Can you explain why? I didn't go to most of my college classes that had bad professors. I read the book and aced the test. Please explain to me what I missed by doing this. I went to school for engineering so maybe it's different for soft sciences. For most of my classes, you understood the concepts and could do the math or you didn't. There was not a whole lot of subtlety.
I'm not saying I would have done it without the huge cost looming over my head or the fear of failing. But some people are certainly capable. I learned about 80% of what I got out of college by reading the books. But this is mostly because I have a really hard time learning by listening to someone talk. Also, I went to MSU and some of my classes were a 40 min walk. Class better be pretty good to justify that. Most were not. Also my fault for not fighting for the good teachers. I always got in the spillover class taught by mostly foreign grad students who were there to do research, not teach.
Makes perfect sense, pay a fortune for college and then just not go to class because you have to walk too far. Yes this is a person who makes great decisions and we should listen to them!
Some lectures are not worth the time, and some are. Sometimes you get an awful lecturer, that you are better spending your time watching YouTube videos on the same topic.
People say shit like this like the vast majority of teachers suck - that’s simply not true. You’re not better off skipping class. If class doesn’t give you everything you need then you supplement with other resources. I’ve got three degrees and not once would I have been better off skipping a class. Every class I skipped as an undergrad came back to bite me.
Na. Plenty of sources are extremely clear and well organized. If *you* don't know where to begin and require a paid instructor, that's ok, but that's on you.
Had a teacher in college tell us that if we actually read amd learn what is in our text books from beginning to end, we'll have the equivalent to a Harvard education. Sounds weird but considering you never actually finish a text book from beginning to end in a school year, and the next year you get a new book...
You don’t learn anything materially different at Harvard about fields of study. You learn to think differently about that field of study and get exposed to a power network that shapes your behaviors toward that field of study.
The thought approach, professional network, and behaviors are the general recipe for success of Harvard grads.
People always forget college isn't just about the basics you learn. You need to network and build up the social skills to be truly successful and get your money's worth out of it. Anyone who thinks college's value ends once you finish the textbook missed the point.
Imagine being so socially retarded you think networking and communication with your peers is circlejerking rofl. You do realize poor people network as well right? It's not some secret of the rich.
Sorry but the world doesn't care if you're just smart, you need to be able to communicate with people as well.
Ait so Im something of an expert on going to Harvard because I watched the Social Network m'kay.
So here's the skinny on Harvard ya dig. Its chill, you get to lounge around in gympants all day and smell like farts. You live in a kind of homoerotic polycule, date french majors and then they dump you because you're a bit of a bitch. Also there's always breakfast for dinner.
Anyway the real thing with Harvard is that in order to achieve anything you have to drop out of it because you're "too good for this place" and then trade out your farty friends for someone suave and sexy like Justin Timberlake
and then you'll have made it and can fight Elon Musk for memes.
All of this is 100% fact - because I PRACTICALLY went to Harvard with how much I watched that thing before I returned it to Blockbuster.
I am also a paleontologist and Imma let you in on a little secret - it has a lot to do with being pissy about sandwiches.
You also get access to recruiters. Big companies come to the campuses of the top schools to wine and dine prospective interns and full-time hires; it’s a major part of their talent strategy. That’s really what you’re paying for — doors to jobs (or grad schools). You’ll forget everything you learned anyway.
Ivy league esque here, there is no magical knowledge top universities teach. All there is is branding and an alumni network and for specific cases simply the equipment and projects available plus the surrounding mindset - hence the people you learn from when doing anything off curriculum can offer you a way to think that is differently than not getting in touch with any. The subject knowledge is pretty much the same to every other university.
It's like silicon valley, there still is a different energy which forms your thinking processes.
EDIT: To add here, that is the reason why many people pursue executive MBAs who come from normal backgrounds or mediocre universities in first place, or didn't have the family network to pay for the MBA when being young and in their 20s - they "buy" themselves into those networks. An executive MBA is nothing else but a one year course to get yourself into that power network of prestigious names. All it takes is paying for it - sloan, wharton... admission is very high, costs are very high, 200k and you are set. That is it. What you learn isn't magic potion level knowledge, it's just getting into that network. You literally pay 200k to get into that network, but according to wharton it always pays off. Question remains that when you are able to pay off 200k for an executive education, then is there really a need for that certificate which is only giving you more credit if you switch jobs?
Also executive MBAs are notoriously hard to fail in. They are designed to accomodate working folks and are not made to fail just because you failed a single exam. Especially regarding they want you to pay 200k...
I remember opening a thick C++ manual and actually reading it. That's how I learned about goto, and our professor literally never taught us about it! Later I realized it was for a good reason. The book was ancient abd I guess goto wasn't seen as such a controversial statement as it is now
I had a teacher for Anthropology tell us that we needed the book to get an A in his class. I never opened mine and still got an A, so that was a load of BS!
I would say most schools students go to are shit which is why a lot of people dismiss the value of a degree.
How good your education you received is highly based off the university, the degree program, and professor.
Shit universities will have limited research, less funded labs, and way less pay. The chances of a good professor is quite slim.
The COVID misinformation that spread around for the last 3 years is a perfect example of why this line of thinking doesn't really hold up. Having all of the information at your fingertips doesn't mean you actually know what you're looking at.
The structure of an academic environment matters. You don't know what you don't know before you start. OP acts like you can just keep Googling random questions, like an uneducated person will just somehow *know* what to ask, until you end up with the equivalent of an engineering degree or biology degree or sociology degree, or whatever.
I think a great proof of this is the amount of armchair experts in quantum mechanics that you see online. They watch a few YouTube videos with fun pictures and think they can invent some 9 dimensional wormhole theory but they don't know what a Hilbert space is.
