Are You Sattisfied With You're Edducation?

In My Humble Opinion
21

Drop—Hey! I LIKE Thackeray!

They were into the “moderns” when I was in high school, so we got Conrad (feh!), Dreiser (double feh!), Fitzgerald, Hemingway (another feh!), etc. When I got to college and for several years thereafter, I devoured the classics like Orson Welles at a free buffet.

When I was in grade school (1960s), they pulled “new math” on us, with the result that I cannot look at a fraction without bursting into tears. They also had ONE teacher in each grade teaching the class every subject. So, for instance, in 4th grade we had a teacher who liked science—and that’s ALL we got. My 6th grade teacher liked history—so that’s ALL we got.

And this was, I may add, in a wealthy neighborhood, and a school district with plenty of money.

22

I never really thought about it before, but in retrospect, my education was excellent.

I went to a Catholic school. In the province of Ontario, Catholic schools are public schools. There are two entirely different province-run systems, the public system, and the “Separate” system. They’re exactly the same except that the “Separate” system teaches Catholicism; it’s a Constitutional requirement, believe it or not, that this system be available. (It’s not limited to Catholic kids, though. I went to school with kids who weren’t even Christians.)

Shirley Ujest, we never got the “Catholics are #1, everyone else is #2,” thing, or at least my class didn’t. We were taught Catholic doctrine but never that other religions were inferior. Hmmm.

Overall,

English - I was well ahead of my class in English (I was reading at 2 years old) so I’m not sure I learned many basic skills here, or could have. The practice helped.

Math - I am confident that I learned almost all my math skills in school, beyond Sesame Street stuff, and I’m good at math. Cervaise, are you sure you figured out math on your own until Calculus? I can’t see many people figuring out skills like long division on their own. Algebra comes before calculus, too.

History - I’m not certain I learned a lot of history in school. Again, this is a personal interest, but Canadian history instruction is extremely poor in elementary school, concentrating almost entirely on Canadian history from the 1500s to Confederation. In thsi regard I think our school system is pretty bad.

Geography - I learned a lot of basic geography in elementary school. We were expected to know all the provinces, capitals, and major geographic features of Canada, to identify the world’s continents and oceans, to know how to use atlases and maps, and to have a basic understanding of climates and terrain, all before high school. I can still draw a map of the world freehand; I learned that in Grade 7.

Science - Most of my science came in high school. I think I learned a lot. I am certain that everything I know about basic chemistry, physics, and biology came from high school; my chemistry instruction in particular was excellent.

Computers and Technology - Not much here, but when I went to high school the word “internet” was commonly unknown and my personal PC loaded programs off a tape deck, so go figure.

Art - I learned lot of little skills here. I’m not an artist, to be honest. I learned a lot of drama in high school, which helps with English.

Gym - My experience in gym was surprisingly positive, though it helps to have good gym teachers. My Grade 9 phys ed. teacher, an outstanding teacher, taught us SKILLS. It wasn’t “run ten miles today,” it was “This week you will learn to throw a football. Do this, this and this. Okay, now we will learn to punt a football. Learn this, this and this. Okay, now you will learn how to perform a backwards somersault. Now we will learn how to wrestle properly. Now you will learn to dribble a basketball. Now you will learn to jump hurdles. Here are the specific steps to do these things.” By the end of ninth grade gym I knew how to play about thirty different sports I’d never tried before. I can still throw a football and I never even played for the team.

23

My high school education was top notch. Three years private, one public. I was able to take AP courses in English, Biology, and Physics. I took Calculus my senior year. I could have taken AP History, but I did not.

I learned how to write a critical essay in high school. We studied (…let’s see who I can remember…) Shakespeare, Dickens, Chaucer, Conrad, Twain, Dostoevsky, Camus, Kafka, Melville, Franklin, Eliot (George), Eliot (T.S.), O’Neil; I’m sure there are others, but these come to mind quickly.

As a bonus, I was able to take a very interesting class called “Law and Punishment.” We studied serial killers, mass murderers, assassins, the U.S. judical system, etc… Neato.

