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From: Rich <rich@example.invalid>
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: Schneier, Data and Goliath: no hope for privacy
Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2025 17:54:47 -0000 (UTC)
Organization: A noiseless patient Spider
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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).