Should Physics Curriculum Prioritize Exams or Practical Skills?

[Andy Resnick]

It's different, but if works, then it works. One problem that I have with discussions of an "ideal degree" is that there are a lot of different ways to structure a bachelors degree. What you are describing is very, very different from the way MIT structures things, but if it works, then it works.

But don't you see how your experience has colored your opinions about college education? I totally understand where you are coming from, now.

It's the same deal with medical students- they have been trained to become docs from a very early age. Every career step along their life was in singular pursuit of getting an MD.

The problems start in medical school when they (naturally) consider alternate plans, for whatever reason- too hard, too boring, not what they expected... If they can't resolve that inner conflict, they usually just become unhappy MDs. Sometimes they flame out quite spectacularly.

I got hung up because you say "most" freshmen get into a lab and stay with it for 4 years. That tells me it's not a requirement, it's a 'desirement', and that's a big problem- it sets you (the student) up to be treated like a grad student, and by that I mean treated like slave labor for the glory of the PI, with all the disillusionment etc. normally experienced at a later stage in your career (and emotional development). Never mind that the student gets exposed to a tiny sliver of physics at a point where they should be experiencing as much as they can, to more rationally specialize later

My point is, your experience in school may not be typical. And from the overall tone of your posts of PF, I would say the MIT approach definitely did *not* work.

 

[twofish-quant]

But don't you see how your experience has colored your opinions about college education?

Well... Ummmm... Yes...

It's the same deal with medical students- they have been trained to become docs from a very early age. Every career step along their life was in singular pursuit of getting an MD.

Exactly. One thing that is cool was, it really started before I was even born.

If they can't resolve that inner conflict, they usually just become unhappy MDs. Sometimes they flame out quite spectacularly.

Yup, and this turns out to be a huge problem at MIT. One problem with MIT is that you end up in a campus learning physics and math with people whose supreme life goal is to learn physics and mathematics. It's worse because much of the faculty are people that have very little experience outside of MIT.

This is both a good thing, and a bad thing. The good thing is that for a lot of math and physics geeks, after spending high school being something of an outcast, you end up with people that are also math and physics geeks. The bad part is that you can end up with horrendous mental health issues.

I got hung up because you say "most" freshmen get into a lab and stay with it for 4 years. That tells me it's not a requirement, it's a 'desirement', and that's a big problem- it sets you (the student) up to be treated like a grad student, and by that I mean treated like slave labor for the glory of the PI, with all the disillusionment etc. normally experienced at a later stage in your career (and emotional development).

If you aren't super crazy about math, physics, and engineering, then you are just are not going to get admitted to MIT. If you go to an admissions interview for MIT, and the interviewer asks you whether you would prefer to work in a physics lab on the weekends, or get drunk and watch football, and you choose option 2), then you probably are not going to get in.

If you put people that are math-crazy and physics-crazy together in a small campus, lot's of interesting things happen.

One reason I enjoyed grad school as much as I did, was because I got rid of the "blow up" early on. If you are destined for a nervous breakdown, it's a lot better that it happen at age 22 than at age 30.

My point is, your experience in school may not be typical.

Everyone is different. However, I think that the things that I had to deal with are pretty standard for people that end up doing Ph.D.'s. If you aren't insanely committed to math and physics, you are just not going to get a Ph.D. in physics and math.

Where I *am* rather unusual, is that I'm still in the game. Because things fell apart for me at age 22, I could step back, figure out what to do next, and get back into the game. Most people when they fall apart it happens at age 30, it's too late to do something like that.

And from the overall tone of your posts of PF, I would say the MIT approach definitely did *not* work.

I think it really did. The reason it did was that I got enough education and mental tools so that when things really blew up, I was able to deal constructively with them. I'm a terribly angry and bitter person, but I think I deal with it quite constructively.

Part of the reason I think that MIT was a wonderful place, is that if you work in a "real lab" you get to see the politics, the petty bickering, the huge egos, the brutal exploitation early on, when you can still make major life changes. If you want people to learn physics, I mean *real physics*, you want to get them exposed to the NSF grant review process early on, and the constant quest for funding, and what a faculty committee meeting looks like. That's *real* science education.

If you are a undergraduate senior and you've decided that you really, really hate academia, you can do something else. Many of my classmates when through the physics degree, and learned that they really hated and detested academia, but at that point you have lots of choices you can make. Me, I'm crazy.

If you are an tenure track assistant professor with a spouse and kids, and you've decided that you really hate academia after you've been denied tenure, then what do you do?

 

[Andy Resnick]

Yup, but I don't consider those "real labs". They are demonstrations. Anything that comes out of a cookbook, I don't consider a "real lab."

Why not? Your analogy is apt- in order to be a "Top Chef", one must first follow some simple recipes. That's why I feel strongly that there must be an *educational* component to laboratory work in the undergraduate curriculum. And you correctly guess why there isn't- it's very expensive, and so the institution has an incentive to cut it.

And the UROP program is a reflection of this. From the website:

"...participate in research as the junior colleagues of Institute faculty"

"If you want to receive pay for your UROP research, discuss funding options with your faculty supervisor. The majority of paid UROPs receive Supervisor funding."

It's also pretty clear the PI has to pay for lab costs. For example, my lab (which is a very small operation- just me) goes through $40k of consumable items every year. If I had a full-time student, that person would also go through about $40k per year, *plus* salary, *plus* my time teaching the student how to use the equipment (which is why undergrads most likely get taught by the grad students). That's what the institution 'saves' when I have a student.

Education is a money-loser, any way you slice it. Again, when the administration tries to treat education as a 'product', which is the impetus for on-line courses, the students lose.

I'm not claiming an MIT education is inferior; I'm simply saying it could improve. Improvement is always possible, but the goal should be better learning, not cutting costs.

 

[Andy Resnick]

I think it really did.

How can you say this? It's clear from your posts that you think college education is designed to produce brainless cogs, you've said the system is a money-hungry exploitation machine, and you've even posted a link to an article questioning the value of *going* to college.

 

[twofish-quant]

Why not? Your analogy is apt- in order to be a "Top Chef", one must first follow some simple recipes.

One thing that I believe is that there are different ways for teaching people that work or don't work, and different teaching methods may work well or badly for different people. The MIT physics department curriculum is based on the idea of "total immersion." They drop you into a lab, you got to figure out the recipes on your own. For some people 'total immersion" works beautifully, for some people it's an utter disaster.

"If you want to receive pay for your UROP research, discuss funding options with your faculty supervisor. The majority of paid UROPs receive Supervisor funding."

Much of which comes comes from the institute. The UROP office has a budget of about $1 million/year. This is one of the things that I learned at MIT. Great ideas mean nothing unless you get the financing to work, and if you read about the history of the UROP program, it all started when MacVicar convinced Edwin Land to allocate a grant for undergraduate research.

