Education Discussion

[NorthSideSox72]

My education at Oswego rocked. I was lucky to be taught by well-paid teachers that liked their jobs, had a ton of choices of AP classes, and really just got a good education. For a while I was not so convinced of that, because I went to college with some kids that went to top notch private schools who were head and shoulders above the rest of us.

 

Districts that can afford to pay top salaries are going to be getting the best teachers. And god bless Teach for America, but the neediest kids are getting people with the least qualifications. And that sucks.

 

Did you go to New Trier? Oswego had a similar ranking stuff. Remedial, regular, honors, AP. It was a good program. But it requires additional funding, so I think size alone isn't going to get you all the levels.

 

McNair is actually a college program. You can nominate minority or first generation college students for additional mentoring scholarly opportunities. It's a cool opportunity.

Agreed on teachers and salary, it will end up that way. But I actually like the Teach for America program in general - I think it might work better if those teachers were at higher level schools though (as you indicate).

 

Yes, went to New Trier.

 

My brother-in-law's wife (not sure what that makes her) teaches in the IB program in the Chicago Public Schools. Its a great opportunity to offer kids who are achievement-oriented, but it is highly confined by the restrictions of the funding grants. Programs like that need to allow teachers a lot more latitude.

 

[Heads22]

Des Moines East was a sobering experience for me....being placed in an eleventh grade social studies classroom where a "B" student could not identify Wisconsin on a map.

 

Going into secondary education.....we have to help kids like that, but it's a struggle when you're so far behind. Half of the battle in curriculum, it seems, is pacing. Teachers are expected to get through a certain amount of material, but when they start falling behind (which will happen), it just complicates things.

 

You've got students coming in that aren't filling Maslow's basic needs. Others that aren't getting challenged. Others that don't want to be there. And that's just one row in one classroom.

[Texsox]

I think that there needs to be a standardization in some areas, but not in others.

 

Math is pretty black and white. Science? I think standardization goes too far. History's history - although the political slant that is taught troubles me because kids aren't taught to see both sides of an issue and then learn to choose for themselves.

 

I think standardization is good for curriculum, NOT how it's taught. It's like reading a college course guide. In this class, you will learn, XYZ. How it's taught should be left to the teacher to teach to his/her strengths. However, how much of that has the teacher been taught?

 

Standardization is coming via the free market. There are fewer and fewer textbook offerings and of those, Texas and California, via legal requirements, are setting the tone for the rest of the country.

[mr_genius]

I don't know where you got the impression that I meant art history should be what was pushed. Our engineering educations at American universities are a more liberal education than in Europe with all the upper level electives and gen eds needed.

 

most students in an engineering program that I knew in college thought these classes were a joke. no offense.

[Texsox]

most students in an engineering program that I knew in college thought these classes were a joke. no offense.

 

They are a joke if the person does not value the subject.

[NorthSideSox72]

most students in an engineering program that I knew in college thought these classes were a joke. no offense.

Funny thing about that... I work in financial technology, and have managed a fair number of tech professionals. And I can tell you without a doubt, that even for people in a highly technically specialized field, the success rates are much higher for those who can communicate effectively and think dynamically outside the world of bits and bytes. Its just much harder to get a job, keep a job, and advance, if you are a purely technical person who lacks people skills and some level of emotional intelligence.

 

That doesn't mean that taking a few gen ed classes in college will solve that issue, but it does make for a more well-rounded and world-savvy person (unless the school and classes are of very poor quality), and that definitely ties out to those necessary non-technical skills.

 

[mr_genius]

Funny thing about that... I work in financial technology, and have managed a fair number of tech professionals. And I can tell you without a doubt, that even for people in a highly technically specialized field, the success rates are much higher for those who can communicate effectively and think dynamically outside the world of bits and bytes. Its just much harder to get a job, keep a job, and advance, if you are a purely technical person who lacks people skills and some level of emotional intelligence.

 

That doesn't mean that taking a few gen ed classes in college will solve that issue, but it does make for a more well-rounded and world-savvy person (unless the school and classes are of very poor quality), and that definitely ties out to those necessary non-technical skills.

 

That’s true, and I have been working successfully in high levels of technology for 10 + years so I don't really need a lecture on this. The truth is a lot of these classes aren't geared towards critical thinking, rather agreeing with a professor’s opinion on a subject.

 

I really don't have a problem with students having to take before mentioned classes; I was just giving a different perspective.

 

 

 

Writing and communication is very important to most any professional; this is without question. I enjoyed my English classes very much in college, learning to write a well thought out essay and such is key. I even liked speech class.

Edited January 21, 2009 by mr_genius

[santo=dorf]

I don't know where you got the impression that I meant art history should be what was pushed. Our engineering educations at American universities are a more liberal education than in Europe with all the upper level electives and gen eds needed.

Can you show me a link that compares the two programs?

