I'm Getting old

Orpheo

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My girlfriend is some years younger than I am, and so is my sister, and all the friends of my girlfriend are younger than me, ofcourse. I'm in university, and she is doing her final exams of high school. In my university they're complaining that the level of high school education not high enough is, and that they have to make the curriculum easier. Well, I find the curriculum already a laugh, and my sister finds it ok, but not supereasy. My girlfriend is REALLY struggling to get the grades sufficient enough to get her degree. I find myself thinking, girlie, if this is already so hard, don't go to university, thats even harder!!! its not just my girlfriend, all of her friends are finding it superhard. And I have seen some of the questions. its not really that hard, in my opinion.

In days like this I feel ancient. I am smart, but not a genius or whatever. but is it likely that I am so much smarter, or that they are so much more stupid, or that the level of education is on a slippery slope?

For instance, their education in English is just poor. Sure, I make a ton of mistakes while writing here, but their level is even lower. In my days we had to read at least one book by DIckens, and we had daily vocabulary tests. Nowadays they can put 'Harry Potter' on the reading list, Dickens isn't mandatory, and vocabulary?! No man, lets just use Google Translate.

wtf?!
 
Well there goes me thinking you were fourty or something  :doh:
Anyways, yeah education is on a slippery slope, far as im concerned, #
here in england my year group and some of the one under ours was the last year that actually could learn anything,
now they all seem to do F all in school, and most of the time there understanding of there own language is abismal  :sad:

Im in university too, hopefully just passed my retake of first year, failed first time round due to personal circumstances.
But know its just going to get harder, but ready for whatever they throw at me,
but the amount of people this retake year from the year below that dropped out is abismal aswell.

Grumpy rant over  :)

P.s, I have trouble with there and their, case you wonder if i put the wrong one  :tard:
 
Oprh are you kidding?  Your English is excellent.  
I'm sad to say that your English far better than what hear/read from our youngsters over here (in England!!!), and English is not even your native language.

I don't know if our education systems are dumbing down the curriculum to make it seem like more people can pass their exams and get the grades, but it certainly seems like some kids  these days don't try as hard as perhaps they should or could. (i'm not saying all kids are like this, I know many kids are very dedicated and really want to do well).

In some ways it's the fact that our Political Correctness has gone too far, in as much as we are not allowed to reprimand children (I don't mean physically, of course) when they fail to put in the effort.  Since there are no consequences for them if they don't try, then why should they try.  

Are we just allowing our youth to become lazy?

 
You guys are a bunch of grumpy old men!  People were complaining about the dumbing down of the education system when I was in high school, er, some years ago.

I don't think the kids are any different.  and I don't think that school is much different either.  There are smart people and stupid people and people who don't know how easy they have it and complain just because.  And some will never learn much about life and complain until they are old about how hard things are.  These are the ones who buy lottery tickets each day and hope  :dontknow:  They have always been there and will always be there.

The trick is to be the guy in charge of the lottery  :eek:ccasion14:

 
Like the great American philosopher Frank Zappa once said, " Some peoples hot, and some peoples cold, and some peoples not very swift to behold"
 
Orpheo,
there is a reason why your relationship would be illegal on this side of the pond!!!  :icon_biggrin: :icon_biggrin:

(wat doet ze? MAVO? HAVO? VWO?)
 
mayfly said:
You guys are a bunch of grumpy old men!  People were complaining about the dumbing down of the education system when I was in high school, er, some years ago.

I don't think the kids are any different.  and I don't think that school is much different either.  There are smart people and stupid people and people who don't know how easy they have it and complain just because.  And some will never learn much about life and complain until they are old about how hard things are.  These are the ones who buy lottery tickets each day and hope  :dontknow:  They have always been there and will always be there.

The trick is to be the guy in charge of the lottery  :eek:ccasion14:

Most of what you say is true, but you're blessed with living in Canada. The case is much different here in the States. The HS graduation rate is about 68%, and the only reason it's that high is because all you need to graduate these days is a pulse. Doesn't even have to be steady, as long as your body temperature hovers around 98-99 degrees. Kids may not be stupid, but they're woefully under-educated and their critical thinking skills are all but non-existent. Few know what research is, let alone how to do it, so as a result they wait to be told what to believe and rarely require any proof. How do you think Obama got elected?
 
Marko said:
Orpheo,
there is a reason why your relationship would be illegal on this side of the pond!!!  :icon_biggrin: :icon_biggrin:

(wat doet ze? MAVO? HAVO? VWO?)

Well look, from the I.T. Crowd, it's Mr. Peter File himself! 

tve67818-20070914-1842.jpg
 
It's not necessarily book smarts that have taken a dive, it's common sense and wisdom that have.

Couple that with a tendency to not reprimand/correct people (like someone here mentioned), and you've got a serious outbreak of dumbass.

And that's exactly what we're suffering through ATM.
 
well, my 2c is that they cram the book smarts altogether too much, along with medicating kids who "can't concentrate in a classroom". I've never been examined, but I'm pretty sure I have ADD or something along those lines. Facts and textbooks and random scientific rules and equations take me hours to memorize, and once I'm done with the test they're on, I've forgotten them. Thank goodness my parents homeshcooled me. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying the US school systems are horrible. For many kids they work quite well. My issue comes with when they expect everyone's learning style to be the same. Heck, 80% of my school I didn't even know was school at the time! Science for me was walking out in the woods, gardening, building my Lego robots, etc. We would go on "vacation" up to Northern Minnesota (insert Pat Donohue's song here). School was anything but sitting still at a desk (something I still cannot do even in college).
 