If I had a full-time student, that person would also go through about $40k per year, *plus* salary, *plus* my time teaching the student how to use the equipment (which is why undergrads most likely get taught by the grad students). That's what the institution 'saves' when I have a student.

Which is why there is a specific internal grant system that MIT faculty can go through to request funding for UROP's. UROP's were started in the 1970's, and it's not a cost cutting measure.

I'm not claiming an MIT education is inferior; I'm simply saying it could improve.

If you ask me, the major thing that MIT could do to improve is to make an MIT education available to anyone in the world that wants it. Open Courseware is a step, but it's a baby step. MIT should figure out how to increase the enrollment of the physics department from 50 to 50,000.

Improvement is always possible, but the goal should be better learning, not cutting costs.

And for people like me, MIT was a really good match. Also you can't separate the issue of better learning from costs. If we had infinite money and infinite time, then every student would have in individual one on one tutor that could create a custom curriculum for them. The trouble is that we don't have infinite money, and we don't have infinite time, and so we have to figure out what to do with finite resources.

If you want to increase the learning experience with more funding that's great! The trouble is that you have to tend figure out where the money comes from.

Right now, MIT is going through a budget crunch, and like all large bureaucracies it's trying to fix things through minimal changes to the status quo. This won't work, and I've got the numbers to prove it. Right now, I'm just too crazy for be listened to, and people are trying band-aid approaches to MIT's budget problems. I think it's going to be obvious in two to three years, that the band-aid approaches just won't work, and which point the floor will be open for some really stunningly radical ideas.

 

[twofish-quant]

How can you say this? It's clear from your posts that you think college education is designed to produce brainless cogs

I said cogs. I didn't say brainless cogs. Sometimes at work, I get extremely angry. If I respond with that anger by hitting someone, this would not produce a well running office. So I take a walk, I go back to my terminal. I write an angry memo. Then I take another walk, and eventually it turns into a pleasant sounding bit of corporate-speak with just the right code words so that people know what I'm thinking and feeling. The bit of corporate-speak is nicely formatted, the spelling is accurate, and it's designed to express my feelings in the correct corporate mandated format.

That's what a college education does for you. This is why people without college educations find it more difficult to get a job. It's not the knowledge that you get. It's learning to conform. Punch in the clock on time. Smile and say how a nice day, when you feel like punching the customer in the nose.

I don't think conformity is necessarily a bad thing.

You've said the system is a money-hungry exploitation machine

Absolutely. I went to the same university as Noam Chomsky, remember.

I'm not sure it's such as bad thing that a universities are money-hungry exploitation machines, or even if it where a bad thing, that you could or should stop it. You can set up social systems to prevent the system from being abusive, but it's hard to do that if people pretend things are what they are not.

If I had lived in the 1940's or the 1960's, I would have ended up being a card carrying Communist seeking to overthrow the evil capitalist system and replace it with a utopian socialist one. However, the big defining event of my young life was the collapse of the Soviet Union. If I lived in 1930's, I could have believed that you could replace the old bastards with new ones that would behave selflessly and wouldn't use their power to further personal interests.

Since in lived in the 1990's, I don't think it's possible for bureaucracies not to be money-hungry exploitation machines. I've also learned that there are worse things in the world then money-hungry exploitation machines, and if you have enough wealth floating around, exploitation isn't that bad.

You've even posted a link to an article questioning the value of *going* to college.

Because I taught at University of Texas at Austin, and I don't think that about half of the students there really should be going to college at the age they are going at. They really should be doing something else (and I don't know what) and come back when they are a bit older and wiser. The problem with the current education system is that it basically forces people to go to college long before they are ready for it, and puts colleges in the role of babysitter rather than educator.

One of the things that I realized at one point is that the MIT undergraduate education worked *because* I left the Institute angry, bitter, and hating everything about the place. Suppose I left the place a "satisfied customer." I don't think that would have been good for MIT, for the world, or even for me. If you live in a world that pretends to be perfect, then you end up with what happened in the Soviet Union in the 1970's in which there isn't the energy to change things that need to be changed.

 

[Andy Resnick]

One of the things that I realized at one point is that the MIT undergraduate education worked *because* I left the Institute angry, bitter, and hating everything about the place.

Except you don't confine your critique to MIT- you indict the entire educational system.

 

[kylem]

Since in lived in the 1990's, I don't think it's possible for bureaucracies not to be money-hungry exploitation machines.

Exactly, this IS America, right? :)

If I could give twofish some sort of e-props on this site I would for every one of his posts.

I don't see any of his posts as "bitter" or "pessimistic;" I would classify them as realistic. Maybe that is because I mostly share the same viewpoints, though. :)

 

[Andy Resnick]

But the correct problem is not being identified- education is a money-loser, period.

There is no way to make education a money-maker except by eliminating the educational component from school. And that's what I object to- the tendency of administrators to remove the educational component from school.

This takes many forms: eliminating required laboratory work. Putting classes online. Having the students teach themselves (i.e. small group problem solving sessions).

This trend should not be accepted as inevitable- or promoted as an American Virtue. Students that are successful in the "self-teaching" model are ill-equipped to survive outside of academia, where you are expected to know things. The result of removing the educational component means there is no way to ensure the graduating student is competent in anything- which is why there's now a sneaking suspicion that a BS in physics is 'useless'.

If you think the trend is inevitable or even good, then think carefully about what this implies when you see a doc or a lawyer, because this trend is not limited to physics (or even science). Medical schools are ahead of the trend, I've seen the results, and I am highly concerned because there is going to be even more pressure on medical schools to produce more docs in order to meet the increased demand brought by health care reform. If you think your BS qualifies you to do nothing, consider what that means if an MD degree does not correlate with qualifications, either.

Training for a profession takes decades of time: your time, your advisor's time, your mentor's time. Nobody pays your advisor for that time.

Again, I like to provide a positive counterexample: this summer, I have 2 students in my lab. Their summer salary is paid for by CSU, but I pay for any lab supplies they use. They are doing tasks appropriate to their skill level- and I don't lie to them that they are doing publishable research, or that they are 'junior members of the institution'. My goal is to provide a useful experience, nothing more. Because if I don't, then who will?

 

[twofish-quant]

But the correct problem is not being identified- education is a money-loser, period.

First of all, I disagree. University of Phoenix shows otherwise. If it turns out to be a money loser, then how do we either make it profitable or convince someone to fund it or change the rules of the system so that it doesn't matter. MIT as an institution is enormously profitable. You have companies dumping money on the place left and right to get access to students there.

