Is technical education getting too...technical?

[GGT]

The point isn't really to wash people out on purpose, the point is that universities here are the highest level of education, and the level is kept high. Therefore, you also need it to be hard. I'm against driving people out, do I'm all for changes that keep people from dropping out unnecessarily. On the other hand, you cannot do that by dumbing down, that'd be defeating the entire purpose. Weeding out those who aren't up for it isn't a bad thing! Not everybody who is interested is cut out for it, after all. Better to lose then quickly, for all sides. The issue is driving away those that are capable, but scared away in the beginning.

Also, loki, in 'your system', there seems to be no lack of 'ridiculous beliefs' or 'idiotic political outcomes, so there you go.

Probably why euro nations like Finland, Sweden, Norway and Netherlands have higher esteem for teachers, and pay them accordingly. Or why nations like Germany have higher esteem for students studying The Trades, and pay them accordingly after graduation.

The US is messed up this way. We claim to value education, but don't attract the best teachers or pay them as top professionals. We throw money at the problems and wonder why we're still lagging in global comparisons (teachers and students).

We have great community and trade schools, but have managed to turn students away from that avenue, hyping the notion that it's best to have a career that starts with a BA or BS in designated fields, instead of getting an education that can lead to a job like plumbing or truck driving or welding.

[Loki]

Loki, your premise that Calculus is hard is incorrect. It can be taught in such a way as to confuse people. Even Algebra can be taught both ways; I've seen my fellow students become totally confused because of the way the teacher presented topics.

I would, however, like someone to teach a course on propositional calculus that's not intended for robots. I had to try to learn this in a databases course over the course of a about one week. It was a total disaster, at least for me. It seemed that everyone else understood, and not just understood, but were able to solve problems with complex logic statements and were able to translate one form of logic to another without skipping a beat. They were all useless robots.

Perhaps the problem is with you and not with everyone else.

Does that mean university for everyone or what?

I've said it here before that I think everyone should get at least a 2-year college education.

[agamemnus]

Perhaps the problem is with you and not with everyone else.

No, it's not with me...

Perhaps; have you taken a course that teaches propositional calculus in 2 weeks and then forces you to become a robot translator? It's the easiest way to teach (just blabber the rules during class and expect everyone to memorize them), but unless you have students who all learn like robot drones, it's not the easiest or best way to learn.

[Loki]

And yet everyone else managed just fine...clearly it was doable.

[agamemnus]

No, they were robot drones. I'm serious. ALSO, it was not really everyone else... maybe 90%, from the test scores, I guess.

[Veldan Rath]

I've said it here before that I think everyone should get at least a 2-year college education.

LOL

Wait, you're serious?

Loki we need to get High School graduate rates up AND increase the value of that diploma. If more kids had a decent and USEFUL High School education then some may not need to college, and at the very least, there might not be the need to have so many redo classes for Freshmen.

[Loki]

LOL

Wait, you're serious?

Loki we need to get High School graduate rates up AND increase the value of that diploma. If more kids had a decent and USEFUL High School education then some may not need to college, and at the very least, there might not be the need to have so many redo classes for Freshmen.

Is the goal to increase the value of a piece of paper or to actually produce informed and productive citizens?

[Veldan Rath]

Is the goal to increase the value of a piece of paper or to actually produce informed and productive citizens?

Wow...please reread my post.

That was the point I was making.

[Ominous Gamer]

Is the goal to increase the value of a piece of paper or to actually produce informed and productive citizens?

You've ignored like, everything, thats been said in the page 2 pages. What is with you and this belief that, worldwide, properly educated high school aged humans are incapable of being informed and productive?

[Loki]

Wow...please reread my post.

That was the point I was making.

You've ignored like, everything, thats been said in the page 2 pages. What is with you and this belief that, worldwide, properly educated high school aged humans are incapable of being informed and productive?

I don't think you two understand how the human mind works or that the level of complexity that a 14-year-old child understands is vastly different to that understood by a 16-year-old or an 18-year-old. The reality is that you can't even hope to teach a 16-year-old the kind of concepts that would make them an informed citizen. Sure, you can have them memorize a bunch of facts about how the government or science works, but anything beyond that is simply asking too much.

