Oh, man, I so do hear what you’re saying. I tried the four-year route twice; at two separate Universities and I just self-destructed each time. I had fun once I stopped going to classes, but it’s strange the way they didn’t want me to stay after that…

Two best learning experiences in my life were getting my ASEE (all technical classes with just a smattering of composition and one very odd psychology class) and going after my certs. The certs were just as focused as the EE classes- I was on fire in that stuff. It was all the absorb-and-regurgitate stuff from the University that left me so damned cold.

Okay, that and an ounce-a-day of ganja…

Yup. Formal education is overrated. Self-instruction is underrated. No question about it.

"By the way, you there. Yeah, you. The one who's about to leave me a comment saying, "Cheer up Dean, you'll look back when it's all over and be proud of what you've accomplished!" Before you type it, just stop yourself."

We-ell. I would never tell anyone to cheer up. I would say that every culture except ours gives pride of place to certain rites of passage that are otherwise content-free. Most of them don't cost US$75000 and eat away several years of productivity, it is true. But they do tend to involve sitting around in a group wondering, "Am I the only one who thinks this is lame?" and "Who put that ninny in charge?" When you're done, consider yourself initiated into the mysteries of your civilization.

Remember: "That which does not kill me merely postpones the inevitable."

Bwahahaha!

Sean. You're the best. That's the finest perspective on this madness I've heard yet!

I wonder, did you feel this way when you were in highschool or is this purely a college (university?) thing.

I've never been to college (or university), but I did hate highschool (never graduated, by the way). Often, though, I think back to those days with longing for the stresslessness of it all. (Only comparitively stressless of course.) I suppose this has no bearing on your situation though, seeing as you are also supporting a family, and all.

What degree are you shooting for? If you say "History" I've got a fist just itchin' for a jawbone...

You know, if I were studying history, I'd probably complain less. But there's no money in that unless you want to be a teacher. Which, come to think of it, is exactly what I'd like to be. I love teaching, because I actually enjoy helping people learn things, have a real passion for that, unlike most of the teachers I've encountered.

In any case:

[rant]
I have hated school since I was a child. Adults used to pat me on the head then about it too. I usually wanted to bite them in response. I got my first job as a teenager and was far, far happier working than I ever was in school.

Stress? I always, always, always found school stressful, from the second grade on. First grade, I had a wonderful teacher who often encouraged me to go off on my own and learn things. Beyond that, I always, always, always hated sitting in the classroom and found it extremely stressful, stifling, and boring.

College is somewhat better, to be honest. At least there aren't the peer games that kids get into there. But it's still a stifling, regimented, boring atmosphere, the same one that I've always hated, and still hate with a steaming passion.

Had a conversation with my father about it about a year ago. "If you just open yourself up to it, you can learn a lot."

"As opposed to just getting striaght As and knowing the material, you mean, which is what I'm doing now?"

"Don't you get a lot out of interacting with the other students?"

"No."

"But it's very enriching!"

"I guess so," I replied, trying to find a polite way out of the conversation. But what I wanted to say was this:

If the educational experience is supposed to be an exercise in "social enrichment," then I'll have to stay socially impoverished.

Mind you, I don't think I am; I've traveled all over this country, and in Canada and Mexico. I've even worked my way across country without so much as a dollar in my pocket and not sure where my next meal would come from. I've met people of all sorts of different races, religions, professions, and backgrounds. Indeed, I'm 37 years old, and I've seen more, and done more, than most people will pack into 70 years of living. I'm not bragging either, that's just a fact. I've run two different businesses (into the ground, alas), had four different careers (at least), researched subjects most people never even read about, talked to people about things most folks never even think about. I can ride a horse, jump out of an airplane, shoot a gun, cook a mean chicken stew, and speak at length about the manifold ways to brew beer.

Shoot, I was in a comparative religion class not long ago and had to explain to the instructor the difference between Shia Islam and Wahabbism, which he'd never even heard of. A couple of years ago I turned a physician who treats her patients for obesity on to the fact that you can use metformin as a weight-loss drug and referred her to a group of physicians in the area doing just that so she could hook up with them. Pointed a laywer a few years ago to case law he could use to help his client get rid of some IRS debt in a way he didn't know about.

And no, I'm not a know-it-all who tells these people how to do their jobs. The point is, I'm fearless about learning facts and communicating them to others who have more expertise than I do.

I think about the only thing I haven't managed to do yet is get arrested, although God only knows how, considering some of the stunts I've pulled.

What am I doing? Bragging? Hell no. I'm just pointing out that learning isn't the classroom. Learning is learning, and if you know how to learn, if you love to learn, then it's a lifelong process and it hasn't got a damned thing to do with the classroom. It involves experience and talking to people and reading books and knowing how to ask questions, and I get damned little of that in any classroom I've ever been in.

Mind you. I freely confess, a science classroom, that's a different thing. An intensive subject study, like law school, that's a different thing. I toy with going to law school at times, because I think I'd be freaking good at it. But the world's got enough lawyers as it is. Something like med school would probably kill me dead, and I've got a family anyway, there ain't no room for that there. (Although, one of my heroes is a guy named Richard Bernstein. He's the world's oldest Type I diabetic. He had a master's in engineering, but came across a way to treat his own diabetes. Couldn't get doctors to take him seriously, so he decided to go to med school. Now he practices in New York, treating diabetics for a living, using techniques he invented on himself before he ever set food in med school. Man that's a guy to admire--how do you shift gears from an engineer to an M.D. and just do something like that? I'm in awe. He's a hell of a nice guy too.)

I know, I know, arrogance. Well if it's arrogance, then I'm arrogant. I crave new ideas, new people, new experiences. I get almost none of that in school, and I bloody well hate being trapped in those classrooms, mostly learning nothing but jumping through whatever hoops will get me out.

Sue me.
[/rant]

"Cheer up Dean, you'll look back when it's all over and be proud of what you've accomplished!"

Do people really say stuff like that to you? Yeesh.

I can imagine how it would be frustrating for you (I think) and I'm afraid I don't have much more to offer than, "That sucks."

Heh. Yeah they do.

Hanging's too good for 'em, I sez!

:-)

I was lucky. I was lucky enough to go to a small college. My parents paid for it all. Because the classes were small, it was a great experience - lots of give and take between prof and student.

I am sure that had I gone to a big school, I would hate it every bit as much as you do.

Sometimes someone will ask me why I don't go back and get an advanced degree. No way. I know I would hate going to school at night while working full time.

Dean, in years to come you will look back upon this time and you will realize that the world would've been a much better place if only you had gotten that c4.

Dean,
Suck it up man. Self pity is not becoming. No one said this is a fair world. When you've got a family to take care, you do what you have to.

Emotional rants do nothing but drive that emotion deeper into your brain. You're a lot smarter than that. You're a bright, ambitious and a caring family man.

This too will pass.

Dean:

I think we've been around on this one a couple of times? And you know I largely agree with you.

When I was junior high age, I had a slogan about school: "Sentenced to 13 years for the crime of being born." And looking back 35 years later, I still think that's just about right. I found school an institution (in the worst sense of the word "institution") devoted to instilling conformity, killing curiosity, and engreying the human soul.

