Studying Is Hard And That’s Unfair
“Everyone deserves 8 hours of sleep,” say Georgia Tech’s branch of the Young Democratic Socialists of America.
Apparently, the students are struggling to reconcile their academic obligations with the need for rest, expectations of free time – eight hours of it each day – and their own socialist activism. And perhaps the students have a point. Socialism is tiring, what with the protests and psychodrama, and the relentless, almost daily, issuing of demands. In this case, our fatigued intellectuals “reject the hostile culture and severe working conditions that pervade Georgia Tech,” and a curriculum that is, they say, “far more difficult and demanding than is necessary.” “All professors,” we’re told, should “implement stress-reducing policies,” including allowing more absences from class without consequence, dropping quizzes and assignments, and generally making lessons “more forgiving.”
The Young Socialists also insist that the university hire more counsellors and psychiatrists, with fees for psychiatric appointments being “eliminated.” “We need more relief from the… emotional burdens of higher education,” say these warriors of tomorrow.
Less socialist activism = more sleep.
#sorted.
#sorted
As yet, I haven’t seen any evidence of the Georgia Tech College Republicans, on the same campus, protesting en masse about “severe working conditions,” or a lack of sleep, or a need for free counselling, i.e., paid for by some other sucker. Perhaps they manage their time better and prioritise accordingly, or maybe they’re not quite so inclined to excuses and whiny self-involvement.
Perhaps they manage their time better…
Or maybe they take a leaf out of their peers on the left of the divide and simply turn up late?
“All professors,” we’re told, should “implement stress-reducing policies,” including allowing more absences from class without consequence, dropping quizzes and assignments, and generally making lessons “more forgiving.”
The public sector WANTS YOU.
In other academia-related news,
I’m paraphrasing, of course, but not by much.
The public sector WANTS YOU.
Not entirely unrelated. You see, working in a tardy, half-arsed way is “a political stance” and an affirmation of “social justice.”
If you are too stupid not to be able to arrange your classes so that they are all between 1000 and 1500 Tuesday through Friday, you are too stupid to be in college. Besides, the average grade these days is something like an A- even if you never show up, so I am not sure what they are whining about.
However, speaking of welcoming and inclusive multicultural spaces, American University students want segregation.
This is, of course, part of, “…its diversity and inclusion strategy…”.
I see, so there already is a separate “space” (what is it with these idiots needing “space” for their “bodies”) for the Non-Pink People, but that is not good enough.
Perhaps if young Othniel got more sleep he wouldn’t need to be doing all the protesting.
I am a sporting man, get to Georgia where the footballers are as rigorous athletes as you would see. Maybe get some of these nerds out to play.
…get to Georgia where the footballers are as rigorous athletes as you would see.
Compared to Swarthmore, maybe, that state next door, not so much…
Compared to Swarthmore, maybe, that state next door, not so much…
Ooh. It’s all kicking off now.
Nobody drafted you to attend the North Ave. Trade School, y’ wuss!
(I am of that era at Tech when freshman orientation included some old guy telling the incoming class, “Look to the man at your right. Look to the man at your left. One of you will not be here come Christmas break.”
“All professors,” we’re told, should “implement stress-reducing policies,” including allowing more absences from class without consequence, dropping quizzes and assignments, and generally making lessons “more forgiving.”
Perhaps, Georgia Tech can make its courses more like your average law school. It’s only lecture three days a week for an entire semester and attendance is not mandatory. Rather, your grade is determined by the results of one four hour exam at the end of the semester.
Something tells me these students would be screaming for extra-credit assignments and more assessments in short order.
In other news: There’s a Georgia Tech branch of the Young Democratic Socialists of America? That’s shameful. The rot set in, I believe, when they started letting football players major in ‘Management.’
Yet again a result of allowing people who simply aren’t smart enough for University to go there. They get a place at Uni, struggle with the work and instead of looking honestly at themselves, blame some external force as the reason for their failure to thrive. Fortunately for them, there are plenty of others on campus, both students and faculty, who are only too eager to help them identify the enemy: Whypipo! The Universal Evil.
Farnsworth, you will need to educate me on the, shall we say, educational outcomes is Swarthmore or indeed physical address of said institution. I await with bated breath.
“We demand free psychiatrists!”
