Re: an interesting little tidbit about our cheap food

[Guest guest]

>So is gov't funding for college something you consider " good "

>or " bad " ? Should a communty create and provide it's own

>college?

I don't know for sure. In general, the existance of a community college (what I

go to) is a good thing, and gives lots of people an opportunity to get higher

education who otherwise don't. It's also good for the economy. I apparently am

going to school in the 20th most dangerous city in the country (right in the

" ghetto " according to some *rolls eyes*), so it's probably good for these folks

to have easy access to something they can better themselves at.

On the other hand, my experience over the last couple years indicates that

government-funded school is a really bad idea, providing there is another way to

provide the same wide access to education. Our budgets are subject to the whim

of political ideology, determined by people who have nothing to do with us and

who live and work on the opposite side of the state (some dumbass put MA capital

on the coast instead of the middle of the state), and influenced to a far

greater extent by the economy.

We do get private funding, just like public libraries do. I suspect that since

the foundation is established, it would be able to get much more private funding

in a libertarian society, in which case the funding would be more constnant and

more adequate. Community colleges didn't always exist, and to my knowledge

they've always been government-funded, but that seems mostly historical accident

to me. Had the people who started the community college movement taken it in a

different direction, it might have wound up differently, and we might be better

off for it.

Chris

[Guest guest]

>We do get private funding, just like public libraries do. I suspect that since

the foundation is established, it would be able to get much more private funding

in a libertarian society, in which case the funding would be more constnant and

more adequate. Community colleges didn't always exist, and to my knowledge

they've always been government-funded, but that seems mostly historical accident

to me. Had the people who started the community college movement taken it in a

different direction, it might have wound up differently, and we might be better

off for it.

>

>Chris

Historically, school was for rich people and poor people

didn't read or write, nor see the need to. The US pioneered

" public education " and it was BIG BIG deal at the time.

It was considered by the Protestants to be important that people be able

to read the Bible and not have it interpreted by the church

heirarchy. Later generations felt that every person, rich or poor,

should be able to get educated, so they funded schools and

scholarships etc.

But schools are immensely expensive ... we had a small

parent-funded one and it still lost money with big

tuition costs. Would people fund them out of the goodness

of their hearts? I doubt it, and there is no historical

basis to think so. Everyone I talk to complains that their

taxes go to fund schools and THEY don't have kids in

school, darn it!

Rich folk can afford to fund schools (like Yale etc., though

I think even those get gov't funds). Poor folk can't. So

IMO if you get rid of gov't funding for schools, average folks

can say goodbye to higher education.

People are incredibly narcississtic too, which

is why communism was doomed to failure. That, and they

were so idealistic they thought people would just form

into nice groups once the nobility was deposed. Instead,

of course, a new set of warlords took power and the folks

at the bottom, lacking incentive, stopped working. Anyway,

rich white folks will fund schools for rich white folks, but

likely not for anyone else.

-- Heidi

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 12/6/03 1:16:19 AM Eastern Standard Time, hei

dis@... writes:

> But schools are immensely expensive ... we had a small

> parent-funded one and it still lost money with big

> tuition costs. Would people fund them out of the goodness

> of their hearts? I doubt it, and there is no historical

> basis to think so. Everyone I talk to complains that their

> taxes go to fund schools and THEY don't have kids in

> school, darn it!

>

> Rich folk can afford to fund schools (like Yale etc., though

> I think even those get gov't funds). Poor folk can't. So

> IMO if you get rid of gov't funding for schools, average folks

> can say goodbye to higher education.

Heidi,

It's neither true that education is expensive, nor that schools require

people with much money to fund them.

Case in point, I " homeschooled " beginning at 15, and went to the Pathfinder

Learning Center in Amherst, which is now called North Star and located in

Hadley, MA. This was a " school " for " homeschoolers " , and it was funded by

member

payments. They had a sliding scale for fees based on income, so anyone that

gave a damn about education could afford to go. We had no money and payed the

minimum amount, which was about $1000/yr.

