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[Higher Education] Practical Problems and Philosophical Foundations
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I've heard "diploma mill" applied to many decent schools, though...generally your third-tier and below public universities and such, due to the class sizes and perceived lesser value of a degree from them.
To be honest, I think the distinction may be less than we'd like to think. I'm pretty sure anybody who can get accepted to the average lower-tier university can also graduate, and they crank out more and more graduates each year, such that the value of a degree is lessened (and the standard go down yearly). They make less money doing it, but...yeah, I'm jaded.
I understand your point, in case it wasn't clear, but I just wanted to point out that "diploma mill" is used in other ways.
When you are calling Harvard a diploma mill, you're using it wrong. I've heard diploma mill applied incorrectly too, but it refers to for profits for the most part.
Though yes, there are some traditional universities that could qualify.
Heffling was still super duper wrong.
I know you weren't saying he wasn't, I just wanted to reinforce my point.
This is fair.
I'd argue that, in some very limited contexts, you could apply the term not-entirely-incorrectly to Harvard. Which is to say I agree that there is a certain class of person I suspect Harvard (and other top-tier private schools) will wave through admissions and essentially hand a degree to, regardless of accomplishment or ability. This is probably irrelevant to the bulk of students, though, so I still agree almost entirely with you.
afaik, legacy students are still A Thing. That said, I don't know that any institution "hands" people diplomas. I mean, you could argue about low standards/easy grading at some institutions... but I don't think the Ivies are the place.
#FreeScheck
#FreeSKFM
There are actual things a bachelors does for you outside of the job application tick.
Getting experience, building skills, and networking being the big three.
Being student 432 out of 1000 in Managment 203 Spring Class 2-55 ain't doin' it.
Everyone in this case being 30% of the population.
It's a bad road to go down. MOOCs can make a great supplement, but they will never make a good replacement.
Not having a bachelors degree seriously hurts your prospects.
#FreeScheck
#FreeSKFM
The solution to that is not "Reinforce a shitty economic model".
#FreeScheck
#FreeSKFM
No it doesn't. It makes them waste time and money. If MOOCs ever become a standard (they won't) they won't be appreciably cheaper.
They're a supplement, not a replacement.
Put social pressure instead on business having not retarded demands for entry level jobs instead and start putting more trust and weight behind trade schools.
Except it won't be a Bachelors. It'll be an MOOC Bachelors (ie - the inferior variant)
Do you honestly believe that businesses will just accept a B.MOOC as anything worth a crap?
I've seen quite a few BAs on resumes from schools I've never heard of/wasn't entirely sure were real.
The status quo is pretty awful imo.
#FreeScheck
#FreeSKFM
#FreeScheck
#FreeSKFM
I doubt MOOCs will ever become that kind of a thing. Nor will they remain as attractive as they apparently are once they can be monetized.
Now, getting in while being common as muck might be hard, but they are good places to study. Far from diploma mills. I can't help imagining Harvard is similar.
Harvard is not a diploma mill (in the vein that Phoenix or ITT are), but legacy students who have families that contribute to Harvard are given lax grading and assured to graduate. There were a few hot articles about it a few years back.
The main problem, as I see it and has been said in this thread many times already, is that higher education is now a misnomer. You may as well call it "subsidized job training" now and skip the pretense. That's what corporate America sees it as, and (hilariously enough) they don't even consider it to be *good* job training.
"Oh, I see you graduated Magna Cum Laude in (relevant field). Please have 3 years experience working in (relevant field) before you apply to our entry level positions." Corporate America has gotten so lazy and entitled that they're not happy with just getting job training taken care of at no expense to themselves, now they want free experience as well!
It's all a damn mess.
"There is not a man of us who does not at times need a helping hand to be stretched out to him, and then shame upon him who will not stretch out the helping hand to his brother."
This is what I was getting at. All universities are to a greater or lesser degree, diploma mills. From an educational standpoint, that's the goal and it is generally measured by both quality and quantity. Harvard is considered, from this view, a good university because it provides a decent number of high quality graduates. ITT is a poor university because while it provides a large number graduates, the quality is abysmal.
From the view of the student, quality is (or should be) the most important factory. Quantity acts to the detriment of the students, because it reduces quality. MOOC's, because they rely on student initiative for betterment, have a very high risk of going down the path of ITT. This is why some feel that they will not have a significant impact in the future. But, I think the same feeling existed in the for-profit colleges, who are now major contributors to the student debt crisis. I wholeheartedly agree that low quality education is unsustainable, but Corporate and Political America have shown that they only care about the short term, and not the long term.
What makes Harvard such a good university, imo, is not only do they have a fantastic education system, but they also work with major companies to provide internships and networking opportunities. This isn't a service that ITT or an MOOC can provide.
An interesting article on it : http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/11/18-0
That's part of it. Another part is that states are giving less support to their colleges, which has caused tuition to rise.
The "social capital"/networking aspects of a good uni -- and especially an Ivy -- cannot be overstated, imo.
Also: now we can start turning kids into rat race drones right from grade school!
While this could easily be terrible, teaching people to handle money from an early age is a good thing overall IMO. Too many people have very poor money management
You'll get no argument from me about the merits of teaching money management; I am fucking terrible with my money.
It's more the philosophy that I'm disagreeing with them on. There's a parent interviewed for the story who says, "I don't want my kids to ask how they'll use something they learned in school." While there is obviously some overlap between the Venn diagrams for 'Things worth knowing' and 'Things you will use in everyday life'... the former is waaay bigger than the latter.
Having said that, I was always much better in chemistry or physics than I was in math because science is just applied mathematics, and I like the application better than the theory when it comes to mathematics, so I could see how adding in an application context might improve knowledge retention even without the conceit that it's important to learn to use skills only insofar as how they can be monetized.
Really, determining how much of the knowledge you acquired you are actually using can come as much down to how many degrees of Kevin Bacon (seperation) you want to articulate in your thought process as it can direct application.
EDIT: Horribad sentence structure.
Current Playthroughs: Neverwinter Closed Beta|Let's Build! Sim City
Good lord almighty, yes.
I remember feeling stunned as a 17 year old boy to realize that I was never going to be in grade school again. Considering that I could barely remember a point in my life where I wasn't in grade school, the notion that it was suddenly over felt utterly incomprehensible. Expecting a middle-schooler to understand the long term utility of anything is basically the stupidest way to promote learning, I think.
But in school I enjoyed science classes and remember a lot of it. I am slowly becoming a scientific translator at the age of 43, and that background knowledge is what has made that possible.
You never know what parts of your education might be useful.