3 ms·

> If I pay $60k/year, I can’t fail out. That's some serious entitlement right here. Why can't you fail? What's the point of education then when all one needs t

> If I pay $60k/year, I can’t fail out. That's some serious entitlement right here. Why can't you fail? What's the point of education then when all one needs to do is to pay some money and do their time?

what-the-grump 4y ago
/s missing? Isn’t that what education is? Paying someone money and putting in the work?
- cassianoleal 4y ago
  Of course not. You still need to actually learn the subjects and pass the exams. Putting in the work is not enough. The people who fail usually should fail. When I was doing CompSci most people would fail discrete maths 2-3 times until they managed to get it. It's a good thing that they failed the first few times. I don't see how that's bad, they didn't understand it at first.
- rad_gruchalski 4y ago
  > Paying someone money and putting in the work? Yes. That's what it is. But it isn't "paying someone money and feeling entitled to finish because I paid the money".
  - what-the-grump 4y ago
    So these students, and I know plenty, that went to NYU. Paid the money, put in the work, and pass every class getting B's & A's, except orgo. Well orgo is hard... no not really, its a first - second year class? The students are setup to fail. Do I think the professor is the root issue, no just look at replies in the this thread, 'its been that way for 30 years, blah blah'. I am paying you to teach me orgo, not to fail me at orgo. Teach it in a passable way and then test the students outside of the class, like the MCAT or LSAT where you are not commingling the selection criteria on the whims of a professor. Is this really that hard to see?
voisin 4y ago
Not OP but if a huge portion of students fail a course tangential to the ultimate practice for which they are in the program, and this comes midway through the program so those students are now 10s or even 100s of thousands in debt / opportunity cost, then wouldn’t you chalk it up to a university’s failure to either (a) choose students for the program more capable of succeeding in the program or (b) teaching in a manner that doesn’t lead to so many failures, or (c) some combination of the two? If one student fails, it’s that student’s failure. But at some point, once (x)% of the class fails, it is a systemic failure of the institution itself.
- fallingknife 4y ago
  The problem is that universities have come to see them selves as agents of egalitarianism whose job it is to educate the masses and lift people out of poverty. But they derive all of their actual economic value from being an elitist weed out process for who gets high paying jobs. These two functions cannot coexist.
  - voisin 4y ago
    I don’t know if either of your stated functions are true or just a cynical view of them, but regardless, if the explicit objective is to take in students and teach them certain things so out the other end they can perform certain tasks to certain standards, then my statements above are accurate.
hotpotamus 4y ago
I'd say you can't fail because student loan debt can't be discharged in bankruptcy.
rcxdude 4y ago
I think the point is that if education wants to be selective it should not be catastrophic for that that it does not select (i.e. it should be cheaper). Especially when the cost (and revenue) of education is so high it creates all the wrong incentives and mindsets.

what-the-grump 4y ago

/s missing? Isn’t that what education is? Paying someone money and putting in the work?

cassianoleal 4y ago
Of course not. You still need to actually learn the subjects and pass the exams. Putting in the work is not enough. The people who fail usually should fail. When I was doing CompSci most people would fail discrete maths 2-3 times until they managed to get it. It's a good thing that they failed the first few times. I don't see how that's bad, they didn't understand it at first.
rad_gruchalski 4y ago
> Paying someone money and putting in the work? Yes. That's what it is. But it isn't "paying someone money and feeling entitled to finish because I paid the money".
- what-the-grump 4y ago
  So these students, and I know plenty, that went to NYU. Paid the money, put in the work, and pass every class getting B's & A's, except orgo. Well orgo is hard... no not really, its a first - second year class? The students are setup to fail. Do I think the professor is the root issue, no just look at replies in the this thread, 'its been that way for 30 years, blah blah'. I am paying you to teach me orgo, not to fail me at orgo. Teach it in a passable way and then test the students outside of the class, like the MCAT or LSAT where you are not commingling the selection criteria on the whims of a professor. Is this really that hard to see?

voisin 4y ago

Not OP but if a huge portion of students fail a course tangential to the ultimate practice for which they are in the program, and this comes midway through the program so those students are now 10s or even 100s of thousands in debt / opportunity cost, then wouldn’t you chalk it up to a university’s failure to either (a) choose students for the program more capable of succeeding in the program or (b) teaching in a manner that doesn’t lead to so many failures, or (c) some combination of the two? If one student fails, it’s that student’s failure. But at some point, once (x)% of the class fails, it is a systemic failure of the institution itself.

fallingknife 4y ago
The problem is that universities have come to see them selves as agents of egalitarianism whose job it is to educate the masses and lift people out of poverty. But they derive all of their actual economic value from being an elitist weed out process for who gets high paying jobs. These two functions cannot coexist.
- voisin 4y ago
  I don’t know if either of your stated functions are true or just a cynical view of them, but regardless, if the explicit objective is to take in students and teach them certain things so out the other end they can perform certain tasks to certain standards, then my statements above are accurate.

hotpotamus 4y ago

I'd say you can't fail because student loan debt can't be discharged in bankruptcy.

rcxdude 4y ago

I think the point is that if education wants to be selective it should not be catastrophic for that that it does not select (i.e. it should be cheaper). Especially when the cost (and revenue) of education is so high it creates all the wrong incentives and mindsets.