The education there was vastly superior to what I received in school, despite

that my school had *vastly* more funds. Would the education there have been

better off had they much more money? Of course. But the rate of success in

all sorts of ways is astronomical from this place compared to my school. Less

than half the people from my school district go on to college after

graduation, and lower than the state average, despite a funding level *above*

the state

average, which isn't necessarily a *bad* thing, depending on what they do.

But the people that " unschooled " are all doing creative things, some on their

way to being famous.

But anyway, I think this is drifting way off from the community college

discussion. I don't think we need to rely on the goodness of people's hearts--

rather we can rely on people with money encouraging economic growth, and people

in arts encouraging the survival and flourishing of the arts.

I have a question. When you say " school " was only for rich people, are you

referring to only universities, or do you also mean any sort of post-high

school education?

The community college I go to is largely a trade school. It has many 2-year

certification programs for all kinds of vocational stuff. Many people like

myself throw state money down the toilet by getting a liberal arts degree, then

transfer to UMass to throw more state money down the toilet by getting a

4-year liberal arts degree, to get a job paying less than they could have gotten

if

they didn't go to college.

If the latter course was restricted to rich people, who cares? Obviously if

you are going to the university and you get out with a job that you can pay a

loan back, moneyed folks will most certainly pay for you, and you will most

certainly pay it back.

Isn't it perfectly plausible that less moneyed folks CHOSE not to WASTE their

money on a degree that wouldn't get more money because it was THEIR money, so

they spent it more wisely?

Chris

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 12/6/03 2:52:07 PM Eastern Standard Time,

heidis@... writes:

> >I have a question. When you say " school " was only for rich people, are

> you

> >referring to only universities, or do you also mean any sort of post-high

> >school education?

>

> I mean ANY school, historically. Most people never learned to read

> or write, and for a girl to learn to read was rare even in the upper

> classes. In the 1700's and 1800's, rich folk hired tutors for their

> kids, and if a parent had some schooling they might teach their

> child. The US did start a good public school system though

> pretty early, and a library system, so folks like Abe Lincoln

> could get educated and borrow books. Ben lin had a lot

> to do with that, I think. The one-room schoolhouse wasn't a

> bad deal, but it was an American innovation, I think.

Heidi,

I didn't mean across all time and all space... I meant before state

universities and financial aid. IOW, earlier in the 20th century. I think

state

universities were around pretty early, but financial aid came around 1970s,

right?

You were saying that if it wasn't for government funding of higher education

(if you didn't say this explicitly, it was sort of implicit in the track of

the conversation that we were discussing higher education), only rich kids would

go to school. Or rather you said that historically, before the government

funding, only rich kids went to school.

So my question is, say, pre-1970s, did most Americans not have an opportunity

for education beyond high school, or was it specifically an academic, and

particularly liberal arts, education that they did not have the opportunity for.

And in that light, I'll ask my question again (since it was misunderstood)

whether in *that* particular time in *American* history, it's plausible that

non-rich kids had the opportunity for a liberal arts education but chose to

pursue something more practical, since without financial aid, their own money

was

up and they had to deal with it wisely and practically.

Chris

[Guest guest]

>Heidi,

>

>It's neither true that education is expensive, nor that schools require

>people with much money to fund them.

>

>Case in point, I " homeschooled " beginning at 15

If you can homeschool on your own, it's cheap. If your Mom stays

home and helps, it's " cheap " if she doesn't work already,

which means Dad has a high-paying job most likely. If Mom

stays home from work, then the cost is her salary, say $20-50K/yr.

If you have no teacher, then that isn't " school " , it is self-study.

>, and went to the Pathfinder

>Learning Center in Amherst, which is now called North Star and located in

>Hadley, MA. This was a " school " for " homeschoolers " , and it was funded by

member

>payments. They had a sliding scale for fees based on income, so anyone that

>gave a damn about education could afford to go. We had no money and payed the

>minimum amount, which was about $1000/yr.

