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Generalised testing is FUN, you get to sit in a cold room and wrack your brain for information. BS skills are a must for any generalized test. I had no idea what the differences between renaissance and reformation art besides who funded each and what the art topics were. I managed to get a 4 on the exam after making two concepts a full page paper.

Oh, with testing out of classes. Some schools offer AP classes which offer college credits and if you get a 3 or higher you get college credits for the class. For example: I don't need to take any english, history, or basic math thanks to college credits.

halonachos wrote:Generalised testing is FUN, you get to sit in a cold room and wrack your brain for information. BS skills are a must for any generalized test. I had no idea what the differences between renaissance and reformation art besides who funded each and what the art topics were. I managed to get a 4 on the exam after making two concepts a full page paper.

Wussy, back in my day we had to take the tests by torchligh while we fought off the zombie dinosaurs and sabre toothed jackalopes. Of course back then the tests were simpler.

"Noog has two rocks and a stick. How many rocks would it take to bash Grog's brain in and steal his woman? Use examples."

And of course the short answer portion wasn't too bad.
"What is the history of the world? Be specific."

Frazzled wrote:Wussy, back in my day we had to take the tests by torchligh while we fought off the zombie dinosaurs and sabre toothed jackalopes. Of course back then the tests were simpler.

"Noog has two rocks and a stick. How many rocks would it take to bash Grog's brain in and steal his woman? Use examples."

And of course the short answer portion wasn't too bad.
"What is the history of the world? Be specific."

Pft, you flashy youngsters and your language. Back in my day you were lucky enough just to have two rocks and a stick, let alone be able to write about them!

Ho Ho!
Yep, remember when we all decided to stand upright?

Should have never caught on in my view. Damn youngsters!

Persephone 66 wrote:

dogma wrote:The SAT and ACT are increasingly regarded as irrelevant by college admission boards.

Whether that's good or bad depends on how well you tend to test.

I've studied at 3 different colleges, earned a bachelors, on my way to a second bachelors, never took the SAT or ACT.

Look at the face in the avatar. It's a trap.

I returned to education last year, after a 12-year, ahem, 'break' and let me tell you - life fething sucks if you don't have a formal education! It just limits your possibilities and anyone who says otherwise is just kidding themselves. Yeah, it was fun to go touring around the country with my band - we came close to getting a record deal on several occasions - but earning £5 an hour in random crappy jobs for 9 years was NOT fun.
Long story short - I'm now studying for a degree in music. It's difficult but I love it.
It's never too late to stop being a loser.

Good for you.

I did the same, returning to university as a mature student to do a management degree.

My cousin left school at 16 with a few O levels, then went to university years later and did a History degree.

Granny always said, "Purty teef and book learnin will only git yis so far in life." You Europeans should realize that University in the United States is remarkably similar to secondary school for you. American university students do homework much the same way as their younger peers in elementary (primary) school. It's very strange. For the Americans you should realize that in Europe you typically have one two-hour exam at the end of the semester to determine your entire grade for the course. It's a wonderous thing.

olympia wrote: For the Americans you should realize that in Europe you typically have one two-hour exam at the end of the semester to determine your entire grade for the course. It's a wonderous thing.

Bugger that. I had that in law school. Head and shoulder sthe most stupid way to grade someone in the history of grading.

Frazz, for graduate-level classes, I'm not so sure. The final exam is kind of a "so did you get it or not" as opposed to making you jump through hoops all semester.

Of course, the fairly significant catch here is whether the exam is truly representative of the coursework. So I'll concede that point ahead of time.

gorgon wrote:Frazz, for graduate-level classes, I'm not so sure. The final exam is kind of a "so did you get it or not" as opposed to making you jump through hoops all semester.

Of course, the fairly significant catch here is whether the exam is truly representative of the coursework. So I'll concede that point ahead of time.

Or how are you feeling that day

Or how is the prof feeling when he looks at your paper

Our tests were sometime just two or three essay questions. Screw one and you're ed.

olympia wrote: For the Americans you should realize that in Europe you typically have one two-hour exam at the end of the semester to determine your entire grade for the course. It's a wonderous thing.