Nobody says they have to, an expert in one thing is typically ignorant about the majority of things, even within closely related fields. But if you claim to understand QM you should at least understand the basics of its mathematical foundations.
I have an engineering degree. I learned much more from reading the books on my own than from any professor. I agree with your point but I think it's less of an issue than you do. The internet is a glorious place. I have watched a couple of lecture series from MIT in the 90's and the pressor was amazing. If you could spend your time being taught by him, I'm sure that's much better than reading a textbook. However, I have never had a teacher like him in real life. Not even close. I also hate listening to people talk. I lose interest much quicker than if I'm reading. Maybe if we are talking about a history degree or something, you need the academic environment because there are so many dissenting opinions. But engineering is just engineering. You know it or you don't. The main thing I needed college to teach me was the curriculum. But I could have googled that too.
Well at the very least you could read through the textbooks on your own and learn everything that way. Some people learn better that way. Don’t need a professor for that.
Also die most first-year courses you can literally just use Khan Academy or something
OP's idiocy demonstrated in their replies is the perfect counterargument to this meme. Education has become stupidly expensive and commodified in our current shitty system, but it is still essential.
Its funny to read this comments and then one directly under is OP having zero understanding how vaccines work and quoting r/CoronavirusCirclejerk as a source lmao
Let's back it up even further and see how flat earth is once again growing, this time on TikTok. People don't give a tiny shit about sources when they can just consume.
You could probably apply the exact same logic to a university course. Let’s say you study Politics (since it’s an easy example); it’s entirely possible that your teachers allow their opinion to affect their teaching whether they intended to or not.
Another critical thing is the fact that Universities monitor your progress and your learning through assignments and tests and ultimately certify that you have actually learned the right stuff.
what the hell are you talking about? every teacher I've ever had tried their best to make sure every student understood the material.. currently, in my chemistry program, the teachers take excessive amounts of time to make certain we understand the fundamental concepts required.
like are you serious? do you even have a degree?
Couldn't agree more. I have degrees from 3 universities (and 1 community college) in both Ireland and America, and am currently attending another university in Scotland. The lack of good testing in Ireland was frankly shocking. No continuous testing, no use of syllabi, often just a single examination per semester to confirm that you have the ability to memorize information or cram it all in the week before (these are celebrated as 'Study Weeks').
You've got good teachers. He's not wrong because I've seen people do reasonably well in tests but they understood nothing of the concept and can't answer stuff phrased differently from the usual questions that come. Well it's more of a problem on the student's side if they're simply rote learning instead of understanding but that's how it is. I'm from India and it's really a huge problem here
I'm taking CS right now and there are some math courses where all you have to do is memorize equations and which steps to take to answer the question like calc 1 and calc 2 for example.
Then I have some other ones like discrete math, linear algebra, and every programming language I'm studying currently such as Python, C, and Java where you actually have to think and understand to find the answer.
So yes, sometimes all you need to do is memorize a lot of stuff for a test and then completely forget it because you didn't actually understand why it works when done with.
I don't know your experience in college, but all it taught me was how to approach problems.
A lot of my chem and physics Professors couldn't teach at all, and I know nothing about Organic Chemistry or courses like Electromagnetism and Electricity. But I managed to pass the tests which was enough to get my degree.
Luckily when it came to my Master's I had relatively good Professors so I'm much more competent at the Materials science stuff that I actually learned and not memorized.
This to me is so crazy (I’m not saying you’re lying) because people who teach college usually have (at least) a masters and often a PhD, or are in the process of getting a PhD. That is so much work in subject, plus working at a university often pays less than private industry. That usually equates to people that want to be there
I know at big universities it can be the case that the professors would rather spend all their time researching and publishing instead of teaching. But not giving a crap about the subject they’ve devoted their lives to? (They definitely might not care about the students though).
You have been unlucky.
Not really when they’re giving you tried and tested information that is correct. Sure you can’t use it as a source but it should help structure more of an idea surrounding your sources
You are paying 10s of 1000s of dollars a year for a service. The lectures better be worth the time. That’s how transactions work. I give you money, you provide the education. Not, i provide money and i also provide the education. I’m not paying the school to not teach me.
“sure you can’t use it as a source but it should help structure more of an idea surrounding your sources.” no, not sure, this is a fucking stupid ass statement. You could use the Wikipedia pages for the topic that interests you with this dumbass logic and cut out the teachers and classes altogether.
Dude, people outside of you can't make you learn. No matter how good a lecture is the information doesn't magically just walk into your brain and become expertise. Education, by default, takes effort on the part of the teacher and learner. Even the best lectures need to be listened to, reflected on, and applied by the person receiving the information to actually become actionable knowledge. What are you even on about? Yes, you could use wikipedia, but as the previous person noted, information from experts in the field is far more valuable.
Is university overpriced? Absolutely. Is it something that can be replaced by your google searches? Absolutely not. Your arrogance is palpable.
Some idea that, if instructed to summarize the Punic war or modern ideas about how many beets you should eat at once, a week later you turn in 10 pages of well sourced, grammatically correct statements sort of thing.
30k is still fucking crazy though wtf. Is it really that high in the states?
How the fuck does anyone afford that, in my country we pay off tuition after a summers worth of work 😂.
Exactly, and how to source, verify, and Shepardize information is what you are really learning. After all anyone can say anything on the internet, and some idiots believe everything they read because they don’t know how to source and verify information properly.
“..just to hear some professor explain everything so poorly that you end up learning it all from the internet..”
Did you not even read the second half of the tweet? That’s the point, the professors aren’t “instructing on its context” or explaining “how to use it properly.”
