<p>@RacinReaver, I’d like to have someone who actually knows what they are talking about. All/Most of the teachers at my High School had degrees in the field they were teaching or in something similar. I don’t want to be taught physics by a teacher that knows nothing about physics, but knows how to “communicate” with the students and “understands” them.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>You mean 25-30 applicants for one teaching position isn’t enough?!?! When schools are having to cut teachers every year, that’s not due to a lack of applicants. It’s due to a lack of states paying their bills!</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Well I guess that depends. I took physics in high school and I took it in college. I learned much more in high school from my physics teacher than I did from both of my college physics professors. He was taught how to get us to actually understand the material; not just do research.</p>
<p>I have to say, I’ve had a couple of teachers that have known their stuff, but been so unenthusiastic about teaching it – or just plain and simple did not seem to know how to communicate ideas to us in an effective way – that it was an absolute nightmare trying to learn the material. I mean, no high school class is going to be so ridiculously complex to teach that a decently competent teacher is not able to fathom the material – especially where I live, in Connecticut, where all teachers must eventually get master’s degrees and a “sixth year” degree (only teachers get these apparently) and, in the case of science classes, have to be individually certified in each class they may be teaching (physics, chem, bio, earth science, or whatever).
I definitely would want a teacher with some ability to communicate and who cares about our success… even if that means they’re not a PhD in supermegaspecial astrophysics or something.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I really wonder if that’s a function of the degree or a function of the person’s own natural teaching abilities. Certainly you’ve had professors in college whose teaching abilities blew plenty of your HS teachers out of the water?</p>
<p>(For the record, I had plenty good and bad teachers prior to going to college, but often times the best ones were teachers who were there on “emergency” certificates and had minimal training on how to teach a class.)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>And that would be why I said it depends. I’m trying to think of who I would consider to be the “best” teacher I had in college and can only think of one that really comes to mind. She was hard, but you learned so much in her class. She was a high school dropout, former druggie, who had worked construction and as a nurse before becoming a professor. She was awesome and I had her for two straight semesters. I got C’s both semesters, but learned a ton in her class.</p>
<p>Teachers with straight “education” degrees are generally teaching elementary grades, where the challenge isn’t so much the material, but teaching young kids how to learn. That’s where extensive background in pedagogy is critical.</p>
<p>Teachers with straight “education” degrees are generally teaching elementary grades, where the challenge isn’t so much the material, but teaching young kids how to learn. That’s where extensive background in pedagogy is critical.</p>
<p>In response to 27dreams and JanofLeiden:</p>
<p>Having taken degrees in both music theory and applied math… I will tell you all, now, that any “math” skills you need in music theory (forget needing math skills in music performance–you don’t) don’t even compare to the PRE-REQUISITES for TAKING A CLASS ABOUT the skills you need in, say, quantitative finance (I’m thinking of my first class on stochastic calculus).</p>
<p>That said, the conceptual loops I put my head through during my music theory degree certainly made it easy to learn about groups, rings, etc. in algebra. I wouldn’t say it helped with analysis or measure theory much, though.</p>
<p>ALGEBRA!!! My God!!!</p>
<p>You know there’s more to algebra than what you learned in middle school, right?</p>
<p>I always get confused when people say they want a high paying job after college, yet do everything possible to avoid taking any math courses. Almost everything that pays well requires some math.</p>
<p>Ya I know, and I am taking and going to be taking upper level math classes</p>
<p>The problem is, it is still accepted for people to talk about how bad they were at math in HS or college or something. You hardly ever hear anyone say “I was so bad at English.” We just need to be more focused on math and science as a nation so we don’t fall behind everyone else</p>
<p>"We just need to be more focused on math and science as a nation so we don’t fall behind everyone else "</p>
<p>In many ways that is total BS. Many of those math and science majors will end up becoming teachers anyways. Why? Because employers treat and pay math and science graduates crap pay. In the scheme of things scientists are the true underdogs in the US. Look at all the flack, mistrust and unfounded rumors many of the atmospheric, toxicology, carbon dating etc scientists have to put up with here in the US.</p>
<p>I don’t mean we all need to be Math majors and scientists. I just mena there needs to be more of an emphasis on math and science in HS curriculums. If you wanna be an English major or something in college though go ahead, idc.</p>
<p>I think the math program at my middle school crippled me. It was awful. There were no textbooks, it was just workbooks, so if you didn’t understand something during class you couldn’t look it up in the book, and your parents couldn’t read the book to be able to help you if you got stuck-- the lessons weren’t in the books only problems. In college I realized the only way I can pass math classes is to completely ignore the class altogether and self-teach from the book, so you can imagine that not having a book for three years of school really effed me over. Dyscalculia is bad enough without craptastic math programs.</p>
<p>Sorry if I’m straying from the topic, but I think there’s plenty of an emphasis on math & science in high school already for people who want it. There are more than enough advanced and AP level math & science classes, at least where I live. I’d prefer to keep the emphasis where it is, so that the people who aren’t so fond of math and science can still take 3 years of it in high school if they wish to and a few classes in college. There’s nothing shameful about that if it’s just not relevant to your career path.</p>
<p>kmazza, your argument that math & science graduates have “crap pay” doesn’t hold water. Did you even look at the list of highest/lowest paying degrees? It appears to be quite the opposite of your argument.</p>
<p>This thread makes me lol.</p>
<p>Just cause you get a quant degree doesn’t mean you’ll be making more than that music or art history major. </p>
<p>IN THE REAL WORLD:</p>
<p>If you are a smart engineer but a complete ******************** to work with, you’ll be a cashier at some hole-in-the-wall for the rest of your life making pennies.</p>
<p>If you’re smart with quant stuff but either choose or are only semi-awkward/******, you’ll be in the IT department making a stable salary but not being able to climb the ranks at all in your life.</p>
<p>If you’re quant and are a sociable and good person (aka NOT some loser who disses liberal arts majors and projects an attitude of superiority to their fellow human beings), then you’ll be doing very well in the real world. </p>
<p>In the real world, no one cares you are smart and good with quant stuff if you’re a complete ***hole, because there are millions of other good quant people who respect liberal arts majors, those less fortunate than them, their equals, their superiors, etc. </p>
<p>If you aren’t a quant but are a very smart and good team-player, you’ll do very well too. That’s why Art History majors from Columbia (they must possess some quant abilities of course, but they don’t major in it) get jobs as bankers making more money as starting salary than some RPI graduate could ever dream of. </p>
<p>Stop the flame wars, it just ruins your own personality.</p>
<hr>
<p>I’ll be loling even more if one day while you are on the job you make some off-hand joke about music majors to your supervisor, only to find out your supervisor was a music major. Doh!!! Sucks, but you’d deserve it and your consequential pink slip.</p>
<p>Elementary Education and Special Education need to switch lists. Social Work, too. Art, Culinary Arts, and Art History makes more than those watching after the children, the elderly, the poor, and the disabled?</p>
<p>I wish there were more and better educators. My elementary school taught me to spell wrong (“Just write it how it sounds!”). I look at my SAT scores, then I look at my spelling, and each says something very different about me. Sure, Firefox hasn’t had to correct any words in this post, but sometimes, when writing, I have to avoid words I can’t spell. I’m still repairing that damage. And this was at “one of the best school districts in Florida” as they said. Well, no school district in Florida was very good.</p>
<p>I suck at spelling too… who cares</p>
<p>Lol… Art History…</p>
<p>I have to reteach my math class to myself as well, but it is because I can’t understand my prof</p>