Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants • Hacker News Board

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#311

Post by screye » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 10:40 PM UTC

gonehome wrote: post #17

awillen wrote: post #7

I think this is generally a good thing. I believe there are really two positive things that can come out of going to college - either you get a name-brand degree that opens doors and gets your resume looked at, or you get useful skills that enable you to go down a particular career path (e.g. CS degree). Obviously in some cases it'll be both. The reality is it's really tough to make any case that a humanities degree…

There is so much broken with modern universities and incentives around pricing - why are all degrees four years? Why does a classics degree cost the same as a CS degree when the market value of a classics degree is basically zero? I wrote a little about it in the context of Lambda School, but it mostly applies: https://zalberico.com/essay/2019/04/08/lambda-school.html “The current university system in the US is a mes…

> There is so much broken with modern universities and incentives around pricing - why are all degrees four years? Why does a classics degree cost the same as a CS degree when the market value of a classics degree is basically zero?

Totally agree. Despite 100s of choices for universities in the US, they all appear to be cookie cutter copies of each other.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#312

Post by skinnymuch » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 10:40 PM UTC

908B64B197 wrote: post #279

dbspin wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. As a European I had no idea that Canadian education was so expensive. Was under the mistaken impression that it was largely free, like health care. Obviously much cheaper than the US - which is life destroyingly expensive. But the figures you cite are still pricey enough to exclude enormous numbers of people from higher education.

> Wow. As a European I had no idea that Canadian education was so expensive. It also depends on the province (most funding is at the province level). > Was under the mistaken impression that it was largely free, like health care. Ohh don't worry, what they don't pay in insurance fees they pay in taxes and fees.

What does the last part of your message mean? Obviously no one believes universal health care is actually free.

The US spends a metric ton on medical expenses any way so a qualifier for Canadians like that doesn’t seem right.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#313

Post by ItsMonkk » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 10:41 PM UTC

worker767424 wrote: post #251

devwastaken wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just humanities degrees that are the problem. The problem is the market is not actually in "high demand" like higher education advertises. Graduating CS students across the U.S. are turned down by employers constantly and end up working in a job that doesn't require their degree nor does it use any skills from it. I have multiple friends in this exact situation. We need to remove federal student loans for co…

Could you elaborate on CS graduates getting turned down? I've seen how much trouble companies have hiring, so the only reasons I'm coming up with are these graduates aren't willing to relocate or they studied CS because it pays well, but they're not actually that good at it. Something very underappreciated, and possibly the cause of the classic CS class bimodal distribution, is how many students live the stuff outsid…

They came for the high school drop outs and I did not speak out...

High school grads, College Grads, Liberal Arts Grads, Non-STEM Grads, Non-Tech Grads, and now here we are.

They came for the average CS graduates and I did not speak out.

How far do we have to get up the stack to notice we have a problem? Harvard Medical Grads?

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#314

Post by musicale » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 10:41 PM UTC

gonehome wrote: post #310

musicale wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Classics programs generally require more evaluated prose writing, as well as text reading and analysis, so it is reasonable to assume that they would yield benefits in actual writing skill. However, it would be interesting to have some data to compare, for example GRE writing scores of Classics vs. CS graduates.

I don't mean to come across as overly harsh or partisan against liberal arts majors. I think the content is often interesting. I just think it should be taken along side a technical major too. I do have a bias against overly flowery language that obscures meaning, and tend to find that more often comes from the less technical side of the academic spectrum: http://www.paulgraham.com/talk.html

I assume you haven't read many academic papers in CS? ;-)

That's a bit of a joke. Clarity is of course a primary virtue in all forms of academic writing, and one that is often ignored either unintentionally or in an attempt to impress one's reviewers and/or to signal one's membership in a particular tribe.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#315

Post by michaelt » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 10:41 PM UTC

NovemberWhiskey wrote: post #220

keiferski wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems to me like further polarization. Only those that can afford the elite colleges (or be “smart” enough to get in) will be educated, while the rest will skip any personal development and just go right into the market. Educating people in the skills necessary for being good citizens doesn’t cost that much. Most of the books required are free. Yet somehow the common response to “college is expensive” is “get rid of…

You have the wrong idea because of the headline prices of elite schools. Yes, the prices are high. On the other hand, no-one who is admitted to (say) Harvard is going to be prevented from going by an inability to pay. These top schools are rich enough to fund need-based scholarships. (source: wife is a professor at an Ivy League school)

Nobody's "unable to pay" so long as there are government-backed undischargable loans on offer.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#316

Post by sandworm101 » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 10:43 PM UTC

foolinaround wrote: post #250

sandworm101 wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> I just want to learn how to write compliers and how a MOSFET works, but you want me to take university-level theater? I could learn theater on my own if I wanted to. Ya, and the acting students can learn about "compliers" online too. Outside of a garage startup, an engineer is useless if they cannot integrate into a larger team through the spoken and written word. I've run into BS students who haven't read a book…

while communication skills are essential, needing a theatre program is a stretch. Students should just join a toastmasters

Well, the one thing we can all agree on is that football has no place in education. I have never played it, don't watch it, and therefore it has never done anyone any good anywhere.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#317

Post by gonehome » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 10:47 PM UTC

labcomputer wrote: post #275

keiferski wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The funny thing is how people constantly bemoan the state of politics, yet consistently argue for evaluating degrees entirely based on their financial outcome. As if an educated citizenry will just appear from the ether. The connection between the two seems pretty obvious to me.