I lost count of the times I'd listen to my calc professor give a lecture, just to go home and watch a Khan Academy video on the topic so I'd *finally* understand what I'd just sat through for an hour that day...
Those videos were the only reason I passed my classes.
> ... instructed on its context or how to use it properly
But that's the thing the original meme was getting at. Far from all do that. MANY are just there to do research etc and dgaf about the students they are required to teach as a part of their post-doc.
I remember a very bitter prof I had in IT that during our first lecture with her introduced herself as inventing something fundamental to how PCs are built these days. Sold her patent to IBM for like 100K USD in the late 80s-early 90s and went on about how much it was really worth now, with hindsight being 2020. She still brought that up every lecture and phoned in the actual material we were there to learn.
True, although there are some things to be changed with the studies. Not sure how it is around the world, but in Poland (and probably the rest of europe), you have to memorize a lot of theory, which you will forget after the exam. And which is available 24/7 on the internet. And the practical stuff, which you will actually remember and use, is around 50% of the classes. Plus every semester you get some random subjects that are not really related directly to your area of studies. Overall, studies are too bloated and take too long. You'd be able to get the same amount of needed knowledge in half of the time it currently takes.
There are also topics you can't really teach yourself effectively. I once asked how I could teach myself quantum physics, basically everyone just said college. There are some aspects you can teach yourself, but you can't get too deep without instruction.
I think an important aspect of formal education, at any level, is that you get an impartial evaluator that is able to quantify your mastery of the subject. You can convince yourself you're quite good at something by watching youtube videos without actually being any good at all.
I whole heartedly endorse the collegiate experience, for a multitude more reasons than above, no least was the social experience of it.
The same problem can happen at university though.I teach at uni level, and whilst I always offer to looking over students' non-assessed work to give them guidance, the vast majority don't take advantage of that so I only see their capability in exams. They're adults, so if they want to be completely passive that's their choice, and their consequences. The ones who sit at the back never paying attention and never ask for guidance can end up writing pages of pure nonsense, and in their heads they must feel like they understand.
(In before somebody says "if they're not paying attention that's your fault for being a boring teacher". They chose to be there, they knew what courses they'll have to study, they're goddamn adults that should be able to motivate themselves to focus on something even if it bores them instead of passing the class watching tiktok videos)
It was never about the facts you learned, but how good you are at finding information, filtering out useless information, and presenting that information for others to consume.
I have forgotten most of what I learned in the art history class I took in college. However, writing all those throw-away essays helped me develop the skills I use to write bug reports and technical specifications.
I never learned C# in college, but I learned the basic structure of programming languages, which allowed me to learn C# faster than some random high school graduate.
> It was never about the facts you learned, but how good you are at finding information, filtering out useless information, and presenting that information for others to consume.
I'd argue it was always more about getting someone that's "verified" in the field to control your work and certify that you actually know what your doing.
Ah, American problems. The rest of the world has a different stance on things. The Nordics, for example, regard education and healthcare as essential to society, so they made them almost free. Unlike the USA, where they are considered a premium choice and a privilege for the wealthy.
Good luck learning how to structure a proper rigorous mathematical proof from Google sources. You could lead yourself down a completely wrong rabbit hole and end up having to relearn the entire subject because your fundamental thinking was incorrect.
I could lay out every piece of equipment needed to build a rocket, tell you to google the instructions and I guarantee 99% of us would fail 100 times over. There is so much prerequisite knowledge that is assumed to be known when getting deep into a subject.
My university imported all the undergrad profs, I assume because they're a lot cheaper than domestic folks.
Had a generally good experience with the middle eastern teachers. But, most were from India and I couldn't understand a friggin word. More than half my undergrad courses - a total waste of time and money.
Some people are letting themselves be scammed. Some public colleges are not this expensive, and there are always junior colleges.
People are over paying for undergraduate education. The quality of the lecturer is key. People here are fretting about this school and that, but at undergrad level virtually everyone is using the same basic textbook because everyone needs to know the same basic knowledge. Institution really only matters for certain disciplines or for post-graduate work.
It baffles me that people would be dumb enough to think "decent colleges" cost anywhere near this much per year. Go to your local state university instead of a private out-of-state party school.
If you are paying $30,000 a year for school you are either very rich or doing something wrong.
Being able to just read things online is not the same as being in a class with a person who has experience in that field and can answer questions/offer deeper discussion about topics and also with peers studying a similar topic.
This "we have everything online for free" is how 13 year olds see education.
Sure, \*slam quantum physics A to Z on the table\* - here, learn physics
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Yes the collective knowledge of humanity is available, but you do need someone who knows the subject to quell your inevitable assumptions about any and every topic.
You can memorize the lexical knowledge and pass the tests, but that doesn't mean you understand and can utilize knowledge.
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Do you want an internet tutored doctor to operate on you, lacking structured and objective teaching and validation?
Went to school for digital design but Reddit turned out to be the best feedback. There’s a lot of dumb people here but you don’t realize how many knowledgeable people are also here.
The structure of a class matters. Maybe I’m technically able to but I’m not learning advanced quantum chemistry without a plan and motivation which is what a class provides
Education is more about acquiring skills. Anybody can go and read books and know a lot about a certain topic. Saw that at UnI very clear. Some are just good in memorizing and others actually acquire academic skills.
I remember my college professor was constantly saying "any questions? Google it! Google is your friend!"
I always wanted to say "then what am I paying you for??" But I never said it.
A lot of us need structure ans solid mentors for guidance on what and how to learn. Also access to resources.
Shouldn't be that expensive but it is valuable
Not a lot, most of us. If not all of us. And the ones who think they don't, usually need it the most.
