[lbo-talk] A Modest Proposal (Re: America No. 1?)

Yoshie Furuhashi furuhashi.1 at osu.edu
Sat Mar 5 12:34:13 PST 2005


"Mark Lause" <MLause at cinci.rr.com>, Sat, 5 Mar 2005 03:55:42 -0500:
>One has to take poll results with very great skepticism. Asked
>about their beliefs, people tend to respond in a way they feel is
>expected. Most Bush voters described themselves as churchgoers, but
>church attendance is nowhere that big. Belief in God, angels, etc.
>are seen as social conventions and treated as such.
<snip>
>At one point in my long career as a adjunct brasero, I found myself
>in hot water for giving a student an "F" on an essay in which she
>explained how Columbus had mistreated the Indians by taking them to
>America. She appealed the grade on the grounds that she had
>mentioned Columbus, Indians, and the former's "mistreatment" of the
>latter. The administrators also made it clear to me that they
>agreed that it was unfair for the student's ignorance of history to
>burden her quest for a degree.... I have scores of these kinds of
>anecdotes, all reflecting what seems to me to be the institutional
>nature of the problem.

Sometimes, though, I think that education might actually improve if it was sold on the model of tropical cruises. Students or parents or the government pays for degrees (paid in a lump sum or installments), depending on students' financial statuses. The payment guarantees a degree, regardless of how many or how few courses a student takes (it's like a tourist paying for the entire cruise package regardless of how many meals she actually consumes). And absolutely no grading. The only requirement for students is that they are NOT allowed to work for wages while in college (the government pays modest but adequate living stipends to all students who need them), for a minimum of four years, the main point being to take young people out of the labor market (which, like old age pensions that allow workers to retire, should have a happy effect of forcing real wages up) and give them completely free time to do what they want. Naturally, only students who are truly motivated to study, for their burning love of knowledge, show up in your class. Students are happy -- some just carouse, many date and mate, a select few study hard (because they love to!), and yet others do politics full-time. Teachers are ecstatic -- no deadwood in a classroom! :-> -- Yoshie

* Critical Montages: <http://montages.blogspot.com/> * Greens for Nader: <http://greensfornader.net/> * Bring Them Home Now! <http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/> * OSU-GESO: <http://www.osu-geso.org/> * Calendars of Events in Columbus: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/calendar.html>, <http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php>, & <http://www.cpanews.org/> * Student International Forum: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/> * Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/> * Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio> * Solidarity: <http://www.solidarity-us.org/>



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