What was university like for you guys?

[Lord Vile]

1 hour ago, Radium_Angel said:

A waste of time.

 

"Those who can't do, teach.

Those who can't teach, teach college.

Those who can't teach college, have tenure."

 

That's not how it works at all...

[SpaceGhostC2C]

Mostly relaxed. I studied Economics, not in the US. Quality varied widely, some courses were great, others a burden, others too shallow. Passing exams and getting grades was easy and had a lot of free time, and some courses really expanded your ability to think. Still, by the end of it I felt under-educated compared to where I wanted to be. So, grad school it was. That was much more stressful and demanding, always with this feeling of barely getting by it, but it also made the biggest impact on my knowledge and understanding. I would definitely couldn't have gotten any of the jobs I got since then, both because holding a PhD was a requirement and because, even if they hadn't, I would have lacked the necessary skills to perform them

 

In the end, many of the things people associate with college are mostly about being young, rather than being a college student. In my view, the two relevant questions are: does it help me to get where I want to be? Am I learning, and not just content, but especially a way of thinking; am I expanding my ability to approach questions and problems? If the answer to those is no, you may not be well served by college education, and sometimes by formal education altogether. Some people have a tendency to demand changes to existing degrees, or outright new degrees, so college education satisfies needs currently not satisfied by it, but I think it's the wrong approach. We shouldn't send everyone to college, and then make college an all-encompassing institution that basically offers everything society may desire. Instead, we should provide suitable alternative paths (including DIY) better tailored to each need, only some of which would go through college.

 

On 9/27/2020 at 12:52 PM, CircleTech said:

 

But about that "Free" College you keep hearing people talk about from Countries like Germany? I'm using Germany as an example because I had some German Roomates last year who I got to talk to about this.

  Reveal hidden contents

You may have heard that Germany and Other Nordic Countries provide "Free College" to everyone, and this is only a half-truth. Germany for example has free college, but the STEM majors are extremely hard on purpose to "weed-out" people so the degree does means something. Same goes for Humanities Majors like philosophy, Political Science, ect. This is How Germany keeps their college "Free" so they look good Internationally while still providing a quality education, By systematically denying 95% of their population from attending School in the first place. This approach is actually very similar to how the Military Academies in the US work. We're gonna make everything free, but it's gonna be nearly impossible for the average person to get in and then once you are in, we're gonna make your curriculum mind-crushingly hard. Germans for Example take classes on Real and Complex Analysis for Engineering, something no Engineering degree in the US requires. Meanwhile Everyone else who couldn't make it through goes to a three-year trade school that teaches them how to actually do their job. This seems like a far more sensible approach to me.

 

On 9/27/2020 at 1:48 PM, Volbet said:

Where are you getting that number from? 

I obviously can't speak for Germany, but when I worked at the University of Copenhagen as an external lecturer, we were working with a dropout rate of roughly 5% per year among the student I taught (mainly undergrad pol.sci students). And when I attended the same university, the dropout rate for the entire five year degree, in my selected field, was hovering around 10%. 

Not to mention that the entry requirements in most fields is about a 3.0 GPA. Some fields, like medicin, is obviously higher, but a lot of fields don't even have a GPA entry requirement. And that's only at the University of Copenhagen. The GPA requirements tend to be a tad bit lower in the other universities.   

 

Also, I don't see a massive difference between the educational level of, say, the Nordic countries and the US: According to OECD, the percentage of Americans age 25-64 with a college degree is 48,3, while the average of the Nordic countries is 43,95. That's only a 10% difference.

 