I've spent enough time in Britain, where specialization hits at 16, and history isn't mandatory after 12 (might be 14) to see what kind of one-dimensional people a highly specialized education system produces. You might like having people who major in 19th century English politics and know nothing about the politics of other countries, let alone anything about science, but I don't.

[Ominous Gamer]

You understand high school in the states is 4 years long right? So, we actually are reaching those 16-18 year olds, in high school, and teaching them such concepts. As demenstrated by the AP and dual enrollment classes, taken in high school, that qualify as replacements for classes taken during those first 2 years of college, for those same 17-20 year olds.

There isn't some across the board, magical, age that people reach, where they all of sudden start understanding complex problems.

[Loki]

You understand high school in the states is 4 years long right? So, we actually are reaching those 16-18 year olds, in high school, and teaching them such concepts. As demenstrated by the AP and dual enrollment classes, in high school, that qualify as replacements for the 2 years of college you, for those 17-20 year olds, you somehow think is that magical time of learning to be an adult

And how many people end up taking AP classes (or are even capable of taking them if pushed)? You want to create a two-class system, where one class is knowledgeable, using that knowledge to perpetuate its economic and political advantages, while the other spends most of its life working in McDonald's (or a good union job!)? Oh wait, that's the system you always rail against.

[Ominous Gamer]

and now your confusing personal ability with a properly laid out educational environment.
Which is what Veldan was getting at, and you totally missed.

Seriously, use those college only skills you picked up, and think long and hard before you answer your own question:

And how many people end up taking AP classes (or are even capable of taking them if pushed)?

[Loki]

And you're engaging in wishful thinking. You will never change the culture and education system of the US by enough to make sure that a vast majority of students come out of high school being fully informed and capable of critical thinking. So you either pretend that your utopia already exists, and therefore consign half the population to idiocy, or you require more schooling for everyone, to improve the lowest common denominator.

[Ominous Gamer]

and now you're confusing more with better

[Loki]

And now you're back to your usual style of dodging the argument. Hope you feel good about supporting a system that creates the inequality you supposedly oppose. But at least you can feel good about yourself by attacking the fat cats!!!1!

[Aimless]

Out of curiosity, Loki, do you think those two years of college in which people develop political literacy etc should be paid for by the [state or federal] gummint? Just trying to get a better idea of what you meant with "should get" ("should strive to obtain" or "should receive").

[Veldan Rath]

I don't think you two understand how the human mind works or that the level of complexity that a 14-year-old child understands is vastly different to that understood by a 16-year-old or an 18-year-old. The reality is that you can't even hope to teach a 16-year-old the kind of concepts that would make them an informed citizen. Sure, you can have them memorize a bunch of facts about how the government or science works, but anything beyond that is simply asking too much.

I've spent enough time in Britain, where specialization hits at 16, and history isn't mandatory after 12 (might be 14) to see what kind of one-dimensional people a highly specialized education system produces. You might like having people who major in 19th century English politics and know nothing about the politics of other countries, let alone anything about science, but I don't.

So you don't want to improve high school education in the US?

See what I just did there?

[Loki]

Out of curiosity, Loki, do you think those two years of college in which people develop political literacy etc should be paid for by the [state or federal] gummint? Just trying to get a better idea of what you meant with "should get" ("should strive to obtain" or "should receive").

I like the British system, where university costs money, but you only have to pay it after you have a job paying you an x amount of money.

So you don't want to improve high school education in the US?

See what I just did there?

And my point is that you can't improve high school education enough to come anywhere near to fixing the problem.

[Ominous Gamer]

I can't believe I missed what Loki tried to pull off He completely changed the goal posts of the conversation. Starts out with Ness, trying to argue something about high school students worldwide somehow not being capable of learning critical thinking skills at 17-18, but without issue at 19 years old. To turning this into a result of a failing and unfixable problem in US schools.

So which is it, are 14-18 year olds worldwide not capable of learning critical thinking skills (cause I would love to see some research showing high school seniors somehow being less capable than college freshmen) , or is the problem in the learning environment in the US, and thats clouding Loki's perception of the conversation?

and can you answer that without insults and offtopic bullshit?

[Nessus]

Seeking to wash people out is an entirely different issue from what people are getting educated in. Whether a particular education should be well-rounded or not is one issue, whether a, say medical program, should be seeking to drive out people interested in that education because they wouldn't be able to hack a surgical residency is a different topic. I mentioned both in my post as an illustration of how I didn't think the differences in perspective were cultural. Illusions certainly isn't a representative of Finnish *or Dutch* culture and pedagogy and he seems to feel the same way you do on the latter topic.

