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What I Learned In College

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Re: What I Learned In College

#31

Post by zanny »

navait wrote: post #13
JMStewy wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're being too dismissive. You may be tired of seeing this kind of post from fresh graduates, but just because the solution to their problems seems obvious to you now, that doesn't change the fact that lots of 18-year-old kids don't know and don't find out until it's too late. That this happens to so many bright students is a waste of a lot of time, money, and human capital. Having considered it in the year…

I am a fresh graduate, and I came into university with the same attitude as him, in a scholarship program full of people with my attitude. Fortunately, the dean talked to my freshman class during orientation. He said: "Yes, you're smart. But you'll find here, everyone else is also smart. You'll find that you have to distinguish yourself through the work you do.". Admittedly, my ego was too big at the time to really t…

They are situational tools. They are not the catch all sink of learning, in the same way public instructor driven 30 students 40 - 60 minute blocks x8 chalkboard and tests isn't the catch all way to teach the masses in general for 12 years. The problem is everyone wants a one size fits all answer that takes in toddlers and spits out hyper-successful professionals in the most prosperous industries and human beings aren't best placed on conveyor belts in a factory.

Some people benefit. Some people suffer. Some are indifferent and get bored. The bigger problem is figuring out there are many ways to learn beyond a book and a grade, and that we need to figure out how each individual learns best.

Re: What I Learned In College

#32

Post by zanny »

msutherl wrote: post #5
nickthemagicman wrote: post #3

Does the fact the his avatar is fluttershy kind of ruin his credibility to anyone else?

The fact that you know its name ruins your credibility.

He got it wrong, that is an OC to my knowledge. None of the major main cast are male ponies, and that isn't one of the side characters I know of. So consider his credibility untarnished.

~credibility is for curmudgeons.

Re: What I Learned In College

#33

Post by mjn »

jmduke wrote: post #17
adamnemecek wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I learned that the fastest way I'll ever learn a subject (whether or not it's a programming language, a financial derivative, or an era of Hinduism) is on my own, poring over search engines and worn-down books. Professors will never teach me faster than I can teach myself. I've had the same experience. And I hate how colleges seem not to recognize that.

Something I realized around seven semesters too late is that most programs are conducive to independent studies , which is I'm sure a wildly broad term but at my alma mater it was basically "Go spend three months on your own learning something interesting and then write a paper or a powerpoint or a plugin on it." You'd have an advisor (or sometimes a board of advisors) to meet with you every few weeks, but the work w…

Independent study credit is definitely worth looking into, if your college has such a possibility (most do).

However, as someone who supervises independent studies regularly, I can also say: independent studies are by far the classes most likely to result in the student just not doing anything at all, which to some extent shows why autodidacticism is not universal yet. In a traditional semester-long class with two-times-a-week meetings, it's very rare for a student to literally do nothing. Most will show up at least some of the time, and do at least some of the work. But it's easy to put off an independent study, because you have complete flexibility, and don't have to do anything this week if other things are more pressing. Then you end up 90% of the way through the semester realizing you haven't done anything.

Some very good stuff comes out of independent-study projects, but the variance is large, and it doesn't work for everyone. As a supervisor, they take a disproportionate amount of management effort, just trying to track students down and prod them into non-procrastination.

Re: What I Learned In College

#34

Post by jjsz »

zanny wrote: post #27
adamnemecek wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I learned that the fastest way I'll ever learn a subject (whether or not it's a programming language, a financial derivative, or an era of Hinduism) is on my own, poring over search engines and worn-down books. Professors will never teach me faster than I can teach myself. I've had the same experience. And I hate how colleges seem not to recognize that.

They do (usually). You can even get credit for it, at least in the US, it called CLEP - https://clep.collegeboard.org/ . Cheapest year of college I ever had - was around $200. I skipped an entire years worth of useless general ed courses to get my "requirements" to graduate out of the way at my college on 6 CLEP tests. I think the notes I took for those tests reading the wikibooks and wikipedia articles on the variou…

Can you link your CLEP notes?