I was well prepared for my freshman year of college. I tested out of introductory courses. Even then, the math and physics classes were basically a rehash of stuff I had already learned in high school. Biology was intriguing and challenging. In fact, my second semester zoology class inspired me study biology/ecology rather than pursue my original focus (medicine).

The stuff I read about high schools today just was not my experience. No one ever pulled a gun, although being a southern boy, I’m sure plenty of kids had guns in their cars for after school hunting or varmint-shooting. We did not have security guards or metal detectors. I never knew of a single case where someone got arrested. There were no gangs, although kids grouped along “jock,” “prep,” “brain,” etc. lines. No one I knew came to school drunk. We suspected that a group of kids might smoke pot, but I never saw or heard about anything going down on school grounds. The first time I knew personally of someone doing drugs was when I was in the Army. I knew of two girls that got pregnant in high school (one aborted, one hatched). I did see my share of cheating on exams/assignments.

I’m not saying that none of this stuff happened. Only that what did happen flew beneath school radar. Who knows how many girls really got pregnant? Who knows how many drunk or stoned students there were at parties? Not me. I do know that very little occurred at the school itself. I mostly hung out with the “smart” kids, but I also was “jock” enough to letter in football and soccer. I also fit in well with the “pick-up truck/Hank, Jr./good-ole-boy” crowd. Thus, I think I had my finger on the pulse of my school pretty well; although I didn’t mix much with the “wear-the Ozzy/Black Sabbath t-shirt” crowd. Hmmmm. Maybe that’s where all the shenannigans were going on!

I bring all this up because I feel the “educational atmosphere” is very important when it comes to the type of education one receives. It amazes me, with everything I read about today’s high schools, that kids can learn anything at all.

I must have had a Stepford high school experience. Thank God.

24

I went to public school, graduated in 1993.

Elementary school was pretty good, except for my fifth grade math teacher who was the most sexist pig I’ve ever met in my life. He would tell my best friend and I to our faces that we were girls, so we couldn’t understand math. We didn’t learn a lot about geography that I remember, except for our state - we had a mandatory unit on Maryland histoary, which included being able to draw and label a map. Yippee.

Middle and junior high…the teachers were pitiful, except for my math teachers. And my government teacher in 9th grade. We did read Dickens and Orwell that I can remember. And I chose to take the language track, so I learned Spanish, and then also took music for 4 years.

High school was a lot better academically. Well, except for the idiot guidance counselors. Here’s a rundown:

English: One teacher was annoying, but overall, we covered a LOT. We had one semester of speech class, which was a hoot. Books I remember reading: Richard Wright, Shakespeare, Thomas Hardy (who I despised), Bronte, Melville, Mark Twain, Jane Austen…admittedly, a lot of those were covered in my AP English class. My senior year teacher was amazing, too…we read 4 Shakepeare plays, and acted out 3 of them. My favorite memory of that class is me being Gertrude in Hamlet.

Math: Once again…we had a wonderful system. I was on an advanced track, so I took Calculus when I was a senior. This was after Trig, Linear Algebra, Algebra III, and one other filler class, because they wouldn’t let us take Calc as juniors. My teacher was fun…he was also in my church choir, which was amusing. Oh, and an interesting side note. My Calc class had only 10 people in it, and only 2 girls. Guess which girls? Yep, the two that “couldn’t do math” - me and my best friend. When I aced my AP exam, I wanted to go back and shove it in that asshole’s face.

Science: This was probably my school’s weakest area. The Chem teacher was really good, and she’s why I took AP Chem. However, our biology and physics teachers were PATHETIC. I didn’t learn anything about physics that I remember. Hell, our tests were open-book.

Social Studies/History: This one gave me my best teacher ever. Mr. McMullen. He was my AP US History teacher. And he wanted to teach us how to think, not just how to pass the exam. He was teh hardest teacher I think I ever had, and the one I loved learning from the most. And I remember he liked me, since I did all my work, and tried my best, so he cut me a little slack on things. Which was fun too.

Spanish: IIRC, Maryland law required 2 years of a language to graduate. I took Spanish all the way through high school. We got to read an abridged version of “Don Quixote,” (and then went to see “Man of La Mancha”), and my senior year we read post-Civil war Spanish lit.