I am not exactly sure how Illusions' views affect the validity of mine.

[Nessus]

*shrugs* It may be just be an expression that I value knowledge for knowledge's sake, but it seems to me that the purpose of an educational institute is to teach and educate more than it is to make certain people are "prepared" for a specific job. Most education, even technical education, can be put to diverse uses, not just the "obvious" use a majority of those who get it use it for. Nessus talked about how journalists should go get a journalism degree, but I know that I get driven nuts by the poor quality of reporting because journalists don't understand the topics they're disseminating. We'd be better off if people who had significant science education were the ones doing most of the writing about it. A while ago I recall we talked about STEM managers who, even if they couldn't hack doing the real work themselves were still an improvement over the many, many managers just working off an MBA. And then there's the educational field itself. The weeding you're talking about seems to me to be something better left for accreditation programs, probationary periods, and the like.

Since you're usually not dishonest, nor are you dim, I am baffled by this response. The way you portray what was said is simply incomprehensible. It's a bit of a false dichotomy to claim that either people aspiring to be journalists have to idle through a useless bachelor's in humanities with classes on Russian fairy tales and chemistry thrown in for good measure, or we can't have journos dedicated to a single field with edumacation therein.

[Nessus]

LOL

Wait, you're serious?

Loki we need to get High School graduate rates up AND increase the value of that diploma. If more kids had a decent and USEFUL High School education then some may not need to college, and at the very least, there might not be the need to have so many redo classes for Freshmen.

I can't remember the previous time we agreed on something. Which one of us has to sprinkle ash on oneself again?

[Nessus]

I don't think you two understand how the human mind works or that the level of complexity that a 14-year-old child understands is vastly different to that understood by a 16-year-old or an 18-year-old. The reality is that you can't even hope to teach a 16-year-old the kind of concepts that would make them an informed citizen. Sure, you can have them memorize a bunch of facts about how the government or science works, but anything beyond that is simply asking too much.

Show us your work, why don't'cha?

[Veldan Rath]

I can't remember the previous time we agreed on something. Which one of us has to sprinkle ash on oneself again?

Since we are both atheists how bout we skip the voodoo and have a drink?

[Nessus]

It's a deal!

[GGT]

I can't believe I missed what Loki tried to pull off He completely changed the goal posts of the conversation. Starts out with Ness, trying to argue something about high school students worldwide somehow not being capable of learning critical thinking skills at 17-18, but without issue at 19 years old. To turning this into a result of a failing and unfixable problem in US schools.

So which is it, are 14-18 year olds worldwide not capable of learning critical thinking skills (cause I would love to see some research showing high school seniors somehow being less capable than college freshmen) , or is the problem in the learning environment in the US, and thats clouding Loki's perception of the conversation?

and can you answer that without insults and offtopic bullshit?

Instead of "everyone" having a two year college degree, maybe we should start education early (before age five) and extend HS a bit longer. Whether that means no summers off for K-12, or taking 14 full years to complete....it seems clear that we're trying to cram too much information into kids' heads, in too short a time. It's not as simple as the 3R's anymore. World History and geo-political changes of the 20th century alone are chock-full of important things to learn. And math has expanded so fast that even elementary kids are doing Algebra I was learning in JHS and HS [what my parents used to call "new math", when they couldn't help with my homework--decades ago :eek]

The first five years are the building blocks, though. I wouldn't mind seeing mandatory pre-school and kindergarten, and/or having Day Care facilities operate more like early-learning schools instead of the babysitting facilities that are predominant now (in the US).

[Loki]

Ignoring the fact that most children don't have the cognitive skills to understand complex information at a younger age.

[GGT]

Ignoring the fact that most children don't have the cognitive skills to understand complex information at a younger age.

You're the one ignoring behavioral science. The first five years are crucial to the developing mind. The goal isn't to get toddlers to "understand complex information", but to have proper nutrition, social stimulation, and a pro-learning environment that is the foundation for the rest of their lives.

[Loki]

How this is relevant to what anyone else said in this thread is beyond me. Please stop responding to yourself and start responding to the people you quote.