Fortunately, I learned very young not to connect learning, which I loved, with school, which I detested. My way of dealing with school was to finish my schoolwork rapidly and effortlessly, pull down straight A's, and spend my spare time reading on my own. Come to think of it, my favorite grade school teacher— my fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Swingle— was the one who most encouraged me in this approach.

About my sophomore year in high school, my attitude toward school moderated somewhat. Still the same basic outlook, but somewhat attenuated. Went on to college, and got a college degree. Hung around for several advanced degrees, too. Didn't finally walk away from the academic world until I was 35.

Funny thing is, my attitude toward classes, coursework, and whatnot remained pretty much the same as it always had been. The real learning I gained in academia took place largely outside the classroom. Reading on my own, often in areas unconnected with my classes. Talking with friends and classmates until all odd hours, in the dorm lounge, or out at a restaurant or bar.

Unlike you, I found that I did get a lot out of interacting with other students. A lot. That was one of the things I really treasured about it all.

That, plus the fact that, no matter how busy I was with classwork, I had more time for reading and thinking on my own than I would have had (more time than I do have now) out in "the real world."

I guess I didn't look on university life primarily as a matter of getting an education. That I got, and would have gotten, no matter where I was. Rather, I looked on it as a way of life. A way of life I found fairly pleasant, on the whole. Well, okay, if you could overlook the fairly silly politics, and the bullshit utopianism, which prevailed among so many in academia. And those last few years there, at Duke, the political correctness was getting a bit much to bear. Still, for many years, I did find it to be a way of life.

Dean, If you don't mind sharing the information then I would be very curious to know what school you are attending and what degree you are pursuing. Your rant is related to a series of private conversations that I have had recently and knowing a little more about your educational experience would help me formulate my thoughts on the topic.

Yes! I so relate to this!

Ted: Hmm. Self-pity? Not really. Just anger and resentment. I feel ripped off by a system that steals my time, puts me in debt, and gives me nothing useful in return except a meaningless trinket (i.e. an undergrad degree).

Paul: I'd have to say that if I were in a position where I did not have to work full-time, and were instead simply a full-time student at a good university, I might feel somewhat differently than I do, in that being a full-time student with no other major obligations would be a freeing experience in some ways. Lots of time in the library, lots of time to get to know students persuing independent study of their own.

It still remains that I find the degree program itself utterly useless and virtually learning-free.

StumpJumper: I'll shoot you a note. I'd rather not say publicly for a variety of reasons, not the last of which is that some will decide to jump on my University as the excuse, when in fact I've seen this same problem in other schools and colleges, and heard from others at other schools with similar complaints.

I feel exactly the same way. For the sake of future earning potential I should really go back to school. But it's such as waste of my time. It's not going to contribute a whit to my professional expertise, because where web design is concerned most colleges are years behind the real world. I'd be much better served, in practice, by a couple books from O'Reilly and Microsoft Press and a seminar or two. When I'm personally hiring someone the absolute last thing I care about is a degree.

Most colleges are institutionally biased against practical experience. Faculty come first, because faculty know how to teach. (Teaching isn't really that hard to learn, but don't tell anyone.) Adjunct faculty, who teach only part-time, are seldom respected for their additional exeperience. Non-degree continuing education faculty, mere "trainers", are even worse off. Staff are generally expected to fade into the woodwork and make themselves seen, not heard.

To their credit, there are occasional attempts to bridge the gap and share ideas by encouraging greater interaction between these groups. Unfortunately these are usually doomed by the implicit understanding that the "real" faculty are in charge of most everything. With no real incentive to do more or different work, promising experience-based or intracurricular styles of learning are rapidly diluted into just more of the same classroom instruction.

I work in IT at a community college, where things are a bit better in some ways than in large 4-year institutions. The seperation between the castes of employees is less pronounced, and there's more instructional emphasis on practical skills. Sadly, that leads some in the broader educational community to look down on community colleges, when they really should be emulating them.

Wow. This is long. I'll shut up now. :)

This college problem may have something to do with your learning style, Dean.

Some folks, myself included, can become frustrated with school because we learn almost exclusively by doing. Some folks like to practice, some folks like to analyze, but some folks simply don't really learn until they're trying to do something.

I taught high school and college for a while ... and I planned my lessons so that I'd hit each of four learning styles per class. It was amazing to watch different sections of the class come alive the moment the lesson switched from one learning style to another. Learning by doing, however, often doesn't translate well into the classroom. So sometimes people struggle.

I find myself tuning out unless I find out: What do you want me to do? What's the application in the real world? So much information comes at us in disembodied form. Without some relevance to our lives we can get frustrated.

To this day, I don't know what quadratic equations are for. I'm sure they have a use, and I'm sure a mathematician can tell me. But I have no idea -- and I was expected to spend the better part of a year when I was 14 doing them. By the time an application can along (two years later in physics) I had long since forgotten.

I'm not sure how much of this applies to your situation, Dean.

Most colleges are institutionally biased against practical experience. Faculty come first, because faculty know how to teach.

My father had been teaching a class at one of the most respected universities in the Chicago area, in a field he had helped to develop. The class was popular enough, and the field growing enough, that they decided to create a department for it. The original plan was to offer him the chair, but when they found out he hadn't finished college, they fired him mid-semester.

By the way, I am proud of the fact that my parents met the day they were both kicked out of college.

Yes, Dean, it is incredibly arrogant. You are guilty of gross generalization, that all universities are the same; that neither the major, nor the student's skills (or background) makes a difference.

It is foolish to say that a two-year community college is on the same level as a major university. To extend this (and to be more specific) an Associate Degree in "History of English Lit" from a community college compares in no way to a Bachelors in Computer Science in Wright State University, or a performance degree from the College Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati, just to pick two regional campuses here.

You have said, many times before, that you are a natural self-teacher. That in itself is strong evidence that the fault lies not in the system, Horatio, but within ourselves. Or, in this case, you. You are very good at self-teaching, find the typical system useless and frustrating (for you), then conclude that the system is worthless, in general.

This is self-evidently not the case, else the system of colleges and universities that we have today never would have been developed. All that would be needed are public libraries. Oddly enough, I've never encountered a large number of self-taught experts coming out of America's public libraries. :)

This does not mean, of course, that all courses are necessarily of equal importance. Last spring, the Miami U. student paper included an article written by a graduating senior who complained that she had spent so much time blowing off certain classes all year, then cramming right before the exams, while still pulling a B+ average. But in this case the author was an English major.

I promise you that anyone trying to pull that stunt in the School of Engineering and Applied Science would not pass, much less pull a B+.

I think at least part of the difference lies in the individual involved: someone such as yourself who is good at self-teaching would find less utility in any school system. This is in contrast to the more typical student who finds external direction and organization useful.

The other part originates in the difference between institutions. I've read that an increasing number of colleges are using graduate students as instructors, and that (in those institutions) the students don't even see a professor until their junior year. That certainly makes a difference in the quality of education. Many universities, however, still use professors at all levels of classes. Well, I'll qualify that by saying that at least many colleges in many universities; I don't know that (say) Sociology or Anthropology majors go through, for example.

I also have to question why, if the American college system is such a futile waste of time, do so many brilliant students from literally all around the world come here every year to study? Are they all that stupid, or gullible?

