You raised me this way, now why are you surprised?

That is what I wanted. In high school I tested out of a class that I wouldn't learn anything in (touch typing). The university didn't allow you to do this.


Of course not. However if the actors forced me to see their rendition of a play that I have seen countless times before with other actors, then I probably would.


Maybe, maybe not. The instructor sat at the computer with his back to the class, going through examples step by step that were in the book. He only looked at the class when passing out papers, or for Q&A sessions after he finished each example.

You're being too literal, Nick, and have missed the major point of her post.

I started tuning out here:



This was phrased for maximum shock factor but is it really so bad? Two thirds believe that effort should influence their course grade. Not be the full basis of it or anything -- not that if they try hard they should automatically get an A -- just "influence." As a former college teacher, yes, I included effort in my grading. My husband is currently a college professor and is supposed to take that into account as well. So it just seems kind of axiomatic to me rather than cause for alarm.

The rest of it is along the same lines -- extremist and sloppy. As in, this may even be true but I am not convinced by this article.

I do agree that over-praising is a bad thing, for example, but then the claims made are extremely broad. I guess I am of the generation being referred to and I'm as miserly as they come. I drive a 10-year old Saturn station wagon (bought used) and my husband drives a run-down Mercury Mistake (I mean Mystique), also bought used (and paid cash).

I just spent a lot of time with a whole lot of young Obama volunteers and they were a really responsible, organized, selfless, and generally impressive group of kids. (Who were emphatically the opposite of "apathetic.")

There will be exceptions to every rule of course but this article generally strikes me as typical "in MY day, things were different" curmudgeonliness -- which springs eternal with every generation (what do you think people who came of age in the 40's thought of the people who came of age in the 60's?) rather than any really convincing argument.

I am waaaaaaaaaaaay older than Nick, and I followed his method by late high school.

I saw no benefit in going to classes where all that happened was the same info as was in books was given, with no sparks of interest or debate or inquiry beyond the books happening.

I cut science for an English class I really wanted to go to, and never went to history, for instance. I might have if I had been going to learn anything.
I got straight A's anyway.

Ditto in University.

I recall one Monday 9.00 am turorial I was supposed to go to in Human Development. The tutor was a dithering idiot. I went once and never again.

Oddly, I was given an extra credit for the quality of my class participation.

I guess my efforts to cut through some of the meaningless dithering in the first class were appreciated...or their lack for the rest of the year.


I think being late for classes is way rude, though.

I would have learned something. If nothing else, I would have learned what the instructor was wearing that day. However I learned much more studying PHP on my own (the University didn't offer any PHP classes). PHP is the language that this site runs on. That fact that this skill ended up being what my career is based on doesn't matter. What matters is that I could learn much more useful information in that time period on my own, then in class. Many times I would spend the time studying for a subject I wasn't as good at.

I am wondering how good the research was.

A lot of this sounds like the old chestnuts that have been trotted out since time immemorial.

My intent was never to disrupt other students. I rarely came to class late (because he would give quizzes sometimes at the beginning of class, sometimes at the end). When I did, I tried to be as quite as possible (it helped the auditorium doors were in the back.

I always sat at the very back, so others wouldn't be distracted by my computer screen. Maybe I painted the picture wrong. I wasn't trying to be rude or disrespectful to other students, but I felt that the professor was disrespectful to me. It was pretty obvious he didn't care about the students. He was at the university so he could do research, and part of that involved teaching. He didn't seem to put any thought, effort, or enthusiasm into class. I never understood the "Don't disrespect your elders" phrase. To me, you shouldn't disrespect anyone, regardless of age.

Stepping back and looking at all this, I guess its why you see people like Bill Gates drop out of school, because they feel their time could be spent better elsewhere. It worked for Bill Gates, but doesn't work so well for others. I wasn't ready to start my own company, and didn't want to limit myself to the jobs I could get because I couldn't put a college degree on my resume.