 

I would've love to skip being FORCED to take a non-western and a western class. I wish I would've been forced to do an internship as an undergrad instead of taking humanities classes. Now as a professional I see how much more an internship benefits the young professional, and like to work with recent grads in fitting in. Today I was asked to help out an intern from Germany next March.

 

I didn't do a summer intership or co-op a semester while in college and kinda regret it.

[santo=dorf]

They are a joke if the person does not value the subject.

I play two instruments and still thought my music 101 course at my junior college wasn't worth taking and my non-western music class at the University was a f***ing joke. The teacher took one lecture to bring someone in to whine about the Chief. Completely unncessary as he was pushing his agenda throughout the semester.

 

These classes have had ZERO impact on my career, but the same can be said for some engineering courses I completed.

[hawksfan61]

Can you show me a link that compares the two programs?

 

I would've love to skip being FORCED to take a non-western and a western class. I wish I would've been forced to do an internship as an undergrad instead of taking humanities classes. Now as a professional I see how much more an internship benefits the young professional, and like to work with recent grads in fitting in. Today I was asked to help out an intern from Germany next March.

 

I didn't do a summer intership or co-op a semester while in college and kinda regret it.

 

Completely agree. I was able to opt out of most humanities/liberal arts courses because I had the credit going in due to AP's, but the ones I did take I would have gladly traded for an internship. Engineering course work, unless you are going in to some sort of research, does not prepare you that well for work in the design/construction industry.

 

Now I certainly don't think liberal arts courses are worthless, but my writing/communications skills were developed in high school and by labs/discussions in college, not by writing a ten page paper on constitutional law.

[mr_genius]

I completely agree on the topic of internships. Not only are they a valuable learning experience, but they can be very important for post graduation job prospects.

[lostfan]

I had an internship at Lucent Technologies in high school and could've held on to that through college but I had a s***ty mentor that basically treated me like an "intern" meaning I did her b**** work. So I lost interest. But I loved that opportunity (although Lucent is no more, I forget what happened to them).

[southsider2k5]

Funny thing about that... I work in financial technology, and have managed a fair number of tech professionals. And I can tell you without a doubt, that even for people in a highly technically specialized field, the success rates are much higher for those who can communicate effectively and think dynamically outside the world of bits and bytes. Its just much harder to get a job, keep a job, and advance, if you are a purely technical person who lacks people skills and some level of emotional intelligence.

 

That doesn't mean that taking a few gen ed classes in college will solve that issue, but it does make for a more well-rounded and world-savvy person (unless the school and classes are of very poor quality), and that definitely ties out to those necessary non-technical skills.

 

They are also able to adjust to a quickly changing 21st century job market. I can attest to that with my LA education, and how many times my job has changed in just 10 years.

[StrangeSox]

Completely agree. I was able to opt out of most humanities/liberal arts courses because I had the credit going in due to AP's, but the ones I did take I would have gladly traded for an internship. Engineering course work, unless you are going in to some sort of research, does not prepare you that well for work in the design/construction industry.

 

Internships are great, but I found that student projects were even better for learning real-world engineering, team work and management skills. I learned a lot about practical engineering on my school's FSAE team. This counted for some general elective courses, too.

 

Some of my humanities classes were useful while some of them were a complete waste of my time and money. The online psych course I took at Joliet Junior College was easier than most high school classes. I have to say that I think most engineers should be required to take more than one English class. I can't tell you how many hours I spent editing lab/ project partners' papers so that they were at least coherent, and its almost as bad with some of the people at my work. Proposals for multi-million dollar contracts get sent out having basic grammar mistakes I learned in high school or earlier.

 

In addition to the MIT courses you can audit (more or less) for free, Standford also offers a similar program online.

http://see.stanford.edu/

Edited January 22, 2009 by StrangeSox

[Texsox]

Interesting.

Forced, free labor to jump start a career called internship = good

Forced, free labor for the money to attend college called community service = bad

 

/carry on

[StrangeSox]

Interesting.

Forced, free labor to jump start a career called internship = good

Forced, free labor for the money to attend college called community service = bad

 

/carry on

 

Free? Engineering interns don't work for free!

[StrangeSox]

Standardization is coming via the free market. There are fewer and fewer textbook offerings and of those, Texas and California, via legal requirements, are setting the tone for the rest of the country.

 

This is very true and there was just a round of hearings this week over new science standards. This is important because it seems as if the majority of the board are creationists, and if they change the Texas standards, it could impact what the rest of the country learns about evolution.

 

http://www.star-telegram.com/legislature/story/1152609.html

 

A pro-science blog documenting the situation:

http://tfnblog.wordpress.com/

 

And another showing a clear case of dishonesty:

http://scienceblogs.com/tfk/2009/01/how_th..._of_ed_misr.php

 

 

 

[southsider2k5]

Standardization is coming via the free market. There are fewer and fewer textbook offerings and of those, Texas and California, via legal requirements, are setting the tone for the rest of the country.

