I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears • Hacker News Board

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#941

Post by domkema » Mon, Mar 21, 2022, 8:02 PM UTC

doom2 wrote: post #886

mordymoop wrote: post #851

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn’t find out until many years after graduating that the US is sprinkled with what are known as Primarily Undergraduate Institutions (PUIs), including a large number of well-regarded 4-year colleged which don’t have graduate programs, the professors don’t do (much) research (but do have PhDs generally) and the hiring and evaluation decisions are 90% based on teaching. These institutions are usually on the small s…

How many of them have strong STEM programs though? My partner went to a PUI, but it was firmly a liberal arts school (not that you can't move into STEM with a liberal arts degree). I chose my own undergraduate school because it had a decent engineering program but obviously was a research university. The two I can think of are Harvey Mudd and Rose Hulman.

For those looking, this list is probably a good start: https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/search?schoolType=engin...

Disclosure: my alma mater is on that list.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#942

Post by nebula8804 » Mon, Mar 21, 2022, 8:27 PM UTC

webmaven wrote: post #114

frogperson wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they made college free in America it would be severely underfunded and suffer all the same problems as American high school. If there is no money in something, then it's assumed there is no value. It's the American way.

> If they made college free in America it would be severely underfunded and suffer all the same problems as American high school. You would only get those same problems if you made college mandatory, as well as free. A real commitment to a policy of free tertiary education would also expand the availability of trade schools not just universities.

>A real commitment to a policy of free tertiary education would also expand the availability of trade schools not just universities.

This is part of the proposal of progressives. They always emphasized the freedom for a student to choose between trade school or community college, and then move on to a public 4 year school if they chose to do so.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#943

Post by pen2l » Mon, Mar 21, 2022, 8:32 PM UTC

visarga wrote: post #630

wolverine876 wrote: post #584

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No, colleges have found that the SAT produces racial demographics they don’t like. Where does that come from, other than repetition? > look at the LSAT I'm not talking about the LSAT (and bar exam performance isn't a meaningful indicator of much - the great majority of aspiring lawyers pass their bar exams). > Poor white kids have been excluded by the SAT for nearly a century and colleges never took action in respo…

Math, medicine and law don't become any easier no matter how much you avoid testing. At some point they got to know the subjects.

Medical sector has one responsibility: take care of the patients.

Doctors that share a racial and cultural with their patients are able to provide better care. It's been seen in multiple studies that elder African American women are more likely to follow the advice of the doctor if the doctor shared their background. There is little controversy around the fact that diversity leads to improved health outcomes ( https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8675280/ / https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w24787/w247... )

Similar trends can be seen in other fields. So affirmative action is not just good because it is the morally right thing to do, but also because it is the more practical solution quite often.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#944

Post by AussieWog93 » Mon, Mar 21, 2022, 8:42 PM UTC

gruez wrote: post #863

AussieWog93 wrote: post #727

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The entire notion of taxpayer funded student loans is a scam on both taxpayers and students. It’s a system that allows the colleges/universities to charge any tuition they want and guarantees there will be an artificial demand. Just for what it's worth, Australia has a taxpayer-funded student loan scheme (HECS) and the obscene fees you see in the US simply aren't a problem here. A full 4-year Electrical Engineering…

>Just for what it's worth, Australia has a taxpayer-funded student loan scheme (HECS) and the obscene fees you see in the US simply aren't a problem here. A full 4-year Electrical Engineering degree from Monash cost me about A$30k back in 2012. It looks like now they're around $40k. Even for an arts grad, this is something one could comfortably pay off in 2-3 years. What do you mean that "the obscene fees you see in…

>What do you mean that "the obscene fees you see in the US simply aren't a problem here"?

Typically when people talk about the ridiculous cost of college in the US, they bring up these obscene $200k bills that can never be paid off. I agree that $40k isn't ridiculous, and small change compared to the opportunity cost of not working.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#945

Post by wturner » Mon, Mar 21, 2022, 9:23 PM UTC

slibhb wrote: post #844

shafyy wrote: post #825

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's clear that libertarianism and extreme capitalism is not the best way to organize a society. And no, the alternative to that is not communism. Countries who have a good social net and where the state plays some role in ensuring social welfare fare better than countries who don't. And no, GDP is not a good metric of how people in a country are doing as a whole.

Organizing a society strictly according to any ideology is a bad idea. "Libertarianism and extreme capitalism" are great for people who are intelligent and driven. There's nothing wrong with the idea of trying to identify people like that and giving them money and leaving them alone. Actually there's something progressive about it: instead of forcing people to climb a corporate/academic hierarchy before they can make…

""Libertarianism and extreme capitalism" are great for people who are intelligent and driven."