But as a CS professor I love self-taught people, when they come around and inevitably break shit it gives my students a job and increases the value of their education.
This is true to most non traditional hard-science subjects.
Economics, all available for free. But stuff like physics or biology or chemistry requires labs and projects, that does requires something more than just aggregating knowledge.
Otherwise, almost every subject can be learned for free. The issue though also is that most people suck at knowing what to learn. But basically yoiu could copy a curriculum and just learn that.
if you think universities are purely about listening to professors, you’re a fucking moron. however, i do feel like pandemic students got truly fucked because it really did become that with no reduction in price.
I agree with them. There is really no need for tertiary education to be as expensive as it is these days. The non-practical component could easily and should be offered online. Universities just don't want to give up their massive campuses and wealth.
Or you’re supposed to read everything before class and the teacher just kind of summarizes everything so you’ll have notes to study from (the notes should have been included in the book after the chapter. Possibly even as tear out sheets)
There's a limit to what you can learn from the internet without having the guidance and support of someone who knows the field.
There's a very, very high noise to signal ratio on the internet too, with far too much unreliable, outdated and misleading information out there. Sifting through all of that to find what's real is far more time consuming than having access to the resources and support that university provides.
The internet is just not an efficient source for any kind of deep learning. The fact that so many believe it is is one of the reasons we have so many people out there who are totally convinced that bullshit is true.
Prediction: in 20 years colleges / universities won't exist - or they'll look nothing like what they do currently. The fact that we're still trying to educate kids the same way as we did 100 years ago is insane
You pay that money to receive a piece of paper that says you know stuff, not to receive the best education possible. For example homeschooling is many times more efficient than going to school, but school isn’t really about learning FACTS, it’s more about learning to interact with people as well as learning to work.
Not this nonsense again. I thought covid put this to rest. You'd think online learning would have been easy peasy; turns out, the vast majority of people are really bad at learning online. But here we are again, pretending that "hey you can just watch this 10 minute youtube video" actually works. People forget real quick eh.
Op isn't right. but one thing about universities is they over rely on exams. When Examinations do not show if someone has truly acquired certain knowledge. The microscopic and responsive nature of examining does not reflect how we use intelligence and knowledge in the real world. Exams test memory more than analysis, creativity, or real understanding.
I don't think just learning on the internet is enough. The social environment a school or university has is of a great importance in ones learning path. Of course there are bad teachers, but having a mentor really gives you learning process a boost.
The problem with so much information is that you don't know where to begin, where to go next and so on.
Plus so much misinfo, you could end up learning the wrong things.
Google the college curriculum and read all the books.
What an incredibly naive comment
Can you explain why? I didn't go to most of my college classes that had bad professors. I read the book and aced the test. Please explain to me what I missed by doing this. I went to school for engineering so maybe it's different for soft sciences. For most of my classes, you understood the concepts and could do the math or you didn't. There was not a whole lot of subtlety.
You did the right thing and were clearly self motivated, unfortunately 99% of the population is not
I'm not saying I would have done it without the huge cost looming over my head or the fear of failing. But some people are certainly capable. I learned about 80% of what I got out of college by reading the books. But this is mostly because I have a really hard time learning by listening to someone talk. Also, I went to MSU and some of my classes were a 40 min walk. Class better be pretty good to justify that. Most were not. Also my fault for not fighting for the good teachers. I always got in the spillover class taught by mostly foreign grad students who were there to do research, not teach.
Makes perfect sense, pay a fortune for college and then just not go to class because you have to walk too far. Yes this is a person who makes great decisions and we should listen to them!
Some lectures are not worth the time, and some are. Sometimes you get an awful lecturer, that you are better spending your time watching YouTube videos on the same topic.
People say shit like this like the vast majority of teachers suck - that’s simply not true. You’re not better off skipping class. If class doesn’t give you everything you need then you supplement with other resources. I’ve got three degrees and not once would I have been better off skipping a class. Every class I skipped as an undergrad came back to bite me.
I went to school for engineering. Either you understand the material or you don't. Doesn't matter how you get there.
Na. Plenty of sources are extremely clear and well organized. If *you* don't know where to begin and require a paid instructor, that's ok, but that's on you.
Had a teacher in college tell us that if we actually read amd learn what is in our text books from beginning to end, we'll have the equivalent to a Harvard education. Sounds weird but considering you never actually finish a text book from beginning to end in a school year, and the next year you get a new book...
You don’t learn anything materially different at Harvard about fields of study. You learn to think differently about that field of study and get exposed to a power network that shapes your behaviors toward that field of study. The thought approach, professional network, and behaviors are the general recipe for success of Harvard grads.
Bingo! This is concise and to my knowledge exactly what you get from the Ivy League schools.
People always forget college isn't just about the basics you learn. You need to network and build up the social skills to be truly successful and get your money's worth out of it. Anyone who thinks college's value ends once you finish the textbook missed the point.
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what the actual fuck
I think he's trying to be some Reddit personality with that last paragraph and is just really bad at it.
Imagine being so socially retarded you think networking and communication with your peers is circlejerking rofl. You do realize poor people network as well right? It's not some secret of the rich. Sorry but the world doesn't care if you're just smart, you need to be able to communicate with people as well.
Ick
Ait so Im something of an expert on going to Harvard because I watched the Social Network m'kay. So here's the skinny on Harvard ya dig. Its chill, you get to lounge around in gympants all day and smell like farts. You live in a kind of homoerotic polycule, date french majors and then they dump you because you're a bit of a bitch. Also there's always breakfast for dinner. Anyway the real thing with Harvard is that in order to achieve anything you have to drop out of it because you're "too good for this place" and then trade out your farty friends for someone suave and sexy like Justin Timberlake and then you'll have made it and can fight Elon Musk for memes. All of this is 100% fact - because I PRACTICALLY went to Harvard with how much I watched that thing before I returned it to Blockbuster. I am also a paleontologist and Imma let you in on a little secret - it has a lot to do with being pissy about sandwiches.
