by Zancarius » Wed Sep 06, 2006 1:39 pm
University is nice--if you get good instructors. Otherwise, it's a repeat of high school with senseless busy work being taught by grad students. If possible, make sure you take your first two years at a community college (check to make sure their credits are accepted by whatever major 4 year university you plan on going to, though); the classes are generally much smaller and the professors are a bit more respectable. The biggest downside occurs in CS/IT/IS classes: if you actually know something, you're pretty screwed.
I can empathize with you, Sno. I remember those days. Each teacher seems to forget that the students are in other classes that also assign homework. Oftentimes, the homework that is assigned has no purpose other than to produce grades and keep the students busy. I've never understood the reasoning behind it since I'm not an educator myself. I'm sure there is a reason, but the system is so hopelessly confused and lost itself that the assignments are assigned by teachers because they can. I can't say I enjoyed my experience in the public schools. Although there is one benefit to it: you learn a great deal about upper management and how to do their work without putting in a great deal of effort. I guess it's great training for future work ethos.
On the other hand, there is a faint ray of light piercing through the clouds of moronhood: the real education doesn't start until college. In fact, I never truly learned the correct rules of grammar until my first year in university and it was then when I fell in love with the English language. Middle and high school both seem preoccupied with the results rather than the methodologies, and the students tend to grow confused about the structure because of this underpinning. It seemed to me that they were more concerned about creating little factories of paperwork where quantity was more important that quality. I recall my frustration with those students who were able to churn out pages of poor work, yet they still managed to score higher than those of us who were focused on creating a finished product we were proud of.
I have a quote you might find interesting and hopefully quite telling of the educational system as it stands. Perhaps you might find some inspiration in it:
"A Yale University management professor in response to student Fred Smith's paper proposing reliable overnight delivery service (Smith went on to found Federal Express Corp.): The concept is interesting and well-formed, but in order to earn better than a 'C,' the idea must be feasible."
I gave that lich a phylactery shard. Liches love phylactery shards.