<p>"If you think education is expensive, try ignorance".
I did a search of Lincoln quotes and couldn't find it anywhere. I did find it attributed to Derek Bok in more than one place.
Lincoln was largely self taught, with brief periods in one-room schools. He read for the bar without benefit of law school.
Bok's education was considerably more expensive. Stanford BA, George Washington AM, Harvard Law School.
In his years of service at Harvard, Bok certainly had an expensive product to sell.</p>
<p>I would think that not having TAs would be a piece of evidence that a school is not fulfilling its obligation to educate the next generation of college teachers.</p>
<p>Interesting
However some of the best teachers my older daughter had in private school- didn't have a teaching certificate- private schools have the flexibilty to hire instructors on knowledge of their subject
as I mentioned earlier- her school doesn't have TAs and at least one of her strongest profs weren't on the tenure track- ( so unfortunately his visa expired)- </p>
<p>While schools of education, are charged with educating future teachers- I don't know how well some of them are doing their job. At least one flagship U, has faced lawsuits from students, who are frustrated at being given the credits, but no instruction- or at least not what they expected.</p>
<p>However- LACs who don't commonly have grad students, aren't slacking in their ability to educate enrolled students, at least not by the percentages of students who then receive Ph.ds I also would disagree that schools are charged with supplying the demand for profs.</p>
<p>But is there a shortage of qualified applicants? Several of the instructors at the community college level for example, are over qualified, there doesn't seem to be a dearth of academics who have the background and skills to teach adults.</p>
<p>I would also mention that I have accomplished quite a lot without a college or even high school diploma- after all I have over 5,000 posts!
:D</p>
<p>
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"If you think education is expensive, try ignorance."
[/quote]
But, it's not so black and white. </p>
<p>The amount of 'expense' varies wildly between colleges and depending on the individual's circumstances (full scholarship to full freight). Some colleges are riduculously expensive and others are not really that expensive yet yield the same degree. There's a lot of personal choice here (back to supply and demand).</p>
<p>Also, who says that going to an expensive college is the only way to be educated or even if some of those graduating were educated much at all anyway? There are many ways to educate one's self either individually or through less expensive colleges. I'll even go out on a limb here and state that a number of people who graduate with liberal arts degrees really haven't been educated that much during their college years. I'm not by any means saying this applies to all but it certainly applies to some I know who take the minimum amount of classes, put in a minimal effort, and still can manage a BA in PoliSci or History, etc. with little effort and little actual education.</p>
<p>There is a difference between a liberal arts education and a liberal arts college. Almost all public colleges and universities offer a liberal arts education as do most private universities.</p>
<p>And for some students, the value of education is totally dissociated with economic considerations. </p>
<p>My only issue is with the amount of student debt that rears its ugly head upon graduation. If a student can attend a private LAC@$45k/yr and graduate with a reasonable amount of student loans, great. If (s)he cannot, perhaps enrolling in a liberal arts program at an ISS is a better option.</p>
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And for some students, the value of education is totally dissociated with economic considerations.
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</p>
<p>I couldn't agree more that this is the case. What makes me a little bit irritated is when one hears someone say it is almost crass to associate decisions of the value of particular kinds of education with economic considerations. On CC, this has happened before. If one has no mind toward economic considerations, either one is naive, selfish, and/or daddy's paying for everything. This is not to say that the value of education all or even primarily is tabulated economically. My education had for me very particular benefits for my social and even psychic life.</p>
<p>Ah, Grove City College, the college that refused to comply with Title IX.</p>
<p>By the way, if you get rid of tenure, you will have a heck of a hard time convincing ANYONE to spend 5-10 years getting a PhD and then teaching at the university level. If it's ok with you to have college professors who are not experts in their field, then you don't need PhDs teaching. But the credentials and knowledge of professors will go down.</p>
<p>
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If it's ok with you to have college professors who are not experts in their field, then you don't need PhDs teaching. But the credentials and knowledge of professors will go down.