I should clarify on this - taking time off to go to say Disney World because the parents didn't want to go during school vacation. I think attending a family member's funeral is a bit different. Also, in how you handle the absence and discuss it with your children. Taking a vacation where it is easier for you and then putting out the school as in the teacher then has to gather all your school work for you ahead of time or re-schedule tests is the sort of entitlement it instills.

When we were supposed to relocate, I took my kids out of school so they could visit some potential new schools - we did not have an option of going during vacation as the new schools would be out as well and also do to timing. To me it was important for them to feel comfortable about a big move - and they had to do their school work while they were away. I would not take them out for a trip that could be scheduled at another time because it would be easier on us and thus instill a sense of school/education isn't as important as having fun.

I can't say anything about the professor - there are some good ones and some bad. Those in my experience that were bad (and didn't really teach you anything), I confess I rarely attended the classes as well and learned the material from the text book.

There were many others though that were incredible and insightful - those that I would have missed a great deal if I did not attend. Yes, I could have learned most of the material on my own, however, I learned even a greater deal and had been inspired by lectures from those that were wonderful professors.

I remember my first semester of college, sitting in freshman english and realizing that it was really the same class I'd had my senior year of high school but I was paying $600 to take the class (in 1979 dollars) and I was going to have to pay off a loan with interest to take the class.

That's the moment I realized that I wanted an education, not a degree.

Luckily I had time to drop freshman english and get in a communication law class without having to pay a penalty.

I never took another required course again. I never got a degree but I did get a damn fine education.

I received a degree and got a good education at the same time - sometimes you have to deal with the crap (like Freshman English) to get to the good stuff.

Hell yeah.....there were lecturers I would not miss come hell or high water.

Most of my university folk were like that...except a few psychology dullards.

Though we learned ethology from a complete madman who was one of the most entertaining teachers I ever had.

Not only do I (37 years later) remember a lot of what he taught us, I remember his actual WORDS!

Most of our English lecturers were fabulous.....no way I would miss them.

I found the entitlement thingy here at work.

It seems there were some individuals hired from around the same age group. The definately had the entitlement thing going. Now this is a professional job - one where you do not get paid hourly, but an annual wage - it was not an entry level position. As a result you get better benefits - higher annual pay, higher bonuses, more vacation time, etc. It was expected that you hired to do a job - and during busy times overtime is required.

Most of these individuals had come from positions where they had been paid hourly. This particular position was the next stepping stone in a sense. These individuals would be so naivee they even told my manager (so their boss's boss) that they only work until 5 because they are not getting paid overtime - even after being coached otherwise and getting a higher salary/benefits.

I would also have to watch them - One such individual took two lunches on one day - I called him on it and he whined oh, I forgot that I took an early lunch and then so and so said lets go to lunch. I am telling you - this young man would whine consistently about everything.

He did at one point get canned.

I think that's what BBB was referring to when she suggested a Lib Arts degree followed by specific training in graduate school (or other method of continuing education).

We're encouraging our youngest daughter to consider the same thing. She's a strong academic and can easily ace her way through school but to what end? She'd have a credential but would have missed out on all sorts of opportunities where she might find an interest in an area she hadn't considered.

Edit: My other daughter, on the other hand, would probably be best suited to a specific program that gave her an employment opportunity straight out of school. Different kids, different needs/desires.

Jesus . . . what a lot of babble . . .

"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they allow disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children now are tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.”





















That was attributed to Socrates by Plato . . . Socrates died more than 2400 years ago . . . there is truly nothing new under the sun . . .

Well, right there's a difference. Nobody compiled anything for me, or rescheduled tests. I would just catch up by reading the texts. And my spelling list would be longer than usual.

I remain not agreeing that taking your child to the big city in springtime or the mid fall for a few days plus a weekend - perhaps while Dad has a meeting - is somehow misplacing priorities (given the child is not struggling in school.) But I'm not a Disney person either. .. I would never take a child out of school for that.

