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From: phil@unisoft.UUCP (Phil Ronzone)
Newsgroups: net.flame,net.politics
Subject: Re: (long) The Great Educational Debate
Message-ID: <251@unisoft.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 10-Apr-84 14:51:36 EST
Article-I.D.: unisoft.251
Posted: Tue Apr 10 14:51:36 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 12-Apr-84 04:11:01 EST
References: <381@hogpc.UUCP>
Organization: UniSoft Corp., Berkeley
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The responses to flaming on student loans/education show that I
was not clear enough -- the disagreements to some points in my flame
are ones that I mostly agree with -- hence I was not clear.

To re-flame (more explicitly):

1). I am against Federal/State/local funding,
    direct or indirect, of students or schools.
    All schools, kindergarten through college.

2). Many arguments for this kind of government
    funding use as an argument the need to train
    the ``techies'' of the future. I attack this
    argument by asking the user of it why don't
    we have Institute of Technologies that teach
    nothing but technology? Since most users of
    this argument want `well rounded'' education,
    this sometimes stops them. Since I believe
    all education should be funded by the individual,
    this is really not an issue one way or another.

3). My statement:
    ``I personally gave up all remaining vestiges of faith
      in our "higher" educational system when I saw a UCLA
      history course use as the course book one that compared
      Angela Davis to Thomas Paine.''
    Elicited the response:
    ``Not all history books or (insert your favorite course) texts can be
      masterpieces of educational literature.  Most all, I hope, are
      written by very human authors who have their own opinions, some
      of which may differ from the collective mass opinion......''
      from Rick Paul.
    True -- but (in my value and belief systems) equating Angela Davis
    with Thomas Paine is akin to seeing an ungraduate geology book
    used by a college that asserts that the world is flat. First I
    think it's a joke, then when I realize they are serious, it's
    disgust and horror time.

4). I believe that people respect most the things that
    they've worked hardest for. Thus, the Mommy and Daddy
    pays the bill students tend to learn less, screw off
    more etc. It delays the life lesson of TANSTAAFL.
    (There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch, Robert Heinlein).
    I really like the way Rick Paul put it: ``As a side note,
    after having lived with people whose parents were putting them through
    college, I think that it should be illegal for colleges to accept
    checks signed "Mommy and Daddy". :-)  As a group, those people seem to
    be the worst students, the most annoying in the dorms (stereos blasting
    at all hours, drunk or stoned a good part of the time, etc.), and, in
    general, the greatest thorn in the side of serious students.''

4). Most schools/teachers don't teach. I find they don't even
    get the facts straight. My statement:
      I really tired (what am I, Marvin??) of "rounded" college
      grads that don't know why the Japanese attacked us at Pearl
      Harbor, when the Great Depression was, what the Bay of Pigs
      means, when the transistor was invented, who the current
      leader of the Soviet Union/the UK/West Germany/France, or
      even who our own VP is -- oh shit or ANYTHING!
    was intended to state that not only do the students not
    know why (thinking), but don't even know what/when (facts).

    Let me restate:
    For a ``well rounded'' CS grad, I would expect them to be able
    to discuss, in depth, the following items:
    A). Why did the Japanese attack Pearl harbor?
        a- The US, with the UK and the Dutch, had been restricting
           raw materials, especially steel and oil, to the Japanese.
           The restrictions were due, in part, to the militaristic
           actions (as in Soviet Union in Afghanistan) in China.
           These restrictions left the Japanese navy with about 3
           months fuel oil as of Nov-41, and so other sources of
           oil. The Japanese strategy was to attack quick, grab
           the parts of Asia they needed, and count on the US
           being unwilling to go to war in the near future with
           a damaged fleet over a bunch of territory in Asia.
           The Japanese figured they would then build up and
           be strong enough to discourage the US from war when
           the fleet was rebuilt.

    B). Describe the invention of the transistor and the
        evolution to the integrated circuit. 
        a - Big subject, but expect mention of Bardeen and
            Shockley, the founding of Schockley Labs (and
            WHY it failed), Noyce and the others at
            Shockley Labs, the Fairchild and TI migrations,
            Kilby and the precedence fight over the IC patents,
            Esaki, the IBM SLT designs and WHY instead of IC',
            why plated wire memory looked so good, why it never
            caught on, IBM and NMOS .vs. the world and PMOS ....

And last, I think that the Federal funding of schools
is like the Federal funding of letter delivery -- both
cause ricing prices for declining products.

Have fun, Phil Ronzone.