 

I think you have your cause and effect backwards. Standardization is coming because the federal government's requirements are making less and less demand for differing textbooks, because everyone is trying to teach the same things to their kids. As a result, textbook companies are making less variety to reflect the new marketplace.

[NorthSideSox72]

This is very true and there was just a round of hearings this week over new science standards. This is important because it seems as if the majority of the board are creationists, and if they change the Texas standards, it could impact what the rest of the country learns about evolution.

 

http://www.star-telegram.com/legislature/story/1152609.html

 

A pro-science blog documenting the situation:

http://tfnblog.wordpress.com/

 

And another showing a clear case of dishonesty:

http://scienceblogs.com/tfk/2009/01/how_th..._of_ed_misr.php

The textbook discussion is another one that, to me, is a good indicator of where things are going wrong at the SecEd level.

 

Take history for example again. High school students take history classes, taught from dry, rote-fact type books. These textbooks are bereft of perspective or anything interesting at all - just names, dates and events. Its no wonder why most high school kids hate history classes.

 

And yet, look at some of the most popular non-fiction works of recent years. I read a few very good history books last year - John Adams, Andrew Jackson, Team of Rivals, Blood and Thunder. They are much more in-depth, but really get into that interesting, nitty gritty stuff of who people really were (good and bad), and the way things actually worked and felt during those times. They use a person or group of people as a lense, but through that lense you get a much better look into the more complete picture of history. And adults were eating these books up.

 

So, why not teach from books like that in high school? Instead of skimming over the top of history, learning just some boring facts, how about you give them a real idea of what it was like then, and why it was important. They wouldn't learn as many dates or as many people, but I for one think they will get much, much better knowledge of history, AND actually get some of them interested in the topic.

 

For math and some science stuff, this may not be practical. But for many other subject areas, it is very doable, and makes good sense. It also allows you to get our from under the finger of the textbook empire, which has some questionable practices.

 

 

[mr_genius]

Interesting.

Forced, free labor to jump start a career called internship = good

Forced, free labor for the money to attend college called community service = bad

 

/carry on

 

lul

 

free? i got paid for my internship while in college, but i'm the best. internships are good for a number of engineering students.

Edited January 22, 2009 by mr_genius

[Heads22]

I personally can't wait til I student teach, that way I can still pay tuition, rent, etc., but not be able to work at all for any actual money.

[dasox24]

I'm kind of jumping in here on this conversation, but in regards to textbooks, I don't have a problem with the big, stereotypical texts as long as they're supplemented with some extra, more in-depth type reading. I know the kids would hate it and half probably wouldn't do it, but if you can give them some sort of biographical or non-fictional novel that is interesting to read about, I think that would be a great idea. Not sure this would be easy to do, but in a subject like History or Science, I think it would. There definitely have to be some interesting non-fictional stuff about scientific discoveries or something that would interest students more than the typical stuff you learn.

 

(Now, I know I'm in college and we're talking about secondary education mainly, but...) For instance, in my Operations Management class I'm in right now, we have a bulky, boring textbook that sucks to read, but everybody before me has read it and it obviously has to have some good stuff in it. However, we also have a fictional novel that we're supposed to also be reading throughout the semester that deals with a plant manager trying to make the plant more efficient and stop it from losing money. And if he doesn't, the company will close it. I've only read the 1st chapter but I'm interested in it, and it's a good way of explaining such things as the Theory of Constraints without having to read it in textbook form.

[kapkomet]

I'm kind of jumping in here on this conversation, but in regards to textbooks, I don't have a problem with the big, stereotypical texts as long as they're supplemented with some extra, more in-depth type reading. I know the kids would hate it and half probably wouldn't do it, but if you can give them some sort of biographical or non-fictional novel that is interesting to read about, I think that would be a great idea. Not sure this would be easy to do, but in a subject like History or Science, I think it would. There definitely have to be some interesting non-fictional stuff about scientific discoveries or something that would interest students more than the typical stuff you learn.

 

(Now, I know I'm in college and we're talking about secondary education mainly, but...) For instance, in my Operations Management class I'm in right now, we have a bulky, boring textbook that sucks to read, but everybody before me has read it and it obviously has to have some good stuff in it. However, we also have a fictional novel that we're supposed to also be reading throughout the semester that deals with a plant manager trying to make the plant more efficient and stop it from losing money. And if he doesn't, the company will close it. I've only read the 1st chapter but I'm interested in it, and it's a good way of explaining such things as the Theory of Constraints without having to read it in textbook form.

The Goal. Good book.

[santo=dorf]

lul

 

free? i got paid for my internship while in college, but i'm the best. internships are good for a number of engineering students.

I was shocked to find out how much engineering interns get paid. It's more than people with BA in fine arts. Also, those summers count as full work years which allows some more options with your 401k and retirement.

[bmags]

Why are we talking about internships as if they are either or? Most people get internships in the summer or during a semester during college, so I don't think they are missing out.