1. Before the post-WWII GI bill, which sent an enormous surge of young men to college in the 1950's, the percentage of Americans with a college degree was measured in single digits (Bachelor degrees then were as common as Ph.D.s today). And, yet, we still somehow managed to have a functioning democracy[1]. 2. People evaluate degrees based on financial outcome simply because there is no other way to justify spending a…

> "[1] Even worse: While I agree with premise that we should strive for a better educated electorate, someone arguing the opposite could easily point out that the increasing political discord is correlated with the increasing fraction of degree holders."

I read somewhere, but unfortunately can't remember where. That disaffected highly educated people stir up a lot of political trouble - so these things might be related in a causal way (though I'm a little skeptical).

I also wonder how much university just has people exchange one cultural belief system for another based on who is around them rather than learning how to think critically and independently.

My personal experience leads me to think that most people will just start to believe what everyone around them believes, I worry how much I'm affected by this too.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#318

Post by musicale » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 10:50 PM UTC

908B64B197 wrote: post #89

gonehome wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is so much broken with modern universities and incentives around pricing - why are all degrees four years? Why does a classics degree cost the same as a CS degree when the market value of a classics degree is basically zero? I wrote a little about it in the context of Lambda School, but it mostly applies: https://zalberico.com/essay/2019/04/08/lambda-school.html “The current university system in the US is a mes…

> Why does a classics degree cost the same as a CS degree when the market value of a classics degree is basically zero? Because it has a large numbers of applicants. It's offer and demand. > Universities also get a lot of their prestige from research and the majority of their effort is typically not spent on undergraduate education. This means professors are not typically rewarded for being (or even expected to be) e…

> the better researchers (more publications, better funded labs) were generally also better teachers.

Also anecdata, but I've observed no such correlation. In the sciences I've seen the opposite - that Nobel prize winners (or similar) can be terrible at teaching undergraduates, and even poor mentors for grad students. Some faculty even seem to resent teaching introductory or undergraduate courses. In contrast, I've found many graduate students still remember what it was like to be a beginner trying to learn and understand the material for the first time. (Though not all of them are great lecturers.)

That being said, in CS I've found many Turing award type faculty to be fantastic lecturers (and occasionally acceptable graduate advisors.)

Overall, I'd put my money behind the incentives: at a large research university, tenure is based on 1) research grants, 2) research productivity, publication, and reputation. The university will pay lip service to teaching (both mentoring graduate students and teaching undergraduates) but it is usually a distant third if it is actually considered at all.

It's not a coincidence that the university and faculty will talk about a "teaching load" - i.e. a burden that one is supposed to endure that distracts from the primary goals of fundraising and research.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#319

Post by dvdhnt » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 10:51 PM UTC

Not very surprising, is it?

Right or wrong, "top" colleges are considered better equipped to get you close to the wealth and power needed to live comfortably.

This isn't much different from travelers going west and buying claims in search of gold.

Almost the entire collegiate system in the US is fundamentally broken. It is siloed and just as much pay-to-play as the rest of this country. The soaring costs, low returns, and behemoth mis-allocation of resources towards college football are examples of this.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#320

Post by dpoochieni » Tue, Feb 23, 2021, 10:52 PM UTC

yTh0 wrote: post #177

Balgair wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eidolon is a now defunct online magazine specifically about the classics. The last thing they did was publish a 'fail' essay. In it the head editor, who holds a PhD from Princeton in the Classics, goes through all the challenges, mis-steps, and lessons they all learned. 'Fail' essays in tech are a dime a dozen. But in the classics, they tend to be rare. As such, Eidolon's essay is a goldmine. Two things stuck out to…

I can’t tell if things like this are real issues or “but think of the horse and buggy driver!” problems. We were teaching kids to read, ethics, morals, long before we had PhDs. Obsession with normalizing agency to abide fiscal concerns is the real issue here. Let wealth collapse by refusing to buy into the idea we owe deference to those that hold wealth. Teach the classics. Write open source. None of it has to be don…

An (sadly? or rather realistically) that is what it boils down to, people who read the classics, read the classics, whether at Harvard or elsewhere. People who are critical thinkers, are critical thinkers, again whether at a college or elsewhere. People who X, X. To think that spending money (and increasing amounts of it) will change this is sheer insanity. Sure, you might get a few that otherwise would have never Xed to now X, but is it not just fundamentally inefficient? For every p that now Xs how many are still as lost? What would one do next?

Concerning the nurture component; Change their parents? Take the children away to be raised by a government?

Concerning the nature component; Alter their DNA?