Is Stanford Too Close To Silicon Valley? 171
nicholast writes "The New Yorker has a story by Ken Auletta about the connections between Stanford and Silicon Valley. The piece explains how important the university is to tech companies and venture capital firms, but it also questions whether Stanford has become too focused on wealth. 'It's an atmosphere that can be toxic to the mission of the university as a place of refuge, contemplation, and investigation for its own sake,' says one professor. The piece also explains Stanford's conflicted thoughts about distance education, which could transform the university or prove to be a threat to it."
Well, there you have it (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, New Yorker, you really hit the nail on the head there. Foolishly concentrating on marketable skills and useful scholarship, instead of the laudable pursuits like LGBT studies and Russian literature. New York institutions have it right - charge a lot and turn out people who have nothing productive to contribute and nothing better to do than occupy Wall Street (i.e crap in public and shout slogans) and whine about having to pay back their student loans!
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes, how dare they push out successful engineers!
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2, Insightful)
How is this drivel modded Insightful? MBAs, like all other graduates, come in all shapes and sizes. Some are great, some are unproductive
Would you prefer it if all business were run by people who have no formal education in economics, accounting, strategy og business mangement?
Get real.. I know MBAs embody the people that fire and hire you, but this MBA-bashing is childish and it's getting old.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
Yes, as long as it means they also haven't been conditioned to profit before morals and ethics.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:3)
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:3, Interesting)
You do realize that an MBA is a Masters Degree in Business Administration. And depending on the track you get different areas of study. A lot of the area of study is very close to Computer Science. MBA is about running a business at peak efficiency. Computer Science is running software at peak efficiency. A lot of the concepts are very similar. The MBA from an accredited school is a rigorous academic process.
Also after Enron many if not most MBA programs have put a renewed effort in teaching ethics. And most studies that show most of the stuff you complain about those evil MBA's (Where a lot of those evil MBA's are either not MBA's they do not have the degree but have just advanced in careers without it, or the Full time MBA right after taking Undergrad in Business with no real life experience. You find the MBA who get their degrees threw night classes, or weekend programs are a much different breed of MBA)
Being that an MBA focuses on Administrative skills their productivity isn't measured in simple number of units, however in the ability to increase the number of units, or increase the quality of the numbers of units made, or get those numbers of units made for less.
When you are taking all your time to find the enemy of all of life problems, then you are not spending time solving them.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:5, Insightful)
Computer Science is running software at peak efficiency.
Hearing pearls like this makes me suspect that some professions and degrees are actually mental diseases.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
Shall we play a guessing game? Do you have a) a CS degree b) an MBA c) both?
I'll go for option d). I suspect the only module found on both would be the one called "Introduction & orientation".
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
It makes sense if you compare it to CS. CS is not about running software at peak efficiency however, it's about the theory behind our programs, computers, algorithms etc. So if an MBA is looking at the theory behind our businesses, MBA's should really be employed as consultants, economists, think thanks and faculty, not running an actual business (usually to the ground) because in business theory, people can be calculated with certain properties in an equation, in real life however, these optimal situations never exist and you'll have to work with it.
The problem is also that MBA's are not assigned to run businesses but usually to run business units regardless of their skills or knowledge in the operations of the business unit (for example IT, HR, Sales, ...)
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
Compared to Masters degrees in other curricula, MBA degrees are a joke. Most schools will hand out an MBA to anyone with an asshole and a tuition check. Unless one comes from a highly selective program, about the only thing an MBA qualifies one to run is a Subway franchise - and even then, they'll still have to be trained to make the sandwiches and run the ovens. The only thing worthwhile in the MBA curriculum is the finance classes. Everything else about management either should have been known beforehand, can't actually be trained well, or is better learned via on-the-job experience. You'd be better off with a degree in Russian Literature - at least that would make you a more interesting person.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
It's a slave owner that allows slaves to do any work, and hence be productive.
Hey, I have found a solution for all economic problems -- we need slavery and lots and lots of slave owners!