If the tuition was that cheap, then they had some rich folks paying a lot more,

or they had subsidies from someone, or they had a lot of " volunteer " labor.

Volunteer labor looks cheap on the books, but someone is always subsidizing it.

You can go to the monk/nunnery system, where the teachers don't get paid at all,

they live in poverty for room and board. Someone still has to pay for the land

though, which under that system was the gov't (they donated land to the church)

or the church (subsidized by tithes from the parishoners, which are really a

form of taxation, esp. when there is heavy pressure to pay those tithes).

Our little school was run very lean and mean, but it still cost $500/mo per

student. The " homeschool " my sister's kid goes to is $500/mo but he only goes

one day a week. The school isn't making a ton of money. I personally prefer that

kind of school, but I think people underestimate the true costs involved. Some

of these schools are also " charter " schools and get money from the government,

which by my standards of course, isn't a bad thing. A lot of them get money from

church denominations too. I'd challenge you to get the accounting info from that

school and find out the real costs.

>The education there was vastly superior to what I received in school, despite

>that my school had *vastly* more funds.

Again, local control of schools is a great thing. But you do

need to figure the real costs, and think of things like:

will that school work in some part of rural Mississippi

where there are no educated parents to help? The schools I've

seen are basically run by intelligensia for their own kids --

they don't reach the poor. They also don't handle handicapped

kids or ones with emotional problems very well -- they send

the kids that need therapy to the local public school.

In fact, our school closed partly because the owner found

that both her kids had major issues. One has autism and

one has ADD. The public school system had a whole room

and special programs for those. THAT is where a lot of the

money goes to. (Of course when society gets a better

diet, ADD and autism will likely go away, but that's another

discussion).

>But anyway, I think this is drifting way off from the community college

>discussion. I don't think we need to rely on the goodness of people's hearts--

>rather we can rely on people with money encouraging economic growth, and people

>in arts encouraging the survival and flourishing of the arts.

It's a nice thought. So far the people with money don't seem

to be intent on encourage economic growth unless it

is in their own pockets, with the exception of a few

far-thinkers, like Henry Ford who insisted on paying his

workers enough that they could buy one of his products.

If you look at the current flow of money into the coffers

of large corporations and away from schools and hospitals

(influenced largely by the corporations) you have to wonder

if these folks have any brains at all or any care beyond the

next quarter. If a company can hire an undocumented

alien and work them at low cost with no insurance and

no training, they will and do. They will pay money to

some charities, but hardly enough to meet the needs.

Now I DID go to technical school that was funded by Boeing

so they could get cheap programmers. The tuition was

pretty cheap -- $4,000 for a year -- and I got a job that payed

poverty wages out of the deal, then some on the job

training.

>I have a question. When you say " school " was only for rich people, are you

>referring to only universities, or do you also mean any sort of post-high

>school education?

I mean ANY school, historically. Most people never learned to read

or write, and for a girl to learn to read was rare even in the upper

classes. In the 1700's and 1800's, rich folk hired tutors for their

kids, and if a parent had some schooling they might teach their

child. The US did start a good public school system though

pretty early, and a library system, so folks like Abe Lincoln

could get educated and borrow books. Ben lin had a lot

to do with that, I think. The one-room schoolhouse wasn't a

bad deal, but it was an American innovation, I think.

Now in Europe you sent your kid to " boarding school "

at a fairly early age. There were also schools for orphans,

or the convents, that you could send your kid to. And

there were a few universities, but they were strictly for

the rich. The schools did more than educate -- the kid

made connections that helped them for life. This is still

true. The US is run mainly by graduates from Yale and

Harvard who all interact with each other (and all have

wealthy parents and contacts to help them in business).

>The community college I go to is largely a trade school. It has many 2-year

>certification programs for all kinds of vocational stuff. Many people like

>myself throw state money down the toilet by getting a liberal arts degree, then

>transfer to UMass to throw more state money down the toilet by getting a

>4-year liberal arts degree, to get a job paying less than they could have

gotten if

>they didn't go to college.