I also had my mandatory PE and “Practical Arts” requirement. Yippee.

Like divemaster…I went to college unbelievably prepared. Because of testing out, I entered as a sophmore. I didn’t see any of the problems people have in schools today with drugs and guns. I mean, we all knew who the druggies were, but it didn’t seem like a huge problem. I think part of that was where I lived…my high school was in a fairly nice area. Other schools in the area had more problems. I loved public school, and IF I ever have kids, I’ll probably send them to public school as well.

25

I went to Perry Public High School in Perry, Ohio and graduated in 1987. At the time, it was a pretty small school (my graduating class was 120), and was very poorly funded. No AP classes of any kind, only one instructor for advanced math classes (of which there were two), you get the picture. I never really relied on the school to educate me; I did more study on topic that interested me on my own . Here’s what my curriculum looked like:

Math: Not too bad given the circumstances. I was able to take Intro to Calc my junior year, which covered basic analytic geometry and differentiation; and Calc I my senior year, which covered differentiation, integration, etc. That was the highest math class offered at Perry.

English: Freshman and sophomore English were a wash. There were three levels of English for each grade; from highest to lowest, they were 901, 902, and 903, etc. I was in the -01 classes but honestly can’t tell you what we did for those two years. I remember in my junior and senior years reading To Kill a Mockingbird, A Tale of Two Cities, and a couple others. Nothing from before Dickens, I’m pretty certain. Maybe a little Canterbury Tales, come to think of it, and Beowulf. I blew everyone in the class away in writing skills already, so that was pretty rudimentary.

History: Actually not too bad, at least in my upperclass years. Our teacher Mr. Lomasney, bless his little heart, offered a course our senior year called “20th Century America” which was pretty valuable. I also had American History 2, World History and American Government those last two years.

Science: Biology I, Chemistry, Biology II, and Physics, in that order, 9th to 12th. The physics instructor was terrible (in fact, my friend Grant and I often corrected both her math and her conclusions in class), but the others were good. My most memorable moment was in Biology II, when John Lazarchic refused to take the test on evolution/human development, taking an “F” on principle because it conflicted with his beliefs.

Social Science: A total wash. A half-year each of sociology and economics, taught by an utter clod. Useless.

Foreign Language: Four years of French, of which I remember little, partly because the teachers kept quitting, so we kept getting a great deal of rudimentary and repeated material. Spanish was also offered. No German, no Latin.

I also took one year of wood shop, including drafting; and a required three years of Phys. Ed. (Yes, it was that kind of school.)

I graduated 5th in my class with a 3.8 GPA. You’d have to have been abominably stupid to do badly at Perry, yet many people did just that. I scored a 30 on my ACT composite, and my SAT scores were 640V/690M, so I guess I wasn’t entirely uneducated. Nevertheless, I wouldn’t have wished Perry on anyone.

26

The Danish School system is of course somewhat different, but on the whole I’d say it was OK. The biggest problem was, I believe, that ressources were allocated heavily towards kids who had a hard time learning.

Nothing wrong with that, but it does mean that talented pupils will have to motivate themselves a lot of the time - and if you’re talented, but lazy, don’t necessarily expect the teachers to spend a lot of effort on motivation.

That being said: I went to “Basic school” (Kindergarten and 1st-9th grade) at a private school and that was quite good, in retrospect. The school had a reputation for being old-fashioned, which more or less translated into it insisting on actually teaching the pupils as much as they could handle. 20 pupils to a class, and elementary/advanced levels from the 7th grade in subjects such as Danish, Math, English & German.

On the whole, quite OK.

Our math teacher covered the curriculum relatively fast and started teaching us (very basic) economics, geometry, applied math (including a bit of physics) etc.

Danish was taught by a female (and very charmingly so!) teacher , having no problems in motivating 13-year-olds to avoid her scorn. We covered a lot of the canon (obviously, mainly Danish writers), later moving on to comics (hey, it’s communication), commercial texts etc. The spoken word, unfortunately, wasn’t covered in great depth - I would’ve liked that.

Geography was plagued by lots of group projects and insistence on “socially relevant” subjects. What geography I know is basically self-taught.

