Being competitive is a function of the school/college. Both my kids did not feel that their schools / colleges were meaningfully competitive — ie that people were being cut throat about it. It is also sometimes the personality of the person that determines what they feel.
1 Like
This seems wise. I want to make people numerically literate, which means they need the types of skills taught in the humanities. There is a difference between skills and content, and I think that a broad basis of humanities training gives students the ability to learn multiple types of content more easily.
The philosophical questions that individuals puzzled out 2000 years ago - why are we here? how do we know we are here? etc. - remain relevant. We now have more history and literature to bring to these conversations. We have forms of mathematics that didn’t exist. If people want to live examined and fulfilling lives, it is good to think about the how and what and why; otherwise we are mere gerbils in balls.
Actually, philosophy majors due quite well. Most of them go to graduate or professional school eventually, but over the course of their careers they earn plenty.
Yes, but the current economic tech shake up is changing this. Even before, some people who took out loans to go to “coding schools/camps” ended up saddled with fair amounts of debt.
Of course!
I think we need to be careful - there is a difference between competition that pushes out collegiality and cooperation and competition that pushed the participants to do more than they had previously thought they need to/were capable of. My kids want the former, not the latter.
1 Like
I am encouraging her because I truly think that she is being overly self-conscious. Of course, I’m not there, and I don’t want to discount her feelings, but I bet she could step into most of those clubs if she pushed through the discomfort. Maybe not the math team, but sure the robotics club and others. She goes to a lovely school with wonderful teachers and supportive peers. Her teachers are very positive about her skills despite the fact that she came to enjoying science and math classes late (9th grade) compared to some of her friends.
On the other hand, posters upthread have suggested that kids can’t catch up in STEM fields if they are late to the game. And even you said with math, if you are not early, you are late. She feels skepticism from kids who were placed in calculus as 9th or 10th graders. And there is no question that there are plenty of messages from the outside world (not to mention a few CC posters) that black kids are not STEM material because (apparently), black parents don’t value education like other races… but I am digressing at this point. The thread is about keeping the humanities relevant as our culture changes not about why a particular kid feels more welcome in the poetry club than the math team.
Once limited to discussion in humanities classes these questions are now being discussed in AL/ML classes across the world.
3 Likes
Yes, but they need to be discussed in a deep way in the US, too, even among those whose career paths will lead them far from the humanities, don’t you think?
I’m not sure that discussion was ever limited to the humanities. In sciences, particularly in physics, we ponder the most fundamental questions regarding the entire universe (and everything within it) since the beginning of time. Wait, we even wonder whether there is even such as a thing as time. Is it real or just an illusion?
3 Likes
Neither. It’s all a simulation.
So this is a mixed bag as to how early you need to start what.
With Math, if you want enough math to go into engineering or CS, and finish Calc BC by 12th grade, you are in good shape. If you want to go and study math for math sake, that is a different kettle of fish. If you want to go to grad school in CS, there is a lot of math, but much of it is accessible with Calc BC in 12th grade – you basically need exposure to proof based math either in late high school or early college, and some of this is outside the realm of calc BC – it is a different kind of math.
If you want to be an engineer, most kids are not ahead of you. Doing robotics in high school does not get you ahead. If you want to be a SWE, some/many people start in high school, but starting in good earnest in first year college is quite fine. At my son’s college, there is an older person that came from the marines and had a cold start in CS. By the time he got done with 4 years of college, he got a 400k job as a SWE at a HFT firm. This is doable. The math aptitude is more important than the programming aptitude. The programming is easily taught.
Nobody believes this.
I cannot speak for whether black parents value or don’t value education. I don’t have enough exposure to that community.
As you said this may be a digression, but I thought I would address the issues you raised point by point, in case any of the above is helpful to you.
Contrary to those who say that you have to push the math accelerator to the floor in high school to have any hope of success as a math or CS major, many students in these majors encounter their first college level proof focused math course in first or second year of college – it is not like most high schools offer anything proof focused beyond the level that might be found in high school geometry. Even calculus in high school is not required, since math and CS major course maps typically start with calculus 1 (yes, I have encountered CS graduates who started calculus 1 in college because their high school only went up to precalculus).
Perhaps this kind of math competitive super elitism common on these forums and probably in some high schools creates the image of math-heavy subjects being inaccessible and discouraging to students who are “merely” good at math. In contrast, humanities, social sciences, and biology do not seem to have as much of this kind of thing. But it is also possible that students in the latter fields are getting the idea that they are “bad at math” when comparing themselves to the “calculus in 9th grade” students, and thus get discouraged from taking the math that would be helpful to them in their majors and in general.
10 Likes
Yes, it is a digression, which may very well get deleted by moderators, but I need to respond here because it is hard for me to understand what you just wrote. I have read posts on CC saying exactly both of those things within the last month. Heck the values comment was posted within the last week or so. I am directly quoting not generalizing. I am a bit shocked that you have not noticed the way that black students are discussed sometimes, but perhaps you don’t read the same threads that I do.
