Yes and I hope they start handing out passwords soon, so that we can get to work. I imagine that some benefit can be derived from these graffiti-styled blogs, but we really need to have threads that are on-topic being discussed by people who want to help
This is a very good point we have to abandon the points-of-views of the past and try to understand each other. Nothing good is going to happen, if we are satisfied with simply repeating the same old 1#@% and do not bother to LISTEN to each other. I am a skeptic and a cynic - but I realize that these POVs are just copouts, I have to hope that our President is more than just another figurehead for the Status Quo...
You touched upon one of my sore points, I was accepted into one of the top colleges in the nation, so I barely maintained a 2.5 GPA when competing with other (formerly) straight A students. A great number of the rich kids were cheating to get the better grades (resulting in being offered the best jobs or graduate positions) It was almost a joke. It turns out that having a 2. 5 GPA form a very good school is of less practical value than a 3.5 from some local community college...
only the good ones, mediocre English teachers are pretty much stuck in their 'chosen' profession
Wonderful, you actually had a full professor who taught undergraduates? The 'diploma mill' I attended just had graduate students or associate professors teach the undergraduates. The professors apparently considered such duties a waste of their valuable time as researchers...
Ditto! perhaps some that is due to the practice of having graduate students teaching undergraduate classes. That is to say, many undergraduates are subjected to instruction of graduate students a few years older than them, who have little or no training in the Art of Education. In fact if I am not misinformed, many professors are not considered qualified enough to teach in a public school. They have to take a certain number of classes in educational technique, before they can be considered certified(?)
I agree I attended both the University of Chicago and a state's directional school. While the University of Chicago employed some of the best Researchers in the world, very few of them could be considered gifted Teachers. Whereas, at the state school where no Researchers were employed there were actually more gifted Teachers. I believe that it may be very rare for an individual to possess the talents to be both a gifted Teacher and a gifted Researcher. The Researcher has to be able to focus on the Objective whereas the Teacher has to be able to focus on the Subjective, that is the subjective perspectives of his or her students...
You do make some good points, but I really have not seen very many professors who embrace the teaching aspects of the job with as much enthusiasm as they do their own research, hence professors who are dedicated to research, often are not dedicated to students. The up to date textbooks, often are merely historical accounts of the work in the field. History that really doesn't provoke any novel thinking on the part of the students. I mean what value is there in supposedly memorizing Names, Dates and Accomplishments from the first grade onward to graduate school?
The most successful professors I met were the ones that selected the most talented graduate students; so there was a real question as to who was benefiting most from the student-professor relationship.
Good idea might look at adding the MBTI forums such as intpforum
If people truly wish to continue their educations, then one possible benefit of a relatively, low paying job in the public service industry could be 'free' tuition, a program akin to that which is offered to those serving in the Armed Forces of this country...