And we haven't even touched on how local elementary and high schools affect any particular individual's experience and performance...

So, I have say that you have radically overgeneralized from a single experience.

IB Bill: I am definitely a "learn by doing" type myself. In fact, I think I learn more by screwing something up, then correcting it, than if I did it correctly the first time. :)

I don't know that I can develop an argument for quadratics in particular, but I can do so for math in general. Students need trig, etc., for calculus; they need (at least basic) calculus to learn (real) statistics and probability; when they learn (real) statisticsn and probability, they have developed at least the foundation for critical and analytical thinking.

Me, I think all high school students should be familiar with Bayesian analysis before they graduate.

Actually, Dean, (just to go off on a tangent) haven't you said before that you thought high school students should be exposed to statistics? Or am I thinking of someone else?

Oh, some of it applies to me, Bill. As a professional trainer, I understand the learning styles, and recognize my own style, which as it happens is less hands-on and more concept-oriented. I learn best if I understand firm underlying concepts and theory, and can relate what I'm learning to that.

I am also just fine with rote memorization. It's a bit boring but represents its own unique challenge and I can do it.

Like you, with mathematics, I need to understand the underlying theory of any method of calculation. If I don't understand the purpose or the underlying theory, I become angry and frustrated--and I've noticed that many so-called "math wizards" are really people who are simply very good at learning the mechanics of how to do something but are utterly lost on theory--you ask them "why" and they just freeze up. (Not true of the ones with PhDs I've encountered I must say--probably because you don't get a PhD unless you actually do get the theory.)

More to the point with me, however, I am not particularly auditory, and furthermore, I generally learn far better by sitting down with the book and simply reading and/or doing the work, and occasionally asking a question. In some classes, I have learned that my best bet is to simply ignore the teacher and do next week's homework while he or she blathers about whatever the hell he or she wants to blather about.

I have a surprising number of friends who work exactly like that. Almost all are college dropouts, even though they are extremely intelligent, motivated, driven individuals with records of strong achievement. Academia seems to very much resent people like us, if it deals with us at all. Frustrating.

Dean, I know how you feel. I think it was Mark Twain that said "don't let school get in the way of your learning". I enjoyed part of my undergrad days for a few reasons; working with my hands in engineering labs, great parties and my NROTC training because that was my ultimate goal, fly for the Navy.

Turned out the I did not have the eyesight for flight school so I did the Naval Officer thing for 4 years then moved on.

Liked you, I ran my own business for many years then as an engineer in silicon valley. I spent so much time behind a desk in each of those activities that I wondered just how big my but could become. I finally decided to make a career choice for me, I start the police academy next week.

My ranting aside, when people say the 'college changes you' I think they are refering to those 18-22 year olds living in the college world. This is their first time away from mom and dad and on their own.

You are far beyond that level of maturity and have experience more then those kids. A college education at your stage of life should be for a descrete reasons such as job opportunities or personal goals.

Keep your faith in yourself during this time of introspection and all will work out.

Casey: You continue to strike me as one of those wildly defensive types--you've done so much to suck it up and spent so much money, it upsets you when someone says the Emperor has no clothes.

I'm actually on Beth's side. My experience is that community colleges often offer a superior education to four-year universities, at least at the lower-division classes, precisely because the instructors care more and are far more likely to have actual real-world expeirence and to want to see their students truly understand the material.

Beth and I are far from the only ones to have observed this dynamic, either.

You are also guilty of not actually reading what I said. I've already granted that science and technical classes can be an exception. In fact I've done so more than once. I would appreciate it if you would at least read what I say before tearing it apart. It gets tiresome to have to repeat myself.

Furthermore, you blame the student for being poorly served by the modern university's teaching methodologies? For shame, Casey. The student is a customer, not a supplicant. The university owes the student, the teacher owes the student, not the other way around.

Finally, you are factually incorrect on a major point. Around the world it is generally agreed that American undergraduate degrees are INFERIOR. Repeat: around the world it is acknowledged that an American undergrad degree, with only a few exceptions, a minority of schools, is INFERIOR to what is found in countless other nations.

What is generally agreed is that America's GRADUATE SCHOOLS are among the best in the world. We have some of the world's best graduate programs in medicine and in the hard sciences especially. We also have some of the greatest research universities in the world--research almost all being at postgraduate level, of course.

And no, Casey, I am not generalizing from a single experience. I am generalizing from having attended several different institutions of higher learning, and from having done a good deal of reading on the state of higher education in the United States, and from talking to many other college graduates and college dropouts from schools all over the country.

I am hardly the first to have observed that universities no longer care if their undergrads are learning, and have no real respect for knowledge at all. They only care that they jump through the appropriate hoops.

By the way? Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Edison both educated themselves entirely through libraries. Henry Ford and Thomas Edison not only didn't go to college, but held college degrees in such contempt that they were known to promote men with High School diplomas to head up research and design departments over people with PhDs. Why? Because results mattered to them, and pieces of paper meant absolutely nothing to them.

At some point in the last few generations, we started treating a college diploma as more important than actual real-world results. This is pretty hard to defend.

Indeed, you've complained that as a recent college graduate, you're having trouble finding work. Ya know why I think that is? Because overemphasis on the necessity of college degrees has diluted their value.

>>It appears to me that the only thing I've learned in college is how to sit down, shut up, and jump through hoops without much complaint.

What the heck Dean, you've nailed it to a tee. Why do you even bother to complain. What kind of employee are companies looking for? That would be the kind that sit down, shut up and jump through hoops without complaining. Even with degrees, I found many people unable to even accomplish that. I'm certainly one of them. I'll further add, a college degree normally demonstrates the minimal job qualifications of being able to read, write and communicate somewhat coherently with other people. That might not be the case these days.

Your problem is certainly exacerbated by the fact that you are doing this well past the recommended age for doing it. It is a lot easier when you are 17 and fresh out of high school. One of the great upsides of college is that you get to move out of your parent's house and live in a large dorm with a bunch of other teens with raging hormones. Being drunk and/or stoned half the time with large groups of like minded people certainly took the edge off the business at hand. Unfortunately, you don't have that benefit.

If it is about the money and security, stick with it and finish it off. Perhaps you can invent ways to continue to get good grades and somehow make it a more meaningful experience. I doubt that. Once you get a degreed job, you'll probably be required to sit down, shut up and jump through hoops. The alternative is to start your own business and do it your way. I've been doing that for the last seven odd years and it is no bed of roses. I'm in debt up to my ears, I continually battle my urges to be distracted and there is no security in it. The upside, I don't have to sit in endless meetings about nothing. I'll probably be pounding the pavement for a nine to fiver shortly because the debt has become intolerable. I'll put my structured game face back on and probably appreciate my health insurance, office, direct payroll deposit and the endless meetings about nothing more than if I had not taken this detour.

I hope this puts some things into perspective for you Dean.

Heh. Ralph, it does indeed.

However, I have had jobs I enjoyed. Jobs I was good at, and jobs I can no longer get because of the requirement for a degree that didn't used to be there.

My ability to do those jobs will be absolutely, positively, in no way shape or form enhanced by forcing myself through this exhausting and meaningless and utterly unhelpful grind. They wills imply be re-opened for me.