I've studied in two countries with free or heavily subsidized tuition college education, and taught in a third one: I can confirm that free college is no myth, and does indeed lead to mass enrollment - it just comes with its own pros and cons. Claims about "filter courses" designed to weed people out are prevalent myths in all these countries, but are never supported by the data: yes, when everyone can attend you are bound to have people fro whom some topics seem impossible, but as @Volbet said, in the end the numbers don't show large differences, and non-free college doesn't mean that many fewer students, it just means that many more indebted students  What many point out about Germany is their high school system, that segregates between "college-bound" students and the rest rather early (you can always go to college, it's just that going to certain type of high school makes it much more likely). In that sense, and compared to other European countries, Germany doesn't have the biggest college population, but it does have a much more developed trade school system. It's kind of a virtuous vs. vicious circle: good trade schools with a lot of good students, companies hire them and see they are good, they are more likely to hire them in the future, students notice this and are more likely to choose trade schools when it makes sense, etc. In other countries much fewer students go to trade school, so most good students are found in college anyway, companies see this and bias their hiring decisions towards college students, students see this and try to avoid trade schools and stick to college, the pool of students in trade schools gets worse, it strengthens the hiring bias, etc. In the latter case, you end up with a lot of bored colleges students who are thre only fo r the signalling value of the degree, and who will have to learn later on the job what they could be learning right now at a trade school 

[Radium_Angel]

20 minutes ago, Lord Vile said:

That's not how it works at all...

Go tell that to my university Physical Chemistry professor whose 1st words out of his mouth (mind, you, this was a 2-part, 4 credit each, senior class) were:

 

"None of you will pass this class the 1st time around. I guarantee it."

Oh, did I mention he was both the dean of the Chem dept AND had tenure?

 

No my friend, that's exactly how it works.

[Lord Vile]

13 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

Go tell that to my university Physical Chemistry professor whose 1st words out of his mouth (mind, you, this was a 2-part, 4 credit each, senior class) were:

 

"None of you will pass this class the 1st time around. I guarantee it."

Oh, did I mention he was both the dean of the Chem dept AND had tenure?

 

No my friend, that's exactly how it works.

Isn't it American Unis that you go to knowing nowhere near enough to study an actual degree which is why they have the first year where you do pretty much nothing? I wouldn't expect anyone to pass an actual degree level course when there's so much you don't know.

 

When I went to Uni and all of the staff there had experience in either research or working in the sector, most of them had both. Mate who went to Manchester Uni had lectures from Professor Brian Cox who is apparently useless as a lecturer but I don't think fits your generalisation

[Radium_Angel]

3 minutes ago, Lord Vile said:

first year

 

3 minutes ago, Lord Vile said:

senior class

Meaning, this was in the 4th year, of a 4 year degree. The last two classes (part 1 and part 2) required to graduate.

The best student there got a 32 (a complete failing grade) and that was the highest grade, not a curve either, straight up 32. She'd been a straight A student the entire time she was there, until that class.

 

For the record, I got a 26. I did not return for another round of that class, or any others for that matter.

[Lord Vile]

2 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

 

Meaning, this was in the 4th year, of a 4 year degree. The last two classes (part 1 and part 2) required to graduate.

The best student there got a 32 (a complete failing grade) and that was the highest grade, not a curve either, straight up 32. She'd been a straight A student the entire time she was there, until that class.

 

For the record, I got a 26. I did not return for another round of that class, or any others for that matter.

What class was this exactly? 

[Sauron]

It was all right, I don't live in a place where you need to get in debt to get an education so I didn't really worry too much about the value of individual courses - overall it gave me what I needed to get me learning the right things at a quick pace. As for learning things that are "useful", don't worry if your early (yes, I consider 2 years to be early) courses seem to only cover theoretical basics that you can't actually use, you're going to need that theory when you move to the more practical stuff.

 

Also, when it comes to engineering specifically you have to consider that learning by yourself is part of the trade.

On 9/27/2020 at 3:36 AM, GDRRiley said:

I don't need discrete math

Literally all computing relies on discrete math. If one only wants to learn how to program I'd recommend just getting into a seminar or going to a technical high school.

On 9/27/2020 at 5:52 PM, CircleTech said:

It's a unfair advantage that puts people like me who can both afford to go to school on someone else's money and afford to pay for expensive projects to teach myself on own time ahead of everyone else.

 

If more people refuse to go to college, then tuition prices will be forced to come down.

Or maybe colleges shouldn't be aggressively privatized. Instead of a boycott (boycotts never accomplish anything, especially when you don't really have a choice if you want to be reliably hired) you could just push policies that make public education a viable alternative for everyone. There are plenty of countries where public education is on par with private schools or at least close enough that you won't be at a huge disadvantage if you can't afford the more expensive option.