Exactly WHAT the role of college is, is really an issue right now.

I agree on that point. A whole lot of the role of

college, was to make contacts and become a " gentleman " .

A " gentleman " had to speak authoritively about worldly

matters and had to know all the best families. He didn't

have to be intelligent especially, but he had to read and write

and sit a good horse. A liberal arts degree sufficed just fine.

Nowadays I guess a " business degree " is the thing to get,

but if you belong to a good family it isn't that important.

Bush didn't get great grades and failed in business,

but still runs the country, for instance. But he is " connected "

and a lot of his advisors all went to his school.

Now we have this huge class of " technicians " that run

the science that runs the modern world. They don't sit

a good horse at all, but they do research and make circuits

and write programs that run the Internet. Or fix water

heaters. What is the educational path for them? I don't

know -- I went to technical school and then to the state-funded

U, and the U really did help in ways I can't pin down. They

also provide a lot of the great ideas, via their research

dept funded by slave labor (grad students) and the gov't.

>Isn't it perfectly plausible that less moneyed folks CHOSE not to WASTE their

>money on a degree that wouldn't get more money because it was THEIR money, so

>they spent it more wisely?

No, because like I said, the degree isn't about learning,

at that level. It's about social connections.

For " normal " folks, the corporations will fund narrow

technical training to get workerbees. But they won't

fund a lot of research, because the research is " public "

and they want to own the results. Public research

helps the ENTIRE economy, but it doesn't help

one company, and no company wants to share

their results with the world unless the world pays

(hence, patents!).

-- Heidi

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 12/6/03 6:47:19 PM Eastern Standard Time,

heidis@... writes:

> I think the " liberal arts " degree is kind of an historical

> anomoly, or it was designed for creating teachers. Well,

> my Dad was teacher and he had a liberal arts degree.

So only rich people were teachers? If not, then non-rich people must have

gone to college, no?

> As for drugs and drink as you mentioned earlier: this

> is a nationwide epidemic, and not just among young

> college students. You have the movers and shakers

> having coke parties too, and their offspring doing

> the same (in or out of college). But that wasn't the

> case in my parent's day, and in any case the colleges

> they went to were very strict and they couldn't get

> away with much (ah, the days of bed-checks and

> locked doors ...).

>

But the movers and shakers are responsible for the own coke use. I have no

moral objection to reacreational cocaine use, though I've never done it and

probably never will. If rich folk use drugs, either they will use them

responsibly, or they won't, and they will suffer for it. Same thing with poor

folk.

On the other hand, when college students use cocaine or LSD or nitrous oxide or

alcohol etc, and someone else is paying for their college, they bear no

responsibility for their actions. If they get a 2.0 grade average, they wasted

time, but not their own money.

I have no problem with the partying that kids do, nor the age at which they

do it. But if people had to pay for their own education, they would dissociate

college from partying, and their would be an enormous net social gain as well

as enormous personal gain for the individual, because all the resources

(millions and millions of dollars worth) that go into education would become

vastly

more productive.

Chris

[Guest guest]

>Heidi,

>

>I didn't mean across all time and all space... I meant before state

>universities and financial aid. IOW, earlier in the 20th century. I think

state

>universities were around pretty early, but financial aid came around 1970s,

right?

That's probably correct. Prior to the 70's though there was the GI Bill

and some other programs (Which is how my Mom and Dad went

to college). Prior to WW2 I don't think middle class went to college

much.

>You were saying that if it wasn't for government funding of higher education

>(if you didn't say this explicitly, it was sort of implicit in the track of

>the conversation that we were discussing higher education), only rich kids

would

>go to school. Or rather you said that historically, before the government

>funding, only rich kids went to school.

>

>So my question is, say, pre-1970s, did most Americans not have an opportunity

>for education beyond high school, or was it specifically an academic, and

>particularly liberal arts, education that they did not have the opportunity

for.

