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Poll

Should higher education serve to specialize or generalize?

Specialize - Exceptional people are always needed84%84% - 33
Generalize - be well rounded and you have a wider pool15%15% - 6
Total: 39
2008-04-03 19:22:18
CaptainSpaulding71
Member
+119|6780|CA, USA
in my high school we had 3 tracks.  one track was college prep where kids took calc, and the upper level sciences, etc.  another track was business where they took accounting, econ, office skills, etc.  the third track was vocational technical where kids went to the tech school and learned how to weld, frame a building, pour concrete, work on cars, etc.  all three tracks were required to take certain core classes like english, basic maths, civics, stuff like that.

i have heard (europeans on this board please comment), that in some countries on the continent that they have tests in fourth grade or so that determine your aptitudes and then you are 'placed' into different tracks.  so if you have an aptitude for math or science maybe you would be placed in the academic track whereas if you were gifted in working with your hands or other such skills maybe you'd go into the vo-tech track. 

i believe this system is very effective since you don't put kids that shouldn't and don't want to be in the class there to drag down the others and have the kid also get frustrated.  and, the kid is ultimately more happy anyway because they learn the skills they would use just out of school from the vo-tech program.

did any of your guys' high schools have these kinds of programs?
2008-04-03 19:39:58
Pug
UR father's brother's nephew's former roommate
+652|6965|Texas - Bigger than France

PuckMercury wrote:

Question says it all really.  I say specialized.  You are responsible for your own education.  You are presented with more than enough rounding at the grade school and high school level to function at a high level in society.  Higher education should serve to hone specific skill sets, not round out facets of education entirely useless or at the most highly abstract to your desired profession.

Example - I went to study engineering.  Why do I need to take humanities courses?  I am not there to be anything but an engineer.  I was presented with the basics in high school as is every student.  It's federally mandated.  Similarly, what use does a writer or psychologist have for advanced math or science?  Would either of these be of interest to the engineer or the psychologist respectively?  Maybe - but that's not the point of a core curriculum.  Allow a limited number of free electives if you must, but don't integrate it into core curriculum.  As I said in the thread which prompted me to have this rant - celebrate your differences, not our similarities.
What's it like an 80/20 split?

Isn't that specialized?

Ps. Math is required for writer's and psyche majors...Journalism undergrad I had to take pre-calc.  And psyche majors have to take statistics.

An engineer who has the greatest ideas of the world is useless if the world they live in is different from where everyone else lives.  You have to have a common ground to be excellent at being different.

So I disagree with you - your current degree is specialized.  Now stop whining and take your "D" in theatre appreciation.
2008-04-03 19:41:28
KEN-JENNINGS
I am all that is MOD!
+2,991|7055|949

Pug wrote:

PuckMercury wrote:

Question says it all really.  I say specialized.  You are responsible for your own education.  You are presented with more than enough rounding at the grade school and high school level to function at a high level in society.  Higher education should serve to hone specific skill sets, not round out facets of education entirely useless or at the most highly abstract to your desired profession.

Example - I went to study engineering.  Why do I need to take humanities courses?  I am not there to be anything but an engineer.  I was presented with the basics in high school as is every student.  It's federally mandated.  Similarly, what use does a writer or psychologist have for advanced math or science?  Would either of these be of interest to the engineer or the psychologist respectively?  Maybe - but that's not the point of a core curriculum.  Allow a limited number of free electives if you must, but don't integrate it into core curriculum.  As I said in the thread which prompted me to have this rant - celebrate your differences, not our similarities.
What's it like an 80/20 split?

Isn't that specialized?

Ps. Math is required for writer's and psyche majors...Journalism undergrad I had to take pre-calc.  And psyche majors have to take statistics.

An engineer who has the greatest ideas of the world is useless if the world they live in is different from where everyone else lives.  You have to have a common ground to be excellent at being different.