Science: Even our somewhat inept teachers couldn’t keep me from learning physics & chemistry. I LOVED it. But lots of bright kids (especially girls) managed to slip by with minimal effort.

German: The teacher was in the classroom, but that was about it. He didn’t really care and obviously, neither did we. In the ninth grade, the school realized something had to be done and brought in another teacher, who cracked the whip over us for a year and managed to teach some of us passable German.

Moving on to public high school (“Gymnasium”, from German), I encountered some inspiring teachers who weren’t afraid to present a challenge - and some who completely misunderstood their mission. FTR, I chose the so called “Mathematical/Physical” track. Academically, it was quite challenging in most areas.

Our history teacher, unfortunately, was a horrid example of not getting the point - she tried to teach us “how to be a historian”, not history. It didn’t help that her political stance was 3 steps left of chairman Mao’s. I can still remember some of the debates I lost to her and ITCH for a rematch. I guess most of the history I know is self-taught - I’m interested in military history, and the rest follows.

My French teacher was quite OK, too bad I’ve forgotten so much. I’ve picked it up again when visiting France, and it’s amazing so fast one can recall old skills. But the week I spent harvesting grapes in Beaujolais probably taught me more than three months in the classroom.

My science teacher was downright inspiring. He visibly enjoyed seeing people “get” a tricky point - as did my math teacher. Cool people, both - although I’ve forgotten a lot of my math, now. (“Math” covers all the disciplines, I’m not even sure where the boundaries are). I remember fondly a project with English translations of the classical mathematical texts (Pythagoras, IIRC), attempting to follow the reasoning and redo the proofs in modern notation. Not bad.

The English teacher was a complete slacker - I taught HER new phrases, so help me. Most of the English I know I’ve picked up by reading on my own. Foreign films being subtitled, not dubbed, in Denmark doesn’t hurt, either.

I graduated in 1985. Yikes - that’s a long time ago.

On the whole, I’ve been quite happy with what I learned in school. I could’ve wished for a better geography and history education and I was allowed to be a complete slacker in PE - however, the Army was quite happy to correct that little oversight. Unfortunately, things have degraded since my days (Nope, I’m not making it up, they test these things) and basic skill levels are getting a tad too low for my liking. Well…

S. Norman

27

I thought that the title for this thread was hilariously ironic until I realized that it was written by the erudite Eve…and I always bow to her greatness.

Hi Eve!
::waves::

I’ll be brief: I thought my formulative schooling was fine. Now, as I deal with 18-25 year-old co-workers, I am abhorred by their level of education.
I feel blessed. I’m no genius, but I know what the capitol of Texas is, who the third U.S. President was and what the common terms for the three states of H2O are.
My math skills suck though.
…and somehow, I know this post is going to come back and bite me in the ass…

28

High school class of 1979 here.

RickJay, I’m a product of the Ontario school system too, but the public one. My guess as to your Catholic school’s avoiding the “Catholics are Number One” philosophy is that you Catholic kids and us others all lived in the same neighbourhoods, and they wanted to avoid any neighbourhood strife. Certainly, I know that if the Catholic kids in my neighbourhood tried pulling that one, they would have been either lonely with nobody to play with at best, or beaten to a pulp at worst. But since it never happened, we all got along pretty well.

As for school subjects, well, let’s see:

The Canadian History we had through elementary and high school was the dull kind of Canadian history–sure, we fought in WWII, but you’d never know it from our history classes, which seemed to consist of endless study of the parliamentary debates that surrounded historical issues. (Using WWII as an example, we spent a week on the fighting and six weeks on the debate about the conscription crisis. This did not go over well with those of us who had fathers who were WWII combat veterans.)

But we also got a year of British history, from William the Conqueror to Victoria (probably excised from the curriculum now, but it was there in the mid-1970s), and two years of world history–from the ancient Greeks and Romans and Egyptians through to WWII.

I was never good with high school math, though I did get a good elementary school grounding in basic arithmetic, and can still do it in my head. Nor was I good with any kind of science that went beyond the basic. But many of my classmates could do well with those subjects, so I guess the teaching in those was good.

