The curriculum is largely flawed. There is something wrong with teaching people who will not pursue being English teachers, authors, etc. about diagraming sentences ad nauseum like they do. It's irrelevant if you want to be many professions. Why waste time with such nonsense when specialization is far more important in the actual economy than being "well rounded"?

I believe people should be educated too, but examples like I just gave are not condusive to success.

For God's sake, I still remember how to diagram sentences but was never taught things I could of actually used! This is why I dropped out and taught myself. Not only was I free to move at my own pace (some subjects I could move faster without hinderance of the average and below average students, and some I could move slower until I "got it"), but I could focus on relevant specialties.

But again, this might not work for the majority. Maybe the answer is to start an elective system in curriculum in earlier education. Perhaps as soon as junior high school, with more and more choices becoming available to the student as years progress. I'll link you an article I wrote a while back on education, maybe that will more clearly lay out my ideas.



http://www.campaignforliberty.com/blog.php?view=41202

Could HAVE actually used.

And that's one of the things I was going to say about diagramming sentences. It helps one (I didn't want to use *you* so that it would be misunderstood) come across as more 'educated').

You were being taught to diagram sentences in college?

Then you have to pick winners. In an economy that constantly changes and innovates the well rounded woman can retrain/retool more efficiently than the vocational specialist. I'm getting to Charles Murray this week, and education is a focal point to Coming Apart. If I thought enough people were reading we could start a thread on it. It's all over elitism, homogamy, iq, advanced degrees, and higher wages from them.

Yeah, should be ninth grade and once in middle school. But mine eyes have seen the drivel that is college writing.

Matching parentheses requires more powerful tools, though.

Gankstar- But what if people try to self educate and end up reading something like this:

http://www.campaignforliberty.com/bl...191&blogpage=2

and assumes the author knows what they are talking about? They might go on believing that stuff for a long time.

LOL. I program and use LaTeX (with an editor, not a WYSIWYG interface) enough so you'd think I'd have that matching problem down

ITT we conclude that people should only learn the bare minimum required for them to be a cog in the wheel of society.

Are you suggesting he become accredited as a for profit university and qualify to accept federal tuition assistance?

Who cares? It's a facade. I mean where is grammar relevant to MOST real world professions? It's not. I agree that's the purpose, but it's not helping anyone. To appear intelligent or educated isn't the same as being actually intelligent or educated in areas that matter to your success in life/the economy.

That error hasn't one iota effected my life or gross income. So why are we wasting time on such novelties? To please the snobs in society, I guess.

Yes. I spent like 6 months of my first year in college doing nearly the same things I did in high school. All of them were college level courses. I never had to take any prerequisite remedial courses. It was a complete waste of my time, and most everyone else in those classes too. The same can be said of many of the prerequisite courses needed before you start taking more specialized courses focused on your major.

I still have the textbooks, as reselling them wasn't worth much.

But the parts of the economy that phase out careers aren't usually requiring a college education (industrial manufacturing today, buggy whip manufacturers when cars were invented, etc.). No one is phasing out doctors, lawyers, etc.

I've been considering taking the bar exam for law in Virginia (the only State left you can take the test without a degree) just to prove to myself I can pass it. Aptitude seems more important than formal social recognition via institutions. I think this one method/size fits all method of education is detrimental to those who could excel without it (this may not apply to most people).

If it were up to the system we have now, I wouldn't be allowed to take the test. It's been slowly changed over the years to accomodate only those who bury themselves in debt in formal education settings...which is to me, a shame.

There just isn't a huge segment of society that needs to transition from career to career in which those careers require higher education.

"Labor set free", as David Ricardo refered to it, is the re-allocation of labor through lay-offs, often because of phased out industries like you're describing. There will always be lag in time as the workers find new places to work. This largely isn't aided by higher learning. It also is hindered by bereaucracies (not necessarily state related) that believe they know best what the economy of tomorrow will require. No one can know such a thing.

As for incomes, more education is usually better...but that doesn't mean some magic piece of paper (a degree) necessarily. Education isn't monopolized by institutions anymore than it is by self learning. Again, aptitude should be how education is defined, not pieces of paper that carry social recognition (and have largely being degraded in value over the years).

I can't tell you how many engineers come into the field on large construction projects and are completely confused. They think because it works on paper it has to work in the field. I'd trade most degree holding engineers for a non-degree holding superintendent or general forman with experience. In the practical world, education isn't a degree...it's experience and know-how.