I of course have reason to find this quite annoying.

Having been self-employed before, having in fact run two different businesses that failed, I have to say I feel your pain. One of the things that will need to change politically in the coming decades, I think will be the need to make medical and other security easier to attain for the self-employed, as more and more people are self-employed every year. At some point, most Americans might be self-empoyed--we may have to wait until that point before the necessary sea change takes place.

I'm paying $1100 a month for health insurance. The federal tax burden I experience can only be described as oppressive. If America wants people to be self-employed, they are going to have to make some changes. Alas, the slide to socialism will probably preclude those changes. I honestly believe we are being Wal-Marted into oblivion. This thing is turning into a massive corporate owned government running out of control.

Tell us again how this degree is going to make life all wonderful......?

You asking me? If you have a family, there is much to be said for a nine to fiver with health insurance, 401k, direct deposit payroll, tax refund in April, etc, etc, etc. In many cases, the price of admission to this club is a degree.

Is raising a family and working a nine to fiver a wonderful life? Heck if I know. One size doesn't fit all.

Ralph,
There have been lots of times when a 9-5 job seemed attractive - self employment can be a bitch. My college degree translated into 4 years as a biological technician before I quit and went into boatbuilding and design. Seems that with all the varied experience Dean cites a degree is superfluous unless he is going into medicine, engineering or law. As you said, one size doesn't fit all...

The purpose of college, of course, is to soak up the middle-class surplus, period. It also serves as a full employment program for college-educated folks that can't find jobs in the real world (ie., rent seekers). It still pays obeisance to classic education, as a sop to the parents footing the bill. However, I bet that those checks would stop pretty quickly if parents received a copy of the curriculum and actually investigated it.

The purpose of college, of course, is to soak up the middle-class surplus, period. It also serves as a full employment program for college-educated folks that can't find jobs in the real world (ie., rent seekers). It still pays obeisance to classic education, as a sop to the parents footing the bill. However, I bet that those checks would stop pretty quickly if parents received a copy of the curriculum and actually investigated it.

"You ARE in jail, just do your time and get your ticket punched." That was the best advice I got while in law school. I was clerking for an insurance lawyer who, after graduating from Harvard and going to Case Wester Law School, drove to Hollywood and wrote that slasher classic "Silent Night, Deadly Night," before settling down and earning an honest living by working for his dad's business partners. I realized while eating in my college cafeteria that only prisoners, mental patients, and students eat the institutionalized crap that passed for food there.

You do not learn how to be anything in school except a student. Even teachers do some hands-on student teaching before they're let loose. Best education, (well, the most practical) I ever received was working for three years as the only white guy in a black law firm AFTER I graduated. But I never considered those nine years in higher education wasted. Even though socially, law school was a throwback to high school, what made doing the time tolerable was life outside of class. But if you're not single, or need to watch your alcohol consumption, it's not nearly as fun.

I was priviled to take two classes with John Gaddis before he joined Yale's faculty, but learning about the "History of the Cold War" in 1984 has little practical purpose today. But he did challenge me to write a 10-15 page research paper per week for 20 consecutive weeks. (That wonderful bastard would consistently give me an "A" on each paper, find at least 2 typo's, and slash out the "A" and insert a "B-spelling." My old TRS-80 had no spell checker. very frustrating.) After 3 1/2 years of the law school socratic method (a stimulating learning mode to say the least) I didn't necessarily learn the "Law," but I did know how to be an argumentative SOB. What to write and argue about were always left for me to decide. The formal education merely gave me the tools, confidence and credentials to do it better.

Dean, if you wanted to realy enjoy school you must realize that you're too old for that life-style. You might be in college for the wrong reasons and have taken the wrong major (whatever that might be) because you're not in school for yourself but others, and don't enjoy what you're learning. Is it too late to switch? Nonsense! At your age, you've had your fun. You just did it outside of acedemia.

You must believe you're there for good reasons and have selected a specific course of study to obtain your eventual goals. If not, and merely want a degree, then at the very least take up a stimulating and enjoyable course of study. You love to write and spout off (excuse me, er, offer your opinions) about a wide range of subjects, why not journalism or get that history/political science monkey off your back, majors you can phone in, write esssays, and are never really wrong or right. They're a blast and perfect if you really want to scratch that law school itch.

I was a mutant. I wanted to be a lawyer from the day I met F.Lee Bailey when I was eight years old. But I was determined that the minute college bacame too much of a drag, I would try something else. I played, chased girls, partied, read my books, worte my essays, and they kept passing me. Look at me know, I'm a pompous blowhart, but happy. But I never would have gotten away with it while married with children.

So, since you seem a very rational person, taking on college at your age, with your responsibilities, must mean a specific plan with measurable goals. You aren't there to have fun, get over it. You are in jail. Do your time and you will have paid your debt to society and earn that rite of passage. Hope its worth it. Just don't count on that sheepskin containing some kind of magic. You want it, this is america, go get it, but everything here cost time and money.

I hated high school and missed almost 1/3 of the school year while I was off doing things like mountain climbing and hang gliding. I still managed to graduate with second-class honors, but I swore I would never go to university. Since then I've taught myself Anglo-Saxon, Middle English (two dialects), Japanese, three programming languages, watchmaking, tech diving(trimix) and many other things of greater and lesser utility; become a published writer, started a very successful publishing business, and semi-retired at 43. But I've met plenty of poeple who think I'm a loser because I never went to university. And they're serious about that! One scarcely knows how to deal with them (boot to the groin is tempting, however).
More importantly, as Dean has pointed out, a huge number of organizations will not hire you without that piece of paper. And the colleges and universities know it.
Example: While I was living in Japan, I needed a job to bring in some extra bucks. An advertising agency needed someone to rewrite rough translations into fluid English. Since I had been published in numerous magazines and newspapers by that time, I figured this was a job for me. I brought in my tear sheet file and was promptly shown the door because I didn't have a degree. Simple as that. "Where did you get your degree?" "Uh, didn't get one, but-" "Thank you for coming, goodbye."
Same thing is common in America. I graduated from high school in 1978 and since then I've seen a bachelor's degree become the "high school diploma" of our times. Basic education has extended from 12 years to 15 or 16, at enormous expense for society and for very little gain.
What America needs are less universities and more trade schools.
End rant.
Dean, my Dad did the same thing as you--he HATED university, but put himself through it while simultaneously working two jobs to take care of a wife and two kids, because it was the best thing he could do for his family in the long term. I'll never forget what he did for us.

There was a very fine young woman with whom I was acquainted. I asked once why she had never finished her college education, "I just can't stand to spend hours on end in a room with forty stupid people." was her reply, an estimable one at that.

Dean, I think you just cured me of wanting to back to school. Seriously!

I've been pondering going back for sometime. But I've always resisted, always felt that I'd get into something only to find that, upon graduation, that I'd HATE IT. And, as you note, be stuck with a zillion dollars in debt.

Maddening. And stupid. As Toren says, our "educational life span" has increased, and for what? More debt and a loss of creative thinking.

Sorry to have missed this thread when it was hot. There is a "necessary sea of change" that will need to occur regarding all levels of education. The system that is education is not meeting and cannot meet the needs that our developing society continues to generate.

