Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Failing Intro Economics

jamesgmartin.center

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 101 posts

Re: Failing Intro Economics

#91

Post by rustybelt »

vondur wrote: post #81

Regarding students attending classes. I went to a state university and on a typical lecture day, around 25->30 percent of students didn't show up. I was a Chem major and it blew my mind. This was especially crazy in O-Chem and P-Chem, bot of which have high failure rates. I will admit this is probably more prevalent in a state university compared to a more prestigious school.

This one blows my mind. I wasn't the brightest student in college but knew enough to show up everyday. I still remember walking into Calc II on 9/11/2001. The professor (a Jesuit priest) was leading the class in prayer. At least 80% of the kids in that class showed up.

Re: Failing Intro Economics

#92

Post by rustybelt »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #6
apwheele wrote: post #5

Utility(Sleeping In) > Utility(A in MacroEconomics)

Also, smarter or more disciplined kids might have realized utility of small less selective private college is not commensurate with costs, so they are opting to go with lower cost government supported schools or focus on getting into more selective schools.

I think this is a fair criticism. It seems very plausible that Davidson's reputation has fallen among students and more importantly parents in the last twenty years. As the parent of a 9th grader, I would much prefer her attend our state flagship (UIUC) than somewhere like Davidson. My parents on the other hand were much more impressed with those types of smaller private schools and encouraged me to attend one. Anecdotal, but I think this attitude is fairly representative of the mindset of older millennial parents I talk to.

Re: Failing Intro Economics

#93

Post by mihaic »

logicprog wrote: post #49
mihaic wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see this quote or mentions along this line popping up every single time someone says there is a regression in a newer generation. But some generations actually are worse than their predecessors (at least in certain aspects). There are universal complaints about teenagers: loud, rude, etc, and there are specifics I see for youth today: they are emotionally more fragile and underdeveloped, are more passive in general…

Can you actually back up any of that, or is this just your personal feeling about "the youth"? And have you considered that we're not more emotionally fragile and underdeveloped, but that we are instead more aware of our emotions and psychology and willing to engage with that and our own needs instead of just repressing everything and turning into a bitter, hateful old person with a lot of toxic shit shoved into the…

I can back it up, although only in a longer conversation, as it involves a lot of personal experiences.

You're right that past generations could be more bottled up because of social expectations, but I've seen also more flexibility in the past around various concepts.

I don't mean to make an argument, for which you seem to be positioning yourself, but rather just see that some things have regressed, and it's not all merely relative.

By the tone of your response, I'd imagine you had many contradictory conversations, possibly with close-minded individuals, so maybe that's why you're interpreting what I'm saying as if I'm a US right-winger.

I think we'd be more in agreement if we'd met in real-life, as you also seem to value growth. My argument is that for that growth and development to happen, weaknesses need to be stated more clearly and addressed.

Re: Failing Intro Economics

#94

Post by wink »

capnrefsmmat wrote: post #15
wildrhythms wrote: post #3

I genuinely believe a lot of professors are out of touch, especially around this point: >Fourth, students seemed reluctant to come to the office seeking help. [...] I suspect there is an increased factor of intimidation associated with being lost in the material and asking a much older male professor for help. Let's ignore the weird second half assumption about 'older males' for now... Young people do not have a conc…

> I wonder how many times a student has taken time out of their day to trek across campus to the professor's office only to find the professor away, or head-down busy grading papers, or just about to leave? Typically, professors announce office hours during which they will be available to answer questions, so this is not an issue. From a professor's perspective, online options for tutoring students are vastly inferio…

Your answer confuses me. Background: I studied in Europe, from 2003 to 2010.

Yes, professors had office hours, but you'd usually go there if something was extraordinary, or maybe if you really couldn't find a tutor or someone else to answer your pressing question before the test. We did have tutors, with weekly sessions, those were good for 90% of the stuff. Also it was recent enough that you could indeed write emails and expect an answer (CompSci though)

But that's not the point, your "jump from student to student" confuses me - was this in a lecture hall with multiple people and some sort of panel Q&A? Office hours for us was basically waiting in line in front of the professor's office and going in one by one, also for the most part there were so many people that you'd hardly be remembered as an individual, so your "go talk to Sarah" sounds really unrealistic to me.

But overall I am not disagreeing with you or the author a lot, my main point would more be: if their lecture was being streamed/recorded I probably would not have missed a single lesson, if I was in the position of the students here.