Nevertheless, I would think that anyone reading these forums or for that matter living in the US would be aware of how black students and families are perceived by some on CC and in the media (and sometimes in schools by teachers & administrators themselves) as less than and lacking. Certainly black students like my daughter are aware of it, notice it, and those stereotypes impact their self-confidence.
8 Likes
Given prior references to greater European (particularly French) reverence for public intellectuals, I was intrigued by the suggestion in a (London) Times magazine interview with Bari Weiss (unfortunately paywalled) that some of the most topical intellectual debates in the humanities are now taking place outside of a university setting. Perhaps that’s ultimately a good thing for the general public, even if it’s not good for the universities (or for more obscure topics)? A larger number of people than I would have expected seem prepared to pay to subscribe to substacks nowadays.
“Weiss has joined the ranks of the thinkers who constitute what she once described in an admiring New York Times column as the “intellectual dark web”. This network of “heterodox thinkers” hostile to “woke” thought includes personalities such as Peterson, Rogan, the author Bret Weinstein and the philosopher Sam Harris, who all operate, with varying degrees of sanity, outside the academic and media institutions that would once have been their homes. This is a new media world of podcasts, Substack newsletters and viral YouTube clips.
The intellectual dark web now includes some of the best-known and best-paid celebrities on the internet (no broadcaster in the world earns more than Joe Rogan) and their success is an important symptom of the way that the culture war has consumed our society. Intellectual debate – the more vituperative and soap opera-esque the better – has become one of the great public spectacles of our times.
Once upon a time the weedy squabblings of the intelligentsia hardly reached the ears of the powerful businessmen presiding over American capitalism. But in the 21st century billionaires, entrepreneurs and men of action have found themselves drawn to the apparent glamour of the intellectual dark web.”
2 Likes
There is a wide spectrum of material that kids interested in math self study, even if it is not in high school curriculums. Just like literature inclined kids read a lot of literature on their own, or history inclined kids read a lot of history. If you want to go to math grad school at a top place, usually the median kid in that cohort starts separating out in middle/ high school either through the school or outside of it. But math grad school is a very small cohort — not sure why there would be broad interest.
2 Likes
It is noticeable that there are not a lot of African Americans in grad math type classes. That is different from thinking that these kids are not capable of math. Most families that have math inclined kids know that it is 99% perspiration and passion. So if a particular demographic is missing in class you think that either they are not interested, or some other reason. Not a lack of ability. I de-stress ability when i talk to my kids about outcomes. Effort is 99%. We start this early — like at the age of 5, telling them that every one has mostly the same ability. It is the effort that separates you. 10-20% extra effort every year makes a large difference when you get to 12th grade or
To senior year of college. Effort together with passion. There is no room for race /ethnicity in this.
If a student is passionate about and wants to pursue a career in math or another highly quantitative field, s/he needs to start early. The exceptional examples like June Huh (who, BTW, did build a solid foundation in math, even though he was more interested in other subjects early in his life) mentioned upthread are exceptions. There’s so much material in those fields that are not only highly challenging but also highly hierarchical in depth, not breadth (being able to go in depth in one or more quantitative subjects is far more important, IMO, than broadly studying different subjects at superficial levels). Moreover, if a student is perceived, or self-perceived, to be significantly behind in a foundational subject, s/he will quickly feel discouraged and lose interest. This isn’t that different from why some kids quickly lose interest in a sport.
5 Likes
This reminds me of when the sciences weren’t considered something apart and separate, but part of the whole of knowledge, and were referred to as “natural philosophy”
That’s funny(ironic) - The NYTimes, which she had had to leave, has a very tall paywall! I had always enjoyed her columns and still pay attention to her work.
I don’t know what you mean. Kids in PhD programs? If there is a competitiveness advantage to bringing diversity to a company, the opportunity cost of attending graduate school rather than getting a job is higher for those students.
1 Like
If you ask me, there is not enough “math competitive super-elitism”.
This country would do well to crank it way up, perhaps at the expense of “sports competitive super-elitism” - which, strangely, doesn’t seem to discourage a lot of aspiring student athletes.
3 Likes
Which is precisely what several posters in this thread have been saying all along: that it is a lot harder to catch up in STEM than in some other fields.
The learning curve is steep an unforgiving. Many a student will give up.
1 Like
I’d expect most engineering and CS majors never encounter a proof based math class throughout their lifetime. Some fields of engineering require math up to differential equations, but requiring proof based math is quite rare. I have 3 degrees in engineering fields. None of my programs required proof a based math class.
I agree that at the overwhelming majority of colleges, it is possible to major in these fields without taking calculus in HS. The bigger issue is often that highly selective colleges may expect you to take near the highest level classes offered at your HS. If you don’t take calculus in HS, you may have substantially less chance of being admitted to certain colleges/programs than if you do. However, most colleges in the US are not especially selective and have far less stringent expectations.
2 Likes
Perhaps, but certainly not all.
Many don’t use math after graduating. Some, however do. Last month I shipped off about 8 lbs of math textbook to our S - he needed them. 
So, one book? 
3 Likes