[Radium_Angel]

Just now, Lord Vile said:

What class was this exactly? 

Physical Chemistry. A 2 part class, each part was 4 credits each. Meaning 8 credits on your GPA. at least 4 of which were a 0.0, because you failed it the 1st time around. And maybe if you were lucky, the 2nd time around, you did better and didn't fail. But then you had to take the 2nd part, which you'd fail, because the prof promised you would, so you got 8 credits of 0.0 on your record and your good GPA is now shot to shit.

[Lord Vile]

Just now, Radium_Angel said:

Physical Chemistry. A 2 part class, each part was 4 credits each. Meaning 8 credits on your GPA. at least 4 of which were a 0.0, because you failed it the 1st time around. And maybe if you were lucky, the 2nd time around, you did better and didn't fail. But then you had to take the 2nd part, which you'd fail, because the prof promised you would, so you got 8 credits of 0.0 on your record and your good GPA is now shot to shit.

Physical Chem isn't that hard... Was expecting Quantum or advanced Thermodynamics or something. 

[Radium_Angel]

1 minute ago, Lord Vile said:

Physical Chem isn't that hard.

If you have a good professor.

 

For the record, I aced Quantum mechanics, because I like Math, but I was a chem major. I had planned on a minor in math (since there was so much of it I had to take anyway) and in physics, because why not?

[Lord Vile]

46 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

If you have a good professor.

 

For the record, I aced Quantum mechanics, because I like Math, but I was a chem major. I had planned on a minor in math (since there was so much of it I had to take anyway) and in physics, because why not?

Quantum Chemistry isn't quantum mechanics, well it is but a very specific region of it applied to atoms and related shit. Thing with Quantum anything is wrapping your head around it, similar to astrophysics, after that is a lot easier. Personally found thermodynamics a lot harder because of the sheer volume of knowledge you have to acquire, think my formula sheet for quantum was about 1/3 the length of the thermo one plus thermo ties into pretty much everything else. And BTW I know technically physical chemistry covers thermo but my uni treat it as it's own thing separate from the rest of physical 

[HM-2]

Did my undergraduate in international relations at a large university. It was...fine. Variable teaching quality. Decent enough facilities. Good social atmosphere. I've reread some if the stuff I wrote then having spent a good dozen years either directly or indirectly involved with the subject and it's pretty good. 

 

After a few years I did a master's at a tiny, niche university that had a specialist school for security studies. That was absolutely ace. One of the best years of my life. Quality of teaching and material a world away. Ten people in my classes and seminars for the whole year. Though small the social side of stuff was good, albeit I didn't experience that much of it as I lived a good 5 miles out from campus. Doing my masters was the best decision I ever made from a career perspective.

[Ricardo Harrow]

17 hours ago, Sauron said:

Also, when it comes to engineering specifically you have to consider that learning by yourself is part of the trade.

I do agree with you on that part, but the fact that I pay this much just for teachers to have really bad attitudes towards me and my class is not at all a fun experience. Not to mention the fact that a lot of the teachers with shitty attitudes are in cahoots with the administration which means that if we were to complain about any of them, they would just find out and fail us.  Even though a lot of people in my country are complaining about online classes, I actually kind of prefer them over physical classes solely because of the fact that I don't have to deal with asshole teachers in person.

I really wish I could learn a lot of other stuff relating to my major, but I barely have the time to considering my study schedule is busy enough as it is. If you do have some advice or insight, I would greatly appreciate it.

Thank you for sharing your uni experience.

[Sauron]

8 hours ago, Ricardo Harrow said:

I pay this much just for teachers to have really bad attitudes towards me and my class is not at all a fun experience.

Well, again, it sucks not to have viable public education...

8 hours ago, Ricardo Harrow said:

I really wish I could learn a lot of other stuff relating to my major, but I barely have the time to considering my study schedule is busy enough as it is. If you do have some advice or insight, I would greatly appreciate it.

You can't learn everything at the same time, keep on schedule with your exams if possible and take breaks when you can.

[Sauron]

23 hours ago, CircleTech said:

The only degrees I know of where it literally doesn’t matter where you get them is Engineering, Law, and Medicine. with Engineering at least, most degrees are accredited by ABET and contain identical pre-Engineering classes regardless of the school. I think law and medicine have similar accreditation bodies.