“It must be those evil capitalists raising college tuition fees! We demand free college education!”
Socialism is a hell of a drug.
“You can’t be white in here. This is a welcoming and inclusive multicultural space.”
“I understand why they would’ve opened it to everyone because exclusivity isn’t something that’s really garnered on campus,” said Sam Liang, a sophomore…”
Garner? They’re now garnering inclusivity? That’s an odd construction.
I await with bated breath.
Be happy to oblige, but even having run your sentence past the Yellow Jacket ESL app I am not sure what you are asking. Meanwhile, one of these states is famous for football and the US space program, the other for Coca Cola and Billy Beer.
“confronting professors, challenging administration, and so forth”
Noticeably absent from the list of student activities: studying.
You don’t have enough time to protest and study? It seems simple enough choice to make. What are you (or more likely, your parents) paying the university for?
If you want to spend that so much time protesting that you don’t have time to study, simply drop out and protest full time. You save tuition, you get a full 8 hours sleep, and you free up a slot for someone who actually wants to learn.
That last one is a bit of stretch, to be honest. I doubt it’s Chem Eng and Computer Robotics majors that are making these complaints, for some reason.
@Farnsworth,
I had occasion to visit the football-famous university with the youngest last year, and indeed it dumped a substantial part of its “bucket-of-competence” into that “extracurricular” activity. The very perky and very attractive Southern coeds who led the campus tours were well-versed their university’s gridiron achievements. Sadly, precious little competence was left for things like explaining its academic programs to prospective students or arranging meetings with professors and so forth, despite lengthy correspondence confirming such meetings. We did, however, get to venerate the football stadium and pantheon of former coaches’ statues, so there was that.
Asked the youngest as we were driving out of town toward Memphis on our return trip: “Is it just me, or were the tour guides wearing red and silver stripper glitter?”
American University students want segregation.
In one of the more astoundingly tone deaf demonstrations ever, when black students at a Georgia university discovered that they couldn’t have black-only student housing because it violated the Civil Rights Act, they denounced the Act as white supremacist, with one demonstrator yelling “What would Martin Luther King say to that?”.
Uh… the guy who fought hard to get the Civil Rights Act, you mean?
I’m old enough to remember when it was the whites who were for apartheid, and the blacks who were against it.
I doubt it’s Chem Eng and Computer Robotics majors that are making these complaints, for some reason.
It’s not. The middle child is graduating this week from a reasonably well-respected STEM university. It has suffered none of the lunacies which afflict other U.S. post-secondary institutions of learning. Perhaps the reason can be discerned when one looks at the list of majors for graduates this term here. Note the relative lack of “liberal arts” programs.
Coincidence?
“We demand free psychiatrists!”
[ Rubs chin. ]
Hm. It’s almost as if there were a clue in there somewhere.
“Is it just me, or were the tour guides wearing red and silver stripper glitter?”
Yes, yes, they were. Nobody ever said Alabama or Auburn were the best academic schools (Alabama is tied with Mizzou in present rankings, so middle of the road), but the subject raised was football…
Meanwhile, back on topic, from the article, it appears these nitwits want 8 hours each of work, sleep, and farting off.
If an average semester is 15 credit hours, that translates, generally, to 5 one hour classes that meet three days a week each M-F, or a whopping 15 hours/week with their butts in a chair, which leaves them 153 hours to complete assignments, sleep, and protest.
Besides, aside from a narcoleptic, what sort of a sorry excuse of a college student needs 8 hours of sleep ?
I doubt it’s Chem Eng and Computer Robotics majors that are making these complaints, for some reason.
The list of signatories features quite a few “solidarity committees,” “liberal arts” undergraduates, students of Spanish and digital media, unspecified “community members,” and lots of people, perhaps a majority, who chose not to share their field of would-be expertise; but it does also include students of maths, computing and mechanical engineering, etc. So maybe it’s more a case of students who were encouraged to reach beyond their grasp, and who perhaps aren’t entirely suited to tertiary education, both in terms of temperament and wherewithal.
I doubt it’s Chem Eng and Computer Robotics majors that are making these complaints, for some reason.