So I disagree with you - your current degree is specialized.  Now stop whining and take your "D" in theatre appreciation.
Yes.  I had to take Statistics - for a BA.  I failed it 2 times (and you could only take the class three times).
2008-04-03 20:01:28
Pug
UR father's brother's nephew's former roommate
+652|6965|Texas - Bigger than France

KEN-JENNINGS wrote:

Yes.  I had to take Statistics - for a BA.  I failed it 2 times (and you could only take the class three times).
To be a reporter I had to take pre-calc AND calculus.  Calculus!!!  I couldn't even spell it.

But then I found out I could take "Logic" instead with the football and hockey players.  I graduated with a mere 4 hours credit in maths...

You know...logic...All men have penises. Women do not have penises. Therefore Richard Simmons is a woman.

Of course, within the first year of being a reporter I had to do some stats...and had to teach myself...sucked.

Last edited by Pug (2008-04-03 20:04:50)

2008-04-04 02:23:13
CameronPoe
Member
+2,925|6978
Generalised higher level education is called an arts degree. Ye know - one of those degrees that are no good for getting you a decent job....
2008-04-04 02:45:53
djphetal
Go Ducks.
+346|6759|Oregon
Both.
And in my opinion you've got to be a tad bit off the rocker to not see this.

We need specialists, but we also need - especially given the state of things right now - people who are leaders, and a good leader has to have great knowledge and skill in a broad range of subjects.

So I null voted.
2008-04-04 03:24:19
FEOS
Bellicose Yankee Air Pirate
+1,182|6834|'Murka

In the US, you pay for your own university courses (either out of pocket or via grants, scholarships, etc). If you're paying for a degree in engineering, you should get a degree in engineering. If you CHOOSE to take (and pay for) other humanities courses, that's your decision, but they shouldn't count toward your engineering degree. If the University wants to levy gen ed requirements on its students, then those courses should be free of charge to the students forced to take them.

In the years since I've graduated from undergrad, I've never--NOT ONCE--had to apply the stuff I learned in humanities courses in college. They have proven useful/interesting in private life, but not professionally.

I think that if universities focused on teaching the core of a subject (ie, engineering) rather than padding with a lot of extraneous subjects, then there would be a higher graduation rate and more people with those kinds of degrees in the workforce due to shorter college times and higher graduation rates.

The same argument would apply to non-technical or liberal arts degrees, as well.
“Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.”
― Albert Einstein
Doing the popular thing is not always right. Doing the right thing is not always popular
2008-04-04 03:43:29
PuckMercury
6 x 9 = 42
+298|6950|Portland, OR USA

Pug wrote:

Ps. Math is required for writer's and psyche majors...Journalism undergrad I had to take pre-calc.  And psyche majors have to take statistics.

An engineer who has the greatest ideas of the world is useless if the world they live in is different from where everyone else lives.  You have to have a common ground to be excellent at being different.

So I disagree with you - your current degree is specialized.  Now stop whining and take your "D" in theatre appreciation.
Wasn't whining and I excelled in theatre, but that's not the point.  The point was an intellectual debate more than anything, but whatever.

I know math is required for psyche majors - that was my point actually.

The common ground to which you refer to is achieved through the thirteen years an American spends in pre-college coursework.  There is no need for me to pay for further common ground or rounding.  Should I desire it, great - wonderful.  Let me make that decision.

Is degree specialized with respect to another degree or to no degree?  Of course it's specialized with respect to no degree, so there's not really a point to be made there.  As for being specialized with respect to another degree - no, nor should it be.  It's just differently focused.
2008-04-04 11:11:32
BVC
Member
+325|7118
I think students should be free to do both, but that forcing either option on a student without good reason is nonsensical.