Cagey said:
mayfly said:
You guys are a bunch of grumpy old men!   People were complaining about the dumbing down of the education system when I was in high school, er, some years ago.

I don't think the kids are any different.  and I don't think that school is much different either.  There are smart people and stupid people and people who don't know how easy they have it and complain just because.  And some will never learn much about life and complain until they are old about how hard things are.  These are the ones who buy lottery tickets each day and hope  :dontknow:  They have always been there and will always be there.

The trick is to be the guy in charge of the lottery  :eek:ccasion14:

Most of what you say is true, but you're blessed with living in Canada. The case is much different here in the States. The HS graduation rate is about 68%, and the only reason it's that high is because all you need to graduate these days is a pulse. Doesn't even have to be steady, as long as your body temperature hovers around 98-99 degrees. Kids may not be stupid, but they're woefully under-educated and their critical thinking skills are all but non-existent. Few know what research is, let alone how to do it, so as a result they wait to be told what to believe and rarely require any proof. How do you think Obama got elected?

* Politics:  As a subject, politics is as controversial as you can get. Posts dedicated to this topic often get heated and burn up a lot of moderator time. We don't want to moderate politics, we want a guitar parts forum. Threads dedicated to politics will be deleted without warning and that posting member likely banned. Hijacking a thread with political comments can also result in that thread being deleted and the offending member being banned from this board.

This rule doesn't apply to Cagey because he can drop his political comments at will (and does). You can guarantee if I answered his Obama question I would  have people jumpin my shitee and warning me about politics.
 
pabloman said:
Cagey said:
mayfly said:
You guys are a bunch of grumpy old men!   People were complaining about the dumbing down of the education system when I was in high school, er, some years ago.

I don't think the kids are any different.  and I don't think that school is much different either.  There are smart people and stupid people and people who don't know how easy they have it and complain just because.  And some will never learn much about life and complain until they are old about how hard things are.  These are the ones who buy lottery tickets each day and hope  :dontknow:  They have always been there and will always be there.

The trick is to be the guy in charge of the lottery  :eek:ccasion14:

Most of what you say is true, but you're blessed with living in Canada. The case is much different here in the States. The HS graduation rate is about 68%, and the only reason it's that high is because all you need to graduate these days is a pulse. Doesn't even have to be steady, as long as your body temperature hovers around 98-99 degrees. Kids may not be stupid, but they're woefully under-educated and their critical thinking skills are all but non-existent. Few know what research is, let alone how to do it, so as a result they wait to be told what to believe and rarely require any proof. How do you think Obama got elected?

* Politics:  As a subject, politics is as controversial as you can get. Posts dedicated to this topic often get heated and burn up a lot of moderator time. We don't want to moderate politics, we want a guitar parts forum. Threads dedicated to politics will be deleted without warning and that posting member likely banned. Hijacking a thread with political comments can also result in that thread being deleted and the offending member being banned from this board.

This rule doesn't apply to Cagey because he can drop his political comments at will (and does). You can guarantee if I answered his Obama question I would  have people jumpin my shiteee and warning me about politics.

Good point, but you are not a moderator, if they feel they need to take action they will, otherwise who gives a flying F*ck monkey.
 
Correct I am not a moderator, that is why I chose not to warn him or address him or jump on a soapbox or anything else.Beside this forum has enough junior moderators as it is. I don't need to be one of them. My comment was more to point something out than anything else. Truth be told I am not opposed to political conversation. And I don't know anyone that has flying monkees and if they did I'm not sure they would part with them anyway :dontknow:
 
Thanks for taking the high road and ignoring it instead of making a big deal over nothing.

oh, that's the opposite of what happened.
 
It's only a big deal if people chime in with a self rightous attitude and keep it going. Otherwise it's just an observation with an opinion. If you choose to make a condescending comment to a comment I made that you felt was unnecessary how does that make you any better or different than me?
 
KIDS THESE DAYS!

The educational system may have flaws, but honestly, guys... the main issue is the kids. Yes, there are other problems, but the biggest one is that the kids don't care. I don't care much, but I make sure to do my work, and do it well. I've been lucky enough for that to be all I needed so far, but I'm going into college in about 3 months, so we'll see how that change affects me. 
That being said, it's probably been the kids always, even back in your day.
 
I have a feeling that it's much to do with the entertainment society we've built for ourselves. School isn't entertaining (not if we're honest), and kids being kids have a tendency to choose the path of least resistance. I'm kind of happy I didn't grow up with a computer as a given source of distraction and easy access to easy answers...
 
Super Nigerian Turbo Deluxe Custom said:
The political thing, read it, ignored it.

Me too.  Used the mental filter.

Just an observation here:  We've had a German exchange student living with us since last September.  He's spending a year with us and going to high school.  His grades?? Straight A's in everything, including English and American History.  It has been a walk in the park for him because he came over knowing how to study and apply himself.  That's something his parents instilled in him.  His parents set the expectations and taught him how to study.  (And we hold him and our son to those expectations as well!)

Orpheo, you're not old.... just getting a little wiser and your eyes are opened to the world.
 
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