Re: Schneier, Data and Goliath: no hope for privacy

D <nospam@example.net> wrote:

 
 
On Sun, 23 Feb 2025, Salvador Mirzo wrote:
 

This is very interesting!  What was it that the student thought was
crazy complicated compared with git?

>
Not compared to git.  They did not get to see git.  They just hated
fossil to the point of almost giving up on the whole course
altogether.  Very likely they knew that other courses would give
them the same credits and they could try it afresh on the next
semester.

 
Ahh, got it!  Yes, sadly this happens to me as well.  At the
slightest hint of difficulty or effort, about 20% of the class riots,
complains to the school that the teacher is evil, that the difficulty
level should be lowered etc.

The result of 20+ years of "everyone gets a participation trophy, and
no winners are declared" parenting.....

They do not realize, that the only ones they are cheating by doing
that are themselves.

They lack the wisdom that comes with age to recognize this fact.  Some
of them will wise up early enough to be able to succeed.  The rest will
be set for "table waitress with master's degree" careers.

The sad thing is that business owners (including myself) have noted a
dramatic drop in skill from graduates over the past 3-4 years.  One
reason is that the government has changed the funding of the schools,
rewarding schools that pass all students.  So of course, the schools
pass all students, since it means more money for them (they are paid
by the government upon graduation) and you get the situation where
awful students graduate, and now, where companies no longer hire
them.

Pass them all along has been more the norm here in the US for a quite
long time, as it is easier to just push them up (then out) than it is
to actually try to devote the time to find out how to educate them. 
The result is huge numbers of table waitresses with master's degrees.

Usually in order to buck the trend somewhat, I make my first course
more difficult in order to get rid of the unmotivated ones.  If I
don't have the first course of the semester, the following 1-2 are
pure hell, since the bad ones remain and complain about everything,
but after 1-2 semesters they usually quit.  It is just sad that I
could not make them realize this after 3 weeks, and instead they
waste 1-2 semesters.  But such is life.

Provided you can withstand the heat, this is the best option.  Clear
out the ones unfit as early as possible.  I still remember the carnage
of the freshman Engineering courses when I went through.  Began with
120+ students per lecture.  End of each of both semeters could see the
shrinkage.  Start of second year and more than half were no longer
anywhere to be seen in the courses.  Sadly, I can only imagine what
kind of complaints would be going to the dean's office now 40 years
later for such carniage in the first year.

This experience gave me the following feeling---they ask for
real-world, pratical experience, but they're not up to an
introduction to the tools used in the real-world.

 
True.  But from time to time it is fun to see when they really "get"
the terminal.  It's such an eye opening experience for them, and
they, themselves become completely amazed at what they can do with a
computer all of a sudden!  One guy told me he had no idea and it was
amazing the day he understood the terminal concept.  He went on to
become a rock star!  Those students are what makes it worth it for
me.

And he was someone who *should* have been in that course.  Many of the
others were likely only present because they had been told the degree
was a magic paper towards a big salary (while omitting that they have
to know what the F they are doing for the magic paper to gain them the
big salary).