[/quote]
But, do you really need a PHD to teach entry-level Calculus, Stats, Psyc, History, and other courses? Would it be less expensive to have a multi-tier system where the PHDs are teaching only the upper-level courses and non-PHDs (and presumably lower-cost) are teaching the more entry-level courses? One could argue that this is already being done at some colleges where some course are essentially conducted by the TAs.</p>
<p>I have not been impressed with the skills of those with only Masters in English. I teach at a community college at which 85% of the faculty have PhD's (as I do.) Our most common course offering is Freshman English. If ever there were a course that needs to be taught well, it's that. Wruting courses taught by publishing writers differ markedly from those taught by those whose recourse is a set of rules about writing. I have had students tell me that all paragraphs must have five sentences, all essays five paragraphs and that an essayist can never say I. Students are completed shocked when I say that the only two rules I know about writing are the writer must have something to say and that s(he) must write that clearly. Both parts of the equation must be attended to, and surprisingly, it does take experienced professors with a sophisticated approach to succeed at this task.</p>
<p>As for the fate of small liberal arts colleges, I would hate to return to a society in which only the rich had access to the best education. Class divisions in the society would be magnified and the rich would gain even more influence. Once we decide that a first-rate liberal arts education is worthwhile (and I certainly think it is) only then can we discuss the best ways of paying for it. Right now public institutions, merit aid, need based financial aid, tax credits, Federal work study, and low interest guaranteed loans are some options. I'm sure there are many others.</p>
<p>I would agree with mythmom
My daughter had a class at a community college- which is taught by a man who has degrees including Phd from Stanford and Caltech. Similar background actually to her profs at Reed.</p>
<p>I suppose you could argue that students don't need someone with that sort of background, certainly her sister in public school, has been taught by a substitute for most of the year in Spanish, who may have taken some in college- but it wasn't their major.
Subs, don't need to have a degree in anything but education and they don't need to be certificated in even the grade they are teaching.
Schools with a higher percentage of "challenged" youth, may have less preparation in high school and so are even more in need of appropriate- accurate preparation in college.</p>
<p>You have to really know your subject, to know what is essential and what is extraneous.
Or that is my take on it anyway :)</p>
<p>UC_dad, On the contrary the introductory courses are the most demanding. Those are the courses that absolutely have to be done right. It is easy to be an expert in a narrow field but it takes true understanding to teach a general introductory course.</p>
<p>Grove City College has apparently gotten off the federal money teat in every way, from what I have heard.
I think that there is a very loose association between academic credentials and value as a teacher. Obviously Lincoln was his own best teacher. I also think that there is a very loose association between money and learning. In my family there is virtually none.
Ivan Illich argued that the education industry survives because it has convinced people that there is a shortage of the means and opportunities to learn. Of course there is no such shortage.
My kids left school after elementary school. The biggest expense has been overdue fines at the public library. One has completed college with a fine education, in my book, and is a babe in the woods at figuring how this is going to pay off economically. The next will start college in the fall and is appalled at how many kids at her school have already figured out what they want to major in, shorthand for what they will make a living at.
Our family income is such that the family expense for the first was minimal, and at least tuition and then some will be covered for the second.
I guess I am an atheist when it comes to the idea that education has to equal money, and that credentials have anything to do with educators' value to the student.</p>
<p>
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It is easy to be an expert in a narrow field but it takes true understanding to teach a general introductory course.
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I don't think it takes a PHD degree to have a 'true understanding' and be able to do a good job teaching the material of many of the courses in college. And, we all probably know of some PHD professors who aren't necessarily great teachers either - some are downright terrible (and some are great). Some of the best college 'teachers' are the lecturers without a PHD - according to a lot of the students.</p>
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The kind of generalization you are talking about is not instructive, to put it nicely.
