<p>How far can our kids go without this basic information? Are our BS teaching this or something (PC) else?</p>
<p>[YouTube</a> - Milton Friedman - Greed](<a href=“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWsx1X8PV_A]YouTube”>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWsx1X8PV_A)</p>
<p>Kids are taught this. That’s why our society continues to be capitalistic. If anything, I’d say boarding schools may teach this even more than other schools - which is why the average salaries of boarding school graduates are higher than those who graduated from other schools, and why many boarding school graduates end up more financially successful than their public and private day school counterparts.</p>
<p>Really, Tom? So can we BS parents including your parents count on your financial success for our retirement? What a relief! :)</p>
<p>Haha, I hope so! I’d love to buy my parents some nice retirement presents at some point, but with the current economic climate, they probably won’t retire until they’re in their 110s ;-)</p>
<p>You know how many people are so-called “forced to retire”? It’s not always a choice. nice retirement presents uh? Got some present ideas yet?</p>
<p>Haha, well, I’d love to buy my parents a new car… If they don’t still have the terrible VW minivan that has been such a huge source of embarrassment to me since 2005, I get the feeling that the car they will have will be just as terrible. So maybe I’d buy them a nice, comfortable sedan or something. Change is good =)</p>
<p>Sarum, what presents (not necessarily retirement presents) have you got so far?</p>
<p>My oldest is graduating from Northwestern in June. No money coming in yet. But, with younger little ones I still get the cutest hand drawn Birthday cards!</p>
<p>On the topic of greed though. When I was a Preppie in the early 70’s, there was a movement afoot mostly from the younger teachers who are now older teachers, to teach the joys of “Hippiedom”. They had just come out of their colleges where it was being taught by the likes of Timothy Leary, Abbie Hoffman, etc etc. Integrity and morality were being challenged. The media was also behind the tune in and drop out movement which went well into the mid 70’s. Many of my fellow Preppie students bought into this taught lifestyle and have never recovered. They missed college or dropped out midway, or never recovered the motivation they had when they applied and got into the best Prep Schools in New England, and thus were mediocre in business at best.
Do any of you think there are any similarities/comparisons from then to what is being taught today in New England boarding schools?</p>
<p>“Greed, for lack of a better word, is good.”</p>
<p>Gordon Gekko</p>
<p>Dave, I think that especially after the events that we have all born witness to in the banking sectors around the world and particularly in America, we can all agree that greed is certainly not a good thing. At least not when the public’s money and livelihoods are at stake. You’re not seriously going to say that the greed that led the world into the crisis it is in now is good, are you?</p>
<p>And the banking sector is only one, poignant example. Would you care to elaborate on why you believe that greed is a good thing? I’m genuinely interested.</p>
<p>I didn’t say that. Gordon Gekko did.</p>
<p>Okay, I just thought that since you posted that, and that alone, that maybe this quote represented your personal opinion.</p>
<p>I highly doubt few if any of the students at most prep schools could tell you anything about Milton Friedman. </p>
<p>Having a D in her 3rd year at prep school, I sense that today’s equivalent of yesterday’s “Hippiedom” is the “Green” movement. And I think the motivation is the same. Hear me out.</p>
<p>The younger teachers seem to be more in tune with the thoughts and feelings of their young students, not being very far removed from the students situation (often 10 years or less). They know the boredom they experienced at that age learning what to them seemed to be irrelevant facts about things they couldn’t apply to the world of that time from rigid old teachers. They wished for a leader to take them to a place where “new” ideas could solve their perceived problems (mostly boredom) and escape the controls put upon them by the old culture.</p>
<p>In the 70’s the “new” ideas were mind altering drugs to experience the “truth” (or at least a different perception of reality) and different sounding approaches to life (popularized eastern religous ideas - not the perfected practices of these ideas - come to mind here). The friends you described who dropped out and never found their way back even after those ideas were passe, just never looked in the mirror and asked “what was I thinking?”</p>
<p>Today, the popular way to distract the student from the established core of knowledge seems to center around the “green” movement. While not as mind wasting as our generation, it tends to take the followers off the established path into contemplating their navels in a different way. The first indoctrination is easy enough and supported by the schools. Trayless cafeterias (ostensibly to save water and power washing - really more to save costs for the school) and lights-out power conservation contests (similar negligible environmental impact in the bigger scheme of things). The extremes of this is to buy into the notion that everything corporate is a plot to destroy the earth which some of the buyers of junk science (prove how much of global warming is due to change in human activity and not part of a normal cycle and you’ll get a Nobel Prize) seem to be selling as “environmental studies” at some schools. </p>
<p>Quite frankly, these kids don’t have enough Biology, Chemistry, Physics to sort out the unprovable from the provable, but when they are taken out in the field and find a frog with a deformity, the “chicken little” instinct that corporate greed is responsible is easily fed.</p>
<p>Mind you I am not trying to defend corporate capitalism here, as it is used as a cover for lots of non-meritorius activity (see all sorts of short-sighted financial and industrial decisions). My point is that it has always been easy to point out wrongs and blame the establishment (like its some kind of conspiratorial monolith LOL) for its existence and lead the gullible off into the weeds.</p>
<p>All of this simplistic answer teaching basically leaves our young lacking in basic critical thinking practice. When you see a problem, try to analyze how it began and what forces (of nature and human nature) caused it, what types of alternatives are available and most importantly what the effect (intended and possible unintended) of the various alternatives are. Apply scientific principles and learn and keep your emotions out of science.</p>
<p>This cynic is now getting off his soap box and is wating for the mods to move this to the politics subforum in the parent cafe. LOL</p>
<p>Look what happened to Gordon Gekko. I certainly don’t advocate that outcome. Lots of karma payback there.</p>
<p>Right, okay goaliedad, so what you’re saying is that believing in and working towards a good cause (the “green movement”) decreases critical thinking ability in young adults?</p>
<p>Interesting.</p>
<p>I’d like to see you “sort out the unprovable from the provable” with this assertion… And, err, as interesting as your post was, how did it directly relate to any type of greed other than the kind that you referenced when you said that schools exercise green initiatives ostensibly to save costs? That is, indeed, partly true, but still…</p>
<p>Awesome essay Goalidad. It gives me more fodder for bedtime horror stories that I can relate to him while I still have him in the nest.
