<p>I like Dilbert, but Scott Adams is an idiot, as a thinker! </p>
<p>In 2005 Adams created a storm - or a tempest in a teacup - of his own making, by backing Intelligent Design Creationism, over evolution. This was shortly before a Federal Judge in Dover PA ruled that ID is nothing more than Creationism in a cheap tuxedo.</p>
<p>For a more detailed debunking of Adams by a Prof at University of Wisc Green Bay, visit the link:</p>
<p>So, even though Adams is an IDiot, I still read Dilbert, but anybody that lets their thinking get swayed by a cartoonist gets what they deserve. A horse laugh.</p>
<p>Actually cartoonists probably have done more to sway public opinion than many political writers. He might very well be correct in most of this analysis. For most business jobs–even at high levels, the advanced math we were forced to take had zero value for considerable effort and pain. If you can remember basic algebra and stats you are usually set for life. Same for many other required classes.</p>
<p>He makes a great point. The same point can be applied to high school when we, that is the public, force people to sit there until the 12th grade when some of them have no interest in being there. They then, of course, disrupt the learning process for the ones who do want to be there. </p>
<p>Repeat after me …</p>
<p>Waste of resources!!</p>
<p>Education should be focused on the ones who want to be there. There should be absolutely nothing controversial about that either. Let them go. Say good bye and good luck to the ones who don’t want to be there. </p>
<p>And I agree with barrons, the curriculum is full of classes that are not needed. Zero value for considerable pain and effort. Welll put. Yet it will never change.</p>
<p>I think the key is in the level of motivation found in any student regardless of how effective he or she is in taking tests. The biggest problem I see is a lot of people looking around for a handout of some kind, whether it’s an admission to their first choice college or their first job out of college in which they expect a high paying position near their home. Just a couple of examples that come immediately to mind. I have experienced this first hand with a particular offspring of mine.</p>
<p>“hmmm…didn’t the Greeks keep their people focused on liberal education while the Romans included engineering”</p>
<p>Not quite…while the Romans certainly were known for their engineering achievements, they wouldn’t have de-valued the liberal arts and engineering wouldn’t have been considered part of education for the Roman elite…and don’t forget, Roman engineering depended on Greek mathematics, one of the liberal arts.</p>
<p>Actually, as things turned out, I think the A-student Greeks ended up working for the C-student Romans!</p>
<p>Of course, the way universities are raising prices, it is hard to think of going to university without any type of “utility” thinking. Preaching the value of a liberal arts education while raising prices so that a liberal arts education without any consideration to job and career utility is an expensive luxury affordable only by the very rich does not show much consistency in the universities’ words and actions.</p>
<p>I don’t think entrepreneurship can be taught. You either have the drive, the initiative, the willingness to take risks, or you don’t. Most of us don’t (including moi). That’s why I’m still a corporate slave after all these years – too scared to freelance!</p>
<p>I think Magnificent makes a really good point in his/her post.</p>
<p>But with that being said, I hear a lot of people preaching the “START YOUR OWN BUSINESS” and “SCREW COLLEGE AND BECOME A ENTREPRENEUR JUST LIKE BILL GATES AND MARK ZUCKERBURG!!”. We find it so easy to say that not everyone is made for college but yet I never hear anybody say not everyone is made for entrepreneurship.</p>
<p>There’s more to it than just making a **** ton of money. I think a lot of young people look at folks like Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Mark Zuckerburg and think, “Geez, all I have to do is drop out, create some product, and it’ll go from there!!.” Just like you have some who feel like they must go bankrupt on a college education because they feel that’s how they will get a good paying job.</p>
<p>Honestly, what we should do instead of trying to push one over the other is that we should express all options to our young people and the pros and cons that come along with it.</p>
<p>From entrepreneurship, to college, and to picking up a trade. All should be talked about and supported and the student themselves should be able to make the choice for themselves. Not what mommy, daddy, and the guidance counselor thinks is best for them.</p>
