Things that make you go hmmmmm...

[Raymond]

Originally Posted by M&M Guy

Our assoociation, in IL (same state as JRut), sets aside a meeting to go over the test every year. In IL, we need to complete the Part 1 test (open book), and turn it in by around Nov. 15th. The association meeting is usually before the state deadline. I would say most of the members have already done the test, and most of them already have their grades and answers back by the meeting. We go over each question, and there are discussions on some of the questions.

Is this the meeting where Kurt-Whats-his-Name throws out any questions that can only be answered in old FED casebook rulings and therefore he feels don't apply to the state of Illinois?

[jbduke]

You know, Dan, I see some scary parallels between your charges of "elitist prick," and the way the POTUS recycles the same joke of standing with an advisor with a Ph.D. and saying something like, "I got C's, he got a Ph.D. Look who came out ahead."

BITS is expressing a very legitimate criticism of the disturbing trend in US education towards a test-based standard of education. He has not argued that "knowing stuff" is unimportant. He's argued that limiting the stuff we even try to know to what we think is going to be on the test is not the best way to do things.

He's not naive, and he's not an elitist prick. He recognizes that success, as defined by many people, can be achieved by studying to the test. What he and many others also recognize, though, is how critically deficient many such people are in being able to process and analyze information that comes to them in formats that they were not explicitly prepared for. One of the overarching goals of a liberal arts education is to ground students in the thinking skills necessary so that they don't need to ask whether something's going to be on the test.

Another side of the argument is that good teachers don't ask exam questions that require only a regurgitation of facts, equations, etc. One of the best math professors I had explained his assessment philosophy something like this:

"When an engineer is designing and building a bridge, do you think the contracting agent gives instructions not to consult any notes? Of course not. That doesn't mean, though, that there aren't certain things he or she needs to have memorized in order to conserve time. I don't give 50-minute sit-down exams because there's not a whole lot of useful information I can glean from them. Sure, you might have all of your integrals memorized so that you can run through the small number of problems that I can reasonably expect you to be able to complete in such a short period of time, but so what? I can teach my 8-year-old daughter to memorize patterns just as well as you can. What I want you to be able to do is to be able to think critically, even creatively, to use the concepts you have hopefully learned here, to apply them in ways that you're not necessarily familiar or comfortable with. In order to do that, I have to presnent you with such challenges, and I can't reasonably expect you to do anything productive with them in 50 minutes.

So what's the answer? Take a handful of hard and novel problems home with you after class and bring them back in three or four days. If you haven't been practicing, if you don't have even the most elementary concepts mastered, then the exam, if doable at all, will take you forever, and you'll probably give up. This doesn't mean I'm trying to punish you; quite the contrary. The point of an exam should be to assess a student's progress. Not being able to do a test doesn't mean you're a bad person, or even that you can't do math. It means that you haven't put in whatever effort is necessary for you to get to the level of conceptual competency that is satisfactory to me. It's not necessarily even your fault. It might be mine. I might suck at this. But after looking at your exam, we'll have a better idea of where we are. With traditional exams, I could suck, and you could lack any ability to solve something that broke with the patterns you were accustomed to seeing, but you might be diligent enough to solve all of the problems perfectly and still leave us both in the dark. Useless."

BITS's commentary is simply a call to do better, and I defy you to claim how traditional testing models don't have loads of room for improvement.

[Dan_ref]

Originally Posted by jbduke

BITS's commentary is simply a call to do better, and I defy you to claim how traditional testing models don't have loads of room for improvement.

First I'll thank you for the long article on how things work in college, and in particular engineering undergrad & post grad schools. And especially your explanation of what and how you learn in college is applied in the field of engineering. I certainly had no idea about how all that works, but is sure does seem complicated to me. I'm only exposed to this hi tech gee-whizz stuff when watching "How It Works" on Discovery Channel.

Having vented my sarcasm...your last sentence is kinda my point.

Schools generally are an extraordinarilly artificial place that have very little to do with real life, and higher ed is probably the most artificial. But you don't need to have a college degree to be qualified for something better than garbageman. Ask Bill Gates, Paul Allen, Michael Dell, Larry Ellison, David Geffen, Steve Jobs, Peter Jennings, Harry Truman, Stephen Spielburg, John Glenn, Ted Turner... In 2005 something like 12% of all CEOs in the US did not have a college degree. Something like 1/4 of the Fortune 500 wealthiest don't have college degrees.

I suppose you agree with BITS (and Camron) that these people are life's losers who can't cut anything more mentally challenging than serving up or cleaning off fries.

Sad to be you.

[M&M Guy]

Originally Posted by BadNewsRef

Is this the meeting where Kurt-Whats-his-Name throws out any questions that can only be answered in old FED casebooks rulings he feels don't apply to the state of Illinois?

Kurt doesn't belong to our association.

I may have to defend Kurt-Whats-his-Name a little. He is in charge, at the state level, for boy's basketball. His duties include officiating, but it is not his entire focus. He is also not an official, so it doesn't surprise me that he may have answered Rut's question the way he did. (I mean, after all, how many "real" officials knew the answer?) It did surprise me that he answered it quickly without checking an interpreter, or directly with the Fed.

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by M&M Guy

Kurt doesn't belong to our association.

I may have to defend Kurt-Whats-his-Name a little. He is in charge, at the state level, for boy's basketball. His duties include officiating, but it is not his entire focus. He is also not an official, so it doesn't surprise me that he may have answered Rut's question the way he did. (I mean, after all, how many "real" officials knew the answer?) It did surprise me that he answered it quickly without checking an interpreter, or directly with the Fed.