We STEM majors could have made such complaints about the many extremely demanding classes we had to take, such as Organic Chemistry I and II, Advanced Differential Equations, Quantum Mechanics, and so on, but we knew that demanding course work was the key to successful careers. And we solved the problem of not enough time in the day by rounding out our semester’s course list with something from the humanities that placed little demand on our time or our brains. /snark
They say all science is physics and all physics is math.
Well I say all modern bitching (including politics) is just trying to get something for nothing. See how often demand _X_ boils down to simply wanting something without paying/saving/sacrificing/delaying/producing something in return.
Also, having attended the great discount southern football factory that is FSU I can attest that it is possible to both enjoy the fantastic gridiron culture with it’s attending bounty of fun co-eds AND achieve a useful degree that allows one a comfortable office job from which one can write blog comments.
it appears these nitwits want 8 hours each of work, sleep, and farting off.
The real world is going to be a bit of shock then.
bit of a shock.
Preview is my friend.
C’mon, Jen. Get it together.
lol
Socialists wanting others to serve them for nothing. News at Ten.
it appears these nitwits want 8 hours each of work, sleep, and farting off.
Wasn’t that part of the demands of late-19th Century Socialist parties and labor unions? The difference between then and now, of course, is that there is an immense difference between 12 to 16 hours of hard labor and 12 to 16 hours of sitting in classrooms and libraries–not to mention that these protesting students do not really lack time for recreation and rest (except for the “affirmative action” students who should have gone to less demanding schools) and that kids can handle these sorts of long hours far better than older men can handle long hours of hard labor. It’s all Luxury Socialism for spoiled brats.
All Western socialism is a product of Western wealth creation. It’s simply the spoiled rich kid syndrome writ large. How do the SJW’s put it? “When you are accustomed to privilege equality* feels like oppression.”
*Or wealth, or easy standard of living, or low crime, or the softest and kindest environment the world has ever known, etc
How do the SJW’s put it? “When you are accustomed to privilege equality* feels like oppression.”
How does our host put it? “Lefties project.” 🙂
Keep off the internet and drive over your smart phone. That’ll free up time.
I haven’t touched a computer for years, and it’s liberating I can tell you.
I haven’t touched a computer for years,
Um…
I haven’t touched a computer for years
His secretary is so very bored with typing blog comments via dictation.
His secretary is so very bored with typing blog comments via dictation.
I’ve always said this place has a classy readership.
Um…
I have no idea how my comment got onto your pages. And of course I haven’t read your laudable opinions in years. I’m currently in the basement refinishing some furniture, not an electronic device in site.
not an electronic device in site
😀
I don’t know if it’s been covered here, but the Julian Von Able affair is astounding.
Dare not speak your rational mind for the press has become a full-on inquisition.
https://twitter.com/VonAbele
Note the relative lack of “liberal arts” programs.
Coincidence?
Liberal arts, proper liberal arts, are a blessing, not a curse.
Unfortunately, they are few and far between, most having been either co-opted by, or replaced with, grievance mongering.
The first thing I did was search for the word “Studies”, and the only one listed was “Multidisciplinary Studies”.
While my alma matter’s web site sadly resembles the class XKCD cartoon here, even a cursory glance sees that the Humanities department has the word “gender” or “lesbian” in roughly one third of the course names (up from zero per cent 30 years ago), and even the English department has replaced those boring old white guys like Shakespeare and Chaucer with “Writing of Women of Colour over the Ages – A Lesbian Perspective”.
Yeah, I can see why people who take this would (a) have time on their hands, and (b) be driven to distraction. I mean, it’s not like they are learning anything useful, or developing a marketable skill.
I’m currently in the basement refinishing some furniture, not an electronic device in site.
Except your Google pacemaker sold by Amazon…
His secretary is so very bored with typing blog comments via dictation.
I actually had a boss, an executive, who responded to email that way.
Mind, this was in 1991, when keyboards still had a stigma. Typewriters were for clerical workers, and once you reached a certain level you simply did not have one on your desk, it was beneath your status.
This led to considerable problems introducing computerization, as executive acceptance was, um, low.
My exec boss, in his early sixties, was actually very forward thinking. He not only had an email account, anyone in the company could send things to him! This was 1991, in a company with 50,000+ employees, were communicating with executives directly simply was not done, so this was revolutionary.