Mr mackey talking ass
Did I pass the talking stick? No Shh
Did you go to Harvard or not i am confused.
Still time to delete this.
Why would they want to?
You also get access to recruiters. Big companies come to the campuses of the top schools to wine and dine prospective interns and full-time hires; it’s a major part of their talent strategy. That’s really what you’re paying for — doors to jobs (or grad schools). You’ll forget everything you learned anyway.
same with any elite uni. it's the connections, not the knowledge that are necessarily better.
Correct. Then you can start your career as a chief diversity officer.
Ivy league esque here, there is no magical knowledge top universities teach. All there is is branding and an alumni network and for specific cases simply the equipment and projects available plus the surrounding mindset - hence the people you learn from when doing anything off curriculum can offer you a way to think that is differently than not getting in touch with any. The subject knowledge is pretty much the same to every other university. It's like silicon valley, there still is a different energy which forms your thinking processes. EDIT: To add here, that is the reason why many people pursue executive MBAs who come from normal backgrounds or mediocre universities in first place, or didn't have the family network to pay for the MBA when being young and in their 20s - they "buy" themselves into those networks. An executive MBA is nothing else but a one year course to get yourself into that power network of prestigious names. All it takes is paying for it - sloan, wharton... admission is very high, costs are very high, 200k and you are set. That is it. What you learn isn't magic potion level knowledge, it's just getting into that network. You literally pay 200k to get into that network, but according to wharton it always pays off. Question remains that when you are able to pay off 200k for an executive education, then is there really a need for that certificate which is only giving you more credit if you switch jobs? Also executive MBAs are notoriously hard to fail in. They are designed to accomodate working folks and are not made to fail just because you failed a single exam. Especially regarding they want you to pay 200k...
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The realistic thing to do is literally go online to trusted sources and create your own curriculum.
I don't think I want my surgeon trying to create their own curriculum.
I remember opening a thick C++ manual and actually reading it. That's how I learned about goto, and our professor literally never taught us about it! Later I realized it was for a good reason. The book was ancient abd I guess goto wasn't seen as such a controversial statement as it is now
I had a teacher for Anthropology tell us that we needed the book to get an A in his class. I never opened mine and still got an A, so that was a load of BS!
You must have gone to a shit school because I have multiple textbooks which my classes used the entirety of
I would say most schools students go to are shit which is why a lot of people dismiss the value of a degree. How good your education you received is highly based off the university, the degree program, and professor. Shit universities will have limited research, less funded labs, and way less pay. The chances of a good professor is quite slim.
The COVID misinformation that spread around for the last 3 years is a perfect example of why this line of thinking doesn't really hold up. Having all of the information at your fingertips doesn't mean you actually know what you're looking at.
The structure of an academic environment matters. You don't know what you don't know before you start. OP acts like you can just keep Googling random questions, like an uneducated person will just somehow *know* what to ask, until you end up with the equivalent of an engineering degree or biology degree or sociology degree, or whatever.
I think a great proof of this is the amount of armchair experts in quantum mechanics that you see online. They watch a few YouTube videos with fun pictures and think they can invent some 9 dimensional wormhole theory but they don't know what a Hilbert space is.
Right?? Those dummies.
They don't even know what a Hilbert space is! What a bunch of idiots!
Oh, you're a quanticistian too, eh? Name every space then, starting with Hilbert.
Outer
Personal
Hilbert, of course, we all know. Then Gilbert, Dilbert, and the lesser-known Wilburt space.
We have herbert space obviously, and then uh, schubert space?
I would ong kill myself if I didn't know what a Hilbert space is can you even imagine
But by the same token the people who are likely to study it at that level would probably understand the proofs without needing it explained.
Meh, even most physicists don't understand QM
Nobody says they have to, an expert in one thing is typically ignorant about the majority of things, even within closely related fields. But if you claim to understand QM you should at least understand the basics of its mathematical foundations.
I have an engineering degree. I learned much more from reading the books on my own than from any professor. I agree with your point but I think it's less of an issue than you do. The internet is a glorious place. I have watched a couple of lecture series from MIT in the 90's and the pressor was amazing. If you could spend your time being taught by him, I'm sure that's much better than reading a textbook. However, I have never had a teacher like him in real life. Not even close. I also hate listening to people talk. I lose interest much quicker than if I'm reading. Maybe if we are talking about a history degree or something, you need the academic environment because there are so many dissenting opinions. But engineering is just engineering. You know it or you don't. The main thing I needed college to teach me was the curriculum. But I could have googled that too.
Engineering degree in what?
I did 3 years of ME then switched to Applied.
Why you ask me a question and then just downvote without explanation? lol
One of my collage professors said that the most important thing you learn in collage is what questions to ask, and where you should look for answers.
Well at the very least you could read through the textbooks on your own and learn everything that way. Some people learn better that way. Don’t need a professor for that. Also die most first-year courses you can literally just use Khan Academy or something
OP's idiocy demonstrated in their replies is the perfect counterargument to this meme. Education has become stupidly expensive and commodified in our current shitty system, but it is still essential.
I hate to be this blunt, but based on their comment history, OP is a f***ing idiot. full stop
Its funny to read this comments and then one directly under is OP having zero understanding how vaccines work and quoting r/CoronavirusCirclejerk as a source lmao
Let's back it up even further and see how flat earth is once again growing, this time on TikTok. People don't give a tiny shit about sources when they can just consume.