Socially speaking, education is *incredibly* profitable. One thing that made teaching at University of Phoenix worthwhile is that you could teach someone algebra, and then once they come back to you telling you how they used that at work, you could just smell the wealth that is being generated.

Given that education creates enormous amounts of social wealth, then the hard part is figuring out how to channel that wealth back to fund the education. The way that MIT does it is that it educates its students, makes them rich and powerful, and then they direct some of that wealth back to the university.

There is no way to make education a money-maker except by eliminating the educational component from school.

University of Phoenix has managed to make huge amount of money from it.

This takes many forms: eliminating required laboratory work. Putting classes online. Having the students teach themselves (i.e. small group problem solving sessions).

Yes, yes, yes. It's exactly what MIT is doing and for that environment it works really well there. It might work very badly in other situations, but it works great there.

Students that are successful in the "self-teaching" model are ill-equipped to survive outside of academia, where you are expected to know things.

It's really funny when someone tries to tell you that you don't exist.

At least where I work, you are not hired for what you know. You are hired for what you can figure out. Five years ago, I didn't know *anything* about finance. I knew a lot about supernova iron core collapse, but people figured that if I could learn about supernova, then I could learn what I needed to know about finance. Part of the reason that this happens is that 80% of what we thought we knew five years ago was wrong. About 30% of what we thought we know a year ago is wrong.

In most of the high paying jobs that I know of, you aren't expected to know things. What you know is going to be totally out of date in a year or two. What you are expected to do is to do is to *learn* things and *learn* things very quickly.

The result of removing the educational component means there is no way to ensure the graduating student is competent in anything- which is why there's now a sneaking suspicion that a BS in physics is 'useless'.

Degrees are useless except as a signifier that you can function in a bureaucracy. That's not a small thing, but a BS in French literature will work for that as well as a BS in physics.

If you think the trend is inevitable or even good, then think carefully about what this implies when you see a doc or a lawyer, because this trend is not limited to physics (or even science).

Great! Because it's people like me that are hiring or not hiring students that are pushing it.

Anything you can figure out by googling, you use google. There is no point in getting a doctor or a lawyer to tell you what you can use google to figure out. What you want is a doctor or a lawyer to tell you stuff that you can't use google to figure out.

Anything that you that involves basic knowledge that you can teach via cookie cutter, you can teach someone in India or China to do ten times cheaper than in the US.

ITraining for a profession takes decades of time: your time, your advisor's time, your mentor's time. Nobody pays your advisor for that time.

There is a difference between training and education. What the really high status jobs are looking for are people that can solve problems that no one has the solution to. How do we structure the global financial system so that we don't have another crash? There is no textbook. There are no advisors. There are no mentors. I don't know how to structure the banking system. Ben Bernake doesn't know. Tim Geithner doesn't know. No one knows.

They are doing tasks appropriate to their skill level- and I don't lie to them that they are doing publishable research, or that they are 'junior members of the institution'.

You are making me feel more and more happy that I went to MIT.

The thing about MIT undergraduates is that they do end up with some extraordinarily stuff. There is a lot of stuff that students do that is publishable, and one of the things that I think is great about MIT is that you *are* junior members of the institution.

The thing about MIT is that it's very common to have a situation where you have a student that has a higher IQ or stronger math aptitude than the professors there. Having a high IQ or strong math aptitude does not turn you into a physicist. You have to learn a culture and an ideology, and MIT does a very good job at it. Also, you may be a genius 18 year old with a 200 IQ, but you are still an 18 year old, and there are things that you have to still learn. Yes you can do algebraic topology, but can you ask someone out on a date?

You have undergraduates on all of the faculty committees, and course evaluations are taken very seriously for tenure reviews. Because I was chairman of the course evaluations, I got pretty heavily involved in academic politics at MIT, which was a valuable learning experience.

Yes, I did leave angry and bitter, but I was angry and bitter because MIT was taught a set of ideas and ideals and the institute failed to live up to them, but that's one thing that you learn when you are 20. Your parents are human. Your teachers are human. Your school is human.

But it's *great* that I left angry and bitter, because if I didn't live angry and bitter, I wouldn't be working like hell to make the world a better place. And I'm doing what I think my teachers really wanted me to do. You just can't take a young impressionable kid, fill him with the idea that he is going to be CEO or a Nobel prize winner someday, and then say "sorry, go work for Starbucks" and expect him to go quietly into the night. Hell no. If I have to make the Earth shake and the stars tremble to get what it is that I want, then I will make the Earth shake and the stars tremble.

Any less and I'd be disrespecting my teachers.

 

[twofish-quant]

Except you don't confine your critique to MIT- you indict the entire educational system.

It's less of an indictment than a constructive criticism. The thing about social systems is that they are complex organisms. One part reacts to its environment, and changes its environment.

One thing about me is that I like asking questions. I don't always ask them out loud, but even in situations where it's a good idea to keep my mouth shut, I still ask them silently. If I ask "why can't we do this?" and the answer is "because of budget" then the I ask "why is the budget what is is? Who decides budgets? Why can't we change budgets?"

What's really funny is that when you someone says that they can't do something because of "budget" and you ask them "well how much money do you need?" they usually don't have an answer.

One reason I ended up on Wall Street, is that whenever you ask "why not?" it's amazing how often the issue of money comes up, so I figured that my education would be sorely lacking unless and until I learned more about this "money" thing.

 

[Andy Resnick]

First of all, I disagree. University of Phoenix shows otherwise.

*Any* business can be made profitable- even ones that sell imaginary things like tranched mortgages. I said *education* is a money loser.

If you draw a distinction between 'cog' and 'brainless cog', surely you distinguish between an education and a college diploma. Otherwise, you assign a BS in Physics from MIT equal value to a BS in Physics (if one exists) from University of Phoenix.

But I can do more than claim- I have evidence. MIT, like any non-profit, posts financial documents publicly. Let's see what it says for 2008:

http://vpf.mit.edu/site/general_ledger_operations_reporting/reports_publications/treasurer_s_report

Hey, they just posted 2009... like, 5 minutes ago. My numbers are for 2008.

$2.4 B operating revenue, $2.3B operating expenses. MIT made a profit of $114.2 M in 2008, as compared to $27.3 M in 2007. MIT is a profitable business! Of course, it's sad that one of the world's largest universities made a profit of only $114.2 M million- think about Exxon's profits, or Bayer, or heck, University of Phoenix.

Here's the breakdown of income-

Research- $1.2B (on campus $620M, Lincoln Labs $619M), Tuition $371M, Fees and Services $163M. The remainder of income ($1.4B) comes from (I think- I'm not a financial guy) interest on the endowment and other investments.