Every day, his secretary (who had a networked PC) would log into his account, print off his email (usually only about 20-30 a day… it was a simpler time), and leave them in his inbox. He would read them, make notes in the margins to collect his thoughts, then call her in, and he would dictate his responses, which she would then type on her PC and send out his replies.
While he never actually had a computer himself, he had an email account and you could communicate with him using it, which actually put him about five years ahead of the other executives who explicitly refused to have an email address in the first place.
I’ve always said this place has a classy readership.
Uh, thank yuh, thank yuh vurry much.
My exec boss, in his early sixties, was actually very forward thinking. He not only had an email account, anyone in the company could send things to him! This was 1991, in a company with 50,000+ employees, were communicating with executives directly simply was not done, so this was revolutionary.
I remember around that time in a documentary on Bill Gates or Steve Jobs or someone like that, the words-talker remarked on such a thing, about how in-touch this made him. I remember thinking to myself, doesn’t every CEO or such have a phone on their desks? But of course a secretary runs interference on that device. Why should one think that such a thing would ever happen with email?
but the Julian Von Able affair is astounding.
Is there a good third-party description of the facts in this story? I see his rebuttal on that twitter feed but then tons of criticism of him. The top google hit on him is from TheRoot, of all places. Don’t see much else beyond media pile-ons.
We STEM majors could have made such complaints about the many extremely demanding classes we had to take, such as Organic Chemistry I and II, Advanced Differential Equations, Quantum Mechanics, and so on…
If you are too stupid not to be able to arrange your classes so that they are all between 1000 and 1500 Tuesday through Friday, you are too stupid to be in college.
When I was taking my Physics degree, every class beyond the introductory stuff consisted of a single section, taught by one of a handful of professors. Unfortunately for us undergraduates, several of these professors were early risers, who felt that 0800 was practically mid-morning, and why should anyone complain about attending class at such an hour on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays?
Now I’m struggling to determine whether I’m one of the righteous STEM heroes, or an idiot too stupid to attend college in the first place. (I’m going to lean on my formal training, and say that I am both simultaneously, at least until somebody observes me directly.)
Right, that’s that bugger done.
Time for a glass of red.
We STEM majors could have made such complaints about the many extremely demanding classes we had to take, such as Organic Chemistry I and II, Advanced Differential Equations, Quantum Mechanics, and so on, but we knew that demanding course work was the key to successful careers.
I did an MEng in Mechanical Engineering, and am now doing an MBA. Let’s just say fluid mechanics was a lot harder than marketing.
Hi Tim,
I happened upon a site frequented by (people who said they were) college professors who were in general agreement that the dumbest students get routed into MBA and education majors. Do you agree with this? It does explain a lot about our society.
P.S. Tim, your site may have a virus; when I try to read it I get hijacked into a thing wanting to give me (free! Of course!) a several-hundred-dollar Amazon gift card.
Tim, your site may have a virus; when I try to read it I get hijacked into a thing wanting to give me (free! Of course!) a several-hundred-dollar Amazon gift card.
F*ck, not that again! Can you take a screenshot and send me the URL? Sorry about that!
I happened upon a site frequented by (people who said they were) college professors who were in general agreement that the dumbest students get routed into MBA and education majors.
I don’t know how representative my course is, but let’s just say I’m not expecting I’m studying alongside any future Nobel laureates.
When I was taking my Physics degree, every class beyond the introductory stuff consisted of a single section, taught by one of a handful of professors. Unfortunately for us undergraduates, several of these professors were early risers, who felt that 0800 was practically mid-morning, and why should anyone complain about attending class at such an hour on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays?
Heh…Was just relating to the wife this very thing after reading Muldoon’s post. The ONE class that I ever had to take that started at 0800 was introductory physics.
As we’ve started with xkcd…
Also not unrelated, particularly given lit crit’s influence on grievance studies.
@Governor Squid,
OK, I’ll grant there may be some exceptions to the rule, but where I spent the first two years pretending to go to school (just like these nutcases) any class actually scheduled by the school before 0900 was a rarity, and anything after 1600 probably astronomy.
Even though it is Georgia Tech, I am guessing the complainers aren’t actually studying anything tech, so I am also guessing they are lousy planners as well.
but the Julian Von Able affair is astounding.
Is there a good third-party description of the facts in this story?