We will, unfortunately, wait until there are sufficient 'drivers of change' rather than acting in advance of our critical needs.

Maybe this tendency will be excised as the eduction system is reborn. I hope so.

Ok Dean, I can understand withholding the name of your school, but WHAT MAJOR??? :-)

I'm curious, as I have a very similar outlook on the university experience to yours (mostly a hoop jumping exercise, except for some professions), although as far as classroom interaction goes, I'm at least blessed by being both a heavy visual/auditory learner (I often recognize people better by their voice's, and at times have to NOT look at them while they speak to place them :-)

Oh, did I mention that I am (assuming I can 'get right' with Uncle Sam on taxes) going back to school this fall at age 33, when I'll be newly reborn as a Freshman Mathematics Major?

Turns out my HS math teacher was right, I should have been a mathematician this whole time, or at least should have stayed in school for much more of it. I've literally hit the wall in a number of my professional and personal interests with the math, and now must go get a bunch of post-calculus stuff under my belt.

But if I didn't have such very specific goals I wouldn't do it, even with the Bachelors degree being the filter at the door of so many employers.
At my tender age I've already seen the tech job market go south (under both Bushs), and the FIRST thing that happens is that '4 year degree' becomes a resume filter.

The poster above who had experiences with that in Japan was right on, they suddenly don't care how much experience you have when things are in the toilet, and demand a 4 year degree to even look at you. During the dot-boom and crash cycle, my consulting firm and I went from having banks, stock exchanges and suchlike large firms paying up to $500/hour for us, to nothing. Nada.

And none of us had degrees, so the post-crash job market was doubly cruel. Of course we're all self-employed, it's hard to go from being the A-Team back to driving a desk. And damn do those Self-Employment taxes hurt. Working stiffs should see that hidden almost 8% Social Security tax they disguise as 'employer contribution'.

Dang, sorry about your teachers... because they seem to be the heart of your problem. I remember how obnoxious it was to take a COMPLETELY WORTHLESS class that I was required to, and since I got value in the strangest things you can understand how worthless this class really was.

I think one thing I probably had that you don't (aside from the interesting teachers) was the ability to take classes that meant nothing toward my major without a financial penalty. My major did not require ceramics, yet the three semesters I took probably did a lot for my peace of mind. (As well as providing me with lots of Christmas presents...)

Well, there is one undercurrent in this thread that I'd like to challenge: Whether you go to college or not, you can't learn much on your own that's not rudimentary and obvious. Self-made men are self-evident.

Education, whether formal or not, comes out of dialogue with others. It's not just experience. A Roman general once rebutted a junior officer who pointed to his experience to justify a promotion: "Those donkeys over there have seen twice as many battles as you. Yet they're still donkeys." Learning to understand and contextualize our experiences through dialogue is essential to education.

As it says in the book of Proverbs, "As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another."

As I said, this idea is more of an undercurrent than outwardly stated ... maybe I'm imagining it.

Having taught at the college level there seems to be one constant: the contempt that the older student has for their younger classmates along with the instructor's general approach to the majority of the class [those being younger].

It sometimes seems that we expect that those who are teaching us will and should always be smarter than us. When we go to college as an older student, having gained some real life experience, we are way ahead of the curve on our majority classmates. The instructor is there to teach these 18-20 year olds. Like it or not the level at which they learn is perhaps significantly lower than yours, Dean; yet they are in most cases, the majority.
If you are capable of jumping through the hoops like falling off a log and in general tune the instructor out, are you just there to pass the class with a grade? and subsequently feel that you are wasting your time, because the course content doesn't challenge you enough? You are the minority in your classroom, no?
I understand your frustration, but short of demanding individual treatment to accommodate your advanced knowledge you are probably caught in one of those rock or a hard place situations and need to find a way to challenge yourself,
Just one of the ironies life. In order to get somewhere, sometimes you actually have to go backwards because you leap frogged earlier in life.
The instructor probably knows enough to teach the 18 year old student and not enough to teach the 30 something and they don't gear college to 30 somethings. But there you are.
Better make the best of it.
I wonder had you been 18, if you would really hate school and learning in the university system or are particularly upset that now your level of knowledge due to your age is not being challenged.
I daresay, you might be able to add a great dimension to the class, your fellow classmates and the instructor if you weren't so sullen and contemptuous of the whole system.

Been there myself. But I'm the opposite - I actually loved it and learned to hate it.
BTW - what I learned kicking and screaming about computer tech, web design, etc., back in 1995 was way ahead of the curve.
I'm only now seeing things via web design that I learned 8 years ago.
The issue of the piece of paper does suck. I have the grad degree. For those of you who can't get a job because you don't have the BA? Try having the MA, MFA, etc. and not get a job because you're overqualified. The land of innovation is being run by a bunch of paper pushers with rubber stamps.
Aargh!

I quit school at 16, got a GED and went in the Army. I hated high school.

I finished my BS in Management from the University of Maryland at 41, just as I retired from the US Army.

Didn't seem to help me much, but then after five years of struggle it got me a contract to do a computer system conversion. Two of us were competing, we both had certifications in UNIX, but I had the degree, and I got the contract. And it was ultimately worth almost a million bucks.

Now I am 55 and enrolled in an MBA Program, almost half way there.

The things most valuable about college are the people you meet (connections) and the ability to complete something you start, evidenced by the degree.

A bachelor's is bankable for a lifetime, a Microsoft certification is worthless after the next version comes out.

Hang in there, ..............or not! ;)

I stood community college long enough to get my Associate's.

If I can swing it, I'd rather do tech schools for certs for the rest of my life than ever suffer the backwards-looking, years-behind-the-curve, totally-irrelevant-to-my-skills-and-interests voluntary indebtedness of a 4-year university.

I'm a hands-on/visual type - I learn more by either doing something practical with it, or reading about it, than I ever do by being 'taught' about it, unless the instructor is very, very good and presents it in such a way as to stand out.

And so, unless I end up with a family that requires me to get a 4-year for financial reasons, I'm unlikely to ever get my 4-year.

Well, here's my take on secondary education, FWIW.

At 17 (1970) had the choice between 4 year, fully paid scholarship to Brown University (RI) or join the Marine Corps, travel to distant lands, meet new & interesting people, and kill them. Can anyone guess which course I took?

After that, I bummed around for years, finally settling in VT to ski all season (1978). Had a great time, met a wonderful woman and married her in 1984, had first daughter in 1986. At the time, owned my own construction company (summer) and worked the bars at night and taught skiing days.

All was fine until 1990, when I blew my back out and had to change fields to a more sedentary one, so I decided to go back to school nights while working days.

Although this was extremely trying for myself and family, I stuck it out until 1999. By that time, I had earned a Bachelor's in accounting, my MBA and passed the CPA exam.
I now am a self-employed CPA, with a small office in VT.

My point is, I would not have enjoyed going to school as a normal student (part-time work, live on campus, etc, etc), but did enjoy night school while working full time, especially the interaction with other adults in the same boat as me. The profs were outstanding and easy to learn from (95% of them, anyway).

It sounds like you don't like your learning environment, which is not the same as hating school. If you are interested in your major, maybe consider changing your method of learning??

Sorry for the long-windedness, but thought the context would help.