I believe kids/schools can go green and still beget integrity into their students. The teachers I spoke of from the 70’s era had integrity issues themselves, let alone the ability to teach kids how to face moral issues.</p>
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<p>Not my assertion at all!</p>
<p>I am not saying that the “green movement” is a bad or good cause just like the “establishment” (for lack of a better term describing those not involved in the green movement) is neither bad nor good.</p>
<p>What I am saying is that “in the name of making learning less boring”, many younger teachers at today’s prep schools apply “junk science” learning techniques (inadequate experiment design and control) to demonstrate the importance of protecting the environment. Young and impressionable kids, not having the experience or the knowledge to sort things out put their trust into these “facts” and become the “true believers” of misguided folks out to battle the “establishment”.</p>
<p>A learned person knows how to analyze the conclusion presented (the data, the logic behind the conclusions, and the source of the data) in a dispassionate way.</p>
<p>The “green” movement in one sense or another has been around forever (believe it or not). You can even think of the Amish as a “green” culture, not using modern technology and the poisons (to earth, body and soul) that modern technologies bring.</p>
<p>It is nothing new except to those who have not adequately studied history (memorization of facts does not constitute studying history - understanding human behavior in the context of the physical, technological, and social environment of a time is). Most high school aged kids do not have enough life experience to understand that cultures across geography and time are more similar than different (most adults don’t either so don’t feel too bad) and that there aren’t any “new” ideas but just new circumstances for the application of similar logic.</p>
<p>BTW, I never said greed was good either.</p>
<p>Greed is a loaded term meaning the excessive desire for material (or equivalent financial) goods for one’s self. It is a destructive anti-social impulse. It is often the result of a perceived shortage of material goods at a young age (key word here is perceived - poor people are no more greedy than rich) and a focus on ones own needs over those of the family and community around you.</p>
<p>There is nothing wrong with wanting to produce more than you need and keep a share proprotionate to what you contribute. Often there is disagreement as to how much someone “contributes” to the overall effort, hence politics (but that is another long subject). Environmental change to promote the long term success of the species is a good thing in the Darwinian sense. It is when you don’t understand the effects of your actions (unintended) and are not subject to the consequences of your behavior, that large scale destruction of the human habitat (both ecological and community) happens.</p>
<p>There will always be greedy people. Usually, they are not powerful enough to harm the larger community before the community reigns him/her in. However there will always be a few (Benie Madoff comes to mind here) who have superior social skills that allow them to impart a lot of harm. </p>
<p>So I am saying that there is good and stupidity in the “green movement”, but unfortunately there are some who will ply the impressionable (e.g. HS students) with the less than provable in the name of a cause that currently has a halo around it.</p>
<p>To go back to the ops original question, yes todays boarding schools teachers are as hippiesh as you remember. Mostly there is a vast chasm between the economic background of teachers and students. That chasm cant help but produce instances of chip on shoulder and jealousy. That situation persists not only in NE boarding schools but especially in NE lacs. Kids learn Miltoniana not by schools teaching it but by osmosis, observing the top 5% of the student body. I agree with goaliedad that the hippiness has been replaced by greenness, but the main idea is the same. As to the poster that said BS graduates have higher earned wealth than parochial or private day school students – please dont be cavalier with your statements but back them up with statistics.</p>
<p>The top 5% of students of NE liberal arts colleges & Boarding Schools are teaching the rest of the kids and teachers what? How to dress for success, study, speak correct English, aim high, be personable, look for mentors? What?</p>
<p>goaliedad, thanks for saying what you are saying. My kids have fits with the “science” curriculum at their public school. When my daughter questioned the methodology behind some global warming “evidence” presented by her “science” teacher, she was told that they could discuss it after class, but she didn’t want to “confuse” the other kids.</p>