Now, expenses:

Sponsored research- that's sponsored by someone *other* than MIT- $1B, Instruction and unsponsored research- $607M, Administrative costs $490M. Scholarship dollars and employee benefits were not reported.

It's clear- MIT could make more money by not having any students. Here is the incentive to reduce costs ($607M), which are not met by tuition ($371M). So yes- MIT is a (barely) profitable business. MIT is (barely) profitable *because it has lowered the costs of education*. What is lost? Labs. Time students spend with faculty. Faculty teaching classes. Student satisfaction. The list goes on and on.

Note also research barely breaks even- that's another myth commonly spread, that pulling in research dollars generates money for a University. It doesn't, but the faculty get totally stressed, constantly chasing after the dollars.

And this is MIT- consider smaller schools, or state schools that get a considerable amount of money from taxes. Americans *love* paying taxes. There is constant pressure towards the University of Phoenix model from the administration, and that should be opposed vigorously by both faculty and students. Because education is the reason to go to college, and education is what is being cut.

 

[twofish-quant]

I said *education* is a money loser.

In that case we have to define precisely what education is, and what the goals for education are.

Personally, if your goal is to instill wonder in the universe, I think it's better to have a structure that's more similar to a museum and library than a university, and probably better not to issue grades or degrees at all.

If your goal is to give someone skills that allow them to have gainful employment, then you have a different set of requirements.

Otherwise, you assign a BS in Physics from MIT equal value to a BS in Physics (if one exists) from University of Phoenix.

One doesn't. Personally I think that the piece of paper that I got from MIT wasn't that useful, and probably not that much more useful than the piece of paper someone could get from the University of Phoenix. For about 90% of the people in the US, a piece of paper from the University of Phoenix is going to be far, far more useful than a piece of paper from MIT.

MIT made a profit of $114.2 M in 2008, as compared to $27.3 M in 2007. MIT is a profitable business! Of course, it's sad that one of the world's largest universities made a profit of only $114.2 M million- think about Exxon's profits, or Bayer, or heck, University of Phoenix.

And everything changed in 2009 after the stock market crash.

It's clear- MIT could make more money by not having any students.

There are long term difficulties with that plan. The trouble is that without students, your endowments will eventually dry up, and you will no longer have access to corridors of power. Also, I don't think that MIT would be as good a research institute without students in the labs.

But anyway, it's a big discussion that will come up in about two years. MIT made it's money in 2008 from real estate speculation. After the crash of 2009, it blew up. Right now MIT is doing what most bureaucracies do in a crisis, which is to make minimal changes and hope the crisis blows over. It won't. In two years it will be obvious that MIT has some serious problems, and that "business as usual" won't work. At that point, there will be some pretty heated discussions.

Something that might come out of it is that MIT might become a pure research institute like Howard Hughes or Fermilab and leave classroom instruction to University of Phoenix or someone that does it better. I don't know if this would be good or bad. Still thinking about it. There are still about twenty months or so before MIT hits the iceberg.

There is constant pressure towards the University of Phoenix model from the administration, and that should be opposed vigorously by both faculty and students.

The trouble with screwing people over, is that when you need their help, they aren't likely to defend you.

I'm for embracing UoP. I don't see any particular reason why I should defend the status quo. Personally, I'm all for crushing the current model of education. One reason is quite simple. I'm willing to teach. There are likely to be lots of students that are willing to learn from me. University of Phoenix gave me the chance to teach students that wanted to learn, and I was able to do some pretty creative and innovative things with my class.

The students at MIT want to be Nobel Prize winners. The students at UoP are generally older professionals that want to make more money at work. So what I did with my Intro Algebra class and Intro Astronomy class was to focus on some math tricks that they could take straight back to the office and start being more efficient cogs in the corporate machine.

Also, I don't think that it's a good idea for anyone to copy UoP. UoP is UoP and probably can do a better job at being UoP than any other university. What every university really has to do is to do figure out what to do.

Because education is the reason to go to college, and education is what is being cut.

Maybe it should be the reason to go college, but for most people "education" (as I think you define the term) really isn't.

Look, if you are right, and I'm just a lone voice in the wilderness, then you have nothing to worry from me. I'll just keep screaming, and no one will care what I'm saying.

But there is an entire generation of Ph.D.'s and junior faculty that have been screwed over by traditional academia, and when you have more smart people outside the tent than inside it, that's when revolutions happen.

 

[twofish-quant]

One reason I talk about what employers look for in college degrees is that I've been on both sides of the interview table. It's pointless to use a degree as a signifier for specific skills. If I want to know if someone can do partial differential equations, I don't look at their degree. I just ask them to solve two or three equations while I watch them, and you can figure out pretty quickly what their level of math and physics aptitude is.

What's harder to see, and what's more important involves things like will they show up on time at work, are they tactful at meetings, can they write reasonably intelligent memos. Those are harder to test for in one hour, but if someone has a bachelors degree then I'm reasonably sure that they will show up on time to work. The thing about University of Phoenix is that its actually a lot better at providing the skills and learning that most employers look for than many traditional universities, which is why bashing them based on skills don't work.

I should point out that at this point, bashing UoP in an interview in a major corporation will likely kill your resume. Somehow, and I think this was somewhat intentional, you will be amazed at the number of HR people that have degrees from UoP. MIT is a great school if you want to be a Nobel prize winning physicist. If you just want a decent job as a HR person, then you are better off going to UoP, and there are more job openings for HR people than Nobel laureates.

So appealing to corporate America is not going to save traditional academia...

What else? Appealing to the "wonder of science" the "thrill of discovery"? Get real.

Appealing to "educational quality"? Nonsense. For the type of degree and the type of student that the specialize in, University of Phoenix has really great quality.

I'd put the crisis in academia with something deeper than money. The essence of the liberal arts is to teach people how to be free, and you cannot teach freedom on a system based on slavery. Sure I'm a corporate cog. Sure I'm begin economically exploited, but I have one big freedom that almost no one I know in academia has.

I can quit.

They treat me nice where I am, but it's not because they are nice people. They treat me nice because they know that the second, they treat me badly, I'll walk out that door, and they can run their own computers, thank you... I have money in the bank, I have very little debt. If I think that I'll have more fun being a beach bum, then I'll be a beach bum.

Course it works both ways. The millisecond they think I'm a liability, they'll kick me out. But it works out nice.

I don't know of too many people in academia that can realistically quit, and that leads to a lot of dysfunction.

And then there is tenure...

One thing that annoys me is why am I saying these things? The stated purpose of tenure is that it gives people security to talk about the great issues of the day, and to express controversial opinions. So why am I the one screaming about how bad things are?

This just ain't happening, and unless professors really use tenure for the purpose for which it was designed, which is *NOT* as some sort of grand prize, then it's just another special interest group looking for their jobs.

