The First Lecture
blog.punchthrough.com
The First Lecture
1–10 of 13 posts
Re: The First Lecture
#2This is great, while I've often thought I should go back to my college and bridge the glaring holes between the curriculum and reality, I never got much further than that.
Definitely alumni going back and helping their schools should be encouraged, and hopefully most dept's are humble enough to accept that help. But I worry it's a small thing that doesn't scale, have you thought about the growing online education movement as a vector?
Re: The First Lecture
#3This is great, while I've often thought I should go back to my college and bridge the glaring holes between the curriculum and reality, I never got much further than that. Definitely alumni going back and helping their schools should be encouraged, and hopefully most dept's are humble enough to accept that help. But I worry it's a small thing that doesn't scale, have you thought about the growing online education mov…
Definitely. This is kind of the test of my hypothesis, that doing these projects in the real world create a motivation that influences your school work, life, career, etc.
I've long thought that there should be a 'maker scholarship', giving small amounts of funding to people/students building real things. I found small amounts of this in the form of sponsorships from companies, but I really had to hustle for it. Whereas I randomly (literally just showed up in my mail) received a scholarship simply because my grades were above a certain mark. The 'Maker Scholarship' idea is definitely scalable.
As far as a new kind of school, I'm not sure the best way to do that. Certainly interested in all the online activity but I do like the social feel of a 'real life' school.
Re: The First Lecture
#4This is great, while I've often thought I should go back to my college and bridge the glaring holes between the curriculum and reality, I never got much further than that. Definitely alumni going back and helping their schools should be encouraged, and hopefully most dept's are humble enough to accept that help. But I worry it's a small thing that doesn't scale, have you thought about the growing online education mov…
Definitely. This is kind of the test of my hypothesis, that doing these projects in the real world create a motivation that influences your school work, life, career, etc. I've long thought that there should be a 'maker scholarship', giving small amounts of funding to people/students building real things. I found small amounts of this in the form of sponsorships from companies, but I really had to hustle for it. Wher…
Maybe there is some concept you can develop at one school that can spread to more. I'd also bet maker companies like sparkfun would be interested in sponsoring such things.
Re: The First Lecture
#5Argghh, please do not decry the state of general education when you can't spell. I know this is a nitpick, but phrases like "I've had the good fortunate" do not help your cause.
Re: The First Lecture
#6This is great, while I've often thought I should go back to my college and bridge the glaring holes between the curriculum and reality, I never got much further than that. Definitely alumni going back and helping their schools should be encouraged, and hopefully most dept's are humble enough to accept that help. But I worry it's a small thing that doesn't scale, have you thought about the growing online education mov…
I teach programming in a university. We have to pull teeth to get alumni to come back to advise us, much less get them interacting with the students.
Re: The First Lecture
#7This is cool...I had no idea people didn't like microcontroller classes. At my school, "Principles of Engineering" (microcontrollers + mechE) is almost universally loved and a whole lot of fun.
http://www.olinprojects.com/tag/principles-of-engineering/
It seems that we learn in class a lot like how you originally did. Agreed that it is way better and more fun.
Re: The First Lecture
#8Argghh, please do not decry the state of general education when you can't spell. I know this is a nitpick, but phrases like "I've had the good fortunate" do not help your cause.
Listen to this wise being. Never try to motivate others into learning something you yourself are passionate about without the use of a good spell checker. Even then, you best make sure the words you use are the right ones!
Re: The First Lecture
#9This is cool...I had no idea people didn't like microcontroller classes. At my school, "Principles of Engineering" (microcontrollers + mechE) is almost universally loved and a whole lot of fun. http://www.olinprojects.com/tag/principles-of-engineering/ It seems that we learn in class a lot like how you originally did. Agreed that it is way better and more fun.
I've heard a lot of good things about Olin and have always been impressed by it's grads. Seems like they are doing it right. I get the impression it's still a smaller school, is that true?
Re: The First Lecture
#10Argghh, please do not decry the state of general education when you can't spell. I know this is a nitpick, but phrases like "I've had the good fortunate" do not help your cause.
Really? His typo invalidates his premise about how to teach engineering in a fun and engaging way?
As far as I could tell, his main concern was for the curiosity and motivation of the students, not their ability to communicate via the written word.
Typos may detract from his post, and nitpicking is fine, but your first sentence is illogical, incorrect (it's not a spelling error), and unnecessarily negative. Take it easy with the attitude, man.