>

>And in that light, I'll ask my question again (since it was misunderstood)

>whether in *that* particular time in *American* history, it's plausible that

>non-rich kids had the opportunity for a liberal arts education but chose to

>pursue something more practical, since without financial aid, their own money

was

>up and they had to deal with it wisely and practically.

I think the " liberal arts " degree is kind of an historical

anomoly, or it was designed for creating teachers. Well,

my Dad was teacher and he had a liberal arts degree. But

at that time, a liberal arts degree WAS practical ... you

could get hired in lots of jobs with that degree, because

it meant you were well-read and an " educated " person. You

could use it to get hired as middle manager and then become

management. A business degree has much the same

function today. Heck, for that matter computer science isn't

very practical except that it teaches one basic computer

skills so you can get a job. But I learned NO basic technical

skills in compsci. Gets you a good job though, and you learn

on the job.

And those basic theoretical skills DO come in handy.

I noticed on the job that the tech school people just

were not as good as the university folks, which is why

I ended up going to the university AFTER technical training.

The fact that kids get into drugs and don't know what

they want to do in life is sort of an historical anomoly

too, and goes much deeper than funding issues. Both

my Mom and Dad broke into the " middle class " with

gov't subsidies. Both worked hard and settled down and

neither messed around in college.

As for drugs and drink as you mentioned earlier: this

is a nationwide epidemic, and not just among young

college students. You have the movers and shakers

having coke parties too, and their offspring doing

the same (in or out of college). But that wasn't the

case in my parent's day, and in any case the colleges

they went to were very strict and they couldn't get

away with much (ah, the days of bed-checks and

locked doors ...).

-- Heidi

>Chris

[Guest guest]

----- Original Message -----

From: " Heidi Schuppenhauer " <heidis@...>

> As for drugs and drink as you mentioned earlier: this

> is a nationwide epidemic, and not just among young

> college students. You have the movers and shakers

> having coke parties too, and their offspring doing

> the same (in or out of college).

Are you talking about cocaine, or Coca-Cola? I'm not sure which is more

reviled here. <grin>

[Guest guest]

>I mean ANY school, historically. Most people never learned to read

>or write, and for a girl to learn to read was rare even in the upper

>classes. In the 1700's and 1800's, rich folk hired tutors for their

>kids, and if a parent had some schooling they might teach their

>child. The US did start a good public school system though

>pretty early, and a library system, so folks like Abe Lincoln

>could get educated and borrow books. Ben lin had a lot

>to do with that, I think. The one-room schoolhouse wasn't a

>bad deal, but it was an American innovation, I think.

>

> The US is run mainly by graduates from Yale and

>Harvard who all interact with each other (and all have

>wealthy parents and contacts to help them in business).

Heidi,

Pretty much all of this is Massachusetts history. Zinn on NPR last

week said correspondence between the Constitution writers shows there is a

Constitution because of concern to pacify and to deter further rebellions

like Shay's Rebellion http://www.calliope.org/shays/shays2.html Shay's

Rebellion google search has more info. Town librarian said first library

was in Massachusetts. Harvard originally was a Massachusetts boarding

school for Native American children only. Upon closing and becoming Harvard

it was agreed they would continue to educate Native Americans. AFAIK, they

offer full scholarships to Native Americans that qualify academically.

Someone l know who went there said there were quite a few Native Americans

working in their hospital but didn't know Harvard's roots were as a Native

American boarding school.

Wanita

[Guest guest]

Chris-

I'm always puzzled by the libertarian party line that all of society should

be organized strictly along lines of self-interest, and that in such a

society, charitable giving would rampant and would take care of all social

ills.

>I suspect that since the foundation is established, it would be able to

>get much more private funding in a libertarian society, in which case the

>funding would be more constnant and more adequate.

-

[Guest guest]

>Are you talking about cocaine, or Coca-Cola? I'm not sure which is more

>reviled here. <grin>

Hard call there! I have to say though, that no one

I've met has been arrested for drinking Coca-Cola.

