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An elitist system divides people into an elite and the others. So a system where you have demonstrate the ability know and do a certain set of things, and give

by artsrc 16y ago

An elitist system divides people into an elite and the others. So a system where you have demonstrate the ability know and do a certain set of things, and give unlimited attempts. Then provide enough help to enable everyone to get over that line. There is some military training that work like this: train/test then if the person fails, retrain and retest and repeat. Everyone learns the material and is credentialed as such. I agree this will not create the gold standard. The gold standard will still be knowing the right people, and belonging to the right clubs. It may just be that the clubs are not Yale and Harvard.

gaius 16y ago
The military washes people out all the time. What proportion of applicants makes it as a Navy SEAL, is it even 1 in 10? It is a sad indictment of our society when "elitism" is something to discourage. Let's be very clear: the opposite of elitism is mediocrity. But there will always be bastions of those who strive for excellence.
- anigbrowl 16y ago
  I think T_TTB's original point about elitism was not to just give everyone a degree, but that the financial cost of college makes it inaccessible (or at least difficult) for a lot of people, regardless of their academic ability. On the other hand, if your wealthy parents made big donations to an Ivy League college, getting admitted and collecting your degree won't be all that difficult. Bush's 2001 commencement speech at Yale sums it up nicely: Bush poked fun at his average college record while at the Ivy League school. "And to you 'C' students, you too can be president of the United States," he said to a crowd that rippled with laughter. The president also got in a good-natured jab at his vice president, who attended Yale for a time. "A Yale degree is worth a lot, as I often remind Dick Cheney, who studied here but left a little early," Bush said. "So now we know, if you graduate from Yale, you become president. If you drop out, you get to be vice president." Cheney got into Yale but flunked out. Bush got his degree, in history. Opinions on what that says about his academic ability vary.
- artsrc 16y ago
  > What proportion of applicants makes it as a Navy SEAL, is it even 1 in 10? I am saying you can teach most people the content of an excellent university education. I kind of knew that my point about training techniques could easily be misunderstood. I am not trying to say there are not elites in the military, Seals are elite. What percentage of people fail basic training? If elitism is "a situation in which power is concentrated in the hands of a limited number of people". Then opposites of elitism are freedom, and direct democracy. We are talking about education. Look at literacy levels Sweden. Here is my understanding of how it works: people who don't meet the standard have to go to night school till they meet it. They have the highest rates of adult literacy in the world. Do they have mediocrity? Do they have elitism? Can excellence be nearly universal?
  - gaius 16y ago
    I am saying you can teach most people the content of an excellent university education. That is absolutely not true. My undergraduate degree was in Mech Eng. Even people with As in A-level maths and physics struggled with some of the course. Half (possibly more) of the freshers I enrolled with didn't graduate from that course with me, they either dropped out altogether or switched to something easier. Or some people repeated a year. But if you don't get partial differential equations (for example) on the second attempt, you're probably not going to get them ever. Doesn't mean you're a bad person - just means you should do something else with your life. A vanishingly small percentage of the population is capable of a true university education. The only way to enroll more is to relax the standards and simplify the material. Which is exactly what New Labour did with their arbitrary goal of 50% of the population to be graduates. BTW according to Wikipedia, of every 200 applicants to the SAS (most of whom have already qualified as Paras, they're already elite) only 30 make it. Or if you want to be a fighter pilot in the Air Force, or a Captain in the Navy. Using your analogy, perhaps basic training is analogous to secondary school - it is certainly not analogous to a degree.

by artsrc 16y ago

gaius 16y ago

The military washes people out all the time. What proportion of applicants makes it as a Navy SEAL, is it even 1 in 10? It is a sad indictment of our society when "elitism" is something to discourage. Let's be very clear: the opposite of elitism is mediocrity. But there will always be bastions of those who strive for excellence.

anigbrowl 16y ago
I think T_TTB's original point about elitism was not to just give everyone a degree, but that the financial cost of college makes it inaccessible (or at least difficult) for a lot of people, regardless of their academic ability. On the other hand, if your wealthy parents made big donations to an Ivy League college, getting admitted and collecting your degree won't be all that difficult. Bush's 2001 commencement speech at Yale sums it up nicely: Bush poked fun at his average college record while at the Ivy League school. "And to you 'C' students, you too can be president of the United States," he said to a crowd that rippled with laughter. The president also got in a good-natured jab at his vice president, who attended Yale for a time. "A Yale degree is worth a lot, as I often remind Dick Cheney, who studied here but left a little early," Bush said. "So now we know, if you graduate from Yale, you become president. If you drop out, you get to be vice president." Cheney got into Yale but flunked out. Bush got his degree, in history. Opinions on what that says about his academic ability vary.
artsrc 16y ago
> What proportion of applicants makes it as a Navy SEAL, is it even 1 in 10? I am saying you can teach most people the content of an excellent university education. I kind of knew that my point about training techniques could easily be misunderstood. I am not trying to say there are not elites in the military, Seals are elite. What percentage of people fail basic training? If elitism is "a situation in which power is concentrated in the hands of a limited number of people". Then opposites of elitism are freedom, and direct democracy. We are talking about education. Look at literacy levels Sweden. Here is my understanding of how it works: people who don't meet the standard have to go to night school till they meet it. They have the highest rates of adult literacy in the world. Do they have mediocrity? Do they have elitism? Can excellence be nearly universal?
- gaius 16y ago
  I am saying you can teach most people the content of an excellent university education. That is absolutely not true. My undergraduate degree was in Mech Eng. Even people with As in A-level maths and physics struggled with some of the course. Half (possibly more) of the freshers I enrolled with didn't graduate from that course with me, they either dropped out altogether or switched to something easier. Or some people repeated a year. But if you don't get partial differential equations (for example) on the second attempt, you're probably not going to get them ever. Doesn't mean you're a bad person - just means you should do something else with your life. A vanishingly small percentage of the population is capable of a true university education. The only way to enroll more is to relax the standards and simplify the material. Which is exactly what New Labour did with their arbitrary goal of 50% of the population to be graduates. BTW according to Wikipedia, of every 200 applicants to the SAS (most of whom have already qualified as Paras, they're already elite) only 30 make it. Or if you want to be a fighter pilot in the Air Force, or a Captain in the Navy. Using your analogy, perhaps basic training is analogous to secondary school - it is certainly not analogous to a degree.