One of my favorite sayings is:"If you can't raise the bridge, lower the river". You have options- explore them.

I've heard this kind of complaint from students before, and I have little patience with it.

If the material is so trivial that it can be mastered without the guidance of an expert, then do it. Study it thoroughly, come to class, and run rings around your professor. Go to professional meetings and dazzle 'em with the depth and breadth of your self-taught knowledge.

I have never met a student in college who knew more about the subject I was teaching than I did. Some who were smarter, sure, but none who had exercised the discipline on their own to demonstrate real knowledge of the material. I've also run into a few who had deluded themselves into thinking they knew more than any of their professors...but it never took more than a minute's probing to find out how shallow their knowledge really was.

And boy, have I met a lot of people who dropped out of college who tell me it was because they were too smart for it, and had better things to do with their life. They tend to be arrogantly ignorant, absolutely convinced that they know more than any graduate, yet more often than not, they are superficial and uninformed and mistake stubbornness for knowledge.

PZ Myers: Very tactful. Way to win friends and influence people. Hell, I agree with you, and I want to give you a smack on the head.

IB Bill: truth always hurts and no one likes it. Makes the world interesting though when there actually are people who DON'T beat around the bush

PZ Myers: I had just one of those kinds in my class.
Needless to say, he didn't do well because he thought himself better than his classmates and ultimately he wasn't - just too stubborn to take the 'easy' knowledge and apply it.
Too bad, because he was 'smart enough' to know better-one would think.

IB Bill,

>>A Roman general once rebutted a junior officer who pointed to his experience to justify a promotion: "Those donkeys over there have seen twice as many battles as you. Yet they're still donkeys."

Ain't that the truth. I'm an employer and I'm paying good wages and benefits. I'm going to hire someone. I'll hire the guy with the degree if I can because the odds of getting a donkey just might be smaller. That might not be the case but I certainly think it is.

Add my name to the list of the school haters. And, if I hear one more body of hormones dressed in pants with her tummy showing having a conversation where the word "like" is used every other word, you may just have to visit me in prison.

If college is supposed to be teaching English, grammar, thought, etc--it certainly isn't reaching these children/young adults. Ugh.

Chalk me up as another school-hater...until I found this comment and thread, I thought I was alone. Just goes to show what hanging round all those "hard-working immigrant parents who value education" does to you. Yeeesh!
I learned more through desultory reading in public and university libraries than I ever did in classrooms.

Having given Dean some snarky comfort above, I feel obliged to add that my own college experience was fantastic. My Japanese teachers rocked--I've sometimes spoken to old people here who have practically cried because I learned to speak more politely than their own grandchildren. Since I was a comp. lit. major, I had two mentors. My Japan-side advisor was the good kind of stereotypical professor: sober, magisterial, answered every question with, "There are a few books (all published before 1960) I think you should read." My English-side advisor was a Foucauldian feminist, but she didn't object when I wanted to quote Camille Paglia or the New Critics. I had maybe one too-cool-for-you professor and one TA who couldn't speak English out of four years of courses. In the few lecture classes I took, the TA's worked hard to give worthwhile comments on papers and to make their little recitation sections enhance the lectures and readings, and the exams were usually as demanding as you'd hope. Maybe I was just lucky, and I know that in the ten years I've been out of school, a lot has gotten worse. But still, while I'm the furthest thing imaginable from the alumni club type, I think of my college with nothing but affection.

Bill: Actually Bill, I'd have to say that, for me, most of my learning comes through books and through figuring things out for myself. Almost all of my best learning experiences in school have been when teachers have allowed me to do that, and not forced me into classroom participation and similar activities.

Like I said, many of my college classes, I merely sit in class and tune out the teacher and do the homework. I do better that way. Almost every real-world skill I have I've learned that way.

PZ: You have "never" met a student who knew more about a subject you were teaching than you did? Hoo boy. You illustrate perfectly why higher education is increasingly getting a contemptible reputation. If you lack the basic humility to acknowledge that a student just might have more knowledge and experience in a subject area than you do, you really must be a truly lousy instructor. Unfortunately for me, I've met plenty like you. You're one of the reasons I hate school so much--but I'm quite certain you don't care, either.

Same goes for you "observer." If you can't tell the difference between a blowhard and someone who actually is highly knowledgeable and experienced, and lack the humility to acknowledge that both types exist, then you're probably a lousy teacher. Truth hurts, don't it?

By the way, I would like to repeat an observation I've made elsewhere:

When a student with a 3.92 GPA who is a year from graduation can tell you point blank that he has learned nothing at all from you, you would think this would cause a crisis of conscience for any teacher who sees it as his job to pass on knowledge. It would certainly bother me.

When peoplel who actually have graduated from your university, with excellent GPAs, have actually obtained the degree, and still view the degree with contempt and state flatly that they learned nothing, you would think that would cause a crisis of conscience for professional teachers.

That it does not, that teachers would react angrily and blame the student for this, speaks volumes to me about what higher education is really all about: getting the tuition money and jumping the students through hoops, and nothing more.

When two teachers will actually sit and say with glee that they have "never" met a student who knew a subject better than they do, which is easily the most arrogant and condescending thing I've seen said in this entire thread, I see absolute vindication of my point of view.

Will good old PZ and Observer change their minds if I graduate with honors, and my opinion doesn't change one whit? Because I will, you know, and my opinion is unlikely to change. But I'm sure they'll find some way of dismissing my point of view too.

Funny thing? I know people with PhDs who don't much disagree with me. Think that matters to PZ or Observer? Doubt it. Truth can't hurt 'em, because they're immune to it, apparently.

Why don't we just change the term "student" to "supplicant?" I'm sure it would make them happy.

Oh, by the way, for the record? In most of my classes, a majority of students are in their 30s and 40s.

Not that it matters. It really doesn't matter. But since the question was asked, I thought I would point it out.

My major is in I.T. Should I pick another one? I suppose. Since I will probably go on to some graduate degree, I may switch majors. I increasingly believe that what I would most like to be is a college professor. I've seen so many lousy and stupid and arrogant and thoughtless ones, it's a job I know I could do and enjoy.

I actually care about imparting knowledge, you see.

Hey Dean!

Of course those two types exist and more than that to boot.
Your particular rant gives nothing substantive to understand why the hell you aren't learning anything.
I doubt very much you are the student who thinks he knows too much but is too stubborn.....and so on.
If your classmates are the majority of 30 to 40 year olds - are they all not learning anything either? With a majority like that, I'd think that you might ALL know a bit about organizing and taking it to the top.

I don't disagree with you. Get that straight.
I've been on both sides. I finished my undergrad ASAP because my 'peers' could no longer offer anything challenging and sitting in a class listening to the instructor teach to the rest who were too lazy to give it their all tried my patience.
As an instructor - I can't tell you how disappointing it is to teach these days. Something about awards for the sheer accomplishment of being born comes to mind and the absolute absurdity of carrying this on into the university.
I'm no hand holder for adults -18 or otherwise and I'm hard pressed to lower my expectations to accommodate the unprepared.
I had 'smart' students who didn't work. They carried on good conversations but never followed through with work. I had 'smart' students who worked hard all the way through. I had 'smart' students who were there to party cuz face it, they were away from home. Hell, they're all smart, all trying to work the system for their gain. Problem for my students was that they never could figure out what hoops they were supposed to jump through. That was because I didn't have any save for the ones they made for themselves. If you don't know what I mean by that, I'll say this: I'm in visual communication and there is no step 1, 2, 3, subject, content, 1,2,3. No lock step to get by, hence no hoops. The truly smart ones understood this.