I read an article on home schooling this morning that illustrates how non-institutionally educated children actually do better throughout their lives in testing as compared to institutionally educated children. Why? They are allowed more individualized curriculum and attention. The institution can be the source of stagnation and degraded acheivement.

http://momshomeroom.msn.com/articles.../?WT.mc_id=msn

The study that tracked achievement of home schooled kids versus classically institutionally educated kids:

http://www.hslda.org/docs/study/rudner1999/Rudner2.asp

Well besides the typos (I never edit blogs like that, I just write them quickly when I have time), I do know what I'm talking about. I mean, can you argue with the main points I made? The institutional system has resegregated schools by race by accident via socio-economics and school districting. The system does hinder the smartest kids and rush the least bright. It is foolsih to fund state schools via property tax because of the problems I described. And I know this from not only experience (essentially an anecdote), but from looking into the subjects individually.

You can disagree perhaps with my solutions, and that's fine (like you might be anti-voucher for instance)...but I think it's tough to argue with the diagnosis.

The problem I think you have is the source (me and my philosophical leanings). You can appeal to authority, but that doesn't make it logical or valid.

You seem to want to reset education back about 400 years. Common sense is retrograde. One parent educating a few children can work if the father has education and screws the community who subsidized it over. Education at scale requires authority, communication, and agreement. Some inefficiency and folly ensue as the price of organizing for the millions.

Most individuals and families can not educate themselves. apprenticeship? Really? Do we need more people believing in creationism, denying climate change, hating minorities, and disdaining educational achievement? Government is the worst solution, except for all the rest.

I don't believe that at all...just that erroneous material should be elective, not mandatory. I've spent tons of time reading about philosophy and history...none of which applies to any job I've ever held. When it comes to institutional learning, or prefered curriculum in any setting whatever, the requirements should stick closer to what's applicable directly for success. People can educate themselves later (or seek others to educate them later) on things that have little or no bearing to their real life success in the economy (or society).

My main point is that specialization should trump some snobbish sense of "well rounded". Why? Because real life dictates it should. The success you have in a market economy is based on specialization, not a wide range of subjects. The basics should be taught, then people should begin to specialize. You can always go back and learn more general wide ranges of topics later. It's not like time is infinite and we can learn every bit of everything. We have to narrow it down based on something. Success in the real world might be a good "something".

End property tax school funding?
Remove district drawing from locals and parents?
Disband local school boards?

Awesome. You're taking the baby steps towards federal school administration. It is logical, but still a political non-starter..

So you're advocating national curriculum standards?

You're on the right path. I feel sorry you had some really ****ty experiences in education. By withdrawing yourself from the problem with vouchers, home-schooling, and self education you are lowering the top end of achievement and damaging the overall national resource. I might not hire you as a principal, but I would be inclined to try you as an instructor, if I win mega millions and open my academy.

Not sure how to phrase this without sounding like a jerk, but that seems odd to me given my experiences. I'm not sure whether you just went to a college which assumed that you needed that remedial level of instruction, or were just bad at navigating it. If you were doing the same things as you did in high school--such as diagramming sentences--then they weren't college level courses.

Arguing that people should only receive technical or vocational training and not a liberal arts education seems more "snobbish" to me than the opposite. Besides, it's not like alternatives don't exist, even if they aren't as common.

It's a signal. There's a correlation between decent grammar and most things one wants in an employee (for most good jobs).

You're trying to argue that effective communication isn't important to MOST real world *professions*? I think MOST people would strongly disagree. If you mean careers (instead of professions), I'm sure you're adding some careers that don't need to communicate effectively--who really judges their mechanic on their speaking?

And you know what...giving yourself as an example doesn't actually help your argument (at least with grammar). The one little thing I pointed out earlier notwithstanding, you come across very well. There are a lot of other people that need varying amounts of work/help with their communication skills.

Wait, was that your blog? or just given as an example of things one could come across on the web/youtube?

That is Gankstar's writing, and it contains traditional ACist shibboleths like

I might have to go through it a little bit more then (especially given the 'I know what I'm talking about' arguments). I didn't think about the writings too heavily, and I stopped after I saw a few arguments that at best didn't really follow logically. I don't think this thread is really the right place to discuss the blog though.

BTW, I love the word shibboleth.

Yeah, I was just being a dick about Gankstar's faith in the ability of the population to all become self-educated according to their specific needs or whatever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=924tOs-FStU