If you go to a private university/college in America this is usually how it works as well; assuming you have exams. Often times your grade is based on 1 or 2 papers; usually a research paper, or a research paper and proposal. If the teachers are nice they'll derive 10-25% of the from reflection essays or informational tests, but that's pretty rare.

The exceptions are the hard sciences, which tend to be pretty uniform: 80% of your grade tied up in mid-terms/finals, and the remaining 20% based on sectional tests.

It depends on the degree as well.

Hard science classes typically had a lot of hard science type questions and absolutes with mutliple tests etc. whereas the softy stuff tended more towards touchy feely essay and lame projects. My grad stuff was typically annoying project/plan and a couple of tests. Law school courses were usually one test or a a research item depending on what the specific course was. I did see one student get kicked out of the class second year because they weren't prepared to discuss a case, but no one voluntarily picked that male genitalia of a human being to start with.

Frazzled wrote: whereas the softy stuff tended more towards touchy feely essay and lame projects.

I imagine that the softer subjects have changed a lot since you were in school. Many of them trade so heavily in statistics and economics that they're often just applied version of those departments The exception is usually Gender Studies, which is basically what philosophy was in your day. Philosophy these days is so heavily reliant on formal logic that its basically math with different symbols, and a greater emphasis on theory.

Frazzled wrote:
I did see one student get kicked out of the class second year because they weren't prepared to discuss a case, but no one voluntarily picked that male genitalia of a human being to start with.

The prof. or the student?

dogma wrote:

Frazzled wrote: whereas the softy stuff tended more towards touchy feely essay and lame projects.

I imagine that the softer subjects have changed a lot since you were in school. Many of them trade so heavily in statistics and economics that they're often just applied version of those departments The exception is usually Gender Studies, which is basically what philosophy was in your day. Philosophy these days is so heavily reliant on formal logic that its basically math with different symbols, and a greater emphasis on theory.

Two parts, you have the softer courses that are not math based (management for example) then you had the "soft" courses-literature or other such. If you used numbers in the college of liberal you get blank stares, just as if you used touchy feely words in the school of accounting.

I wouldn't know anything about gender studies courses. I only took one thing like that, and sobriety was not an option at that point.

Frazzled wrote:
I did see one student get kicked out of the class second year because they weren't prepared to discuss a case, but no one voluntarily picked that male genitalia of a human being to start with.

The prof. or the student?

student...

I'm bummed I never got to see anybody thrown out of class in law school. I only was caught unprepared once, and I just copped to it. By that point the prof just moved on.

Of course, by third year nobody was ever prepared.

olympia wrote: For the Americans you should realize that in Europe you typically have one two-hour exam at the end of the semester to determine your entire grade for the course. It's a wonderous thing.

Yeah, if you balls up the final exam you have effectively wasted the last 3 to 4 years of your life. ....makes it interesting though. I still think back to my first final exam.. Monday Morning, 9:00 "Can God commit suicide ?" Discuss."

...good times.



Most of the courses these days have some element of coursework/continual assessment as part of the deal. You can appeal and can, sometimes, wangle a resit but that's quite unusual. There's an ongoing "urban myth" type rumour that goes around every year at exam time about you being given an auto pass if housemate commits suicide/family member dies/ X/Y/unlikely scenario 4 and so on.

Where I work we had a spate a couple of years back of people getting mates to phone in bomb threats to the exam venues after a rumour went round that you got an auto pass in such harrowing circumstances.... amazingly enough , this was in fact complete BS.

Over here we have these kind of infamous exam stories that go round : Japanese student committing suicide in an exam by sticking a pencil in each nostril and pushing them into his brain by slamming his head on the table and many variations on the "The question says "Is this a question ?" and the cool student either just writes "yes" or "is this an answer ?" and scores a first.... hmm.. don't think so.

We did genuinely have a case a good few years back which led to a change in the official polices and rules of the university. A guy handed in his very long and dry and dull PHD thesis, and about 90% of the way through it declared that he had in fact plagiarised X % of the work and demanded to be given a mark of zero. They called him and then he showed them the "rules" for said course where plagiarism was specifically defined as attempting to pass off someones else's work as your own... which of course he hadn't done by admitting it. He threatened to sue either way so, mainly to get rid of him, they gave him the mark he wanted and rewrote the rules for the next year.

