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Comment by sklogic | Hacker News Reader

Back in my days in the university we (all the students) hated mostly the toughest professors. Now, many years later, the only stuff that I still remember well, to a degree that I can go and pass an exam, despite not using much of it in my work, is from the courses of those most hated professors.

And now students are much worse, they're expecting a "value for money", they want to be entertained. They do not like being pushed hard. Just look at all those disgusting stories:

http://sheffield.tab.co.uk/2015/01/29/devastated-economists-... (what kind of cretins can find such an exam "too complicated"?)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-31814659 (another bunch of morons enjoying a right to have their say)

This crap must be stopped. Once and for all.

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> And now students are much worse, they're expecting a "value for money", they want to be entertained.

But HN is regularly bombarded with articles about colleges and universities being an over-valued investment.

But how can you chain that in the same sentence to a right to be entertained ?

You sound like Socrates (or better yet: http://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/05/01/misbehaving-children...)

> But HN is regularly bombarded with articles about college and university being a over-valued investment.

Would you go to a doctor who skipped a college? Do you want to drive over a bridge designed by a bunch of hipster dropouts? If not, then the higher education is still relevant, and all the hipsters must just shut up.

> But how can you chain that in the same sentence to a right to be entertained ?

I'm quoting one of the student complaints - that a lecturer is not "entertaining enough", and this is not "what they paid their money for".

EDIT: and yes, it's not the students who changed recently, it's the creeping commercialisation of the education system in general. Students are "consumers" now, and this is a new thing indeed. They should not be blamed for such an attitude, of course.

For a doctor, I don't think I care very much if they have completed bachelors or not (in the US they are more or less required to for acceptance to medical school, but I don't see what good this does me as a patient).

It doesn't do shit for you as a patient. A certainly not any more than trading that 4 yr lib arts degree for 4 more years of medical training. Universities as gatekeepers to actual jobs without is something that definitely needs to be addressed but you'll probably never see them bring this up. Imagine how bad for business it would be if all Universities offered was a chance to learn.

>what kind of cretins can find such an exam "too complicated"?

There is absolutely no context in that article, and it shows a single question from the exam, yet you deduce that everyone that wrote and complained about it is a moron?

This is a two-way street: I've seen ridiculous student complaints, but I've also had terrible instructors. There are "cretins" on both sides of the table.

These are the questions the students specifically complained about. Taken from one of their tweets. And you don't need to know the domain in order to infer that those students are cretins indeed, if they find such questions tough.

Are you saying all those students just weren't paying attention in class or something? It seems suspect if that many of them spoke out about it

I'm saying they're a bunch of lazy, spoiled, stupid kids with a couple of too active leaders (probably ADHD) among them.

Who's paying?

Simple question. Really convoluted answer. But the end payers are the students. And they want their money's worth.

Of course, the worth is derived from their uneducated selves, and "higher educated" peoples know what's best for them.

A percent of income for X years seems much fairer way of paying for education. But even that has its flaws. We have yet to see the full blowback from our current way of financing higher ed. My estimate is 20 years. And 2008 will be a walk in the park.

Of course the current system is awful and it will backfire dramatically. But it's not an excuse for being lazy and stupid.

I agree. The system right now is fucked, and we are at least 20 years out before we see the full ramifications.

Instead, I imagine something different for a school. If someone fails a course, one has to retake it. This is silly if one is trying to learn. Instead, the answer is to stick with the area of problem until it is understood. But, because profit motives take hold, it is simply easier to fail someone.

The better answer for teaching is less material per class, shorter classes (vs 18 weeks), and quick to fail. And aside that should be no punishment to fail. In essence, aside laziness, it is both the teacher and the student who fail when a concept is not learned, but the onus lies purely on the student in our system.

I also believe that payment should be hinged upon future earnings, and not a ballooned sum payable in the hopes of a job. A percentage would be fair for X years... Of course I acknowledge that this could cause the liberal arts to falter. Marx and Engels divined this long ago with their analysis of capitalism and supremacy of what we call STEM degrees.

In the higher education it is not a lecturers job to convey the material to even the slowest of the class. The responsibility is entirely on the students side.

Education is selective and there is nothing wrong with it. Self-education is a very important part of it, and the only thing teacher really must consistently do is to help the students to identify their flaws as quickly as possible so they can go and address them.

But, yes, everyone must be able to retake any course any number of times, until either passed or pissed off.

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