One thing I find interesting is that MIT is not releasing detailed budget numbers. You'd think that the worlds most technological university would have the budget somewhere, and I'm guessing that if people really saw who is getting cut and who isn't, then you'd have a campus revolution.

 

[Andy Resnick]

And everything changed in 2009 after the stock market crash.

<snip>

Look, if you are right, and I'm just a lone voice in the wilderness, then you have nothing to worry from me.

Yep- turns out there *was* a big change last year (2009)- MIT made $182M.

And the reason I am engaging you in this (very professional, BTW) discussion is that you are unfortunately, *not* a lone voice in the wilderness- you accurately reflect the end product of 20 years of MBA-centric academia. Education is a product, and MIT a widget factory. *I* am the one screaming that this has to stop, and *I* am the one fighting against the tide.

I don't know of too many people in academia that can realistically quit, and that leads to a lot of dysfunction.

Anyone can move on to a different job. I've worked in industry, and I could go back there. The key is to have valued skills- the kind that are taught as part of an *education*.

 

[jim mcnamara]

Me == three language exams + several graduate level Math courses + Phycology + Mycology + Evolution. All for a degree in Botany, grasses mostly, admittedly really ancient.

In all of this - what I got and your students also get if you have the spirit of things to impart it:

learn how to learn.

Winnow. Realize when your prof is full of you know what.

Botany was not languages for me. Nor was it Engler & Prantl. It was fun. Even now, I can still pull out Agnes Chase and identify some poor little defenseless, undignified grass - undoubtedly with the wrong modern nomenclature. It is still fun. I don't really care what taxonomic result I get. It is a fun exercise.

I am considerably older than most people who post here. Things were different way back when. Far more stultified 50 years ago than now. But I got the message. Keep learning. Am I doing special things now ? Hell no. Do what interests you. I like programming. So that is what I pursue.

To the point --
As a teacher you cannot decide a priori what interests someone. You choose to teach what your experience and education dictates will fit the defined curriculum and the discipline at hand. And that changes constantly with research. Curricula are never static. Even in discplines like Classics, which has an overly stodgy reputation, IMO.

Most people with terminal degrees in Science ( where most == > 50% ) are active in other fields than the degree awarded. I got this statistic from the Chronicle of Higher Ed back in the '80's. I presume it is still reasonable. Correct me if I'm wrong, please. But you need to keep in mind - the student in your Physics 101 class may be modeling flow in gas lines, 50 years later. Protecting your grand-kids from instant vaporization. So I like to think as a write code myself ...

Anyway, wouldn't it be nice if your grand-kids were safe because you did a great job in Physics 101 and the student really glommed onto life-long learning? And now in 2145 she writes code to monitor the neighborhood tokamak?

The goal of Higher Ed programs should be: continuity of learning. Not how many $ you make. Not if your research area is trendy or cool. And most especially not if your curriculum is perfect.

Therefore I take issue with concepts like 'ideal curriculum'. There is no such a notion. Higher learning is not an exercise in modeling curricula. If you are not in a program that allows you to exercise and grow your learning abilities, then you are in the wrong system. Period. If the guy defining a perfect curriculum persists in doing it, then perhaps he should learn more about career exit strategies. Or maybe move out of Science into some discipline that is more, um, fuzzy.

Apologies, my 2 cents.

Very good thread. Thanks.

 

[Andy Resnick]

Very well put, jim.

 

[twofish-quant]

Anyway, wouldn't it be nice if your grand-kids were safe because you did a great job in Physics 101 and the student really glommed onto life-long learning?

I think it's wonderful. The trouble is that you have to eat. You just can't have an economy in which everyone is a full time astrophysicist. This just won't work. You just cannot build a society that ignores economic reality.

Also, I think you are being overly romantic. The reason that most bright US-born students go into law and management rather than science and engineering is that they get the perception that the life of most scientists and engineers is crap, and they get that perception because it's rooted in reality. You put an undergrad in front of a TA whose car is about to die and who can't afford repairs, and assistant professor that is going bonkers because they know that they won't get tenure but is trying this last desperate gasp to publish something, and you *seriously* expect them to be attracted to any of this?

Also, you simply cannot have an economy in which everyone spends all their time studying quantum mechanics and philosophy. Someone has to plow the fields and clean the toilets. What is wonderful about the age that we live in is that we are at the point where you don't have to divide society into people that work the fields and people that study classical Greek. If you can get a twenty year old a job as a plumber, then by the time they are 30, they may have enough saved up so that *then* they can study classic Greek or ancient philosophy.

I taught algebra for a while at UoP. My "hook" was that if you learn these math techniques you will make more money, and this was the totally honest truth. Now maybe a few of them will find that there is more to math than just making money, but if I don't present them some basic skills in a way that is useful to them, then no one will get to that point.

The goal of Higher Ed programs should be: continuity of learning. Not how many $ you make. Not if your research area is trendy or cool. And most especially not if your curriculum is perfect.

But if you ignore economics, you are not going to get anywhere near that goal. Without some hard as nails thinking about who does what for whom, you are just ignoring reality, and once you start ignoring reality, bad things happen. Academia is supposed to be about free inquiry, but it has turned into a society of lords and serfs, because people are ignoring the fundamental economic reality that someone has got to plow the fields.

The reason I think places like University of Phoenix, community colleges, and vocational technical institutes are so important so that if you give people some practical skills which they can use to make money, then this gives them the chance to have some free time to do something like study quantum mechanics. If you have spare time and extra cash, you can study physics, or you can watch football, your choice. If you don't have basic marketable skills that will let you go out and be productive, then you just don't have this choice.

The good news is that by focusing on this student and giving them some very basic skills (Algebra I), you can greatly increase their productivity at very little cost, you then feed this extra wealth back into the system and then things just mushroom. What I think that MIT should do is to provide the next step. You are now 35, you have finally learned Algebra I, and you have a job as an HR rep. If you want, then MIT will teach you basic calculus and physics.

As far as inspiring people to learn physics. There are a *huge* number of Ph.D.'s and junior faculty that are totally burned out and disillusioned. If you put an undergraduate next to a graduate student or junior faculty that is trapped in the academic rat-race and who secretly hates their existence, people will figure this out. People are quite perceptive and they'll absorb these cues.

Higher learning is not an exercise in modelling curricula.

There's more to universities than learning. If you want to learn quantum mechanics for the sake of learning quantum mechanics, then all of this stuff about grades and degrees is just meaningless. If your only goal is "pure learning" then go on open courseware, buy some books from Amazon, and put an ad on craig's list for a tutor. You can get this done for pretty cheap.