There's a huge problem in education especially when colleges are offereing remedial english and math classes for a large portion of the student body. If they can't read, they can't write, they can't listen and understand.

Yes there's a problem. I might suggest starting with the bean counters in the adminstration and then the nanny types who think that everyone has to succeed with As and Bs and then the parents who threaten law suits if Johnny drinks too much and gets a C and jeopoardizes his chances for grad school. It's a great recipe for disaster and its been going on for 20 years. We're just hitting the tip of the iceberg.

Face it, you're over qualified and no one's going to give you a degree because of it.
As I said before - caught between a rock and hard place.
Go raise a stink on campus and then think about teaching at the K-12 level cuz the way I see it - ya ain't gonna change too much too fast when the majority coming in are not prepared.

You might think you've found your villains to castigate here but you're wrong. There are real problems in this brave new world of diploma mills. You might find that should an instructor actually raise the level of discourse in class, the tiniest minority of the ignorant will raise hell and heaven help you if you're just an adjunct. [all part of the same problems in the university approach to education]

All you've done is rant about your 'feelings' on the issue of your being in a school that's not teaching you anything.
So sue them for breach of contract.
Or get out and make that debt worth it somewhere else.
Why pay for something that isn't working?
You wouldn't buy a car that has no wheels would you?

and I'm talking to you as someone who has a terminal degree that has gotten me nowhere. Okay?

Okay, Observer. That's all fair enough. Let me just point out: I was ranting. It was meant to be a rant, because I'm frustrated!

Do you know what I think the actual problem is? We as a society have made two or three bad choices about higher education. Those bad choices are continuing to cause problems, and feeding upon themselves.

First, you are absolutely right that too many of our K-12 schools are not teaching to the level that they should.

Second, too many people are getting college degrees that don't honestly need them, but employers are demanding them anyway.

Third, employers are demanding them because they can no longer assume that a High School diploma is proof of much of anything.

#3 leads back to #1 which leads to #2 which leads to #3 which.....

Now, add on to this, the fact that we as a society, and government in particular, has decided that the way to success is through a college degree. So instead of doing more to fix what's wrong at the lower levels, our politicians just brag about how they're making it possible for more and more people to go to college.

Do you know what I honestly think? Perhaps 10% of the population really needs a college degree, and perhaps a third of that 10% needs grad degrees.

An undergrad degree should, SHOULD, have one of two purposes. Either:

A) To prepare you for a grad degree in a specific, difficult profession, such as law or medicine or some form of research.

B) To give a well-rounded, liberal smattering of understanding of a wide variety of subjects, to make a more well-rounded citizen.

All of that is somewhat implicit in the system now, but we've lost our focus.

Other problems I see is that we have lost the focus on knowledge and become focused instead on process and grades. To give the most infuriating example, to me:

I have many years of experience in computer networking. I have multiple certifications in it. I used to work as a professional trainer on the subject, and was one of the best in the state of Michigan in a very large training organization. I took a class in basic--very basic--networking, and even got up and taught part of the class at the instructor's behest. More than once, I found errors in test questions he formulated, and helped him correct them. Got a B in his class anyway. Why? I got sick and missed class one day, and he didn't accept late assignments so I didn't get that week's homework in on time.

Now you may wish to shrug and say "them's the breaks." Me, I look at it and say, "here is proof positive that this guy neither cares about the knowledge level of his students nor whether his students have learned, he cares only about the process."

Universities ought to be more open to students who learn by non-traditional methods. Community colleges, not surprisingly, usually are, but 4-year universities are not. Every professional programmer who's gone back to school that I've encountered gets this kind of frustration; he may have written hundreds of thousands of lines of code in C, but the college FORCES him to sit through classes on "Beginning C programming," and they just don't give a damn that he doesn't need to be there jumping through these hoops.

I myself have worked as a professional writer and editor. Did the university let me skip classes on basic composition? Nooooooooooooooooo. Why? Because it was a requirement, period, end of story.

These sorts of things--and I can point to many other examples--are a huge frustration, especially for the returning adult. Yet the universities are clearly afraid, in too many cases, to let students "get away with" skipping classes they don't need.

It is getting better. I come across some teachers who hate the idea of internet classes and fight them tooth and nail, but the universities are doing them anyway, and for many students who hate sitting in a traditional classroom (like I do) thrive on them. (The only reason I don't take them is because, perversely, they cost more and I can't afford it.)

Quite often, as a returning adult, I wish I could have teachers who would let me walk in, take the midterm and the final exam and, if I get an A on both, would not require any further course work from me. Yet most are highly resistant to any such thinking.

I recently took a class in which I was forced to take a 30 minute examination on the basic use of Windows--how to copy files, run programs, restart the computer. I've got 20 years of experience, and you're going to put me through this? But no, there's no choice, no choice, you must simply grin and bear it because, according to the instructor, "there's no other way to measure it." (Yes there is. You just don't want to.)

I had one instructor who was shocked to find a student finishing a homework assignment due that night. The student was finishing it during break, and planned to turn it in at the end. The instructor was scandalized, scandalized! and refused to accept the assignment, marking it as "late" and emphasizing to the whole class that if an assignment was not finished at the beginning of class, it would not be accepted. That student got a 0 on a perfectly valid assignment because she was finishing it up during a break in the middle of class!

I'm sorry man. That's not a teacher who gives a damn about learning. She as an instructor was not in any way inconvenienced. She simply thought homework assignments "should" be done by a certain time, and if they weren't, then the student got a 0. Ridiculous. A student pays damn near a thousand dollars to be in that classroom, and this is how you treat them?

We've forgotten that it's about knowledge, and too often have even forgotten what college is for.

I don't know what the solution is, to be honest.

I'm with you -I don't know the answer either.
What I can tell you that is another downside outside of the university and reguritating, cascading into the real world - I'm self-employed and have been for 20+ years. In the last few years, I have an increasing number of clients who think they are asking good questions about my product and services. Little do they seem to know that they are just using buzz words. So their seemingly knowledgeable questions are answered with the 'deep into technology' observation that their question ultimately demands. Their questions are serious and I treat them as such. but-
Guess what? They really didn't even understand their own questions. I always believed an educated consumer is a good consumer. I can't even educate my clients anymore. Their eyes glaze over and they either shut down or feel intimidated or they just don't care. And I'm really pretty much a softy when it comes to my bread and butter folks. Even my husband thinks I love them more than him. :) So I don't think it's me anymore.
I'm going to give up the downward spiral fight to make less money than I made 5 years ago and try to find some 'real' work where I can probably make more than I've made the last 5 years combined and it's killing me. I love my profession.

And you think school is tough. These people will be running the government [the asylum] in your retirement and mine. It's going to be a bumpy ride. Should be fun. Be Amish.