Afrikan Blonde wrote:

Persephone 66 wrote:

dogma wrote:The SAT and ACT are increasingly regarded as irrelevant by college admission boards.

Whether that's good or bad depends on how well you tend to test.

I've studied at 3 different colleges, earned a bachelors, on my way to a second bachelors, never took the SAT or ACT.

Look at the face in the avatar. It's a trap.

That's what I say everytime I see your avavtar...

My general theory behind school, and job opportunity is this.

The more adults/immigrants found in minimum wage jobs, the less job opportunity there is in jobs that require degrees. You have to take into account the fact that if teenagers are competing with adults over jobs that are basically considered to be "jobs for teens", there is going to be a massive influx of experienced professionals competing with the total noobs. So you get out of college with massive debt, are forced to pay off some of that debt with credit, which in turn only makes your debt worse. After trying to manage your finances, you have to go out and compete in a terrible job market, only to find that you actually need to eat food and have a roof in that time.

Well... it is not to say that most businesses do not want the most obedient workers possible, but the problem is that the inexperienced college kids cant hold a light to the imported and massively experienced college degrees. Take your pick, do you want A.) College kid with massive debt and a penchant for alcoholism?... or B.) College immigrant with absolutely no goals besides getting that job, keeping that job, and working for much cheaper?

Anyway though... There is work out there, of that I have no doubt. But you are going to be competing in one of the most competitive overall job markets the world has ever seen. When you cannot find work in that market, you inevitably start to compete for the minimum wage jobs, and yet again, you are competing against people that are more obedient, as well as not being "overqualified".

Which way to India? I am pretty sure that there is work there .

Polonius wrote:I'm bummed I never got to see anybody thrown out of class in law school. I only was caught unprepared once, and I just copped to it. By that point the prof just moved on.

Of course, by third year nobody was ever prepared.

2nd year required course. The prof wa a dillweed you only took if the good prof was filled up. You know how it is.

The way to pass exams and degrees is simple.

1. Go to the lectures and keep notes.

2. Prepare for the seminars.

3. Do the required course reading.

4. Read around the subject a bit, especially the stuff the professor adds as optional to the core text. Markers love it when you add in some stuff that wasn't core to the course.

5. Do the homework.

6. Do a proper job on the mid-term exam or essay. It can be 10-15% of the whole course, and some courses give you a pass on 35% of total marks. Get 80% on your essay and you only need scrape together another 30 points out of 100 in the final.

7. Go to the exam preparation extra lectures. That's when they give you a strong hint as to what will be in the paper.

8. Review past papers and see how the selection of questions breaks down with regard to the logical sections of the module.

9. Revise, and review exam technique.

10. Read the rubric. Don't panic.

In other words it is a lot of good old-fashioned hard work.

If you do the work, you are guaranteed to pass unless you are very stupid. And you wouldn't have been accepted into the university if you were very stupid.

I got kicked out of one class in law school. Boy was I pissed. The prof wanted me to recite a case that was cited in the notes. I can see reciting a case in the casebook, but not one in the darn notes where the student actually have to look it up and read the entire case.

Most of my other classes the prof just moves on or he/she will discuss the case.

I didn't learn how to file a lawsuit till third year.

Polonius wrote:I'm bummed I never got to see anybody thrown out of class in law school. I only was caught unprepared once, and I just copped to it. By that point the prof just moved on.

Of course, by third year nobody was ever prepared.

in Europe you typically have one two-hour exam at the end of the semester to determine your entire grade for the course.

Hmm. No.

Only my first year doesn't count towards my overall mark, and the exams only make up about 20% (each) of my overall mark for each year. The rest is made up of a portfolio of compositions, arrangements and performance marks. They then take an average. Some pathways on my course don't even involve a final exam.

I got kicked out of one class in law school. Boy was I pissed. The prof wanted me to recite a case that was cited in the notes. I can see reciting a case in the casebook, but not one in the darn notes where the student actually have to look it up and read the entire case.

You should sue him. Arf!

Albatross wrote:You should sue him. Arf!