Music was a subject I loved, and so did many others. Each year at high school, most of the incoming Grade IX class took music, where they learned to read music and to play an instrument–and did so for the rest of their high school years. And, I’m pleased to say, some of us still play those instruments we learned so long ago.

In my opinion, the high school English curriculum was excellent, though not everybody felt as I did. We did the usual Shakespeare and Dickens and such, but we also studied Orwell, Huxley, Waugh, Faulkner, and the Brontes. It was there that I was also introduced to John Donne and his contemporaries. In an English class, I was in my element.

Our French classes may have seemed a little advanced, but we’d all been taking a daily French class since Grade V anyway. This was before French Immersion and similar programs, BTW. Still, a number of us managed to leave high school being fairly fluent French speakers–certainly, I never had any problems on my travels through France or other French-speaking areas.

High school Geography assumed we knew our way around a map of the world, and concentrated mainly on such things as a nation’s imports and exports, a little bit about the culture of a nation’s people, and the earth’s physical features. We also got a year of urban geography, which was more interesting (and difficult) than it sounds.

But I’d have to say that the teaching of high school Gym needed a lot of improvement. The emphasis was on the jocks and what they could do, and if you didn’t measure up to them, you were (thankfully) mostly ignored. We actually had a gym teacher who would say, “We’re playing football today. He-men will play a game at this end of the field, wimps will play a game at the other end, if they can.” Didn’t do much for my view of the athletically-inclined.

Interestingly, in those days (mid-1970s), there was absolutely no instruction in computers or technology. Really, you couldn’t expect there to be any. I can still remember our amazement at the first pocket calculator most of us had seen. One of my classmates brought it to school–and the teachers were divided as to whether he’d be allowed to use it in class. How things have changed!

So to answer the OP, yes, I’m pretty happy with what I learned before I went to university. Of course, there was a lot more to learn, but I think I was well-prepared to face it.

29

Thackeray? FEH! OTOH, Dreiser’s pretty good.

In fifth grade our teacher was mostly into goofing off, so we mostly…

We also got a smattering of French. But I was not prepared for “New Math” in 6th grade. Had to spend the summer teaching it to myself. As can be seen by the remainer of my educational career, it didn’t work. I laugh when I have to help other adults who did better than I do math. It clicked later on.

30

Didn’t know Orson wrote. I thought that was H.G., and good luck finding his stuff listed as “classics” anywhere but Barnes and Noble.

People seem to be confusing “fun” and “education.” They didn’t get assigned “fun” reading, or math, or science, therefore they didn’t get educated. Personally, I hated my undergrad Shakespeare seminar, but what I learned from it has helped me to find the intertexts in Joyce and Nabokov. I’ve never been a fan of Dickens (he was the Stephen King of his time), but so many contemporary writers steal from and parody him that a basis in his works is necessary, to say the least. Hell, I didn’t like “Huck Finn” in HS, but I love it now.

I’ve been teaching First-Year English for a long time now (comparatively–7 years), and I’ve come to the point where I feel that those who come to learn will do so, and those who come to get through a requirement will fail. I don’t care anymore. You make of your educational opportunities what you will, and despite the worst teacher in the world you can learn. Or you can walk in expecting someone to open the top of your head and spoon “useful” information into it, and it ain’t gonna happen. We can’t make you learn–we can present the information, we can try to make it fun, but we can’t make it click into your synapses; that’s your responsibility.

To those talking about going back to school, I say go! I don’t care how old you are–my best students have been older, interested in and paying for their educations, and unafraid to look like geeks by asking questions. They’re the ones who force me to teach, the ones who want to learn. The others? Screw 'em. I’m not paid enough to pass you for basic attendance and 30 minutes a week outside work.

Humbly,
Stof

31

“I thought that the title for this thread was hilariously ironic until I realized that it was written by the erudite Eve…and I always bow to her greatness.”

—Why thanks you, dear [doing her “Queen Mum screwing in a lightbulb” wave]

Drop—Dreiser?! All I can do is quote Mrs. Parker: “What writes worse than Theodore Dreiser? TWO Theodore Dreisers!”

32

Well, I was, until I started hanging around here. It’s unsettling, not knowing what you don’t know.