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:5, Funny)
One Slashdotter's trash is another's treasure.
Also, I've heard over and over again the lots of businesses have a high regard for liberal arts majors as organizers.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:1)
Also, I've heard over and over again the lots of businesses have a high regard for liberal arts majors as organizers.
You mean those people who put papers in binders then stack them on the shelves, or are you talking about the actual binders?
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:4, Funny)
I wouldn't say it's too close, it's not really walking distance. I'll call the Dean and ask him if he can move the University a few miles west.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:5, Insightful)
Instead, they should narrowly-focus only on those vocations which make the most money - professional sports, law, political science, and investment banking. All of those are immensely important jobs and a civilization full of nothing but those professions would be a prosperous one indeed.
I am not defending LBGT studies and Russian literature individually, mind you, but if we ditched any field of study that didn't rain down money upon graduation, we would be much poorer for it.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
I didn't mean to imply that the only valuable degrees that lead to multi-millionaires. A university isn't a vocational school. But you do need to have some useful contribution to make to the world, or you wind up on the damn dole.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:3)
Thousands of Starbucks baristas with English Literature degrees disagree!
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
Just because you don't know what they do with their skills do not mean they are not in play. This is one of the problems, I think, with the tech community.. too insular, doesn't spend enough time interacting with other domains, and tends to forget that there things out there other then gadgets and money. Even LBGT studies and Russian have uses, just not uses most people on slashdot encounter. LBGT stuff is invaluable for people going into fields like counciling (which helps a lot of people) or social services, Russian is good for people who are going into translation services or many types of international business, not to mention how well it can dovetail with any number of research professions in areas like anthropology.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
I'm, uh, married to an English major who went on to get her JD and then MD - so take what I said as a joke.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
Not all engineers suck at writing, and most suck less than you. Just saying...
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
You'd think he was being paid by the comma.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
You'd think he was being paid by the comma.
Sort of, you know, like a certain actor who, before he became a .com spokesman, was known for other, even less prominent, roles.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:2)
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
Hmm - me thinks you are a fan of Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy.. Which of the 3 ships would YOU be on?
That's a myth. Kids aren't stupid. (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, New Yorker, you really hit the nail on the head there. Foolishly concentrating on marketable skills and useful scholarship, instead of the laudable pursuits like LGBT studies and Russian literature. New York institutions have it right - charge a lot and turn out people who have nothing productive to contribute and nothing better to do than occupy Wall Street (i.e crap in public and shout slogans) and whine about having to pay back their student loans!
Look it. Kids aren't stupid. Very few people are stupid enough to beleive the "do what you love and the money will follow."
The job market is soooo bad, there are folks with accounting degrees, engineering degrees and the most surprising to me - nursing degrees - that are unable to get a job. The American Journal of Nursing reported last year that the job market for newly graduated nurses is one of the worst ever. And there's supposed to be a shortage right? Lawyers are having a horrible time too. I haven't seen the stats on new med school grads so I can't comment on that.
And even if you did get into some "marketable" program things change - fast - in this day age. That's what happened to all those nrusing students. Four or five years ago, those kids went to nursing school because that's what they wanted - a marketable and hopefully, a guaranteed job. They graduted in '11 and low and behold over half of them can't get jobs. And there's even more people currently in school because the word hasn't gotten out. Yes, we will have a glut of nurses in a fe short years and folks will be saying, "Gee! Why didn't they get a degree in something marketable!? Morons!"
Back in the 80s there were people studying Chinese lterature. The had to learn to read and speak Manderin. Then the 90s came and globalization - and all that trade with China. In the 80s I remember folks studying math. And back then, if you weren't actuarial, you would have to teach - it wasn't that marketable. (Actuarial is TOUGH. I've seen people wash out of that and go to engineering school for something easier.) Then the 90s came and search engines and applications that were math intensive. All of a suddent a math degree was the thing to get.
What's "marketable" today could very well be saturated or have no market in a few years.