Correcting myself, it’s Abele…
Try this: https://www.amren.com/commentary/2018/12/who-created-the-modern-world/
He’s a brilliant student with the rare ability to tip a glass while in college, which may have contributed to loud declarations of affection for culture builders who happen to be white while at the same decrying those who instinctively decry culture builders who happen to be white. Naturally this aggression shall not stand.
What I thought of interest to locals was the official Declaration of Sensitive Morality from head of nursery at Columbia, namely, ‘Statements of white racial superiority conflict with the university’s core value of inclusivity’. (Core values of history were not mentioned.)
At some point it seems NBC started persecuting the kid. The American lackey press in full bullroar.
I can’t find recent studies, but I know that when I was in college, the 4-year attrition rate in the Department of Physics was around 65%, slightly higher than the rate for the College of Science as a whole, which was around 60%. I know that the College of Engineering had similarly sobering numbers.
The 4-year attrition rate for the College of Education was something like -30%, as the students washing out of the more rigorous programs and transferring over were more than enough to offset the few numbskulls dim enough to wash out of the babysitting major.
(Apologies to the Education majors reading the above, who probably don’t deserve my snark. I should just let the numbers do the talking.)
who were in general agreement that the dumbest students get routed into… education majors.
Yes, education courses tend to attract students with some of the lowest SAT scores, or their equivalents.
Apologies to the Education majors reading the above…
Not to worry, if they are education majors, they probably can’t read it anyway…
I see that in the eight years since I finished at GT, the Useless Major Useless Eater proportion hasn’t gotten any better. I took enough humanities courses to be able to identify a schism of sorts. The drunkest, wildest hallmates and roommates were always in the school of business and other less-serious things, with few exceptions. The stupidest classmates were in 100 level language classes, the most fragile and neurotic classmates in 100 and 200 level humanities.
As to deserving 8 hours, in the words of Eastwood’s William Munny, “Deserve’s got nothing to do with it”.
“say that I am both simultaneously, at least until somebody observes me directly”
Is that a Schroedinger reference or a Motte and Bailey?
Look — you can understand the joke, or you can find it funny, but not both at the same time.
Let’s just say fluid mechanics was a lot harder than marketing.
And infinitely harder than feminist theorizing. 🙂
Remember the feminist professor who proclaimed that significant progress was made in statics long before fluid dynamics because of sexism?
“The first rule of Dunning-Kruger Club is that feminists don’t know they are in Dunning-Kruger Club.”
“When I was taking my Physics degree…several of these professors were early risers, who felt that 0800 was practically mid-morning….”
Yes, me too.
I remember thinking to myself, doesn’t every CEO or such have a phone on their desks?
Indeed they do. But woe would fall onto those who dared actually use it, if they were below executive level.
A cat may look at a king, but that doesn’t mean the king wants to take his call.
The advantage of email (and this was an internal email system, not internet SMTP/POP3/IMAP stuff) was that anyone in the organization was not only able to contact my exec, he pointedly stated that peons could email him. He published his email in the newsletter, showed it on slides at corporate events, etc.
Of course, not everyone in the organization had a computer, but every knew at least one person who did.
We laugh today at the printout/dictation reply sequence he used, but this was almost 30 years ago, and this was practically unheard of. In fact, other execs advised against this (“it encourages them”), and also “this email thing is just a fad anyway”, of course.
The stupidest classmates were in 100 level language classes, the most fragile and neurotic classmates in 100 and 200 level humanities.
I actually had a dorm mate who had to transfer out of humanities because it was too difficult. He transferred into Phys Ed. And apparently, he was a rock star within PE, because he was able to ace the most difficult course there was: “The Sociology of Sport”.
Apparently, this was beyond most of the PE majors. Keep in mind that many/most of his PE campadres were in PE in the first place because unlike him, they didn’t meet the tough entry criteria of the Humanities.
It was most amusing listening to him talk about the utter stupidity of his classmates who weren’t as smart as him and the rest of us in the dorm. I should mention in context that the dorm consisted of myself (Comp Sci/Math), two Bio/pre-med, one Chem Eng, one EE, and two Physics majors.
In his mind, these were all equivalent, and the world was divided into the smart (Humanities and above) and the dumb (Phys Ed). The fact that he’d failed Humanities, and was in PE didn’t dissuade him from his belief that his courses were no less difficult than any of ours, of course.