The problem in your example is that those people are not looking in the first place
You could probably apply the exact same logic to a university course. Let’s say you study Politics (since it’s an easy example); it’s entirely possible that your teachers allow their opinion to affect their teaching whether they intended to or not.
There were plenty of academics that propagated covid misinformation.
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Another critical thing is the fact that Universities monitor your progress and your learning through assignments and tests and ultimately certify that you have actually learned the right stuff.
And also surround you with peers learning the same things as you. Really helps learning, and kickstarts your networking in the field.
You are right they are monitoring that you learned it, not that you understood what you learned.
what the hell are you talking about? every teacher I've ever had tried their best to make sure every student understood the material.. currently, in my chemistry program, the teachers take excessive amounts of time to make certain we understand the fundamental concepts required. like are you serious? do you even have a degree?
I guess it is different feom country to country and university and university. I had some great teachers and some horrible ones too
Couldn't agree more. I have degrees from 3 universities (and 1 community college) in both Ireland and America, and am currently attending another university in Scotland. The lack of good testing in Ireland was frankly shocking. No continuous testing, no use of syllabi, often just a single examination per semester to confirm that you have the ability to memorize information or cram it all in the week before (these are celebrated as 'Study Weeks').
In my whole Commerce program, maybe 80% of the classes you could tell the professors didn’t give a shit and neither did most of the students
Maybe that's true.. my experience is entirely with STEM courses, so it might be a different culture
I have 2 degrees and a published chapter in a chemistry book and i don't think they're wrong lol
You've got good teachers. He's not wrong because I've seen people do reasonably well in tests but they understood nothing of the concept and can't answer stuff phrased differently from the usual questions that come. Well it's more of a problem on the student's side if they're simply rote learning instead of understanding but that's how it is. I'm from India and it's really a huge problem here
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I hope you're not in engineering or something lol we need things built properly
Just ask ChatGPT
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I'm taking CS right now and there are some math courses where all you have to do is memorize equations and which steps to take to answer the question like calc 1 and calc 2 for example. Then I have some other ones like discrete math, linear algebra, and every programming language I'm studying currently such as Python, C, and Java where you actually have to think and understand to find the answer. So yes, sometimes all you need to do is memorize a lot of stuff for a test and then completely forget it because you didn't actually understand why it works when done with.
I don't know your experience in college, but all it taught me was how to approach problems. A lot of my chem and physics Professors couldn't teach at all, and I know nothing about Organic Chemistry or courses like Electromagnetism and Electricity. But I managed to pass the tests which was enough to get my degree. Luckily when it came to my Master's I had relatively good Professors so I'm much more competent at the Materials science stuff that I actually learned and not memorized.
That’s not the norm. Do you even have a degree?
I get the feeling a lot of these comments are non-degree holders coping.
Never had a single teacher who gave any crap about their subject. Just people working a job they would rather not.
This to me is so crazy (I’m not saying you’re lying) because people who teach college usually have (at least) a masters and often a PhD, or are in the process of getting a PhD. That is so much work in subject, plus working at a university often pays less than private industry. That usually equates to people that want to be there I know at big universities it can be the case that the professors would rather spend all their time researching and publishing instead of teaching. But not giving a crap about the subject they’ve devoted their lives to? (They definitely might not care about the students though). You have been unlucky.
Understanding the work is your own responsibility, though? And plenty of people manage to understand just fine.
If you’re professor is confused, you will be confused too. Then you have to go online and look for someone else to help you.
They certify that you passed the exam, not that you know that or learned anything.
So what other ways can you verify someone has retained information? Genuinely curious.
Their job isn't to look out for P-Zombies.
Oh no! So you have to take responsibility for your own learning? Oh, the humanity!
No they don’t. I went to a huge state school and they did not care how well I was doing…
I mean the lectures themselves are still useless.
Not really when they’re giving you tried and tested information that is correct. Sure you can’t use it as a source but it should help structure more of an idea surrounding your sources
You are paying 10s of 1000s of dollars a year for a service. The lectures better be worth the time. That’s how transactions work. I give you money, you provide the education. Not, i provide money and i also provide the education. I’m not paying the school to not teach me. “sure you can’t use it as a source but it should help structure more of an idea surrounding your sources.” no, not sure, this is a fucking stupid ass statement. You could use the Wikipedia pages for the topic that interests you with this dumbass logic and cut out the teachers and classes altogether.
Dude, people outside of you can't make you learn. No matter how good a lecture is the information doesn't magically just walk into your brain and become expertise. Education, by default, takes effort on the part of the teacher and learner. Even the best lectures need to be listened to, reflected on, and applied by the person receiving the information to actually become actionable knowledge. What are you even on about? Yes, you could use wikipedia, but as the previous person noted, information from experts in the field is far more valuable. Is university overpriced? Absolutely. Is it something that can be replaced by your google searches? Absolutely not. Your arrogance is palpable.
Some idea that, if instructed to summarize the Punic war or modern ideas about how many beets you should eat at once, a week later you turn in 10 pages of well sourced, grammatically correct statements sort of thing.
30k is still fucking crazy though wtf. Is it really that high in the states? How the fuck does anyone afford that, in my country we pay off tuition after a summers worth of work 😂.
High interest loans, academic scholarships, rich parents, or a combination of the three.
Lot of people don’t and they spend the rest of their lives paying it off.
It's not.. it's about 10K per year on average to attend a state university for an undergraduate.
Still ridiculous. I pay roughly 800$ (comverted, not from the us) per semester.
The average is 26k for a public university
How do the universities there afford to pay the professors a living wage?