I’m satisfied to have learned the basics, but I wish I had had more of the classics, more intensive history and geography, and I wish that the school would have required more math and languages.

33

I graduated (public) high school in 1996 and (public) college in March of this year. Overall, I think my education was pretty good. I had some excellent teachers in high school who not only taught me facts, but how to apply those facts. My AP Lit/composition teacher (two seperate classes in two years) was perhaps the best teacher I have ever had, including college. He taught me how to write essays, something that turned out to be invaluable (and surprisingly rare) in college. I definitely had a few bad teachers, like my crazy and incomprehensible Economics teacher, who kicked me out of AP Econ for missing the class too many times (hey, it was at 7 am!).

My AP Lit teacher pretty much allowed us to read whatever we wanted, with certain guidelines. We read a number of books and plays in class, not to mention tons of poetry (note: a month and a half of Emily Dickinson can cause suicidal tendencies), but outside of class we had a very long list of books and authors we could read. AP is supposed to be college level, but rarely actually is - this was an exception. So I did read some classics, like Dickens and Austen and Euripides, but the selections were all my choosing, and I didn’t feel the pressure of being forced to read something. What a wonderful class that was.

My only regret education-wise is that I dismissed my abilities in math and science very early (in fifth grade or so) and as a result I barely scraped through with Cs. And I didn’t care. Now that I am out of college, I’m trying to redeem myself and fill up the huge gap in my education by reading lots of science books. I plan to take some courses at the local JC too.

34

My education’s flaws have as much to do with me (especially during my teenage years) as with the schools I was at.

Nevertheless, I had ancient history - meaning Greece and Rome - three times, and not once did I learn anything about Byzantium, Russia, South America or Africa. I am unusual in having had a course in Asian history in high school, China and Japan. I never read Hamlet in school, either, though we did do Macbeth and Julius Caesar.

Eve, I never read Thackeray or Defoe in HS, but I DID have to read Pride and Prejudice over the summer when I was twelve and going in to H.S. as a freshman. I don’t want to shock you, but this is NOT a book with a lot of appeal for twelve year old boys, and although I slogged through it, it turned me off on Austen ever since. I reread the thing last year just to be sure I wasn’t carrying childhood baggage too far. It’s still annoying. A bunch of effete English snobs with bugs up their asses about the proprieties of marrying as much money as they can: “Mr. Darcy has 700 pounds a year from his estates; and Mr. Buha has only 500. Yet I cannot speak to him directly, alas, oh my, for what would people think?” Who gives a shit for crying out loud? Get a job, ya losers.

35

APB, are you sure you were going into high school at the age of twelve? I have a late birthday, but I was still fourteen as a freshman. Not that this means anything, but IMO, a fourteen year old boy can make it through Pride and Prejudice, which is actually a hysterically funny book. In the same way Shakespeare’s comedys are funny - if you actually pay attention, it’s great, if you just sit around and moan about the language, it’ll all go over your head. Okay, so I can understand your young self doing this, but you should really go back and reread it. Wonderful book.

BTW, I read An American Tragedy as a senior in high school, and it was boring, dry, and dull. So anyone who likes Dreiser is wrong. (My opinion will always prevail. In my own mind, anyway.)

36

Maybe I was thirteen, then. Whatever. And I wasn’t moaning about the language, which is not particularly challenging, even at thirteen, but rather at the fact that the characters were completely unsympathetic. (I have always enjoyed Shakespeare greatly, incidentally, and his language WAS difficult until I got used to it.) The central plot is about an Englishwoman who gets off on the wrong foot with the ultimate object of her affection - guess who? Could it be an extremely wealthy landowning aristocrat who is at first cold but, over time, becomes completely smitten with our heroine? Why yes, it could! It is essentially a well-written and occassionally witty romance novel. Oh sure, now and then there’s the social commentary delivered in droll fashion (though I would certainly never describe it as “hysterically funny”; I’d go more for “unevenly amusing”), but essentially it’s a standard female fantasy about a young girl being swept away by a suitably manly rich guy. If it were written today it would be published by Harlequin Press - after the mandatory addition of a rape scene and the phrase “heaving alabaster bosom”. This book came out, by the way, in 1812 - Britain was at the height of the wars with Napoleon as well as that little misunderstanding with the United States. The course of western civilization was being set. The legacy of the French revolution was being decided. The Britons that Austen writes of were at the heart of this. Republicanism? Monarchy? Enlightenment? The Industrial Revolution? Authors must pick their themes, and what possibilities! Yes, yes, let’s read about whether this little chit manages to marry an aristocrat or not.
I reread the thing last year, and while it wasn’t as tedious as I remember from when I was a kid, it still didn’t do it for me. I understand that a lot of woman are taken with the social mores and frilly dresses of Victorian England for some reason, and that novels whose tension arises from the anal niceties of 19th century British manners are considered the pinnacle of the storyteller’s craft by some, but I look for something with a little more scope in my literature, and a little less blushing in my mindless read-for-fun trash.

