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Some students in non-impacted majors probably like it, since they can "cruise on by," happy to know that their nerdy high school valedictorian is over in CS getting straight Ds.
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<p>Huh? What does that have to do with impaction. Grade inflation/deflation is an entirely different issue from impaction. You can have extremely difficult majors, while not having any impacted majors. MIT, for example, does exactly this. You can major in anything you want at MIT without restriction, but of course, most of the majors are extremely hard. </p>
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I do. Doing well in an impacted major might breed higher self-esteem for many kids. So, it's a "good thing" as far as they're concerned.
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<p>Allright! Allright! NOW we're finally getting somewhere. So you admit that you LIKE impaction. I knew it! No wonder you were giving me so much resistance. You WANT other students to not be able to get the major they want, because you want to feel good about their misery! So basically, this is schedenfraude! You WANT people to get hurt, because then you can laugh at them and feel superior.</p>
<p>So all of that talk about how Berkeley can't accomodate these students, or doesn't have the resources, or doesn't have the faculty, or all this stuff - all of that is irrelevant. You just don't WANT these students to be able to major in what they want. You like it when people get hurt.</p>
<p>See, that's the difference between you and me. I see people in pain and in trouble, and I want to help. You want people to be in pain so that you can laugh at them. When you see starving children in Africa, are you laughing at them? When you see people suffering from poverty, do you laugh at them? I guess you do. </p>
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That's because you take such a limited view of things. If Berkeley had 10,000 students, impacted majors would be a bad thing. That's because we'd obviously have the resources to put everyone in whatever major they wanted. We have 20,000 students, so impacted majors are a good thing to prevent overcrowding majors.
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<p>Overcrowded? How's that? The impacted majors are not the biggest majors at the school. MCB is the largest siingle major graduating almost as many students as the entire College of Engineering (580 vs. 720). Yet MCB isn't impacted. Poli-sci is the 2nd largest major on campus (with about 500 students per year graduating), yet poli-sci is not impacted. The impacted majors are all relatively small compared to those 2 majors. Economics, for example, only graduates about 320 students. Yet, for some reason, Econ is impacted. Why?</p>
<p><a href="http://career.berkeley.edu/Major/Major.stm%5B/url%5D">http://career.berkeley.edu/Major/Major.stm</a></p>
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Now, you may argue then that having 10,000 students is better than having 20,000 students. However, it's certainly better for those 10,000 students who otherwise wouldn't have gone to Berkeley for Berkeley to have 20,000 students. And those 10,000 students that were attending anyway are negligibly impacted (this is a point of contention, I know, since this isn't quantifiable and we haven't convinced each other of this point, I just have to go with my belief here). Therefore, having 20,000 students versus 10,000 is better, assuming the university has sufficient resources (which I'd argue it does).
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<p>And what about those people who have the choice to go to one of the top private schools? Is going to Berkeley a better choice, given that impaction is a problem? </p>
<p>If you don't solve the problem of impaction, you're never going to get those students who have other choices. Hence, Berkeley will always basically be known as the 'safety school' for those other schools. Now, if you're satisfied with that, then fine. I'm not satisfied with that. </p>
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Further, I seriously think impacted majors are a good thing. I go to Berkeley and am glad we have impacted majors, because competition is a good thing when resources are limited for some majors. See, you can't just ask somebody "do you like having impacted majors?" It should be worded as a compromise, because it is: "Would you rather have impacted majors, or have your classes fill up quicker because more students are in your major than its budget can handle?"
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<p>Well, first off, you have people like greatesteyn admitting that she actually LIKES it when people can't get the major they want, because it makes her feel superior. In other words, she obtains enjoyment off people's misery. </p>
<p>But putting sadistic people like her aside, how is this issue truly resource constrained? Like I said, MCB and poli-sci apparently have enough resources to accomodate everybody. They're the 2 largest majors on campus. So if they can be so large and yet accomodate everybody, that indicates that resources clearly exist. The resources are just not optimized. </p>
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This is not a case where you can argue from the standpoint of "all things being equal" (ceteris paribus, by the way), because they won't be if you choose one way or another. If there are most students in a major, the same number of classes with the same number of students can't be offered, because the major obviously needs to support more students. In theory, of course "all things being equal" it'd be better to not have impacted majors. But all things won't be equal after sustaining such a change.
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<p>Again, tell me how it is that MCB can support so many students? MCB students need expensive lab space. But they are able to accomodate all the students that want to come anyway. So if MCB can do it, then why can't a far smaller and far less expensive major like Mass Comm do it? MCB graduated 580 undergrads in 2005. MCB has never been impacted. Mass Comm had to enact impaction because they couldn't handle more than 140? Come on, what's wrong with this picture?</p>