@Bill de Haan
I did humanities/liberal arts degrees and I noted that we had very stringent course and GPA requirements to graduate from the college of Arts & Sciences. For those in the College of Education, however, students with an “emphasis” in my area, i.e. they would be certified to teach in American high schools, had to have one-third fewer hours in their core area and of those, six were “Teaching X in High School,” and not substantive courses. Further, they only needed a 2.0 GPA to graduate (A&S students needed a 3.00) with a 2.25 GPA in their subject area as opposed to my required 3.25. There were some good students in education, but invariably, they obtained a B.A. or B.S. from Arts and Science in addition to their education certificates.
OK, we’re all agreed that education majors are idiots, how about the MBAs?
Tim, if I go to your site that gift-card scam somehow jumps on my browser and follows me all over the Internet for several days, sorry. It’s the one where it says it’s giving the cards to loyal customers in a city and state a hundred or so miles away, and it wants you to spin something, if that’s any help.
I remember thinking to myself, doesn’t every CEO or such have a phone on their desks?
Indeed they do. But woe would fall onto those who dared actually use it, if they were below executive level.
As I recall, both Al Gore and Hillary Clinton were the ultimate CEO’s: it was verboten to say ‘good morning’ to them when passing them in the hall at the White House, and Hillary became furious if someone looked at her. (As related by someone who worked at the White House during the Clinton presidency.)
Can’t wait for the lawsuits when these same students sue their alma maters for failing to teach them anything.
“I’m stupid and it’s your fault!”
Not that they’ll win.
Pogonip – add an ad blocker extension to your browser and that crap will go away.
OK, we’re all agreed that education majors are idiots, how about the MBAs?
The Lovely Bride agreed to help one of her work girlfriends study for her MBA, mostly because the Lovely Bride is a born scholar who can’t help but hide her true nature. After several weeks of tutoring her friend in Bullshit Bingo and Contemporary PowerPointing and whatnot, her reaction was “I can’t believe people get paid extra for this.”
After several weeks of tutoring her friend in Bullshit Bingo and Contemporary PowerPointing and whatnot, her reaction was “I can’t believe people get paid extra for this.”
Up the Organization: How to Stop the Corporation from Stifling People and Strangling Profits
First published in 1970.
Hopp Singg: “Can’t wait for the lawsuits when these same students sue their alma maters for failing to teach them anything.”
I believe that has already happened several decades ago in the early days of affirmative action in the USA. Students, often barely literate/competent, were allowed charity “passes” in various classes and granted qualifications. When they realised they were not competent in terms of gaining employment and their qualifications were a joke they sued.
By the way I am an education graduate from the days [1960s/’70s] when admission to university [in Australia] was highly selective and only the very best gained entry. The race to the bottom, led by the corporate boys and girls and politicians, means that there are many students gaining entry, especially to humanities and education, who should not be allowed to become professional dog walkers let alone work with real human beings.
Jim
When they realised they were not competent in terms of gaining employment and their qualifications were a joke they sued.
Ironically, some of these might be the same people who, as students, violently demanded ever more “affirmative action”.
My alma mater is USMA. I have no sympathy, or time, for these snowflakes.
USMA? So, same school as this clown?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2018/06/19/a-west-point-grad-wrote-communism-will-win-in-his-cap-the-army-kicked-him-out/?utm_term=.e716bef2bfaa
R. Sherman: I spent some particularly happy times in Rolla. Is Ozark Jim’s still extant?
So, same school as this clown?
It is also the school that produced the class of 1915, but regardless, 4293:1 normals to idiots is a far better ratio than the average US college where that ratio is reversed.
It is also the school that produced the class of 1915,
Yeah, I’m thinking standards have slipped considerably since 1915.
Yeah, I’m thinking standards have slipped considerably since 1915.
I know three recent grads (2 2018, 1 2016), and many more going back to around the class of 1965, and no, not really. Besides, there are those among the unenlightened would lump the likes of Robert E. Lee and all the cadets who left to fight for the Confederacy with the commie above.
The problem here is that the Marxist Progressive cure for stress is infinitely worse than the disease. What I can’t figure out is why most people are toofa king stupid to see that.
When I was in law school, Conflicts of Laws was a required five hour course at 0800.