But universities are not going to be able to make money off "pure learning." Columbia and NYU found this out when they offered some beautiful classes with some brilliant professors, and found that no one was going to pay $2000 for a course without credit. They lost millions on online learning before they pulled the plug.

Universities just don't make their money from education. They make their money from credentals. People just don't pay large amounts of money to universities for education. They pay large amounts of money for the piece of paper that let's them turn knowledge into cash. You see this at UoP. I can offer the same Algebra I class for a *LOT* less money than UoP charges for it. But no one cares. I can give them knowledge, but UoP controls that piece of paper that let's them turn that knowledge into cash.

Personally, I'm quite bothered by this. One thing that bothers me is that once things are about cash, then the people that control the curriculum are employers looking for cogs. I don't know if this is a good thing or a bad thing, but at some level, it really doesn't matter because its the reality.

Reality can be harsh. I wish I could say that employers are looking for physics bachelors because of their deep knowledge of quantum mechanics and insightful thoughts on space time. I wish I can say that, but I can't because it's not true. The reason bachelors degrees are required for most jobs is that it proves you can punch a time clock, sit through a boring meeting, and turn in a report that has meaningless stuff that you don't really believe on time, and whether you get your bachelors in physics or French literature really doesn't matter. Most of the people that I know with only a bachelors in physics went into management consulting.

One thing that I really like about University of Phoenix is that they are honest about one thing in a way that traditional academia is not. If you are not currently employed, University of Phoenix will not let you be an adjunct instructor. UoP is perfectly honest that there is just no way that you are going make a living wage working as an adjunct there. They are also perfectly honest that working as an adjunct at UoP is just not the stepping stone to greater things. Adjunct instructing at UoP is paid charity work which you do to make some extra cash on the side, and they set things up so you can work at the job that pays the rent.

 

[twofish-quant]

Yep- turns out there *was* a big change last year (2009)- MIT made $182M.

They didn't. In order to get that +$182M, they had to move $450M from an endowment that had already lost $1.8 billion. Also the fact that they mentioned FASB 157 and Level 3 assets makes me *REALLY* nervous.

And the reason I am engaging you in this (very professional, BTW) discussion is that you are unfortunately, *not* a lone voice in the wilderness- you accurately reflect the end product of 20 years of MBA-centric academia.

You say that as if it is a bad thing...

You will notice that I'm one of the few people (maybe the only person) of my age been through the process that is still giddy about physics, and that's trying to get more kids interesting in science, math, and engineering. Sometimes, I get a little sad because I wish I was at some major university enlightening the youth about the grand mysteries of the universe.

Then I look at reality. Among all of the people in my cohort, I'm probably the one that is the most passionate about science and technology. Most of the people that graduated with me are completely burned out. If I kick myself out of my bubble and look at the people I know personally that have gotten junior faculty positions, I'm not very jealous. I know someone personally that just got denied tenure, and they are going totally crazy trying to figure out what to do next.

Education is a product, and MIT a widget factory. *I* am the one screaming that this has to stop, and *I* am the one fighting against the tide.

That's nice. Can you make the numbers work? If not, you are just shooting the messenger.

The basic problem is this. Universities don't make money by educating people. Universities make money by granting credentials. You can see this by fact that people are willing to pay much, much more money for a class that gets you a sheet of paper than one that doesn't.

The fact that universities make money by granting credentials makes them, for lack of a better word, impure. If you try to go for "pure learning" then the university is just not going to make enough money to support full time faculty.

 

[Andy Resnick]

You will notice that I'm one of the few people (maybe the only person) of my age been through the process that is still giddy about physics, and that's trying to get more kids interesting in science, math, and engineering.

Not hardly- it turns out you and I both went to very similar universities at the exact same time.

 

[twofish-quant]

Not hardly- it turns out you and I both went to very similar universities at the exact same time.

So that makes two of us. It's still pretty lonely. And one other thing that we have in common is that our career paths both took a detour outside of academia.

 

[Andy Resnick]

The basic problem is this. Universities don't make money by educating people.

That is exactly what I have been saying *all along*.

So the *real* problem is making universities a profitable business.

And that *is* a problem because trying to make a university profitable leads to universities acting just as you complain about- that is, they no longer educate students. And so that leads to what we see now- the downward drive to vo-tech training, online degrees, etc. etc.

How to balance the need to generate income with the mission of a higher *learning* is what we should be discussing. The modern research university is not a self-sustaining business model. Briefly, the faculty that are recruited to and are successful at a modern research university are not teachers. Students are left to fend for themselves. That works, as long as the university can cash in on it's reputation.

That is an opportunity for universities that *can* offer a quality learning experience for undergraduates. I would love the opportunity to get an undergrad ready for graduate school at MIT- my student would be well-prepared to take advantage of the opportunities there.

 

[twofish-quant]

So the *real* problem is making universities a profitable business.

I think the problem is making universities a business, profitable or otherwise.

Personally, I think that "pure learning" is wonderful, but the second people expect to be employed, then you've got yourself a business. If you want to pay people and then you bash MBA's, then chances are that you have a very badly run business.

The issue is not profit. The issue is viability. Personally, there's no reason I can see that a university should be expected to make a profit *provided* that if the university makes a loss, that we have some way of covering those losses so that the university doesn't run out of cash. If you are in a market economy, and you keep running losses and no one is putting in cash to cover those losses, then you just run out of cash and you have to shut down. Whether markets are the best way of running a society is a whole other discussion, but that gets too "theoretical.'

If you have people that are voluntarily willing to work for free, that's fine, it's even wonderful. The trouble is that in order to get people to work for free, you have to figure out how to get them to eat.

And that *is* a problem because trying to make a university profitable leads to universities acting just as you complain about- that is, they no longer educate students. And so that leads to what we see now- the downward drive to vo-tech training, online degrees, etc. etc.

If universities *can't* be mainly about education and more focused on training, then it's better if we structure them so that they are good at training. It's not that universities no longer educate students, it's that in some sense, the modern American university never really did. Why does the Department of Defense, give MIT so much money? It's to build better bombs. Nothing much to do with higher learning.

How to balance the need to generate income with the mission of a higher *learning* is what we should be discussing.

I don't think you can, and I don't think that universities are the right place for "higher learning." If you try to "balance" things you just end up with something that does both vocational training and higher learning badly. University of Phoenix is not about "higher learning." So some degree neither is MIT.

When I teach at UoP, it's not about "higher learning". It's a set of vo-tech skills, but if you have someone with a comfortable job and steady income, *then* then can worry about "higher learning" or not. Their choice.

The modern research university is not a self-sustaining business model. Briefly, the faculty that are recruited to and are successful at a modern research university are not teachers. Students are left to fend for themselves. That works, as long as the university can cash in on it's reputation.