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</p>
<p>I'm not sure what you mean by "instructive generalizations," but let me ask you this: Suppose that I argued that the societal costs of having every last student get a PhD probably outweighed the benefits. Would you say that's not an instructive generalization?</p>
<p>To me its clear that the problem isn't college in general. Its High School's focus on literature and art (both with almost no utility in real life) over practical math and science education. Too many students are ignorant of the fact that there are plenty of jobs in engineering and science, but extremely few jobs in art or literature, even though the weights that High Schools put on the topics would suggest the opposite. </p>
<p>My suggestion: get literature out of the schools (maybe one class is okay for fun, but the idea that reading/writing literature is any more of serious work than playing video games needs to go out the tube). If there is any English education, it should focus on writing research papers (maybe a class like writing for engineers) and then a class like writing for engineers, focusing around communicating designs.</p>
<p>
[quote]
But, do you really need a PHD to teach entry-level Calculus, Stats, Psyc, History, and other courses?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>An interesting question. I like Robert Hayden's exploration of that issue in connection with statistics, a subject frequently taught in colleges by instructors who have no postgraduate education in that subject. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.statland.org/MAAFIXED.PDF%5B/url%5D">http://www.statland.org/MAAFIXED.PDF</a></p>
<p>I find Alg2000's suggestion of abolishing HS arts and literature (except for "one class for fun") appalling.</p>
<p>Why? I mean, literature is fun, but it shouldn't be the bread and butter of education at any level. Today, most schools I've seen require more English and history credits than Math and science combined. History is important, because it allows people to be good citizens, but isn't science an equally important component of good citizenship? </p>
<p>I'm not saying literature isn't cool, because life isn't 100% getting money and good jobs. But clearly the purpose of school is to prepare kids for jobs, and for today's jobs math, science, and communication (what English should be teaching) are more important than literary analysis.</p>
<p>Communication, which is the thing you take out of lit classes, is more important than any science or math you will learn in HS. Knowing how to properly communicate(all to rare as it is) depends on reading and writing skills. This is infinitely more important than a kid taking some other basic science course in HS.</p>
<p>And my HS - 7 Math/Science and 7 Lit/History credits</p>
<p>The fact that you are ignorant of the most vital part of working today is sad. No matter how good you are at Physics, you still have to be able to explain it to others, which is why english classes are important.</p>
<p>And that is beyond the basic citizenship and those types of requirements. I'll place good citizenship(especially understanding of politics and the goings on there) above math/sci vs. english also. Most people aren't working at a level where the difference matters, vocational schooling is all they need. Prepare those people early for the broader things they will ignore later.</p>
<p>The jobs you are refering to as being needed require further education, that won't change. So they can take those 'soft' courses in HS anyway. The majority of people, who don't continue on, need that same amount of 'soft' courses, but will not continue on in there education, and won't be able to gain them later.</p>
<p>I think that more lit/history/psych/politics/econ type courses should be taught in HS so that people will be better prepared for the real world, and not f@#$ it up for me, rather than be marginally better prepared for high tech jobs.</p>
<p>And you fail to realize that communication and analysis go hand in hand. They are in fact quite similar.</p>
<p>I agree that communication is key. But today's English class focuses on fiction and particularly poetry. </p>
<p>The real world communication skills people need are for non-fiction, and for writings which are very different than poetry. I agree that students should be writing, communicating, and analyzing, but they should be doing non-fiction. They should be writing lab reports, reading college textbooks or scientific journals, and throwing poetry out the window. </p>
<p>Or maybe, we should just integrate writing and reading into regular classes, and just have one "Writing for Scientists and Engineers", and students would learn to read and write by reading a college level textbook, and practice writing with regular lab reports. </p>
<p>It wouldn't be such a problem, having so many English classes, if people didn't major in philosophy, women's studies, English, Psychology, etc. Most people don't realize, like you, that these are soft classes, and are meant to supplement a main course of study, and not replace it.</p>