Oh, I hear ya. I had many fantastic teachers. In fact, let me give shout outs to Doug Jones, Art Fleck, Sriram Pemmaraju, and Ramon Lawrence! Note the worst grade I received in a CS class was in Sriram's class. He was very tough, but a fantastic teacher.

I also loved the first Spanish teacher I had. She did a great job, but man did I hate spanish.

I had a very similar experience.

I was trying to go to college once I already didn't need it (career was already well under way) and tried to take night classes.

If I wanted a degree, I needed to take English 101. I wasn't allowed to test out of it and even though I'd spent 5 years teaching English it was a requirement. I was miffed, I'd taken honors English in high school that was more advanced than this, but willing to jump through this hoop if needed because I was hoping to slowly get a degree (a personal goal I have if not a career one) in my spare time as long as it didn't conflict with work and life too much.

So I paid, bought the books and showed up for class. The teacher was a foreigner, who barely spoke English himself. His classes consisted of telling everyone to open up their books and read. At the end we were supposed to answer the questions on a piece of paper and turn them in. It was disappointing enough that the system required me to go through this to get the degree but that wasn't as bad as this particular teacher's absence policy.

He also told the class that after 2 absences, he'd deduct 5 or 10 percent from our grades for each day we missed. My job was sending me to Costa Rica for a week and I had late night meetings on some days , so I asked him if I could make up any assignments if my job required me to be absent and he said no. I asked him if I could make up the attendance on other days on the week I got back. He said no.

His suggestion was that I drop the class before the cut off date where the bad grade would post or quit my job. At that stage my job was a lot more important than the English 101 class so I had to consider dropping it as suggested. He said it didn't matter if I got every test perfect, he'd downgrade the grades if I couldn't be there that week.

So unfortunately I dropped the class, and it was a very frustrating kind of stupidity that he cared more about attendance than learning. It was like being treated like a child in kindergarten. At this point it was too late for me to pick up another teacher and I lost that window of opportunity over it. I really wish that college had had rules against attendance-based grading and the other teachers I talked to were much more reasonable.

My other class (I only had time for 2 classes with my work load) was a Psych 101 class, and that teacher was much more reasonable. I got an best grade in his class, and made up any of my absences without any conflict at all.

The insistence on treating me like a child was his prerogative, and I didn't make a fuss about it. But I needed to do what was best for me, and what was best for me was not what he required. That doesn't make me someone who feels "entitled" (to anything other than the liberty to make such decisions of course) and some of the comments here are very snotty and self-righteous about this scenario.

I was an adult attending classes to learn (in the psych class) and get a degree (which was why I took the required English 101). Sacrificing an already solid career for the petty rules would not have been a good thing for me and putting the decision of job versus English 101 wasn't going to help anyone.

I made the right choice for me, which was to drop the class and I would hope that all, young and old, are entitled to make such decisions for themselves. I also let go of my goal to have a degree. I'll be back in classes in the future I'm sure. But it will be to learn and not jump through useless hoops.

I don't think this is a generational thing (except the part where every generation likes to tsk tsk at the subsequent ones and feel good about themselves), or an entitlement thing. Stupid rules and instructors have always existed, as have those who recognize and avoid as much of the stupidity as they can. Doing so isn't rude per se, nor is it a sense of "entitlement". It's just doing what's best for you and that's something everyone has the right to.

Sure, they can often get it wrong, and they can also be rude while doing it. But the comments here equating cutting classes to such attitudes are casting a very wide net.

Was that at a university, Robert? I ask because I went to a local small 4 yr college one year, a university for four years, and a city college (2 year type) for a few summer classes... plus a university extension for another several dozen classes. The city college had weird rules back then... It was strange going from the university for regular semesters and then to CC for trigonometry and california government... kind of like going back to, I dunno, grade school.

(the usual disclaimer that my time in city college was long ago)