Rim- Sorry the Prez makes a whopping $200,000 or probably less than any current Rocket. My only point was for his responsibility our President is underpaid. Also his speaking fees are again due to the free market, not becasue he is entitled to do X speeches a year for Y dollars for the rest of his life for just being the Prez. Also I never said it was the parent responsibilty to eductate their children but it is their responsibility for the child to not disturb the class they are in. Too many children today do not respect their teachers and therefore interrupt classes so others can't learn either. I don't honestly know but I would assume their hasn't been a sizeable difference in the quality of our teachers in the last 20-30 years (not much better, not much worse) but what has changed is the students. Why have the students changed? Because they don't respect their teachers. Where should that respect be instilled, I say it is the home. Also wouldn't hurt if these parents spent a little time with the children doing homework or studying. Also my point about education was a response to launchpad who said it wasn't fair the a teacher with a 4 year degree gets less pay than a policeman with a 2 year degree. Education can't buy you success just like succeses aren't always as a result of education.
4chuck, Sorry, you cannot blame the students. I strongly beg to differ about the quality of teachers staying the same as 20-30 years ago. I saw first hand. I went to pretty poor middle and high schools. I only respected 4-5 teachers during those 8 years because the others did not deserve respect. For example, I had a geometry teacher who "taught" us by having us go seat by seat reading outloud from the textbook. Then, we would take tests. She told us that she was so smart and could teach a goat math. She told all the girls that when she was their age, she was much finer than they were, etc. Incidentally, both of her daughters repeatedly failed the math section of the TAAS. I had an english teacher who could barely speak. She would spend 85% of class time talking about Jesus and the Bible. I had multiple subs all year in chemistry. For tests and the final, they just gave us the answers a week before (multiple choice, of course) which we had to memorize. In senior english, I would get 95-100 on everything I did, but everytime report cards came out, I would get an 88-89. The reason? The teacher used holistic grading, she would drop my grade because "I thought I was smarter than everyone else." This was based on the fact that I was very successful in extra-curricular academic stuff. I had a sub who read the paper in class all year for 8th grade history. I took a "theory of knowledge" class where we learned to play bridge to enhance our minds. I got a 50 one semester (six weeks?) because I could not make it to a voluntary bridge tournament, due to the fact that I was in a state tournament for something else. My biology teacher like high school girls, that is all I will say. I got accused af falsifying a source in government because I cited The Congressional Report with some very high page number, maybe 1234567, or so. She said, "do you really expect me to believe that page number?" (for those who do not know, that is everything that is said in congress, compiled and released bi-weekly - I think - the page starts at 1 Jan 1st and continues through dec). There are more, but I do not want to bore too much. Oh, did I mention I was in all honors classes? Regular classes were much, much worse. I also won't start with administration... So, sure, blame the kids. ------------------ EZLN
Whatever. That's why everybody goes to college. If it wasn't about money, wouldn't you rather be partying, sleeping, drinking beer, following the Rockets around the country, etc, instead of going to school? I can tell you right now if I had the money to not have to work, I never would've gone to college. I would've tried to be a rock star or something.
4chuckie, Let me start by saying that the point I was making about policemen vs. teachers salary, has more to do with time and money invested than the degree itself. A policemen makes more money before any optional security work than a teacher, but only needs half of the time in school. This education requirement can easily be obtained by taking blow-off classes from a local community college where tuition is dirt cheap. A teacher, however, must go to a college that offers a 4 year degree and must take more difficult classes to achieve this degree. Even a state college will be much more expensive in tuition and books than a community college and the time invested in studying will be greater. Bottom line: a lot more time and money go into to being certified as a teacher than as a policemen, so relatively speaking teachers are much more underpaid than policemen. You are correct that having or not having advanced degrees doesn't guarantee riches, but they sure do help. I'm sure you are glad that you got that MBA. Most people without a good education don't go on to be Bill Gates. He is the exception, not the rule. I agree with you that the "surplus" belongs to the people to some extent. The "national debt" belongs to the people too. Billions of your tax dollar go to paying just the interest on the debt every year. You can't have it both ways. If it's your money, then things like the debt are your responsibilty too. You say, "Last thing I want to see is more special interst tax creits which reward people who don't pay much (if any) federal money in anyways. Saving SS or midicare is fine but don't give 'my money' to someone who hasn't put any money into the system." If you don't have money, then you don't get to eat, eh? Wow. But that's a whole different argument that I don't want to get into in this thread. On your last point, parents should be responsible for their children, but they can't do it alone. They need teachers; otherwise, why wouldn't everybody just home school their kids? You say, "In the past we never had this type of problem before. Children respected their teachetrs knowing if they got into trouble at school that you would get more discipline at home. THis loss of respect comes from the home not from teachers not being respectable people." In the past, women did not work and could spend more time with their kids. In the past, a high school degree qualified you for most of the jobs out there. In the past, teachers were allowed to physically punish your kids (not exactly a parental contribution). In the past, the vast majority of people didn't go to college. In the past, black kids weren't allowed to be taught alongside white kids. Sorry, for the rant, but I just think the "in the past" arguments are lame and depend heavily on revisionist history. We are more educated now than 50 years ago, we just aren't progressing at the same rate as many of the other nations in the world. ------------------ [This message has been edited by Launch Pad (edited December 11, 2000).]
Freak - sad, really. Seriously, though, you are probably right that many go to college just to increase their future earnings (please do not say everybody, that is just silly), but that is a result of our materialistic, money hungry society, not the true reason for education. I did not go to college to make more money, I was in the arts school with all of the poor people, I did what I wanted to do, wanted to learn. If I had unlimited money so that I never needed to work, I would go to school for the rest of my life, learn as much as I could. ------------------ EZLN
I agree with Rimy! To graduate with a degree in theater I needed 126 hours of core and major classes. I finally graduated with 196 hours. Why... Because I took classes that interested me. Not just my major. Not just what would "make me more money". Art classes (art history minor) History Philosophy Music tons of English dance humanities Critical thinking anything that interested me. Maybe I did this because mommy and daddy didn't pay for school. I paid every dime myself. And no, for me, money was not the primary reason I went to school. I went to learn! ------------------ 'Deeds, not words, shall speak me.'
mc mark, Great post! 196 hours, wow, that is a lot. I ended up with about 150 (of course, 9 of those hours were graduate seminars and so should count as more!). Take out the dance and theater and replace them with art and architecture and we had about the same courseload. ------------------ EZLN
