The $%*! frustration thread

[ZaichikArky]

Yeah... I guess that makes sense if you haven't been to one in nearly a decade. My bf has NEVER been to one. I wonder just how fucked up his mouth is XD. I think he's one of those lucky bastards that has a good mouth with little need for a dentist. All 4 of his wisdom teeth came in with no problems and he doesn't ever have any pain.

[Temporal Knight]

I have about eight of those small (hardly noticeable) spots. The dentist I went to seemed like a swell dentist.

And I finally got that Email from EA. I hope they can help my issue with SPORE. Gosh, I have so many ideas for it!

[Mr Bekkler]

(fuck Mafia Wars BS

Aww. I like Mafia Wars. That's like, the only thing I like on facebook.

[Zelbess]

The Facebook application I can't stand is "Compare People". I'm always getting notifications about it, "See what your friends think of you!" Very annoying. Not to mention, I dislike the idea of comparing people. I wonder how many petty fights between friends have arisen from that application?

[Thought]

I hate finding out about the current lives of people I knew in high school. It is so depressing. There was so much potential back then, and so little of it has been realized.

One girl was a fast runner, as in Olympic Hopeful fast. She's now working for a standard-issue business and the milestones in her life are the people she's dated and broken up with.

A friend of mine was a talented writer. He didn't have anything published at the end of high school, but he had several stories optioned by various fiction magazines (essentially, they paid him for the right to keep his work on file for a year as backup in case something else fell threw). Now days he writes questions for game-shows, is unpublished, and now seldom puts pen to paper with the intent of crafting worlds.

What happened to the passion, the drive, the raw talent?

[Truthordeal]

What happened to the passion, the drive, the raw talent?

Reality, student loans, family, aging, etc. Its easy to be passionate and driven in high school or even college, but when you realize that you're in so much debt that you need a job at whatever the cost, you have to fit into a mold to live.

Speaking of frustration, how about this: I'm now the Federal Government's bitch to the tune of $30,000 in student loans for college. I now have to tow a very narrow and steep line regarding behavior(that's not really a problem though) and academics, simply because I wanted a decent education.

Wait a second. *Goes and grabs a soapbox to stand on*

Besides, I want to teach, and thanks to No Child Left Unscrewed, I can't do that without 4 years of college, whereas ten years ago you could get by on an associates degree.

I would like to point out that those two years do absolutely nothing but add about $15000 to my loan. I won't be teaching Junior and Senior year history to Freshman high school students. All it does is make the teachers fraking hard asses. When the hell did teaching become more about knowing every banal aspect of your field rather than, you know, teaching kids what they need to be taught?

I'm not going to be writing treatises like a college professor would, I'm going to be teaching High School History, which I know about all I need to know with what I learned in high school. The teaching certification thing I can understand, as people can't be decent instructors without some background in the field. And if it weren't for forcing chemistry and physics down my throat, as well as music and other boring subjects, I could graduate in two or three years with my teaching degree, have $15000 less to pay back to the government and actually start doing some good for the community.

And why the hell do we have standardized tests? All they do is cut into my time to teach. Instead of teaching kids about the Gettysburg Address, I'm going to be teaching them how to answer question #4 in packet #9 of the Generic State Issued Standardized Test. ACT and SAT, and even Exit Exams are fine. But aren't Terra Nova, PACT and EOC exams a tad excessive?

I understand the reasoning behind them. You want to make sure the kids are learning. And that's fine, but damn it, you're acting like teachers are the dishonest ones, especially when you have people like politicians and lawyers dictating what I have to teach and when. When's the last time you heard of a teacher stealing money, or killing healthcare with million dollar lawsuits, or raising taxes on people who just don't have that money?

Presumably it's all about the kids,but they always trot out a line of dirty-faced kids when they want to get their own laws through. It's like bringing your son to a restaurant, and then saying it was his birthday so you could get the free Mile High Mud Pie. Maybe he gets a bite or something, but mostly you'd really like to eat five pounds of frozen cake and chocolate ice cream, and there's not really any nobility associated with that.

*Soapbox breaks*

And now my head hurts. Great.

So, Thought, the reason we give up on that drive is because the government and real life hate us. Even in free countries like the US or Britain, you still have so many things tying down your wings that you honestly wonder whether or not its worth it to try to fly. Sometimes its easier to stick low to the ground and live your life in peace.

The raw talent is there, it always has been and it always will be. Whether or not you want to use it comes down to you and your ambitions. Many people just don't bother with their ambitions, because it's more comfortable to stay close to the ground and let others step on you, than to attempt something as lofty as our dreams.

Luckily, you'll still see people like Zeality who do something they really enjoy with their lives and dedicate themselves to that ideal of the Springtime of Youth, where passion gets you through any tough situation. They spread their wings and attempt flight. Sometimes they soar, sometimes they don't.

That's life for you.

[Thought]

Besides, I want to teach, and thanks to No Child Left Unscrewed, I can't do that without 4 years of college, whereas ten years ago you could get by on an associates degree.

Yeah, that requirement has very little to do with NCLB. If an education system was worth its salt, it required a 4 year degree long before that program (and either a major in the subject being taught, or a competency test).

The program isn't exactly a bad thing, but it is ineffective, which should be a crime as far as education goes. Schools need less oversight, not more. Indeed, everything above a principle could probably be cut without hurting education. Teachers need the freedom to teach; bureaucracies restrict that.

I would like to point out that those two years do absolutely nothing but add about $15000 to my loan. I won't be teaching Junior and Senior year history to Freshman high school students. All it does is make the teachers fraking hard asses. When the hell did teaching become more about knowing every banal aspect of your field rather than, you know, teaching kids what they need to be taught?

