Class Teaches Nerds Social Skills 639
PeterAitch writes "According to Reuters, Potsdam University in Germany is now teaching social skills as part of their IT courses. This is intended to 'ease entry into the world of work'. The 440 students enrolled in the master's degree course will learn how to write flirtatious text messages and emails, impress people at parties and cope with rejection(s)." The class is taught by a superficial model, who will fall in love with the nerdiest student at the end of the semester after realizing that he is beautiful on the inside.
Re:You cant teach tact. (Score:3, Informative)
Honestly a HOT CHICK is not worth the pain of their upkeep, and maintenance.
You forgot to mention that most nerds don't make enough money to afford the maintenance of keeping a hot chick ;)
Extracurricular activites (Score:5, Informative)
A lot of homeschooled kids end up socially disfunctional because they aren't put into extra curricular activities where most socializing happens even in public schools.
You could probably learn just as much as the class teaches by joining clubs and sports teams. You learn how to interact with people by being around people.
A lot of it is just getting past your fears and putting yourself out there. The more you do it the more your fear lessens or at least your ability to deal with it improves.
Re:Alternativeley (Score:3, Informative)
Alternatively take a leaf out of the parent's book and piss your life away being an internet troll.
Says the person who is feeding him......
Nerds in general (Score:3, Informative)
I am not much of a gamer, and that was a big big problem in my nerd relationships. I mean I work predominately in IT, do you think I would want to spend my remaining free time on a computer? Hell no, I like living life.
I think the problem with nerdy men is that they feel comfy in their little boxed in life, which I think is a tad bit sad. I would rather experience life than be afraid of it. I am not saying that the nerdy ones are all like this, but nerds take a loooong time to grow into themselves. I am a notorious reformer. I have stopped that at this point, I gave up on nerds. Just my two cents.
Re:You cant teach tact. (Score:3, Informative)
Corporate Skills Important also (Score:4, Informative)
Higher management does not want to hear why their ideas won't work. Even when confronted with reality, they will quickly forget that you WERE CORRECT. You only will be remembered for being argumentative, for rocking the boat, and when layoffs come you will be first, or when promotions come you will be last.
When upper management comes up with an idea, however stupid, ALWAYS EMBRACE it. Remember -- they spent a bunch of time coming up with this idea, so it MUST be great?!? Corporate ideas are subject to the effects of evolution, good ideas thrive and survive, bad ideas quickly go extinct.
No one will remember the ideas that go extinct, they are quickly forgotten. But they will remember that you were (or were not) a "team player". (Whatever that means.)
If you are always positive and never point out management's inadequacies, you will promote faster, earn more money, and retire earlier.
Re:Nerds don't need this.... (Score:4, Informative)
However, all the idiots in Hollywood, at the jock table, the cheerleaders, etc ARE capable of learning basic math and logic, they CHOOSE not to because "it's not cool" and since for so many people (at least in the Western world) their goal is to be cool, they choose to be morons....and we all see where that's leading our society....
I was only talking about math, not logic. (Speaking of which, I don't think people need a class to understand cause and effect.)
True, some people avoid math because of it's uncoolness, which is justified since math is often a refuge of acceptance for those who don't win social approval but still require companionship (as all humans do). The real reason why those people you despise choose to eschew math is because math is not required for them to succeed. Furthermore, your approval is also not required for them to succeed. They can safely ignore both you and all of your hard work and suffer no ill effects to their quality of life whatsoever. I completely understand why you hate them.
A book which you might find interesting is called "The Chosen: The Hidden History of Admission and Exclusion at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton" by Jerome Karabel.
Re:Nerds don't need this.... (Score:4, Informative)
There is a subset of humans who are both mathematically and socially inclined.
They become "Managers" or "Agents" and bilk the "musicians" and "actors" out of millions of dollars.
That's all social power. Managers and agents don't need to understand limits and recursion to exploit the bugs in the human mind.
A book which you might find interesting is "Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion" by Robert Cialdini. Click, whirr...
Re:You cant teach tact. (Score:5, Informative)
Just one viewpoint, take it or leave it.
Aspergers is to the body language and subtle social cues that define 2/3 of human communication as blindness is to vision or deafness is to sound. Only on the outside, no one knows you have an impaired perception. You don't get cut the slack that the person signing or the guy carrying the cane would.
You constantly monitor yourself every second to make sure you don't do anything wrong. You're labelled as weird, or rebellious, rude, or unpleasant to be around because you can't perceive the messages people are trying to send you. You have few friends because whatever secret magical language that's being spoken to generate new connections with people you totally miss. Many attempts you make to reach out to people end in disaster, and you can't for the life of you understand what the hell it is that you're doing wrong.
Those lonely nights spend in front of a computer are ones you'd probably rather spend hooking up with a girl you met at a bar instead of learning the intricacies of Yacc or device drivers. And it drives you absolutely fucking insane that everyone else is in on the fuck-fest that is life except you.
Any super-abilities you might gain from this condition are cold comfort, as they're used more as survival skills to get around the enormous deficits you experience in being able to read people. The money that you earn from your impressive abilities has to be the substitute for having lots of friends who could help you do stuff (e.g. you pay someone to install an super-heavy air conditioner in a second story windows because you don't have many friends you can call on to help you). It's not really a preference for certain kind of social lifestyle, it's a crappy hand of cards you're dealt that you have to make the best of.
Re:This can be improved by removing some text (Score:2, Informative)
MIT's "Charm School" (Score:3, Informative)