Sure. In the case of MIT, this works pretty well, because you admit students that both can and in some sense want to fend for themselves. You just don't go to MIT for the quality of classroom teaching. For me, that doesn't matter, because if I want to learn something, I prefer to buy a book rather than sit in a lecture hall.

MIT has some of the most incompetent teachers on the planet. But it doesn't matter. There was a required class that had a professor that was *so* incompetent, that the suspicion was that he was being purposeful incompetent so that he'd never have to teach a class again (and I think it worked). But it didn't matter. The students, the grad students, and the other teachers banded together, and people learned the material. If you put your typical MIT physics major in front of a totally incompetent teacher, it really doesn't matter. He or she will learn the material anyway. If you put that person in front of someone that is struggle with Algebra, it's a disaster.

Also, it's not just reputation. MIT and Harvard are going to do fine, because they just have too many friends and supporters in powerful places. It's not a matter of cashing in on reputation. It's about putting your students in places of power so that you can write laws and exercise power for the benefit of MIT and Harvard. There really is a "Harvard mafia" that runs astrophysics. Personally, it disturbs me because 1) it offends my sense of fairness but if I'm honest the more important reason is that 2) I'm not a full member of that mafia (although my advisor is).

That is an opportunity for universities that *can* offer a quality learning experience for undergraduates.

Sure, but different people have different needs and desires, and quality learning experience means different things to different people. Attending MIT is like joining the marines, it's great for some people, but it's a disaster for many or even most people.

 

[Andy Resnick]

And one other thing that we have in common is that our career paths both took a detour outside of academia.

1) So what?
2) That is irrelevant to the fact that I am paid to educate undergrads (and MS students).

 

[Andy Resnick]

I don't think you can, and I don't think that universities are the right place for "higher learning."

If that's true, then there is no reason to *have* a university. While I enjoy destroying idiotic things as much as the next person, without centers of learning the future will resemble "Idiocracy", and that's not a legacy I want to leave my kids.

In order to generate future scientists (or for that matter, an educated voting populace), those children need to *learn something*. Without school, where will they learn?

Look, anyone can read a book- and I agree, to the extent that elementary (remedial) function can be learned by reading a book, there will be a legitimate place for online courses. I've taught those, too- and for what they do, they are useful.

But for some activities, especially scientific activities, reading a book is insufficient. Troubleshooting experiments can't be learned from a book, for example. Designing useful experiments can't be learned from a book. It's clear where my bias is, but the reality is that a putative student cannot learn what I do from a book, and never will be able to.

Again, I see opportunity for an institution that can provide a *learning experience* that cannot be obtained from reading a book.

 

[Rika]

It's a serious problem in my country. Training vs education. And I wonder - what's wrong with having them both? What's wrong with creating academic degrees (for those who want to pursue science) and vocational degrees (for those who want to get a job). If there is med/law school what's wrong with engineering/other profession school? You could get general education during your freshman year and after that decide which degree (and major) you want to pursue (and still attend general, more popular science like lectures in literature, history, science etc. to understand world better). Some majors such as pure math or physics should be academic only with very limited number of students. It's not very profitable but other more profitable majors could earn money. If only few students were allowed to pursue academic degree there would be no problem with overproduction of phds (and then you could hire 1 professional scientist instead of 3 gratudate students and pay him/her well). And I guess it's fine because universities should educate ppl that country need. If you need plumbers you should educate plumbers. If you need physicists you should educate them. But if you need 10 plumbers and 1 physicist then what's the point in educating 10 physicists and 1 plumber?

 

[twofish-quant]

If that's true, then there is no reason to *have* a university.

It depends on what you think the purpose of the university is. One fundamental fact is that universities are not getting billions of dollars in tax money and government support for the primary purpose of "higher learning." "Higher learning" is a merely by-product. It's a good by-product, but you have to understand why the money is being given.

Also if you want to run a post-industrial society, you need something like a university. Post-industrial societies require *massive* numbers of people pushing papers from point A to point B.

In order to generate future scientists (or for that matter, an educated voting populace), those children need to *learn something*. Without school, where will they learn?

Libraries. Museums. The workplace. Chat rooms. If you want to learn about waves, go out on the beach. If you want to learn something about observational astronomy, get a telescope and go out in your backyard. One thing that I try to get my students in intro astronomy to do is to just go outside for a few hours look at the stars and watch them move. It's amazing how many people have never done that.

You definitely need a structured education environment up until high school. After high school, you can make things unstructured.

Also, I don't think that there is much economic demand for more professional scientists. We don't need more professional scientists. The demand isn't there. We need to figure out how to let people have scientific careers without being full-time scientists.

The problem with scientists is that one scientist can change the world. So why do we need a hundred. That's the problem with creative professions. One creative person can transform history. But that's a bummer if you are the second person with the same idea.

Plumbers and managers aren't like that. If you have a hundred broken toilets or 100 workers that need supervision, it doesn't matter *how* good a plumber or manager you are, you need warm bodies. This is also good if you *aren't* the worlds best plumber. If you aren't the worlds best physicist, then there's really not that much for you to do, since the world's best physicist has already discovered what needs to be discovered.

If you are an average plumber or even a *bad* plumber, there are still toilets for you to fix.

The result of this is that there is going to be a lot more demand for schools teaching plumbing and managing than physics. Bummer.

But for some activities, especially scientific activities, reading a book is insufficient. Troubleshooting experiments can't be learned from a book, for example. Designing useful experiments can't be learned from a book. It's clear where my bias is, but the reality is that a putative student cannot learn what I do from a book, and never will be able to.

Absolutely. That's why you need to put people where the action is. If you want people to learn research, put them in a research institute. This is one reason that the University of Phoenix model works really well for some things, but is extremely difficult to extend to others.

You can teach things like education, management, nursing, and human resources with the UoP model, because the online learners are in almost all cases actively working as educators, managers, nurses, and human resources people. So there is no need to provide a "laboratory" because the students are already in the lab. So a lot of bachelors of nursing courses involve having nurses in a forum swap stories and share experiences. Same with masters of education courses.

You couldn't teach plumbing that way, and I'm trying to figure out how you can teach physics. The good thing about physics is that a lot of the "bottlenecks" are things that you can teach remotely. You can't teach how to operate an oscilloscope remotely, but you can teach differential equations if you have the right tools.

This is why university presidents that think that they can just copy UoP are in for a rude shock. If you put ten 35 year-old office workers in a chat forum and ask them to discuss management, you've got the basis for a good class or degree on management. All of them are either managers or at least have day to day dealings with managers.

If you put ten 18 year-old that are full time students in the same situation, you got nothing.

 

[Andy Resnick]

But if you need 10 plumbers and 1 physicist then what's the point in educating 10 physicists and 1 plumber?