Here in high school, you start to specialise in 5th form/year 11, branch out a little more in 6th form/year 12 and more so in 7th form/year 13.  You can still continue with the core/original subjects, just if you want to learn science you'll have to take chemistry, biology and physics rather than just one course.  After high school it really depends on where/what you study.  I'm close to completion of a Computer Science degree at UoC and have been free to pick whatever COSC courses I want, provided I have the pre-requisites (XX points, and maybe a paper which covers material you should understand first).  I could have taken all COSC papers, but chose to fill it out with a bunch of other stuff instead, including Philosophy...which I've actually found really useful for COSC, particularly the Logic papers, the stuff you learn there can help you with almost any computer science course there is!

I'm not sure how engineering degrees here work...I know theres chemical, electrical, civil, forestry, eng.management, mechanical and mechatronics...theres heaps of courses listed anyway.

I guess arts/humanities papers help your writing skills (useful for reports) by way of forcing you to write essays.  It would suck having to do heaps of them when you didn't want to though.
2008-04-04 11:43:36
Pug
UR father's brother's nephew's former roommate
+652|6965|Texas - Bigger than France

PuckMercury wrote:

Pug wrote:

Ps. Math is required for writer's and psyche majors...Journalism undergrad I had to take pre-calc.  And psyche majors have to take statistics.

An engineer who has the greatest ideas of the world is useless if the world they live in is different from where everyone else lives.  You have to have a common ground to be excellent at being different.

So I disagree with you - your current degree is specialized.  Now stop whining and take your "D" in theatre appreciation.
Wasn't whining and I excelled in theatre, but that's not the point.  The point was an intellectual debate more than anything, but whatever.

I know math is required for psyche majors - that was my point actually.

The common ground to which you refer to is achieved through the thirteen years an American spends in pre-college coursework.  There is no need for me to pay for further common ground or rounding.  Should I desire it, great - wonderful.  Let me make that decision.

Is degree specialized with respect to another degree or to no degree?  Of course it's specialized with respect to no degree, so there's not really a point to be made there.  As for being specialized with respect to another degree - no, nor should it be.  It's just differently focused.
I was being flippant about whining btw.  Difficult forum for humor...

Well unfortunately you are talking about changing college accreditation...and that comes from the Dept of Education.

And yeah, I feel ya.  Being in the middle of that sucks, big time.  But later...

On some level I'm glad I was forced to take classes I thought were useless (psychology & west civ for me were D's).  Now, I buy books to read about ancient civs because it's kind of neat.

And unfortunately there are very few people out there that can function within only their specialization without having the context those crappy classes bring to the table.
2008-04-04 11:48:06
usmarine
Banned
+2,785|7184

I think it all depends on what you do.  I get paid and do the same job with people who have masters degrees.  But I am in aviation and have damn near every license there is.  I decided to spend my time and money on something I enjoy, and that is the various aspects of aviation, not some god damn liberal college professor spewing crap to me.  And it has worked out fairly well.
2008-04-04 16:31:28
twiistaaa
Member
+87|7091|mexico
chosing early is fine, but high school level is basic. what you are learning now in your "deep high school" subjects will probably be covered in the first few weeks - 6 months of your university course.

do the general courses so you're a well rounded person. not some twat who can cite all the elements on a periodic table.
2008-04-04 17:47:25
mtb0minime
minimember
+2,418|7077

Null; it depends on how high the "higher" education is. I think things are fine the way they are. You declare a major and go to college, but still must do general ed. classes and your major is actually a general area. But when you go to graduate school, that's when you really specialize.

For example: I'm an undergrad in Civil Engineering, which is a very broad topic. I've had to take 4 or 5 GE's in arts and whatnot, as well as the basic science and math stuff. Then my upper-division classes focus on Civil Engineering stuff, and there are a bunch of different subsections that we have to take classes in. After that, I can go to grad school and choose a specialty.

But that's not to say a basic Bachelor's degree isn't enough to prepare me for a career. I can easily get a job and learn from that as well. But the higher the education, the more interesting job I'll be able to get and more money I'll be able to make.

 

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