Now in the good ol' days they both came

together in one easy to drink package that

wasn't even illegal.

-- Heidi

[Guest guest]

>So only rich people were teachers? If not, then non-rich people must have

>gone to college, no?

I really don't know the stats, and it's changed a lot

throughout history. For college, I believe some students

just kind of " stayed " and became professors, and they

would generally be from the upper or upper middle classes.

However elementary school teachers could be any unmarried

woman (and it was about the only genteel job open to

a woman), I don't think certification was required until

fairly recently. But again, you would be talking about upper middle

class women, who had a tutor themselves (or maybe were

just very bright).

In my Dad's day, you needed a degree to be a teacher,

but he also had the GI bill.

>I have no problem with the partying that kids do, nor the age at which they

>do it. But if people had to pay for their own education, they would dissociate

>college from partying, and their would be an enormous net social gain as well

>as enormous personal gain for the individual, because all the resources

>(millions and millions of dollars worth) that go into education would become

vastly

>more productive.

That is a theory, but it's based on a theory of humans being as logical and

disciplined as you are, which is highly unlikely, esp. for young adults. If they

were so logical they would not drive drunk either, which is likely to destroy

their body, not just their finances, but young adults under 25 account for a

huge portion of the auto accidents.

People who are organized and logical enough to pay for their own college

probably aren't the drug-abusing type. Now getting the partiers out of college

(like kicking them out when they are caught) would certainly help the

atmosphere, but getting rid of free colleges and scholarships sure won't solve

the problem.

-- Heidi

[Guest guest]

>Harvard originally was a Massachusetts boarding

>school for Native American children only. Upon closing and becoming Harvard

>it was agreed they would continue to educate Native Americans.

Well, that is cool! If it was a good boarding school, anyway. The

story around here is that some Native American kids were forced

into school to teach them English and to coerce them out of their

traditional ways. I'm not sure if that was really the motivation

or not, but it seems to have been a mixed bag.

Which gets into the sheer power of schooling. A lot of

the " free " schools have been for the purpose of

indoctrinating youth (for better or worse, depending

if you agree with what they are teaching!).

-- Heidi

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 12/6/03 10:56:57 PM Eastern Standard Time,

Idol@... writes:

> I'm always puzzled by the libertarian party line that all of society should

> be organized strictly along lines of self-interest, and that in such a

> society, charitable giving would rampant and would take care of all social

> ills.

>

> >I suspect that since the foundation is established, it would be able to

> >get much more private funding in a libertarian society, in which case the

> >funding would be more constnant and more adequate.

I don't know what's puzzling about it. It strikes me as very similar to the

somewhat well-established superiority of intrinsic motivation relative to

extrinsic motivation in regard to performance in the field of education.

Chris

____

" What can one say of a soul, of a heart, filled with compassion? It is a

heart which burns with love for every creature: for human beings, birds, and

animals, for serpents and for demons. The thought of them and the sight of them

make the tears of the saint flow. And this immense and intense compassion,

which flows from the heart of the saints, makes them unable to bear the sight of

the smallest, most insignificant wound in any creature. Thus they pray

ceaselessly, with tears, even for animals, for enemies of the truth, and for

those

who do them wrong. "

--Saint Isaac the Syrian

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 12/7/03 4:12:50 AM Eastern Standard Time,

heidis@... writes:

> Hard call there! I have to say though, that no one

> I've met has been arrested for drinking Coca-Cola.

> Now in the good ol' days they both came

> together in one easy to drink package that

> wasn't even illegal.

According to Dufty, Coca-cola actually IS illegal or at least was for

quite a few decades (I don't know if they removed the law or not) based on a

court ruling that it violated some law about adding non-food additives to

food. But through various court appeals, it was ruled that Coca-cola could not

be

PREVENTED from producing Coke, but each and every time they had a truck ful

confiscated, it had to be prosecuted in court separately. This made it

basically impossible to enforce the illegality of Coke.