You are the man of paper... steel paper, and a steel trap mind... and the, ummm... something train or plane thing. Never mind.

Frazzled wrote:

Polonius wrote:I'm bummed I never got to see anybody thrown out of class in law school. I only was caught unprepared once, and I just copped to it. By that point the prof just moved on.

Of course, by third year nobody was ever prepared.

2nd year required course. The prof wa a dillweed you only took if the good prof was filled up. You know how it is.

Do I ever. There is nothing worse than the "semi core" classes you take later in law school. I took estates and trusts my third year, and I was pretty checked out, and the prof wanted to run it like a first year course.

Third year was weird, watching super A-type people who used to sweat every point and page of required reading blow off assignments and readings. Hell, I had a class where I was supposed to do this big notebook by the end, and I told the prof I wasn't going to do it and I'll just take an F, because I wanted to start prep for the bar. He had me bring what I had, and I ended with a C, but I just didnt' care about my grades anymore.

Overall, I'm not impressed with american puclic education. Most of my highschool/middle school experiance was hearing a bunch of teacher's opinions and propaganda. I learned alot more from my mom's homeschooling than public school. FFS they never mentioned WW2 or WW1 at the schools I went to. They told us the American civil war was about slavery and only slavery. They barely glossed over the huge tariffs the north had on the south, and didn't mention that some confederates believed in the right to secede or didn't want to fight their neighbors. By the time my peers were in their senior year, I was attending my local community college. IMO schools here are crap, (maybe it's just washington state).

When I was in 4th grade through 6th grade, I had a friend from Belgium, who would come stay in the states while his dad did translation related work. He was quad-lingual at age 10, Latin was a required course for him. He knew basic algebra and trig. Belgium seems to do a far better job at teaching their kids. Most of the kids I went to high scchool with could hardly handle a hardy boys novel.

Ok, now the spelling police can critique my post for errors. BTW I have never had to flip burgers in my life, I was in charge of washing dishes. lol

Norwulf wrote:Overall, I'm not impressed with american puclic education. Most of my highschool/middle school experiance was hearing a bunch of teacher's opinions and propaganda. I learned alot more from my mom's homeschooling than public school. FFS they never mentioned WW2 or WW1 at the schools I went to. They told us the American civil war was about slavery and only slavery. They barely glossed over the huge tariffs the north had on the south, and didn't mention that some confederates believed in the right to secede or didn't want to fight their neighbors.
l

I'm curious as to your latter schooling and self directed learning if the number one complaint you had about the public school was a failure to rehash old "lost cause" revisionist history. No, the Civil War was not solely about slavery, but it's naive to see it as anything other than the major factor.

I'm not really trying to call you out, but it sounds like it's possible you swapped one set of propaganda for another.

As for me, I couldn't tell you what we learned in any given history class. I spent the classes reading ahead, and I read pretty broadly as a kid on all manner of subjects.

Basically the sum of what they told us about the civil war in my 8th grade history class was: "the confederates were evil slave driving monsters. The civil war was about freeing slaves." When I got older and started looking into the subject a little more I was really disappointed in what I was told in school. It was much more complicated than what they had taught me, I realized there was alot more going on.
I was also really disappointed that they never went in depth about WW2, because it was an ugly subject. During my entire public school career WW1 was never mentioned. I was curious about the subjects and had to go learn about it myself at the library. It could just be the way my particular state or school district does things, but I felt cheated, when my friend Sten (Belgiun kid) got a more complete education. I have to admit he was much smarter than me.

Middle and high school history does tend to clean up the darker bits of history, but it's not like what you were taught was wrong, per se, just incomplete.

Lincoln was elected as an abolitionist, which was the triggering event that lead to secession. It's more complicated, but I'd agree that the confederates were wrong to support chattel slavery, and calling it evil might be inflammatory, but by today's standard I think it qualifies. And yeah, the war was about freeing slaves. Maybe it became that a little later, but it was a result of the war, probably the largest just ahead of the greatly increased power of the federal government and the lessening of regionalism in the North.

I'm not saying your school wasn't poorly run or anything, but knowing that the civil war was fought over slavery would still place you fairly high on the scale of knowledge of american history.