We have no idea why the interpretation was given. I think it is very presumptuous who he talked to or did not talk to. The NF is a phone call away from the IHSA and we have many people that know people in the NF personally. It is not like no one from the IHSA sits currently on the NF Committee or does not attend NF meetings. I think many want people to believe what they want because he came to a conclusion that did not fit their opinion to a tee.

Peace

[Jurassic Referee]

Originally Posted by Dan_ref

I suppose you agree with BITS (and Camron) that these people are life's losers who can't cut anything more mentally challenging than serving up or cleaning off fries.

Naw, that's the Duke lacrosse team.

Bad Woddy, bad bad Woddy.....

[Dan_ref]

Originally Posted by Jurassic Referee

Naw, that's the Duke lacrosse team.

Bad Woddy, bad bad Woddy.....

Soooo....I called up google on the phone and asked the guy at the other end if he had any cute pictures of "bad dog". He sent me this in the mail...



No biscuits for either of us today...

[Jurassic Referee]

Originally Posted by Dan_ref

Soooo....I called up google on the phone and asked the guy at the other end if he had any cute pictures of "bad dog". He sent me this in the mail...



No biscuits for either of us today...

A French poodle?

Must be 2 male dogs.

Yes, M&M, I know quite well that I'm going to hell.

[M&M Guy]

Originally Posted by JRutledge

We have no idea why the interpretation was given. I think it is very presumptuous who he talked to or did not talk to. The NF is a phone call away from the IHSA and we have many people that know people in the NF personally. It is not like no one from the IHSA sits currently on the NF Committee or does not attend NF meetings. I think many want people to believe what they want because he came to a conclusion that did not fit their opinion to a tee.

Peace

Ok, I'll certainly admit I jumped to a conclusion that he didn't check with anyone regarding the ruling. I was only going by the reasoning Kurt did a quick check of the most recent rule books, and, not finding a specific case, made a decision, just like some of us did on that play. However, since Bob J. found that case ruling, and given that there has been nothing to change that since, I would have to go with that case.

I'm also jumping to the conclusion that if Kurt knew about that case, he would agree.

[M&M Guy]

Originally Posted by Jurassic Referee

Yes, M&M, I know quite well that I'm going to hell.

[zebraman]

Originally Posted by M&M Guy

I'm also jumping to the conclusion that if Kurt knew about that case, he would agree.

Yes, let's give him the benefit of a doubt and assume that's the case. To know the ruling and go against it would not say much for him.

Z

[Nevadaref]

Originally Posted by zebraman

Yes, let's give him the benefit of a doubt and assume that's the case. To know the ruling and go against it would not say much for him.

Z

But that's exactly what he did! Here's a post from the other thread that states just that.

Originally Posted by BayStateRef

I emailed Kurt and gave him all the information, including the 2000-01 Fed interpretation.

His response, in full:

"Thanks for the note. My interpretation is that the correctable error rule is the rule in question and not 4-14-2."

[zebraman]

Originally Posted by Nevadaref

But that's exactly what he did! Here's a post from the other thread that states just that.

By giving him the benefit of the doubt, I am saying that he is so busy that he just brushed through the questions and answered them hurriedly.

However, he is one of the state's chosen interpreters so you would think that he would make the time to put a little time and effort into responses from officials who seek his input.

He is either making up his own rulings or not taking his job as an interpreter seriously and I am not impressed either way.

Z

[jbduke]

You know, Dan, I'm at a near-total loss; but not so much that I can't respond with some snark of my own: maybe if you'd taken a few more courses that focused on reading and writing, you'd be better practiced in how to respond to arguments that are actually made, rather than simply to knock down strawmen and issuing baseless ad hominems. There's nothing in BITS's posts or mine that even implies that we look down our noses at those who perform very important jobs that don't happen to require higher education.

BITS's arguments were about test-focused education, and how much that can short-change students, whether they be students of officiating, food preparation services, or the applied sciences.

Yours is a relatively new (10 years or so) and extremely noxious strain of elitism, brought into vogue, ironically, by a cadre of philistines who have had every educational opportunity availability in this country. What is ironic about these arguments is that they're so often made by people who have advanced, but not terminal degrees. The argument made by these people is one that looks down on those who think there is more to life than figuring out exactly what you have to do to make money in this world, and scoffing at those who think that there might be more to a well-lived life than simply figuring out how to pass the Series 7 exams. What's interesting is that when you invoke those who occupy lesser-skilled positions in the economy to justify your outlook, you do so not do defend such people (whom you secretly look down on), but to attack those whose world view plays on your own intellectual insecurities.

I work with at-risk students, many-if-not-most of whom will be very fortunate if they can spend productive lives working in restaurants or on garbage routes rather than in prison. They don't have any of the advantages that I, and I suspect you had growing up. So don't you dare think for a minute that I'm unaware of those circumstances or that I would ignore them and think less of those who didn't have them.


You and your ilk are, as a general rule, bright and highly educated (which, on one level, makes your position quite silly). But it makes you feel better about yourselves to look down on those with more formal education than you have or who value a different kind of education from the one you got or value. Your strawman is found in your implicit claim that those who support liberal-arts education and those with PhD's look down on those who don't have them. My experience is that there are jerks in every walk of life, occupying every job possible. There are no more ahole PhDs per capita than ahole engineers; so park that argument in the landfill post haste.

[ChuckElias]

Originally Posted by BITS

After all, every society needs people to collect the garbage.

Originally Posted by JRut

The guys that collect the garbage can make a lot of money with great benefits.