Re: What I Learned In College

#35

Post by jjsz »

zanny wrote: post #27
adamnemecek wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I learned that the fastest way I'll ever learn a subject (whether or not it's a programming language, a financial derivative, or an era of Hinduism) is on my own, poring over search engines and worn-down books. Professors will never teach me faster than I can teach myself. I've had the same experience. And I hate how colleges seem not to recognize that.

They do (usually). You can even get credit for it, at least in the US, it called CLEP - https://clep.collegeboard.org/ . Cheapest year of college I ever had - was around $200. I skipped an entire years worth of useless general ed courses to get my "requirements" to graduate out of the way at my college on 6 CLEP tests. I think the notes I took for those tests reading the wikibooks and wikipedia articles on the variou…

Can you link your CLEP notes?

Re: What I Learned In College

#36

Post by kaitai »

jmduke wrote: post #15

I graduated two months ago, and I learned a lot of things, too. I learned that the fastest way I'll ever learn a subject (whether or not it's a programming language, a financial derivative, or an era of Hinduism) is on my own, poring over search engines and worn-down books. Professors will never teach me faster than I can teach myself. I learned that, yes, you're more or less paying for the piece of paper (but that d…

I learned that the fastest way I'll ever learn a subject (whether or not it's a programming language, a financial derivative, or an era of Hinduism) is on my own, poring over search engines and worn-down books. Professors will never teach me faster than I can teach myself.

That'll work fine until the things you want to learn are not written down anywhere. Most traumatic moment of grad school: Google thesis topic and realize that no one, no where knows anything about this (*&.

Then it gets fun :) Talking with other knowledgeable people will dramatically accelerate the self-teaching process then.

Most people will never do this, though.

Re: What I Learned In College

#37

Post by chunky1994 »

rdouble wrote: post #30
Ixiaus wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A few things formal institution graduates don't realize: When you say "you're more or less paying for the piece of paper" you're taking it for granted (unless you went to a shitty school). As an Autodidact in Mathematics, programming, compsci, and psychology with nothing but a GED; you underestimate the value of rigorous environments. Learning fast is also not the point. Learning thoroughly is the point. Thorough and…

Undergrad level math courses are not as thorough as you might think due to the time compression needed to fit a topic into a semester. Learning fast is kind of the point. If you dive too deep you'll run out of time to get through all of the material and get poor grades.

I would argue that this is highly dependent on the University/professor who is teaching you.

I've seen courses where we're taught next to nothing in terms of thoroughness and also courses that stick us neck deep in the subject, literally going from axioms to a complete, standard mathematical framework.

Re: What I Learned In College

#38

Post by arikrak »

>Any task that can be reduced to simply following a set of instructions over and over is being done by robots and software.

Agreed. Along similar lines:

Any problem that can be solved with clearly-defined steps can be programmed so that a computer can solve it. Many areas of education, especially math-related ones, involve students learning to mechanically implement set procedures and formulas to solve problems. These mechanical processes can all by definition be solved by a computer, so why pretend that these technologies do not exist? Human computers were once necessary, but they have since been supplanted.

http://www.learneroo.com/courses/9/nodes/84

Re: What I Learned In College

#40

Post by voltaism »

dev1n wrote: post #28
jmduke wrote: post #15

I graduated two months ago, and I learned a lot of things, too. I learned that the fastest way I'll ever learn a subject (whether or not it's a programming language, a financial derivative, or an era of Hinduism) is on my own, poring over search engines and worn-down books. Professors will never teach me faster than I can teach myself. I learned that, yes, you're more or less paying for the piece of paper (but that d…

Professors will never teach me faster than I can teach myself. This. I was watching John Adams and he made an excellent quote when speaking to his son, "A scholar is made alone and sober." It's going to be my mantra for my senior year at college.

That quote basically sums up my senior year (graduated in 2012). I found that after studying enough like that and doing well as a result, other people who do the same are more willing to befriend you.

Then if either party have questions about the material, they have a fantastic outlet to ask them to. Then acing a class is really manageable.

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