Classes are not all there is to it. A lot of what makes university "worth it" in terms of job potential is found in internship offers, interesting research opportunities and close contact with local industries - if all of those are unequally slanted towards private schools it's a problem.

[spartaman64]

14 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Classes are not all there is to it. A lot of what makes university "worth it" in terms of job potential is found in internship offers, interesting research opportunities and close contact with local industries - if all of those are unequally slanted towards private schools it's a problem.

yep my first semester of a physics major i didnt even learn anything they just had you do odd stuff for a professor LUL. i got to show off my soldering skills from when i took a high school electronics class when the professor asked us to put together a variable power supply for him. gotta teach the students early how to butter up professors i guess

 

but it was a cool experience and was actually more useful than my calc 1 and chem classes

[Ricardo Harrow]

15 hours ago, Sauron said:

Well, again, it sucks not to have viable public education...

You can't learn everything at the same time, keep on schedule with your exams if possible and take breaks when you can.

Thank you for the advice.

 

15 hours ago, spartaman64 said:

yep my first semester of a physics major i didnt even learn anything they just had you do odd stuff for a professor LUL. i got to show off my soldering skills from when i took a high school electronics class when the professor asked us to put together a variable power supply for him. gotta teach the students early how to butter up professors i guess

 

but it was a cool experience and was actually more useful than my calc 1 and chem classes

When I was around 18, a friend of mine who was a few years older than me told me that when you go to uni, you have to butter up the professors. Back then, I thought that was kind of absurd, but after becoming a uni student, I can see why people do that.

[Trik'Stari]

A complete waste of time. Thankfully I only did a 2 year degree so my student loan debt wasn't absurd. I've already paid a third of it off.

 

I say a waste of time because what I did learn, did not prepare me for any of the I.T. certifications I would need to get further into the I.T. industry. I'm currently a glorified delivery driver for laptops and whatnot. I was a repair technician for 2 years before being "promoted" to the current position.

 

Currently look into getting my CDL and becoming a truck driver so I can earn a decent paycheck.

[Ricardo Harrow]

Just now, Trik'Stari said:

A complete waste of time. Thankfully I only did a 2 year degree so my student loan debt wasn't absurd. I've already paid a third of it off.

 

I say a waste of time because what I did learn, did not prepare me for any of the I.T. certifications I would need to get further into the I.T. industry. I'm currently a glorified delivery driver for laptops and whatnot. I was a repair technician for 2 years before being "promoted" to the current position.

 

Currently look into getting my CDL and becoming a truck driver so I can earn a decent paycheck.

Best of luck to you! 

[Teddy07]

I went to university at the age over 30 and I hate university. I would much rather earn money but I need to do it to achieve my life goal. 

[Ricardo Harrow]

28 minutes ago, Teddy07 said:

I went to university at the age over 30 and I hate university. I would much rather earn money but I need to do it to achieve my life goal. 

You can kind of count yourself as lucky because not a lot of people have the time or money to work towards their life goal.

Just asking, do you have the option to drop out and work with a decent pay?

[Teddy07]

42 minutes ago, Ricardo Harrow said:

Just asking, do you have the option to drop out and work with a decent pay?

No

I am totally screwed if I drop out because I will be ~50.000 € in debt. I had an office job before and I would have to pay for ages to pay it back. I also can´t declare bankcruptcy because most of the debt is owned by my sister and father.  

[Ricardo Harrow]

Just now, Teddy07 said:

No

I am totally screwed if I drop out because I will be ~50.000 € in debt. I had an office job before and I would have to pay for ages to pay it back. I also can´t declare bankcruptcy because most of the debt is owned by my sister and father.  

Oh, I see.

Best of luck to you. 

[Drama Lama]

1 hour ago, Teddy07 said:

would much rather earn money but I need to do it to achieve my life goal. 

So you‘re „ stuck „ in your career and the only way to improve is studying?

[Benjamin22044]

My university was like a dream. Come and go at any time and nobody cares. No issues with the attendance and lots of free time as well with the classes. And mass bunks were always supported by all. Was worth living it again.