37

Public school, high school class of 1987 here (seem to be a few of us)

The content of my education was fine. We had a good selection of AP courses. The thing that really gets my goat more than 10 years later is the ATTITUDE of the teachers. Again, this is public high school, not a private or college prep situation … we had teachers who would hand back assignments and say things like “This paper isn’t bad, Mary, if you PLAN TO WORK AT K-MART FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE.” Of course the whole class would snicker.

This was said as if working at K-Mart was akin to being a career criminal. Was this supposed to be motivational? Looking back, I wonder how the kids whose parents worked at K-Mart felt about these charming motivational bon mots. Other threats included “pumping gas” and “going to community college.”

Success was always measured in terms of your financial future, and career choice. At no time did anyone stress the joy of learning something, or the improved quality of one’s inner life. Yes, one of the goals of education is to increase your access to higher learning and choice of career, but come on! Shouldn’t this sort of advice come in career counseling, and not from snotty little one-liners?

It’s amazing how steamed I got while just writing this post. I guess those people who simply like learning for the sake of learning grow up to read the Straight Dope boards …

38

Norm,

your English is obviously excellent, better than that of most other Dopers, most of whom are probably American!

I studied German for years myself, and became quite good at it, but here in America there’s really no chance to keep up with it.

39

Damn! Where did you people go to school? You should ask for your money back.
I went to parochial (Catholic) school for 8 years, followed by four years at the public high school. This was 1960-1972. I think I got a better education than most of you writing in did.

Grammar school was particularly good at – well-- grammar. We also had a first-rate math education, although they didn’t cover enough for me. I used to hang out outside the high school window algebra class because it was so far beyond what we were getting, and I wanted more.

In my Freshman high school English class we read the Robert Fotzgerald translation of the Odyssey all the way through, along with A Tale of Two Cities and Hard Times by Charles Dickens. We also read Sophocles’ Antigone, and assorted other high-brow stuff. I had a pretty good set of courses in science and history and math. My senior year we were allowed to choose “elective” courses in history and english – I took mythology (Hey, you never know – you might get to write a book about it!) and Shakespeare for English. My Senior Calculus course was good enough that, with a little private summertime study, I was able to advance place out of my first term of Calculus at MIT.
I should point out that my town wasn’t particularly rich. We were a blue-collar suburb that envied the town next door, which had the tax revenue from a LOT of shopping centers. Even so, I think I received an excellent education. Have the standards come down since?

40

Class of '72 grad here.

Eight years of Catholic school gave me an excellent foundation in grammar, spelling, composition, basic mathematics, and passable study skills.

Moving into public high school was my downfall - I aced most things with minimal effort, losing all those hard-won study skills. However, I was lucky enough to have excellent algebra and geometry teachers, the BEST Physics teacher in the world, and great French and Spanish teachers. English was too easy - I recall doing things in senior year that I’d learned in 5th grade. Social studies were endured and forgotten. I try not to think about Home Ec and PE.

Sadly, my guidance counselor didn’t note that I had such a high math and science aptitude, so I was not steered into a more challenging curriculum, and I wound up dropping out of college after my first year and enlisting in the Navy. THAT’S where I was able to shed the notion of “girl jobs” and learn electronics, and then engineering. Made me what I am today! :smiley: