first experience away from home.
    
    The important part of life in college is learning how to think.
    The facts that are taught in class can be later retrieved from
    a textbook so   it's not that important to remember everything.
    It is, however, to know how to get that information.  Learning 
    how to derive information when you don't have all the facts is
    an important skill to learn.  Alot of people don't know how to
    do that.
    
    It is a controlled experiment in letting go of the kids.  They 
    feel like they're on their own, but they have a safety net to fall
    back on in case they really get in  trouble.  College is a good
    place to learn to survive on their own when they finally leave the
    nest for good.
    
    It's not that tangible a return for the investment, particularly
    for the parents, but it's more important to the development of the
    individual going to college.
    
    Extending high school to 16 is not good enough.  It's not flexible
    enough to let the students decide for themselves what they should
    be doing with their lives.  High schools, for the most part, are fairly
    generic and don't differ that much from each other.  Colleges focus
    on specific areas of learning so they can devote their  resources
    to provide a good education in those particular areas.

    I learned best doing hands on experience and internships. I was a
    media communications major and had three great internships as a video
    producer, I did my own thing and learned a lot more then just listening
    to lectures.  They also taught me how to get along in the "real world",
    and woke me up to reality.

    I'd agree that one can (for many/most jobs?) learn the job skills
    better by hands-on experience, some kind of apprenticeship or
    internship, etc. However, for those of us who had no idea what kind of
    job we wanted, or even what the various job categories might require,
    college was a very useful stepping-stone. As others have mentioned, it
    permitted personal and social experimentation and development in an
    environment less sheltered than the home, but more sheltered than the
    working world, and it provided the opportunity to sample a wide variety
    of disciplines. It's from this that I stumbled across what I do now...
    
    Of course, as has been discussed in the "degree-bigotry" topic
    elsewhere, everyone's experience of college differs. For some people,
    for some career goals, for some colleges, the match is perfect; for
    others, it's useless.
    
    -b (helpful as always!)

	From .1:

    > I learned many things that
    > later proved to be completely useless, an example was calculating the
    > amount of coal required to fuel a ship across the Atlantic, this is
    > calculation I have never once been asked to make in my professional
    > life. 

	You didn't learn anything.  You should have learned a concept
	exemplified by a particular example.  You apparently missed
	the concept altogether.

    > As to the Arts. Well I reckon that they are mainly a waste of time and
    > money.  Admittedly there are a few who intend to spend their lives in
    > the field in which they studied, but most seem to end up doing ordinary
    > jobs. Particularly in America I think that an Arts degree is just a
    > status symbol and proves very little about its holder.

	College/University is people who want to improve and broaden
	themselves.  Tech school is for people who want to learn a
	trade.

	-Jim

One of the things that really gets me is that students (parents) spend a lot
of time and money getting a degree and along the way they haven't shown enough
interest in the degree to go out and get appropriate summer jobs.  So we get a
lot of degrees from undergrads and some grads who have absolutely no experience.

Extending education up to grade 16 won't help this.  Improving education by
almost forcing those who are pursuing it to really get an education would
help.  But I'd favor something like this in high school too.

Matt

       >You didn't learn anything.  You should have learned a concept
       >exemplified by a particular example.  You apparently missed
	>the concept altogether.

    No I'm not quite that stupid, they taught us that concept in applied
    mathematics, this particular one came up in mechanical engineering
    science.

    Jamie.
        

    It gave me four years of access to confused people and to good
    libraries, with a flexible schedule. 
    
    I view these benefits as having been well worth the occasional test and
    the student loans.
    
    Ray

    
    The liberal arts degree winds up meaning a lot more than just "arts",
    depending on the school.  For example, my degree is in English Lit.,
    but to get the degree, I had to pass a certain number of courses in
    each of three basic areas: humanities, social sciences, and natural
    sciences.  I was surprised how many things I used later on that I
    could trace back to college -- those psychology courses came in
    handy when I was in a management position.  And I still use the
    concepts of scientific methodology I learned in biology.
    
    Have I learned more out of college than in?  I've learned more
    specifics, but those specifics, learned by experience, are layered
    on top of concepts I learned in school.  The concepts I learned in
    college are likewise layered on more basic concepts I learned in
    high school...
    
    Education is what you make of it.  For me it meant travel to Europe,
    3 years performing with a jazz group, the ability to take advantage
    of the experience of some excellent professors, and the chance to have
    my assumptions challenged.  The thing I use the most is the writing
    skills I learned (that said, you can't teach someone to write well,
    but you can certainly teach them how not to write badly).  I added
    the pages up once and it came up to about 3000 pages as an undergrad.
    That's what all the English majors did... write, write, write.
    (Come to think of it, that's what I do *now*!)
    
    For me it was well worth it.  Your mileage may vary.
    
    Ron

    I have a degree in arts and two in the sciences.  I'm most proud of my
    arts degree because to me it represents a very different mode of
    thinking and a far excursion from my own way of approaching issues and
    questions.  
    
    When I look back, my science degrees were extended exercises in coming
    up with the 'right' technique to approach the 'right' question to
    arrive at the 'right' answer.  The arts program (I also have a degree
    in English Literature) wasn't that clear cut.  The best courses were
    those which required me to take to heart an issue or a topic and then
    come to my own conclusions and my own 'right' answers.  Real tough for
    technoid to do.
    
    But the best part about having the arts degree is the fact that the arm
    of my school jacket reads:
    
    			Eng. Sci.
    			Eng. Phy.
    			Eng. Lit.

    English is a extremely important for any student, I think it is one of
    the most important courses of all, it is the course that is going to
    help you make it in the business world. I am Admin Assistant and if I
    had bad grammer and could not write a decent memo, I dont thihk I would
    have been working here.  English is part of Lib Arts. English also
    played a important role in my media major when it came to writing
    scripts and program proposals.  Very important subject indeed.

    Re .11

    >had bad grammer and could not write a decent memo, I dont thihk I would

    So much for grammar, now could you give us your opinion on spelling.

    Jamie.

    RE: .11
    
    Actually, I'd suggest you go back to college and take a few more
    lessons. Your note has more holes in it than a colander. In fact, there
    is at least one error in each line.
    
�    English is a extremely important for any student, I think it is one of
                ^1
�    the most important courses of all, it is the course that is going to
                                     ^2
�    help you make it in the business world. I am Admin Assistant and if I
                                                 ^3   ^4
�    had bad grammer and could not write a decent memo, I dont thihk I would
                  ^5,6                                       ^7   ^8
�    have been working here.  English is part of Lib Arts. English also
     ^^^^^^^^^9                                     ^10
�    played a important role in my media major when it came to writing
             ^11
�    scripts and program proposals.  Very important subject indeed.
                                     ^12
    
    1.  "a" not required, or the word "subject" missing, in which case it
        should be "an".
    2.  This should be a full stop, and the following "it" with a capital
        "I".
    3.  Missing "an".
    4.  "Admin" is an abbreviation, therefore requires a full-stop (period
        in American).
    5.  Should be spelt "grammAr".
    6.  Can one "have" bad grammar?
    7.  Don't requires an apostrophe.
    8.  Typo, it's spelt "think"
    9.  "have been" is in the past tense, I suspect you mean "be".
    10. "Lib" is an abbreviation, therefore requires a full-stop.
    11. Should be "an".
    12. Missing sentence subject, ie. "It is a" or "Grammar is a".
    
    Yours helpfully, Laurie.

    Having a solid foundation in the English language is also vital when
    correcting other noter's entries.

	
>    Having a solid foundation in the English language is also vital when
>    correcting other noter's entries.
                      ^^^^^^^

	Should'nt that be  "noters'?"

	-Jim

    Yes, and all that without a single degree. In fact, not a shred of
    formal education beyond the age of 17. All I have to help me though the
    day, is 19 years of experience in the computing industry.
    
    Laurie.

RE:       <<< Note 1247.15 by DRWALT::WIECHMANN "Short to, long through." >>>
    
�	Should'nt that be  "noters'?"
    
    That depends on whether he meant the notes of just one noter, or those
    of other noters in general. If the latter, then you're quite correct.
    
    Incidentally, it's "shouldn't", as the apostrophe signifies a dropped
    "o", in the word "not".
    
    Laurie.

    I hate people who pick on spelling mistakes.

    
>    Incidentally, it's "shouldn't", as the apostrophe signifies a dropped
>    "o", in the word "not".


	Phew, that was close. I didn't think I'd find a mistake, but
	I did. Punctuation should be inside the quotes, not outside.

	Can you find the mistakes in this message? They're pretty
	subtle.

	-Jim

	  Both punctuation (other than question marks) going inside quota-
     tion marks and double spacing after terminal punctuation are typo-
     graphical conventions, not grammatical rules; and the latter is used
     only in typescript, not in typesetting (even with monospace fonts).

	  Does this discussion have a point any more, other than one-ups-
     manship?

				      Brian

    Re: .20
    
    Yes - it's showed that one doesn't have to have attended college to
    be rude.
    
    				Steve

    Well I think that .11, with its many errors, proves the point that I was
    attempting to make in .1 that, "Particularly in America I think that an
    Arts degree is just a status symbol and proves very little about its
    holder".

    Jamie.

    re: .19
    
    I'm with .20 on this.
    
    Incidentally, no I didn't see any grammatical mistakes, or spelling
    errors.
    
    
    RE: .21 Steve Lionel.
    
    If you are intimating that I have been rude here, you might like to
    reflect on the fact that the author of the note in question had set
    himself up as a paragon of grammar and English. I was merely pointing
    out that his confidence was somewhat misplaced. 
    
    Laurie.

    Much as I hesitate to correct you, of all people, on this point Laurie,
    but I believe that the author of the reply in question is of the female
    persuasion. Mind you as it was unsigned you could not know this.

    Jamie.

> .4 RUST

>   college was a very useful stepping-stone ... 
>   permitted personal and social experimentation and development ... 
>   and it provided the opportunity to sample a wide variety
>    of disciplines. 

I agree. Can you leap in and say what this did for you?  Would you 
say it was primarily intellectual?  Social?  Emotional?

N years at the university (U) usually gives Student some level of
sophistication.  (Maybe some brave soul can define "sophistication"; 
I'm not up to the stuggle at this moment.)  If you paid $80K for
Student and got back the same level of sophistication, you'd 
be disappointed.  But how much of the U experience is a growth 
in sophistication?  10%? 70%?

I wonder if part of the U experience is simply an increase in
granularity?  (Yeah, I'm half smiling but that's what I mean.)
I'm a too-constant listener to talk-radio, and it strikes me
that the least educated callers see the universe rather
coarsely ... for instance, the government is almost 
always "they."  

FWIW ... I do remember statistics (from the 70s) about "why go 
to college" and among them were:

 o  university grads live longer
 o  university grads have less mental illness
 o  university grads report greater marital happiness

I believe the university experience is wonderful ... but trying to 
define it is difficult.  (What? Me Ungranular!)  Meigs

    >Maybe some brave soul can define "sophistication";

    Gladly, as I am always amused by the current use of the word
    sophisticated and its original meaning of; "not in a natural pure
    state, adulterated, corrupt, needlessly complicated, false."
    
    Given the definition of the adjective the definition of the noun should
    be obvious.                         
    
    Jamie.