To some extent I agree with you. That said, I don't pick who enrolls in CSU. I don't control who signs up for my class, and I don't decide who selects a major in Physics.

So, if a student comes to me, desiring an education, I have a duty to provide the best possible education that I can. That means my class is geared towards their interests and needs, and my research is used as an educational tool as well.

I cannot pick a goal for the student- nor should I. What I *can* do is help them achieve their goal.

 

[Andy Resnick]

Chat rooms.

Seriously? I'm hoping you are joking.

 

[twofish-quant]

It's a serious problem in my country. Training vs education. And I wonder - what's wrong with having them both? What's wrong with creating academic degrees (for those who want to pursue science) and vocational degrees (for those who want to get a job).

Terrible idea. The trouble is that is sets an either/or situation, and it's really, really bad for people that want to spend their life doing science. The harsh reality is that there are not that much job openings for full time professional scientists so if you want to survive in the post-modern economy, you have to learn something vocational. People that want to do science need to be encouraged to pick up some vocational skill along the way.

If there is med/law school what's wrong with engineering/other profession school?

It silos knowledge. If you want to be a top-flight engineer, you will have to learn something about law. If you want to be a top-flight lawyer, chances are that you will have to learn something about engineering. Even if you want to leave most of the work to a specialist, you need to know enough so that you know you've gotten the right specialist.

Also this doesn't deal with shifts in the economy. There may be a technological change that either renders most lawyers obsolete or renders most engineers obsolete.

If only few students were allowed to pursue academic degree there would be no problem with overproduction of phds (and then you could hire 1 professional scientist instead of 3 gratudate students and pay him/her well).

Except that you can't. The thing about scientific research is that there is a *huge* amount of grunt work. You don't need that many people to come up with the brilliant idea, but you need tons of people to reduce data, do computer runs, type up papers. There is a lot of science that just need large numbers of warm bodies. It's not the glamorous "eureka" parts, but there are things that just have to be done.

So you need grad students. To pay for grad students, you need tuition from undergraduates.

Now what you *could* do is to hire people directly as something which are "science nurses" and make that as a career. The trouble with that is that then the economics blows up. You can get grad students to work cheap on the idea that they are going to get something bigger and better later. If it is obvious that they won't, then they demand more money.

There is another problem. Right now grad students are "temporary". They'll be gone in a few years. If you have people spend their entire careers in one place, they are going to end up demanding large amounts of power. So you have to put together an "up or out" system.

If you need plumbers you should educate plumbers. If you need physicists you should educate them.

Who is this "you"? Whoever this "you" is they have a lot of power to decide the fate of people's lives. That's probably too much power.

But if you need 10 plumbers and 1 physicist then what's the point in educating 10 physicists and 1 plumber?

So who decides? Also what's wrong with being a physicist-plumber?

 

[Andy Resnick]

One fundamental fact is that universities are not getting billions of dollars in tax money and government support for the primary purpose of "higher learning."

Again, here is where you extrapolate your own experience to the larger world, and it's incorrect. Is that true sometimes? sure. It's not a "fundamental" fact.

And I'm talking about more than just creating professional scientists. I'm talking about creating an educated voting population.

I think the value of Physics I and II is not just that it teaches non-majors some elementary physics- one of my course goals (stated in the syllabus) is to show the student that rational explanations of things have value.

And how are my students of today going to get the tools they need for the jobs of tomorrow? Your job didn't exist when you were in school- is it wrong for me to want to give my students the same opportunities that you had? Is that not the purpose of education?

Seriously dude, have you *seen* the dialog on most chat rooms?

 

[Rika]

Terrible idea. The trouble is that is sets an either/or situation, and it's really, really bad for people that want to spend their life doing science. The harsh reality is that there are not that much job openings for full time professional scientists so if you want to survive in the post-modern economy, you have to learn something vocational. People that want to do science need to be encouraged to pick up some vocational skill along the way.

That's why I said - why can't we speed up "natural selection" process and start it during college admission (not during post-doc or tenure-track)? If you need 5 new physicists then educate 5 physicists not 50000. And then 49995 ppl are forced to find other idea for their furture. It's much better doing this when you are 18 than when you are 30.

I still find this shocking. Mostly because in my country people are strongly discouraged so they won't pursue scientific career. In my country being Steven Hawking isn't cool. So people who truly want to be scientists have no problem with finding a position.

It silos knowledge. If you want to be a top-flight engineer, you will have to learn something about law. If you want to be a top-flight lawyer, chances are that you will have to learn something about engineering. Even if you want to leave most of the work to a specialist, you need to know enough so that you know you've gotten the right specialist.

I have never said that interdiciplinarity is a bad thing. The point is that law course for engineers should be designed in a different way than the same course for law students.

Now what you *could* do is to hire people directly as something which are "science nurses" and make that as a career. The trouble with that is that then the economics blows up. You can get grad students to work cheap on the idea that they are going to get something bigger and better later. If it is obvious that they won't, then they demand more money.

I don't know if I understand correctly but are you saying that you can trick so many young and intelligent people? That you can tell such obvious lies for so many years? That people believe in a "work hard on this project so we will reward you and you will get a position" and other stuff?

There is another problem. Right now grad students are "temporary". They'll be gone in a few years. If you have people spend their entire careers in one place, they are going to end up demanding large amounts of power. So you have to put together an "up or out" system.

It's just simply amazing how societies are different in different countries. In my country it is obvious that if you have finished technical vocational school and work as "science nurse" under professor (it's very prestigious posintion in my country) then you are a fly and it's funny if you try to demand any power. It's also funny when you try to demand more money because working at public institution is stable and gives you some social benefits. In my country there used to be technical vocational schools, science nurses and people were working in one place their whole life. It's not any different nowadays.

Also what's wrong with being a physicist-plumber?

Because you end as frustrated physicist-plumber. That's wrong.

 

[Andy Resnick]

After high school, you can make things unstructured.

Absolutely untrue- I, for one, would not want to be operated on by a surgeon that is a product of 10+ years of unstructured education. And if you keep the structure of boards or other licensing certification, you are setting up the students to fail.

 

[Andy Resnick]

Also what's wrong with being a physicist-plumber?

I agree with that- I wish I had more plumbing skills, frankly.

 

[Andy Resnick]

That's why I said - why can't we speed up "natural selection" process and start it during college admission (not during post-doc or tenure-track)? If you need 5 new physicists then educate 5 physicists not 50000. And then 49995 ppl are forced to find other idea for their furture. It's much better doing this when you are 18 than when you are 30.

Because in the US, people have the freedom to study whatever they want to <mumbles something about the 'pursuit of happiness' as opposed to 'entitled to happiness'>