It's good for people that want to rationalize their extreme wealth as "meritocracy" when it's inherently luck of the draw that any of us find ourselves where we are. A real libertarian society entails an informal economy and is what the developing world is trying to get out of. State policy is needed to maintain some kind of social order, a libertarian government is the complete inverse of a command and control economy - both are social disasters.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#946

Post by tikiman163 » Mon, Mar 21, 2022, 9:26 PM UTC

Forgeties79 wrote: post #518

beloch wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing I was told as a grad student that I've never forgotten is, "Nobody has ever won a Nobel prize for having happy students". At the time, I was struggling to keep up with the marking demands of a new (i.e. This was the first year it was taught) course I was TA'ing. I had around a hundred students and each one was generating 10-20 pages of handwritten lab reports per week. Student writing varied from human type…

It is so refreshing to see this take. I was on a path to be a history Ph.D candidate - I wanted to teach, and archive diving is basically my own personal drug. The problem is it’s “publish or perish,” as we all know. My higher priority, i.e. teaching, was essentially an obstacle. You know how I know that? My own advisor and other department members told me not to get my doctorate (after writing a 60 page thesis mind…

Dude, getting a PhD is about becoming a philosopher, it's literally in the name. You can't do that but only teach.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#947

Post by darkerside » Mon, Mar 21, 2022, 9:28 PM UTC

shafyy wrote: post #824

darkerside wrote: post #814

Earlier quoted context omitted.

18 year olds are adults. What you're saying is very paternalistic and patronizing. Everybody who wants to should be encouraged to enjoy their lives, travel, and learn. That's not unique to 18 year olds. And if some have already done a lot of that or are just driven for entrepreneurship, that's a choice they should be able to make.

Of course, 18-year-olds are adults in a legal sense. But they are still very inexperienced in life, heck they are not even allowed to buy beer in the US. I'm not saying 18-year-olds shouldn't be entrepreneurs. But what Sam Altman is suggesting is just very dystopian to me, because he suggests it as an alternative to a traditional education. In his narrow view, the goal of education is only to produce people who maxim…

> Find the smartest and most driven 18 year olds in the world

I don't take that as saying take your typical college student, although with the admissions process, I guess you could read it that way if you wanted to. I think we're talking about taking that kid at school who everybody made fun of because he was such a damn super genius it made everybody else feel insecure.

> But as you probably know from your own life (if you're older than 30), this gets harder and harder

It's harder and easier at various times in your life. Again, I encourage everyone who's interested to do it.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#948

Post by throwawaycities » Mon, Mar 21, 2022, 9:29 PM UTC

AussieWog93 wrote: post #944

gruez wrote: post #863

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Just for what it's worth, Australia has a taxpayer-funded student loan scheme (HECS) and the obscene fees you see in the US simply aren't a problem here. A full 4-year Electrical Engineering degree from Monash cost me about A$30k back in 2012. It looks like now they're around $40k. Even for an arts grad, this is something one could comfortably pay off in 2-3 years. What do you mean that "the obscene fees you see in…

>What do you mean that "the obscene fees you see in the US simply aren't a problem here"? Typically when people talk about the ridiculous cost of college in the US, they bring up these obscene $200k bills that can never be paid off. I agree that $40k isn't ridiculous, and small change compared to the opportunity cost of not working.

> I agree that $40k isn't ridiculous

That is about the average student loan amount on graduation in the US, but the hidden truth is the average student will end up having to pay twice that amount or more due to interest. The students with $200k will usually payback closer to $400-$500k over 40 years.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#949

Post by wolverine876 » Mon, Mar 21, 2022, 9:37 PM UTC

pen2l wrote: post #943

visarga wrote: post #630

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Math, medicine and law don't become any easier no matter how much you avoid testing. At some point they got to know the subjects.

Medical sector has one responsibility: take care of the patients. Doctors that share a racial and cultural with their patients are able to provide better care. It's been seen in multiple studies that elder African American women are more likely to follow the advice of the doctor if the doctor shared their background. There is little controversy around the fact that diversity leads to improved health outcomes ( https:…

Also, people of similar backgrounds are more likely to understand the environmental health problems. For example, doctors from middle-class backgrounds don't understand as well the stress and trauma of poverty, and associated malnutrition. White doctors generally don't understand as well the stress and trauma of living with racism daily.

Re: I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears

#950

Post by wolverine876 » Mon, Mar 21, 2022, 9:43 PM UTC

throwuxiytayq wrote: post #831

wolverine876 wrote: post #594

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear, the thesis of the article you quoted from is the following: Every single question carefully preselected to appear on the test favors whites over blacks.

As a non-American, this thesis simply doesn't pass the smell test unless you guys are living in literal KKK land , which - from be outside - doesn't seem to be the case.

Why not read the research? A 'smell test', especially by someone with no experience or expertise, doesn't indicate much.

Any claim of racism - even raised by an expert who has done detailed research, in a society with overwhelming evidence of it historically and now, and in higher education admissions in particular - is always dismissed.