Chris

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 12/7/03 4:12:53 AM Eastern Standard Time,

heidis@... writes:

> In my Dad's day, you needed a degree to be a teacher,

> but he also had the GI bill.

I watched a video about the civil rights movement that had real footage from

the time, and there seemed to be lots of black, male teachers. So if they

needed a degree, they must have had some sort of access to college, which would

indicate that you didn't have to be rich to go to college, because I didn't get

the sense that these black male teachers teaching at black schools in black

neighborhoods were rich.

Nowadays though only white people teach black kids, and white kids.

> >I have no problem with the partying that kids do, nor the age at which

they

>

> >do it. But if people had to pay for their own education, they would

> dissociate

> >college from partying, and their would be an enormous net social gain as

> well

> >as enormous personal gain for the individual, because all the resources

> >(millions and millions of dollars worth) that go into education would

> become vastly

> >more productive.

>

> That is a theory, but it's based on a theory of humans being as logical

and

> disciplined as you are, which is highly unlikely, esp. for young adults. If

> they were so logical they would not drive drunk either, which is likely to

> destroy their body, not just their finances, but young adults under 25

> account for a huge portion of the auto accidents.

I don't know what that has to do with driving drunk, though I know plenty of

people who do it. I also know 35 year olds who drive drunk, and haven't

noticed any correlation with age at all.

But I really don't see the relevance to using college wisely whatsoever.

Driving drunk is a spur-of-the-moment thing, and you do it when you're drunk.

Planning college is a long-term 4-year plan at least, and you don't choose your

major when you're drunk. If you do, you can change it the next morning when

you're not drunk, or the morning after that when you're not hungover.

> People who are organized and logical enough to pay for their own college

> probably aren't the drug-abusing type.

Neither are college students. Psychotropic drugs are meant for the explicit

purpose of being psychotropic, so using them for that purpose in no way

constitutes " abuse. " Most college students do not become drug addicts, and lay

off

the partying when they leave college. It's just a phase that people go

through.

The question is, why do the two have to be connected? I'm not saying people

shouldn't party and use drugs (though if they don't use certain drugs,

especially psychedelics, they'll probably be better off later on), I'm just

saying

that if *college* wasn't viewed specifically as the place to do that, it would

benefit society and the individuals as well.

> Now getting the partiers out of

> college (like kicking them out when they are caught) would certainly help

the

> atmosphere,

Hmm, I doubt it. It would hurt everyone. When they try to close parties at

UMass, enormous riots break out. A massive movement to kick out partiers

(i.e. everyone on campus) would result in something like the 60s without the

political issues!

> but getting rid of free colleges and scholarships sure won't

> solve the problem.

Where are there free colleges and who said anything about getting rid of

scholarships?

Chris

[Guest guest]

At 11:44 PM 12/6/2003 -0800, you wrote:

>

>>Harvard originally was a Massachusetts boarding

>>school for Native American children only. Upon closing and becoming Harvard

>>it was agreed they would continue to educate Native Americans.

>

>Well, that is cool! If it was a good boarding school, anyway. The

>story around here is that some Native American kids were forced

>into school to teach them English and to coerce them out of their

>traditional ways. I'm not sure if that was really the motivation

>or not, but it seems to have been a mixed bag.

>

>Which gets into the sheer power of schooling. A lot of

>the " free " schools have been for the purpose of

>indoctrinating youth (for better or worse, depending

>if you agree with what they are teaching!).

>

>-- Heidi

Don't know of one Native American boarding school who's purpose was to

allow any retainment of culture. Being there was not voluntary. Around

Boston was a group of 6 tribes IIRC called the praying tribes the

colonialists claimed religious conversion of. That school likely an

insurance of continuing English culture and religion. None of the tribes

exist today. One was the Massachusett.

Wanita

[Guest guest]

--- In , Heidi Schuppenhauer <heidis@t...>

wrote:

> Which gets into the sheer power of schooling. A lot of

> the " free " schools have been for the purpose of

> indoctrinating youth (for better or worse, depending

> if you agree with what they are teaching!).