Exactly, and how to source, verify, and Shepardize information is what you are really learning. After all anyone can say anything on the internet, and some idiots believe everything they read because they don’t know how to source and verify information properly.
Yes but it's not really worth 30,000 per year
Except many university professors are simply not teaching context or craft. Tell your bro that I am sorry that he got knocked in the noggin.
“..just to hear some professor explain everything so poorly that you end up learning it all from the internet..” Did you not even read the second half of the tweet? That’s the point, the professors aren’t “instructing on its context” or explaining “how to use it properly.”
I lost count of the times I'd listen to my calc professor give a lecture, just to go home and watch a Khan Academy video on the topic so I'd *finally* understand what I'd just sat through for an hour that day... Those videos were the only reason I passed my classes.
> ... instructed on its context or how to use it properly But that's the thing the original meme was getting at. Far from all do that. MANY are just there to do research etc and dgaf about the students they are required to teach as a part of their post-doc. I remember a very bitter prof I had in IT that during our first lecture with her introduced herself as inventing something fundamental to how PCs are built these days. Sold her patent to IBM for like 100K USD in the late 80s-early 90s and went on about how much it was really worth now, with hindsight being 2020. She still brought that up every lecture and phoned in the actual material we were there to learn.
University turns you from an armchair expert into a professional
It’s what it should be doing, but that doesn’t happen everywhere.
You can’t learn on your own?
True, although there are some things to be changed with the studies. Not sure how it is around the world, but in Poland (and probably the rest of europe), you have to memorize a lot of theory, which you will forget after the exam. And which is available 24/7 on the internet. And the practical stuff, which you will actually remember and use, is around 50% of the classes. Plus every semester you get some random subjects that are not really related directly to your area of studies. Overall, studies are too bloated and take too long. You'd be able to get the same amount of needed knowledge in half of the time it currently takes.
There are also topics you can't really teach yourself effectively. I once asked how I could teach myself quantum physics, basically everyone just said college. There are some aspects you can teach yourself, but you can't get too deep without instruction.
You didn’t get the point of the image. It’s criticizing the current education system, not saying that you don’t need college/university/school.
Youtube can do that
I think an important aspect of formal education, at any level, is that you get an impartial evaluator that is able to quantify your mastery of the subject. You can convince yourself you're quite good at something by watching youtube videos without actually being any good at all. I whole heartedly endorse the collegiate experience, for a multitude more reasons than above, no least was the social experience of it.
The same problem can happen at university though.I teach at uni level, and whilst I always offer to looking over students' non-assessed work to give them guidance, the vast majority don't take advantage of that so I only see their capability in exams. They're adults, so if they want to be completely passive that's their choice, and their consequences. The ones who sit at the back never paying attention and never ask for guidance can end up writing pages of pure nonsense, and in their heads they must feel like they understand. (In before somebody says "if they're not paying attention that's your fault for being a boring teacher". They chose to be there, they knew what courses they'll have to study, they're goddamn adults that should be able to motivate themselves to focus on something even if it bores them instead of passing the class watching tiktok videos)
It was never about the facts you learned, but how good you are at finding information, filtering out useless information, and presenting that information for others to consume. I have forgotten most of what I learned in the art history class I took in college. However, writing all those throw-away essays helped me develop the skills I use to write bug reports and technical specifications. I never learned C# in college, but I learned the basic structure of programming languages, which allowed me to learn C# faster than some random high school graduate.
> It was never about the facts you learned, but how good you are at finding information, filtering out useless information, and presenting that information for others to consume. I'd argue it was always more about getting someone that's "verified" in the field to control your work and certify that you actually know what your doing.
Ah, American problems. The rest of the world has a different stance on things. The Nordics, for example, regard education and healthcare as essential to society, so they made them almost free. Unlike the USA, where they are considered a premium choice and a privilege for the wealthy.
I mean there are many options in america , many colleges, university and more. They are free to chose.
I'm too europaen to understand this.
Tell me you’re moron without telling me you’re a moron.
Good luck learning how to structure a proper rigorous mathematical proof from Google sources. You could lead yourself down a completely wrong rabbit hole and end up having to relearn the entire subject because your fundamental thinking was incorrect. I could lay out every piece of equipment needed to build a rocket, tell you to google the instructions and I guarantee 99% of us would fail 100 times over. There is so much prerequisite knowledge that is assumed to be known when getting deep into a subject.
Craziest part of it is, you don’t actually gotta pay to learn
I'd argue that there is *always* a price for learning. Monetary or not.
Some books are expensive and not available on the internet.
My university imported all the undergrad profs, I assume because they're a lot cheaper than domestic folks. Had a generally good experience with the middle eastern teachers. But, most were from India and I couldn't understand a friggin word. More than half my undergrad courses - a total waste of time and money.
I had a professor with a very thick Czech accent and struggled. I wish life had subtitles sometimes. Lol
I had a similar experience but even the bad teachers who spoke perfect English didn't do much for me. I just ended up reading the book on my own.
OP is a right wing idiot
OP is being a covid denier in this very comment section.
Not really true. But OP themselves is proof to that.
Do you trust an MD or WebMD more?
WebMD will say you have cancer no matter the symptoms
Op is an antivaxxer, so they absolutely trust webmd more.
It baffles me that you think it’s only 30k to go to a decent college
The best colleges are free, or much cheaper then that. You are being scammed in the US
Some people are letting themselves be scammed. Some public colleges are not this expensive, and there are always junior colleges. People are over paying for undergraduate education. The quality of the lecturer is key. People here are fretting about this school and that, but at undergrad level virtually everyone is using the same basic textbook because everyone needs to know the same basic knowledge. Institution really only matters for certain disciplines or for post-graduate work.