A couple of observations

1. There are on-line programs that are accredited at brick and mortar universities. In the US University of Phoenix is probably the biggest, the entire UK is going this route with even Cambridge and Oxford degrees available online. If you are having trouble with traditional university style programs, this might be something that works for you. It has helped me.

2. If you hate current teaching styles and University structures while you love teaching and you have an entrepreneurial spirit why not look into creating your own university and doing it better? Start things up, offer reduced tuition until you get certified by one of the relevant cert boards, and go, go, go. If your complaints are legitimate and you have a method that is superior, you could be saving countless generations of future students from your frustrated fate.

observer said: "There's a huge problem in education especially when colleges are offereing remedial english and math classes for a large portion of the student body. If they can't read, they can't write, they can't listen and understand."

Not to wander off topic, but you're so right. Community colleges all across the country are simply running out of space in their remedial programs. These are generally intelligent kids who've simply been betrayed by their schools.

However galling college might be, at least you can opt out. Being forced to sit through four years of mandatory HS non-education must be a miserable experience.

Dean:
One of the reasons I completed my degree so fast was the school's acceptance of College Level Examination Program (CLEP) tests. In essence, you take a two hour test, and if you pass, you get 4-8 undergrad credits. I earned a total of 60 credits through these tests. (English grammar, Humanities, Accounting, and several others that escape my memory at this time)In one day, I took two tests and earned 16 credits!! Each test cost about $40, which was a lot less than the $450-550 cost of a regular 4 credit course- 13 classes of about 3.5 hours each. They also offered a course called "Assessment of Prior Learning". It was possible to earn 20-24 credits while paying for 4.

Alternatives are out there (along with the Truth). You just have to look for them.

“Man I hate school.”

Now is a great time to throw that one overboard. How many years have you been pulling that wagon around ?

If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.

Marcus Aurelius

We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.

Viktor Frankl

The meaning of things lies not in the things themselves but in our attitude towards them.

Antoine de Saint-Exupery

If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude. Don't complain.

Maya Angelou

A chip on the shoulder is too heavy a piece of baggage to carry through life.

John Hancock

Everything can be taken from a man but ... the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.

Victor Frankl

You can't always control the wind, but you can control your sails.

Anthony Robbins

All blame is a waste of time. No matter how much fault you find with another, and regardless of how much you blame him, it will not change you. The only thing blame does is to keep the focus off you when you are looking for external reasons to explain your unhappiness or frustration. You may succeed in making another feel guilty about something by blaming him, but you won't succeed in changing whatever it is about YOU that is making you unhappy.

Wayne Dyer

Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude…from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude.

Thomas Jefferson

Obey the nature of things, and you will walk freely and undisturbed. When thought is in bondage , the truth is hidden, for everything is murky and unclear, and the burdensome practice of judging brings annoyance and weariness.

Sosan

The mind will be at ease , when one realizes that a change in attitude is the same place something external has imposed itself on your COMFORT zone. In fact, it is the only point at which a change of attitude can be made.

One thing for sure, the world is not going to make the adjustment.

I probably won't add anything of significance.

but here are some of my thoughts.

if you are already an expert in a topic, don't expect to learn more about that topic in a bachelor's degree other than trivia or on occasion systematization of the topic.

Because in a u.s. bachelor's degree you have about 1/2 of it going to core classes, which are generally liberal arts classes, which generally don't teach expertise in the bachelors level. They teach necessary skills such as critical thinking, reading, writing, scientific literacy, mathematical skills, and other traditional topics related to the quadrivia and trivia . Then you have your major.... in which probably 2/3 of the material is introductory of some sort or another, and in that major you might if you are lucky get 1/3 of your classes actually dealing with something that could not be considered 'of historic interest', such as current research and current methods. However, don't discount the merit of the 2/3's because without it, most people who start in the major can't even talk intelligently about the 1/3.

There is a different sort of learning going on at all times, which is not learning the facts which you think you should learn, but learning the facts as they are given. It is learning of the discipline, learning what computer science is, learning what philosophy is, learning what history is, and in fact this learning sets out what those 'will be' for some time to come also. You are learning what will be expected of you should you finish the degree, but not what is expected of you in the workforce, that is something for training academies to do, this is a university or college, which may or may not deal in training a person for work depending on its tradition.

In short, what people are doing is building the foundations for the future, by building an ongoing institution in which learning occurs at many levels and for many reasons. Most of those reasons are probably not targetted toward someone that already is an expert in the area they are studying.

Can't agree with you more. I was miserable in school. Hated it. Burned through it as fast as I could. Glad it's over. Got my degree, looks good on a resume, learned a bit.

My problem is I don't learn well in self-study, really, so I'm back in school for another degree.

But college girls - yum.

Terry

That is exactly correct. I have never met a student who knew more about a subject I was teaching than I did. Why is that surprising? 4 years as an undergrad, 5 as a grad, 8 years in two postdocs, and 11 years as a professor counts for something. All of that time was spent learning this material. And I'll tell you who is "getting a contemptible reputation": snot-nosed students who think they know it all when they walk in the door, and have the gall to whine that they are paying the professor to teach them.

I do think that you are right to complain that you don't feel you've learned anything, but are getting good grades. Professors ought to be more willing to fail students. It sounds like you are just going through the motions, doing only what it takes to get the grade and not to learn, and if that is true, you are right: you shouldn't be passing your courses.

Would you stop complaining if you got a string of "F"s, though? Somehow, I doubt it.

I'm a comp sci grad student at a university, and I have to agree with Dean - as far as humanities go. I gave up on that half of the university as an undergrad because most of the classes did not teach me anything or tried to teach me things that I knew were incorrect (maybe I shouldn't have read all those books in high school). It was disappointing because I love history and anthropology, so I just made a decision to learn that stuff on my own. However, when it came to math and comp sci, I don't think I could have learned all of the skills I needed (at least in a *mere* 4 years) without formal instruction. Which brings me to another point - Dean, it sounds like you belong in Comp Sci and not I.T. They're marketed as the same by colleges, but (as far as I can tell) I.T. is mostly about using/administrating systems and learning programming languages. Comp sci teaches you the mathematical foundation of all those systems, how the theory behind them progressed, and how to make new things. Not much emphasis is placed on how to use programs or how to program in specific languages because students are generally assumed to be smart enough to figure that out pretty quickly on their own. And despite being theoretical, it is very practical because you build up a bag of tricks/algorithms for coding you do in the real world. (An example: it may seem pointless to learn how to write your own operating system from scratch, but the same algorithms that schedule proccesses for the CPU lightning fast are now used to run on-line tournament systems). Plus something you'll consider a plus: in my experience, professors not only allow but often encourage capable students to skip intro classes.

Haven't been around in a while...

I see that I'm sort of resentful wanna-bee that can't stand that some people don't "need' college.

I forgot that I'm inhabiting Dean's World, and (as the saying goes) "[I'm] just living in it."

Yes, Dean, I resent the brilliant gods (such as yourself) who don't need school. I suspect it's all a Zionist/Conservative/neocon plot; everything else is.

I concede. You have more energy to spend on this than I do. You're right. You are, in fact, Right About Everything, yes? And even if you aren't, you'll spend so much time wearing someone down on this that they'll give in just to get some peace an quiet.

I hearby and offically admit that Dean knows more about everything than I ever will. Hallowed be His Name.