Is college overrated?

Parents Forum
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<p>sakky ,you are still asking what majors, other than tech ones, flunk students with Fs? I can hardly believe you are asking this. Students do receive F’s and do obtain very low GPAs that require them to flunk out of college who are not majoring in engineering!! I read about cases on CC all the time and in real life too. I already mentioned that NSM’s son flunked out due to a very low GPA and she has publicly shared that story and her son was not in engineering.</p>

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<p>So name some then. Some non-engineering (or natural science) majors who assign F grades to students who actually put in effort and don’t cheat.</p>

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<p>Sakky, I am now NOT talking of the performing arts majors who were “cut.”</p>

<p>Students DO flunk out of college in many majors. They have F’s and their GPA is too low and they flunk out.</p>

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<p>Again, name some of these majors. You say that there are “many” of them; it should be easy for you to name a bunch.</p>

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<p>sakky, at every college students flunk out. Are you disputing this? </p>

<p>OK, here’s one…I told you I taught Education at college and students were getting F’s and flunking out.</p>

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<p>I have never disputed that college students who put in no effort and/or cheat will flunk out.</p>

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<p>That’s a very interesting assertion, because education seems to be amongst the MOST grade-inflated majors. I strongly suspect those students were putting in no effort. </p>

<p>*
Most shocking, the average high school GPA for education majors was 3.35 while their college GPA in education courses was a 3.77. Universities are supposed to be more rigorous, but this data suggests that standards are lower in college, especially in colleges of education.*</p>

<p>[Center</a> for College Affordability and Productivity: Educating Brilliance?](<a href=“http://collegeaffordability.blogspot.com/2010/03/educating-brilliance.html]Center”>The Center for College Affordability and Productivity: Educating Brilliance?)</p>

<p>But I’ll defer to your judgment. Of those education students you taught who received F’s, would you say that they actually put in effort? Be perfectly honest now.</p>

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<p>I think the best articles on this topic (started by the OP) are written by Charles Murray. Although I do not like his politics much, some of his other opinions are truly refreshing in this politically-correct time.</p>

<p>[WSJ:</a> Charles Murray and Education Second Thoughts](<a href=“Cliff Slater's SECOND THOUGHTS”>Cliff Slater's SECOND THOUGHTS)</p>

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<p>charles murray? “refreshing”…? the man has tap-danced around eugenics for the majority of his career. he’s a bigoted, pessimistic has-been.</p>

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<p>I spent 2 years exploring my options after high school - </p>

<p>This worked for me because I was not sure on what I wanted to do . </p>

<p>I started working then discovered something that interests me so now Im finishing my degree for UM.</p>

<p>im also building a website dedicated to students who plan to study abroad [Study</a> Abroad University | Study Abroad Success | <a href=“http://www.studyabroaduniversity.com%5B/url%5D”>http://www.studyabroaduniversity.com](<a href=“http://www.studyabroaduniversity.com%5DStudy”>http://www.studyabroaduniversity.com)</a></p>

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<p>He may very well be bigoted, but I do think he can be “refreshing”. Here are two examples from the first article:</p>

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<p>That is what i meant by refreshing; honesty can be very refreshing.</p>

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<p>A personal perspective:</p>

<p>I earned a master’s in engineering at age 23, got my first full-time engineering job at 24 (after an internship) and now have a management job in manufacturing.</p>

<p>If I had instead gone to trade school to become a technician, I would:</p>

<ul>
<li> make about 35% less money working 15 fewer hours per week</li>
<li> make the same money working the same number of hours per week (counting overtime)</li>
<li> never have to take my work home with me</li>
<li> get the satisfaction of working with my hands</li>
<li> have more job opportunities that wouldn’t require me to relocate</li>
<li> still be able to advance into middle management if I chose, by taking some extra classes</li>
</ul>

<p>Pretty much the only things I wouldn’t have are the ego boost of being “the boss” and the potential to move into upper management/executive positions. These things happen to be important to me (for now), so I’m satisfied, but if my son wanted to go the trade-school route, I wouldn’t stop him.</p>

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<p>Life is not all about college or academics. I think that learning how to love and how to be happy is definitely more important than academics. There are more important things in life such as spirituality, faith, and love. I think that the positive factor of going to college is that its easier to find a job (which is good). I think that the most important things in life is your relationship with God, and with your fellow human beings. The definition of sucess varies with diffrent people, and I think that there are diffrent paths to sucess other than college, college can be a path for some, but it may not be for someone else.</p>

<p>I’m not a parent, sorry if I shouldn’t of post here, I didn’t realize that until now.</p>

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<p>^^^
Anybody can post here as long as they follow the forum etiquette.</p>

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<p>^
Thanks, that’s good to hear.</p>

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<p>“any more than it is within my power to follow a proof in the American Journal of Mathematics”</p>

<p>did charles murray really say that?</p>

<p>That would explain a lot about the “The Bell Curve”, actually.</p>

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<p>That quote is absolute nonsense. The intelligence arguments are simply silly. My wife directs a program for children that teaches reasoning and problem solving among other things, and results in kids who are typically two or more years behind their peers not only catching-up, but often exceeding them in performance after a couple of years in the program. Most, who many would assume beyond hope (as far as college is concerned), go on to excel in high school and college. The program has graduate hundreds of these successful students over a period of over 30 years.</p>

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<p>Isn’t it really more about motivation? Even if most people could, with enough effort, become a mathematician, few would want to, and that makes the effort moot. Education has to be relevant in order to be effective. If you consider mathematics relevant, you’ll learn it. If you don’t, the best teacher in the world isn’t going to make you. A good teacher can make a subject relevant, but everyone has a limit.</p>

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<p>No. His position is well-supported by psychometrics, as seen in this piece in the WSJ which was signed by some of the most distinguished scholars in the field:</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.udel.edu/educ/gottfredson/reprints/1994WSJmainstream.pdf[/url]”>http://www.udel.edu/educ/gottfredson/reprints/1994WSJmainstream.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Sometimes reality is not pleasant, but it is still reality. My problem with Murray is that his support for Sarah Palin is inconsistent with his belief (about intelligence) as expressed in his writings. I thought Obama would be more to his liking, don’t you think? :wink: That makes me question his motive for writing that book.</p>

<p>In the second article, he indirectly touched upon the debate between two posters in this thread:</p>

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<p>This certainly is consistent with my experience as a student.</p>

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<p>You may want to clarify from what perspective this is consistent with your experience. I’m assuming second-hand.</p>

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<p>I question how someone who does not think he is capable, even with major effort and motivation and sufficient education, that he could ever FOLLOW a proof in the Journal of Mathematics, - not, mind you, discover a proof, or critique a proof, but simply FOLLOW a proof - is capable writing a paper with policy and social that is based on quantitative research as The Bell Curve is.</p>

<p>I understand that many researchers in psychometrics (that ad is from 1997, BTW) agreed large with Murray. IIUC many do not, and there is no consensus in the field. Certainly nothing comparable to the consensus among climate scientists that anthropogenic global warming is real. Has Charles Murray taken a stand on that?</p>