<p>Oh yeah, even if you decide to become a entrepreneur it still doesn’t hurt, imo, to get some courses on accounting or tax laws. I know some small business owners who did this and it helped them greatly.</p>
<p>@Magnificent: I just think you got success running through your veins anyway. :D</p>
<p>I’m not sure about that based on numerous accounts from elderly friends and relatives who graduated college in the US in the 1940s-1960’s. While getting Cs was harder than nowadays, they all mentioned that the disdain for C average college graduates existed during their time. </p>
<p>Then again, according to what I read and from their firsthand accounts only a tiny proportion of the US population went off to college until the mid-1960’s. Either they were scions of wealthy families who got in mainly thorough legacy factors on steroids which existed(Yalie uncle who was a few years behind W said they were the majority of classes prior to his own) or the fewer students who graduated in the top 10% at the very minimum (More like top 1-5%). </p>
<p>Moreover, while high school C students did go on to colleges…even the Ivies back then, only those who happened to be scions of wealthy families and thus, could exercise the legacy/developmental option on steroids would have had the opportunity. </p>
<p>Middle and working-class high school C students were almost always considered “unfit for college” and thus, usually expected to start working after high school or sometimes, even before graduating. Though there may have been exceptions from veterans who went off to college with the GI Bill…all the ones I knew were at least high school B students before they were drafted.</p>
<p>Mark Zuckerberg went to Harvard and dropped out to pursue Facebook, you’re making it sound like he wasn’t good enough to finish college. In fact, he was too good to finish college.</p>
<p>It doesn’t matter what people should and shouldn’t do at the end of the day. It all boils down to one thing-you will make choices in life. Some people opt for the riskier ones and some go the safe route. In the end, education is education and it depends on the individual.</p>
<p>“We also have to remember that many of the people we know best as some of the richest people in the world including Mark Zuckerberg as well as Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, never finished college at all.”</p>
<p>While Gates, Jobs, and Zuckerberg all have smarts and entrepreneurial skills, a necessary ingredient for their success that everyone seems to forget is that they all had EXPERTISE. Long before Gates was a successful entrepreneur, he was an expert programmer. The same with Zuckerberg. In Jobs’ case, he developed expertise in pricing electronic components. </p>
<p>I think its safe to say that almost no entrepreneurs ever studied entrepreneurship. Some of them actually did study the field that that did business in. </p>
<p>Motivation and desire is the key trait, and can hardly be taught. I watched a program about the late Dave Thomas, founder of Wendy’s, and was struck by his daughters saying that he was never home, always at work. And that he did not know where their high school was, because he was so single minded.</p>
<p>While I agree he was a successful entrepreneur, his most important expertise wasn’t actually in programming. </p>
<p>Instead, his expertise was in effectively marketing software to businesses through the concept of the individual/corporate user license and knowing when to purchase intellectual property on the cheap to create or improve his company’s own products. </p>
<p>That was certainly the case when he purchased DOS from a programmer for around $50,000 right before he marketed it to IBM as the OS for their first PCs in 1981. He may or may not have been the first to realize the concept…but he was certainly the first one to capitalize on it on a grand scale to grow his company into a corporate giant.</p>
<p>Do entrepreneurs even learn their entrepreneurship through classes? I seriously doubt that classes really cause people to create innovation. If someone really wants to start a business, it might just be better for them to skip college altogether and use those years to get ahead.</p>
<p>I don’t even know why the opinion of this guy is so important. He got known through writing comics, not because he has major success in starting a business.</p>
<p>I don’t agree with Adams that art history and calculus are useless. They train the mind how to think and they train the senses. I do agree with his general advice. It’s not like he went out on a limb on any of this stuff. It’s all pretty much standard motivational speaking, but it is absolutely true. Read the article and don’t pay attention to whether you agree with his thesis or not, pay attention to the advice given because it is actually very useful.</p>