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Not a big fan of that piece. There are different kinds of education... going through one channel that people believe to be the largest and most correct, isn't
by cyanbane 14y ago
Not a big fan of that piece. There are different kinds of education... going through one channel that people believe to be the largest and most correct, isn't always right for everyone. However, it is a small minority of people that can recognize that that specific path isn't right for them at the end of High School (U.S. model). I went through 4 years of "upper education" knowing I was going to be a coder from the start and in the end of it all I do believe that I would have be a better programmer if I had not gone through all those years of college and just started coding for someone else's ideas. However, from a social standpoint, I would not trade those 4 years back for a million bucks. They are great memories and although I feel I lost those years in hard core coding advancement - I gained a lot of skills for navigating the world. I was also lucky enough to get a free ride. For people looking back with $200k in debt, I can understand their underwhelming. Different strokes for different folks for different situations and kudos to people like Thiel who bring that to the surface and make people critically think about the path before them before they undertake it.
- MikeCapone 14y agoThe question I'm asking myself is: Is there a different way to do things that would get you the benefits that you got out of those 4 years without the downsides? Would it be possible to make your coding progress and get the social benefits and memories and all that kind of stuff? I'm not sure what the answer is, but I know that there are more possibilities out there than 1) follow the traditional US college path and 2) don't go to college and start working full time straight away.
- cyanbane 14y agoTotally agree on more possibilities, and honestly the whole "hand shaking class", etc presented in this piece isn't real world education to me. The kind of real world stuff I mean is much more primal than that.
- teeray 14y agoPart of the problem is the way information is delivered. The model of "plop your ass in a chair and hit record as your professor speeds through PowerPoint" is insane and mind-numbing. It breeds students that are more interested in manufacturing the correct output for assignments than actually understanding the material being presented. There also tends to be a finality to grading that is disjoint with the actual amount of information learned. When you fail a homework assignment and finally understand what you did wrong, THAT'S where the learning actually occurs. Unless that student is able to resubmit that homework in some other form, the grade will never reflect that "Aha!" moment.