Right around when society forgot what education is supposed to be about. Education can take two forms. One is to teach children the skills they need to get a job and, essentially, survive. One might call it trade school, and it is a noble thing in itself. Then there is teaching children how to be human. Our history, our culture, our essence. That is what a lot of high school and college are supposed to be about (they aren't, for the most part, which is why they fail).

Those two extra years are supposed to (and do, though ineffectually so) make individuals into well rounded human beings. History needs music in order to be understood, and music needs math to be fully appreciated, and math needs three beers to be tolerated, and beer needs philosophy to be enjoyed. Human understanding and knowledge suffers when it is compartmentalized. It is bad enough that we teach our children that way; it would be worse if the teachers were that was as well.

ACT and SAT, and even Exit Exams are fine. But aren't Terra Nova, PACT and EOC exams a tad excessive?

No, ACT and SAT exams are excessive to begin with (as are the GREs). They test route memorization, not actual comprehension or understanding. The measurements are largely meaningless; one's GRE scores, for example, are not indicative of one's success in grad school or post grad school. One could do away with standardized testing and loose very little real value (a little would be lost, but only a little).

If you want to be a teacher, I highly recommend you read the Homework Myth by Alfie Kohn. Kohn is a little idealistic at times, so one must take care to keep one's feet well grounded when reading him, but he makes some terribly good points about the American school system.

Of course, you might have realized that I’m an idealist as well. Work and the real world ideally should uplift us, not crush our souls. That a business suit is little more than a prison uniform is one of the great crimes of the modern era.

Hence, my frustration and depression over the issue.

[IAmSerge]

and math needs three beers to be tolerated, and beer needs philosophy to be enjoyed.

Ew no, I like my math sober! =D

But I understand your point!

And here is another, more fun way to look at it!

http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/myl/XKCD_Purity.png


....and I'm frustrated that I now officially have back problems for the next 6 weeks..

[Truthordeal]

Thought, I've heard the well-rounded individual argument a lot recently. I'm sure there is some merit to it, and something like that does appeal to me as an idealist.

At times I'm an idealist, but when it comes to money, I'm an extremely practical person. Right now, as  rising college freshman looking at $30,000 in debt, I'm more concerned with getting my degree and getting a job soon afterwards rather than paying an extra $60 lab fee per science class to take that class and be miserable and gain nothing from it that I'll use in real life.

As for the major/4 year degree thing, if they would just make a program, one to two years long, to teach people how to teach, and then give them some type of competency test, we wouldn't have the shortage of teachers we do now.

[Zephira]

I think I'd rather have a teacher who went to school for four years and who really knows his subject, than one who rushed through school and is only regurgitating what he read in a text book. If you are going to teach you have to be passionate about your subject and you have to be able to help your students. If you're having monetary issues, find another job to tide you over until you can finish your degree. If you cut your education short because of money and go on to teach, your students will not get the full benefits of a completely trained teacher, and thus will have to cut their own education short and repeat your debt scenario.

[Truthordeal]

I'm passionate about history, don't get me wrong, and I'll probably end up going back to school at a later date to study it, when I have the money. But I'm not passionate about music, chemistry, biology, physics, etc.

If I can get all of the history knowledge and teaching skills I need in two or three years for a Bachelor of Arts degree, then why shouldn't I?

Knowing chemistry and physics might help me look smart at parties, but after high school, there's no real need for it. I won't be teaching chemistry, math or physics, just history.

And yes, a lot of college ends up being filler and unnecessary. Its a waste of my money going in, and that's the fact of the matter, and that's what's got me frustrated. It's not necessary and its wasting my money.

About 70% of kids who go on to college are in my debt scenario regardless of their teachers. The average indebtedness of a student right out of college is somewhere around $17-18,000.

Another thing on the topic real quick. I'm betting  that one of the people in this thread have had at least one teacher during high school that was a coach of some sport. According to the law, to coach at a school, you must also teach.

Now, is it fair to students to get a coach as their teacher, who more often than not knows nothing outside of what the textbook teaches them? At least in my scenario, you're getting someone that is knowledgeable on the subject. 

[Zephira]

Current frustration: Curling irons. I'm trying to do something fancy for a friend's birthday party tonight, but I really suck at using this thing, and I keep burning my fingers. These things really need to come with better directions.

Back to the schooling.. True, you don't absolutely need to know the exact structure of an atom or how kidneys work if you want to teach history, but there are other fields important to history as well. Literature, geography, economics, art and even music all lend to an understanding of history. I'm not saying you need to be a jack of all trades, but if you're going to teach our children, it'd be great if you knew more than one subject and how all these fields intertwined.

[Truthordeal]

Fair enough.

I mean, yeah, literature, geography, economics are extremely important. There's no point discussing the Great Depression or the Wirtschaftswunder without being able to say what caused them or how they ended. But the music and art I'm talking about is more music theory or composition, not about who Van Gogh or Mozart were and their contributions.

Heck, even splashes of sociology and psychology could be extremely beneficial.

But now I've moved on to a new frustration...paperwork...'nuff said.

[ZaichikArky]

Truth, you probably should have thought about going to a community college to deal with all the crap that you have to take before you get into your STUDIES OF PASSION. That way, there would be pretty much no debt and the other 2 years could be spent solely on what you love... 

I went to a 4 year college, but actually for me my parents insisted I go to one when I wanted to go to a community college. I guess I was lucky in some ways.

[Lord J Esq]

What happened to the passion, the drive, the raw talent?

Were you being rhetorical, or do you think you know?