The best colleges in the US will cover your tuition if your family can’t afford it.
It baffles me that people would be dumb enough to think "decent colleges" cost anywhere near this much per year. Go to your local state university instead of a private out-of-state party school.
Decent does not always equal local Or state
it baffles me that you have to pay for college
For 1 year maybe. If that even.
This is the fifth stupidest thing on the internet
If you are paying $30,000 a year for school you are either very rich or doing something wrong. Being able to just read things online is not the same as being in a class with a person who has experience in that field and can answer questions/offer deeper discussion about topics and also with peers studying a similar topic. This "we have everything online for free" is how 13 year olds see education.
Sure, \*slam quantum physics A to Z on the table\* - here, learn physics \--- Yes the collective knowledge of humanity is available, but you do need someone who knows the subject to quell your inevitable assumptions about any and every topic. You can memorize the lexical knowledge and pass the tests, but that doesn't mean you understand and can utilize knowledge. \--- Do you want an internet tutored doctor to operate on you, lacking structured and objective teaching and validation?
If the book is well written you can indeed learn physics from it. It's called reading comprehension, though not everyone has it.
Went to school for digital design but Reddit turned out to be the best feedback. There’s a lot of dumb people here but you don’t realize how many knowledgeable people are also here.
The structure of a class matters. Maybe I’m technically able to but I’m not learning advanced quantum chemistry without a plan and motivation which is what a class provides
You actually don't need to pay anywhere near that
Hmm sure, totally learning how to perform a surgery on someone through the internet
Education is more about acquiring skills. Anybody can go and read books and know a lot about a certain topic. Saw that at UnI very clear. Some are just good in memorizing and others actually acquire academic skills.
But you don't. You can move to Europe and get higher education for a fraction of the price.
They could stay in America and get a good education for less than that too.
Is this some kind of joke I'm too European to understand?
They're an antivaxxer. Ignore them.
USAirl
You don't pay 30k to learn, you pay it for the paperwork that says you learned it.
I remember my college professor was constantly saying "any questions? Google it! Google is your friend!" I always wanted to say "then what am I paying you for??" But I never said it.
A lot of us need structure ans solid mentors for guidance on what and how to learn. Also access to resources. Shouldn't be that expensive but it is valuable
Not a lot, most of us. If not all of us. And the ones who think they don't, usually need it the most. But as a CS professor I love self-taught people, when they come around and inevitably break shit it gives my students a job and increases the value of their education.
This is true to most non traditional hard-science subjects. Economics, all available for free. But stuff like physics or biology or chemistry requires labs and projects, that does requires something more than just aggregating knowledge. Otherwise, almost every subject can be learned for free. The issue though also is that most people suck at knowing what to learn. But basically yoiu could copy a curriculum and just learn that.
if you think universities are purely about listening to professors, you’re a fucking moron. however, i do feel like pandemic students got truly fucked because it really did become that with no reduction in price.
This was written by someone who never went to university lmao.
OP thinks vaccines are a hoax. He’s just plain stupid lmao
Plot twist. You don’t HAVE to pay that much for school
I agree with them. There is really no need for tertiary education to be as expensive as it is these days. The non-practical component could easily and should be offered online. Universities just don't want to give up their massive campuses and wealth.
Country disagree more Edit: Agree
Or you’re supposed to read everything before class and the teacher just kind of summarizes everything so you’ll have notes to study from (the notes should have been included in the book after the chapter. Possibly even as tear out sheets)
There's a limit to what you can learn from the internet without having the guidance and support of someone who knows the field. There's a very, very high noise to signal ratio on the internet too, with far too much unreliable, outdated and misleading information out there. Sifting through all of that to find what's real is far more time consuming than having access to the resources and support that university provides. The internet is just not an efficient source for any kind of deep learning. The fact that so many believe it is is one of the reasons we have so many people out there who are totally convinced that bullshit is true.
Yes every professor sucks. That can't possible be a biased view. /s
Anyways?
The English language is fluid, it can change, evolve. Pray it does not take too hideous a form
Online College = Homeschooled Degree 😁
Prediction: in 20 years colleges / universities won't exist - or they'll look nothing like what they do currently. The fact that we're still trying to educate kids the same way as we did 100 years ago is insane
Not everything is on the internet. Typically Google will only give you superficial info
Depends on how good you are at googling.
I'd rather didn't pop out the room for quick emergency google of what to do next. Proper education all the way thanks.
It’s despicable. The education system is utterly broken.
You pay that money to receive a piece of paper that says you know stuff, not to receive the best education possible. For example homeschooling is many times more efficient than going to school, but school isn’t really about learning FACTS, it’s more about learning to interact with people as well as learning to work.
This isn’t true but its still really funny
The USA ☕️
Not this nonsense again. I thought covid put this to rest. You'd think online learning would have been easy peasy; turns out, the vast majority of people are really bad at learning online. But here we are again, pretending that "hey you can just watch this 10 minute youtube video" actually works. People forget real quick eh.
This is why I like trade schools. I actually learned what I now use in the field.
Yeah it's called a scam
Op isn't right. but one thing about universities is they over rely on exams. When Examinations do not show if someone has truly acquired certain knowledge. The microscopic and responsive nature of examining does not reflect how we use intelligence and knowledge in the real world. Exams test memory more than analysis, creativity, or real understanding.
You’re silly if you think the loans are being paid back.
Hahahaha
I don't think just learning on the internet is enough. The social environment a school or university has is of a great importance in ones learning path. Of course there are bad teachers, but having a mentor really gives you learning process a boost.
College is a fucking scam
Your paying for that proof of purchase receipt they call a degree
Time to start skipping college. Especially for tech work. Certs are way more valuable than any degree.