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More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

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Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#561

Post by waynesonfire »

ethbr0 wrote: post #543
khalilravanna wrote: post #480

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Love this thought. I’d also throw in that doing well in college can be as simple as trying tons of new experiences with the absurd low risk entailed with being a kid with almost total freedom and almost 0 real responsibility. Make friends, make memories, but most of all: make lots of mistakes!

Making mistakes is one of the most important parts of college, but sadly another one that's being torn down by over-zealous administration and campus policing. My father went to a small, rural school whose local police force generally took the approach that as long as it didn't hurt anyone "At worst, a night in jail and no record of the arrest." Even for what would be considered distribution of hard drugs now. When I…

lol what? this isn't high school bro.

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#562

Post by zamfi »

cperciva wrote: post #505
OJFord wrote: post #462

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not quite equivalent in that it's more standardised and every university uses it. I think it's more accurately equivalent to 3.x GPA or above; probably you could find graduate entry requirements (though most are probably fine with at least a 2:1/upper second) stating exactly that as their equivalent admissions criterion.

Let me rephrase that. An Oxford first is equivalent to summa cum laude from an Ivy League. Yes, the standard for graduate admission around the world (and also other things, like undergraduate research awards in Canada) is upper second.

Not the same — Oxford first means top third of the class, roughly. Summa at Harvard is top 5%, a much higher bar.

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#563

Post by thomastjeffery »

juve1996 wrote: post #430
thomastjeffery wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

College/University does not have a monopoly on intellectualism or networking. There is no guarantee that attending a college or university will help you develop more than you would outside that setting. There is, however, a guaranteed cost; and that cost can be debilitating.

> There is no guarantee that attending a college or university will help you develop more than you would outside that setting. There is, however, a guaranteed cost; and that cost can be debilitating. Two things - that guaranteed cost CAN be debilitating. It also might not be. There are plenty of cheaper options available for higher education. And, in general, people with higher education make more money overall.

You can't trust a generalization to direct you to a specific outcome.

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#564

Post by [deleted] »

ryeguy_24 wrote: post #206
azinman2 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also grows the intellectual souls, exposing people to far more depth of thought. It also builds professional networks. If a person is smart enough to receive it, more education is almost always good. Of course money is a factor, and schools have gotten insanely expensive. I’m glad to hear that more people are finding alternative routes - it shouldn’t be that everyone needs college because quite frankly many career…

Everyone says that it teaches you how to think but I’ve never heard of a good reason why. I remember difficult classes but I don’t remember any special sauce that made me think differently than I did in high school. I’m not saying that I don’t believe that it teaches you this, I just have never heard more reasoning than the surface statement. Does anyone have any examples or theories of this?

[deleted]

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#565

Post by rnk »

WWLink wrote: post #381
Balgair wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an uncle told me many moons ago: Do more in college. Write a rock opera, spend a week curled up in the union learning about black holes, be good enough to tutor. Don't just graduate with nothing but a taste for bad jazz and cheap beer.

A lot of CS students need to be told this as well. If you take the bare minimum CS so that you can double major in business, don't come crying on here that CS didn't teach you anything about programming lol.

Double major in business, bleach. I was math & cs and I wanted to do physics too.

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#566

Post by rnk »

waynesonfire wrote: post #561
ethbr0 wrote: post #543

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Making mistakes is one of the most important parts of college, but sadly another one that's being torn down by over-zealous administration and campus policing. My father went to a small, rural school whose local police force generally took the approach that as long as it didn't hurt anyone "At worst, a night in jail and no record of the arrest." Even for what would be considered distribution of hard drugs now. When I…

lol what? this isn't high school bro.

Police record, not some hidden college record

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#567

Post by xyzelement »

mym1990 wrote: post #491
mantas wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cultures shall be analyzed as a whole, advantages, weakness and not skip infamous parts. Cherry picking is a direct way to indoctrination.

Ah yes, just like things such as slavery, Native American history, colonialism was glossed over in US History so that the great achievements could be celebrated, and we didn't have to actually think about who paid the price.

When were these parts skipped in American education? As a high school student in mid-1990s, I was exposed to these a-plenty, not to mention college.

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#568

Post by diceduckmonk »

thomastjeffery wrote: post #143
hgsgm wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's only because almost everyone desirable goes there. If people stopped going, they could meet elsewhere.

The trouble is: where? The alternative is a variety of places, and practically all of them have some kind of tax; where it be coffee, alcohol, or some kind of membership fee. What we are missing is called, "the third place".

That was kind of the vision of WeWork, for better or worst. An extended college dorm for white collar workers

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#569

Post by Fomite »

wolverine876 wrote: post #414
pacaro wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a two edged sword here, both for the university student and the independent learner Learning in a structured environment provides access to the orthodox in the field of study. This can be very valuable to limit unnecessary exploration of blind avenues (there is of course such a thing as necessary exploration of blind avenues) For those who progress through the academy, the risk is that they become narrow thin…

> Learning in a structured environment provides access to the orthodox in the field of study. That's a trope of critics, but not what happens. Have you studied in college? They (almost always) cover a very wide range - much wider than you will discover on your own - and the focus is to teach you to think critically and be able to examine them yourself. They are not there to teach you information, or that is secondary…

In my first year of college, as not an Econ major, I had been exposed to both an avowed socialist economist, and one of the leaders behind the push to deregulate the airline industry.

The idea that they represent a single orthodox is a little flawed.

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#570

Post by xyzelement »

ghaff wrote: post #541
xyzelement wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You get the point I'm making though, right? :) If you want to sell your product to 33% percent of kids, your product has to be very easy to consume.

Are you suggesting that college is a standardized product? Most people can get through a generally non-selective state school--and, to be clear, some of those graduates have done extraordinarily well for themselves. But selective elite schools aren't selling their product to 33% of kids.

I am making a generic comment. For college to be accessible intellectually to 33% of people, the barrier to entry (amount of mental effort and desire to learn) has to be pretty low. Doesn't mean it has to apply to every student or school.

This thread was about "college" generically, not about MIT.

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