Re: Failing Intro Economics

#95

Post by wink »

beej71 wrote: post #71
wildrhythms wrote: post #3

I genuinely believe a lot of professors are out of touch, especially around this point: >Fourth, students seemed reluctant to come to the office seeking help. [...] I suspect there is an increased factor of intimidation associated with being lost in the material and asking a much older male professor for help. Let's ignore the weird second half assumption about 'older males' for now... Young people do not have a conc…

In my short time teaching so far, in 2.25 quarters, only one person has used office hours, and that was over zoom. I have 2 fixed office hours per week, and allow zoom office hours by appointment any time. On the other hand, I help the students async and at odd hours on Discord every single day. It seems the more a student should be asking for help, the less likely they are to do so. I spend a fair about of time duri…

Kinda offtopic, but thank you for your guide to network programming, it helped me a lot, many years ago.

Re: Failing Intro Economics

#96

Post by Gibbon1 »

hikingsimulator wrote: post #24

Having had economics classes in the past, I echo the teacher's feeling that economics is a somewhat stagnant or entrenched field. I would further say that it is fairly ideological and terse up to being cryptic at times to some extent. Econometrics and how it's taught come to mind. If you grant this assumption, I wonder how much students' lack of interest may come from the field's teachings clashing with a person's ev…

Might also be that outsiders perception of the usefulness and validity of standard economics has taken a big hit. Result is students unwilling to put in very much effort.

Re: Failing Intro Economics

#97

Post by capnrefsmmat »

wink wrote: post #94
capnrefsmmat wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wonder how many times a student has taken time out of their day to trek across campus to the professor's office only to find the professor away, or head-down busy grading papers, or just about to leave? Typically, professors announce office hours during which they will be available to answer questions, so this is not an issue. From a professor's perspective, online options for tutoring students are vastly inferio…

Your answer confuses me. Background: I studied in Europe, from 2003 to 2010. Yes, professors had office hours, but you'd usually go there if something was extraordinary, or maybe if you really couldn't find a tutor or someone else to answer your pressing question before the test. We did have tutors, with weekly sessions, those were good for 90% of the stuff. Also it was recent enough that you could indeed write email…

I admit as many students as fit into my office, and talk to them together. For larger classes I have booked larger rooms so ten students can come at once. In those courses, often students will come to work on the homework, and ask questions as they arise, rather than coming with pre-chosen questions. Usually the students are talking to each other as much as they are talking to me.

I would only admit one student at a time if I were giving individual feedback on a project, or answering questions about a take-home exam where collaboration is not allowed, or something like that.

Re: Failing Intro Economics

#98

Post by mihaic »

tchaffee wrote: post #59
mihaic wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see this quote or mentions along this line popping up every single time someone says there is a regression in a newer generation. But some generations actually are worse than their predecessors (at least in certain aspects). There are universal complaints about teenagers: loud, rude, etc, and there are specifics I see for youth today: they are emotionally more fragile and underdeveloped, are more passive in general…

> some generations actually are worse than their predecessors Sure. But the point is that the prior generation is too biased to correctly identify when this happens. And it's a solid point. The older generations are far more often wrong than they are right. Many of the kids I know who were supposed to do horribly in life due to their parents being too easy on them are now pretty damn successful adults. > there are sp…

My experience might be limited to my geography/culture (Eastern Europe).

While I agree that it's hard to have an assessment of new generations that isn't biased by your beliefs, I also think that simply giving up because everything is relative is not useful.

The questions becomes: how can we see the problems of a generation with which we don't share a history in way that's useful to them?

The original Socrates quote I was referring to is used to give up on doing anything, while my understanding of it was that we need to use more nuance and empathy to help guide the youth. Simply giving up on passing the lessons we learned from experience is a waste.

Re: Failing Intro Economics

#99

Post by mellavora »

mellavora wrote: post #45
mstipetic wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is this objective reality people struggle to accept?

If you don't pay your bills, people come and take your stuff. Then other people come and make you leave your residence. Then you get to live in your car. Unless someone has come and taken that.

Hey, sorry, it looks like my comment was taken out of context. I was replying to mstipetic who said "what is this objective reality", which I read as saying there is no objective reality.

And I only wanted to point out that there is an objective reality.

I certainly did not mean to say anything negative about younger generations.

Re: Failing Intro Economics

#100

Post by mstipetic »

mellavora wrote: post #99
mellavora wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't pay your bills, people come and take your stuff. Then other people come and make you leave your residence. Then you get to live in your car. Unless someone has come and taken that.

Hey, sorry, it looks like my comment was taken out of context. I was replying to mstipetic who said "what is this objective reality", which I read as saying there is no objective reality. And I only wanted to point out that there is an objective reality. I certainly did not mean to say anything negative about younger generations.

You can always choose not to play that game. The world is a big place.
Post reply on HN