So, in other words, less STEM, and more gender studies.GrumpyCatFace wrote:Enough for the opportunity to absorb some culture and perspective on human life. I'd prefer more focus on history/art/science... pretty much anything to a useless and easily forgotten math skill.Okeefenokee wrote:do burger flippers need to know about the battle of new orleans? should we remove history from school, too? how far are we going to gut education before we get it close enough to the minimum needed by the lowest rungs of society to satisfy you?GrumpyCatFace wrote:
Right, and I admitted that I misunderstood the article.
However, I am wondering what use any of that is in a highschool education. It seems completely unnecessary. If you're going to use it, great, but that's not going to happen without a degree anyway.
One thing I love about my engineering professor, the head of the department, is that all of it, to him, is about national strength. He's a Mexican dude from California. His favorite project was working to develop the Marine Corps hovercraft, which involved creating the military GPS satellite array. He views all of his work as part of the effort to maintain American dominance.
A young dude yesterday brought up Newton during class. He had some naive questions about the wonder of knowledge. The professor cut him off. He said Newton's work, and the work of many other British scientists, was funded by the government, not because of any hippy dippy feelgood crap, but because Britain was a world power, and wanted to keep it that way.
If you were to tell him that the focus of education should be to increase cultural awareness and perspective on human life, he'd laugh in your face.
It's the height of ignorance to think that what is important for a nation is more knowledge and understanding of the people who have less than you, want what you have, and would take it from you in a heartbeat, if given the chance. You talk about the bare necessity of what a person should know. That is the bare necessity. The simple understanding that the sole global power, having more than any other nation in the history of the planet, better be able to defend it.
You don't defend it with lectures on Chaucer and gender studies.
The baseline bottom rung of what people should be taught in primary school is that the fact that they can go to school depends on not being run over by whatever menacing horde might appear on the horizon tomorrow. After you've established that, you seek out the best minds who can make sure that doesn't happen. Only after you've established dominance in that field can you entertain ideas about wasting human capital on liberal arts degrees.