>I like the Swiss system: put the kids in a REALLY

>structured environment for a couple of years

while they grow up, away from their parents.

Heidi, I try to stay out of these off-topic political posts because once you're

swept up by them, you can get trapped in the back and forth for quite a while.

However, I couldn't help but notice the incompatibility of these two

statements. I shudder at the thought of sending my (future) kids off to a

structured environment (run by a government system) for a few years, away

from my influence. There IS great power in schooling, and that is why I value

my freedom to teach my kids my values, not the government's. I certainly

hope the Swiss have the right to opt out of this program.

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 12/7/03 12:46:08 PM Eastern Standard Time,

Idol@... writes:

> It boils down to " if people were just given the opportunity to be more

> selfish, they'd be more generous " , but in fact neither human nature nor

> history bear out the assertion.

It's human nature to do evil unless you're forced to do good?

Chris

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 12/7/03 12:47:10 PM Eastern Standard Time,

Idol@... writes:

> This sounds fascinating. Do you happen to have a URL handy?

Nope, he writes about it in Sugar Blues. He tells the story in considerable

length, but he doesn't cite anything in his book.

Chris

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 12/7/03 12:49:02 PM Eastern Standard Time,

Idol@... writes:

> >Nowadays though only white people teach black kids, and white kids.

>

> I don't know what things are like in MA, but that's not true here in NYC.

That's good to hear. For whatever reason, black people don't do as well as

whites on the standardized teaching tests, which are fairly new, relatively. I

did some classroom observations in Springfield, MA a couple years ago, and

most of the kids were black, some hispanic, some white, and all the teachers

were white.

Chris

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 12/7/03 4:41:30 PM Eastern Standard Time,

heidis@... writes:

> I'd send my kid to a structured school if I could choose the school. I'm

> not sure how I feel about having her live at a dorm in a University though ...

> from all I've heard it's difficult to study with all the partying going on,

> which just isn't right. I did go to school in Switzerland for some time, by

> choice, and it was VERY structured and wow did I learn a lot! (It was about

> watch repair, which isn't exactly controversial).

It probably mostly depends on what *she* wants to do. At UMass, there's

notoriously quiet residential areas, and there's notoriously riotous residential

areas. Some 70% of the kids live in the latter, but anyone who wants quiet can

opt for the former.

Chris

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 12/7/03 5:37:54 PM Eastern Standard Time,

Idol@... writes:

> It's because of a lot of things, as near as I can understand. Test bias

> may be a small, though inadvertent, part, but culture is also a

> problem. " Book learning " (a stupid enough phrase by itself, and one

> embraced by segments of all ethnicities) is often disdained as being

> " white " , for example.

Sure, that's certainly a widespread problem, but I think it primarily affects

high school students. People who take teacher tests are already through

college, with a BA or close to a BA. Obviously these people didn't disdain

education as a " white " thing.

I'm not fond of discussing these issue because I don't like the subtle but

unspoken implication lurking in the background that black people are somehow

culturally or genetically inferior as quantitatively measured on tests, and, as

much as I may have an opinion, I generally feel unjustified in pontificating

about what black people need to do to succeed.

Chris

[Guest guest]

Chris-

It boils down to " if people were just given the opportunity to be more

selfish, they'd be more generous " , but in fact neither human nature nor

history bear out the assertion.

>It strikes me as very similar to the

>somewhat well-established superiority of intrinsic motivation relative to

>extrinsic motivation in regard to performance in the field of education.

-

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 12/7/03 5:39:04 PM Eastern Standard Time,

Idol@... writes:

> Selflessness vs selfishness isn't a good vs evil axis. It's much more

> complex.

>

Well for being so complex that's put pretty simply. Of course it's complex.

But there's plenty of indication that people's self-interest often coincide,

and that people derive satisfaction from doing good things for others.

Chris