best college class yet....

I have found that most of the college courses I have taken are not terribly practical. However, one that I thought would be totally useless (and may have been had I not gotten a genuinely good instructor) is Speech. I have learned so much from this course, things that I can apply every day!

I also just discovered StoryCorps because of this class. We were assigned to listen to 3 stories and write a very brief synopsis. These stories are only about 3 minutes each, but I have been on the site for about an hour listening to the stories that have been shared.

If stuff like that interests you, check it out! It is so neat!

Here's to future semesters with classes that may be practical for every day life

As a graduate student, I can honestly say that MOST college courses are things you could teach yourself in 2 weeks at a library or online for free.

The world has drastically changed, and information is abundant at your fingertips at no charge.

To be entirely honest, I have been to 2 different colleges for a total of 5 semesters, and after all this money and time I feel that my daily research on certain subjects yields more knowledge than my momths of studying for classes. I would like to point out that I have a 3.89 GPA, never missed a class, and I am a member of several different clubs as well as do volunteer service each week and undergraduate research wih a professor. This entire semester I have continually felt an increase in enlightenment that all of this stuff is no real help except for my personal research and the undergrad research. I feel that I have wasted my parents money and my time with all of this college. I would be better off working and learning on my own than staying here another day yet I am still here. Why? I don't know I guess it is culture, pressure, and fear. I think college is a huge waste of time for those who teach themselves. Those students who are the ones that insist on taking so many classes and doing a bunch of activities and continually make As as well as barely study.

College is for those who need structure and for those who just don't know what they want to do in life. Sadly you still need college to become a doctor or whatever else. I mean hell it's even more sad that you still need a Phd to do major research in the biology fields. There are teenagers who are discovering amazing things all because they had an interest and pursued it and no rules or regulations held them back.

I can not express anymore how awful I think college is. Just a waste of time and an institution for indoctrination, yet I write this in the middle of my Ecology class...(pointless class btw yet required for a biotech major). I won't drop out tomorrow or ever. Ironically as much as I hate this place, I can't seem to leave it. I guess I'm just like the wife that can't seem to leave that husband who continually beats her.

a reply to: chelsdh

a reply to: Nosollar

If you needed a surgery... would you go to a hospital to get treated with a licensed Heart Surgeon who went through college, medical school, residency and a fellowship training or someone who "researched" in the internet for decades on how to do surgery?

I agree that we can learn a lot in the internet and other places outside of school. But we all need to go to college to get a diploma and show that we learned and are qualified to do a certain job.

The system works and thankfully we have it because it would be worse if it wasn't that way. There was a story of a fake doctor that had a fake diploma from a fake school that told a mother that her daughter did not need to take a medicine that was prescribed by a licensed doctor. The girl died soon after.

Sadly you still need college to become a doctor

Thankfully you still need college and more to become a doctor.

Unfortunately, most undergrad and grad level courses are too theoretical and not nearly enough practical. It's a shame. I know that it left me high and dry graduating from my undergraduate in 2011. Not to mention the # economy.

a reply to: Nosollar

College is, for many professions, just a way to get money from the people. Trade school, that's what needs to come back. Apprenticeship .... Why has that disappeared? not enough money to be made by institutions.

Most of what college is is not applicable for most of us. But, we have to do it. A college degree isn't even worth what it once was, but we still have to have it. It's so frustrating

The point of my thread was to say how I am finally in a class that gives me real world skills. Communicating (even though the class is intro to speech) is not something I would have chosen to research on my own. Through this class, the text, assignments, I have learned so much. I am better at talking to others and understanding better. Chemistry, a & p.... Those havent helped me outside of the classroom.

a reply to: StarGazer77

I'm not in school to learn, I'm there because I need a degree to do what I want to do. Most of my learning is via the Internet, but I still have to pay out the wazoo to take classes that do not even pertain to my intended career. (Elective courses..... )

originally posted by: StarGazer77
As a graduate student, I can honestly say that MOST college courses are things you could teach yourself in 2 weeks at a library or online for free.

The world has drastically changed, and information is abundant at your fingertips at no charge.

It was the same back in the 1980's. Around 1982, my family bought an Atari 800. With that I learned all about interrupts, assembly language, pointers, player-missile graphics, display lists, display list interrupts, data streaming, data communications with RS232. Our high-school computer studies course just taught 10 line BASIC programs. Then when I started college in 1986, our courses covered Pascal on Desktop PC's, C on UNIX and assembly language on AIM-69's. Later in the decade, when it was possible to custom build a multimedia PC from Adlib Soundblaster and Hercules coprocessor boards, download programming guides from USENET, the college was still using PC's with regular 8-bit VGA boards.

Generally, academics wait until their is industry demand for a particular technology, then they create a course to cover that market. By the time that course is complete, there is mass competition by undergraduates for jobs. When you do a post-graduate degree then you get to play with the current custom technology. But you have to wait ten years or more for it to go mainstream. Then you are back to mass competition. Much like the game industry now - ten years ago, most game companies did their own technology. Now, everyone works with Unity and Unreal.

I think the most eye-opening experience I had in college was in I took a basic course in US History Since 1867 or something like that.

Our professor was African American and turned it into a total racial/progressive lens experience. I was taking reams of notes so I requested a tutor through the athletic department and received an older Vietnam vet with very conservative leanings. I proceeded to learn that history looks a lot different depending on who is teaching it to you that semester!

a reply to: stormcell

What's worse is the only way to get any hands-on, practical experience in college is thru a good internship, which were brutally hard to get and keep. I couldn't get one, and I busted my balls fighting for it. Of course, now that I am job hunting, everyone wants me to have experience, which I couldn't get because the ball was dropped by my university.

Essentially, graduating from college, I was immediately at a disadvantage for not being able to have an internship.