Re:That's a myth. Kids aren't stupid. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:That's a myth. Kids aren't stupid. (Score:2)
Re:That's a myth. Kids aren't stupid. (Score:2)
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:2)
The problem is not focus on 'useful' scholarship, but 'profitable' scholarship, which tends to lock out a lot of stuff that might be of benefit but has no immediate use, which, once again, is where Universities excel since private research institutes already have the 'short term benefit' focus going on.
Re:Well, there you have it (Score:5, Insightful)
Does The Art Institute of Las Vegas teach you how to draw to an inside straight?
That problem is not unique to Stanford (Score:4, Interesting)
My university's model is to attract as many international students as possible and charge them 3x the 'domestic' tuition rate, which is already high for Canada. Better yet is a privately-owned college they've licensed our 'brand' to, which allows them to do the same but with dirt-low entrance requirements and higher yet tuition!
Even my previous institute, a very small liberal arts university on the opposite coast, was showing shades of the same. What else do we expect with burgeoning human resources departments and shrinking public funding?
Re:That problem is not unique to Stanford (Score:1)
I bet "as many international students as possible" is not accurate. My business school ( top 10-20ish ) said they could 100% fill the class with international students with perfect SAT/GRE scores.
Re:That problem is not unique to Stanford (Score:2)
My experience with international testing shows that all foreign TAs had perfect TOEFL test scores, but we all know they mostly didn't speak/read/write English.
I wouldn't read too much into "perfect" international SAT/GRE scores.
Re:That problem is not unique to Stanford (Score:2)
Most people who work in English-speaking country but whose native language is not English, first only learn techical English that is applicable to their profession, then s-l-o-w-l-y the rest of the language. For someone unfamiliar with their work, they may look ignorant and stupid for years (decades if they end up in an insular community of immigrants, but that's genuinely stupid in its own right).
Then, there are countries that have just large enough percentage of people speaking English to develop its own dialect of English, but not large enough for that dialect to become known and accepted worldwide.
Re:That problem is not unique to Stanford (Score:2)
Re:That problem is not unique to Stanford (Score:3)
The way I remember it at my local canadian university, for engineering, was something like this.
10% international students,
90% reserved for citizens,
75% of which was reserved for in-province applicants,
and 5% for Aboriginals.
(give or take 5% on all of those, I'm a bit fuzzy).
Does it make a difference though, money wise? I presume the overall amount the university gets is roughly the same per student, just the govn't isn't subsidizing the foreign nationals. Maybe it's a flawed presumption.
Re:That problem is not unique to Stanford (Score:2)
The way I remember it at my local canadian university, for engineering, was something like this.
10% international students,
90% reserved for citizens,
75% of which was reserved for in-province applicants,
and 5% for Aboriginals.
(give or take 5% on all of those, I'm a bit fuzzy).
Does it make a difference though, money wise? I presume the overall amount the university gets is roughly the same per student, just the govn't isn't subsidizing the foreign nationals. Maybe it's a flawed presumption.
So... 180%? I can see why your university is broke.
(just kidding, i realize the 75+5 is part of the 90)
Stanford Grads are Awesome (Score:5, Funny)
Can't tell you how helpful having some Middle-Manager type making an appearance in the interview room, proudly proclaiming his Stanford Alumni status and MENSA membership before laying out the all important "brain teaser" to save me from taking the interview any further. Funny how the recruiter mentioned beforehand that they were having such a hard time finding qualified candidates.
Mensa is the problem (Score:5, Interesting)
So next time you meet Mensa member be sure to ask them how their investment club is doing.
Re:Mensa is the problem (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Mensa is the problem (Score:2)
I used to feel that way about Mensa too, until I found out Geena Davis was in it. (But then again, she can do anything.)
Re:Mensa is the problem (Score:4, Insightful)
I have to say that most Mensa members I've met have been people I would consider intelligent, interesting and fun to be around while most of the anti-Mensa folks I've been around (you know, the ones who hate on Mensa and Mensa members) have been boorish, dumber than the average Mensa member and quite frankly not a lot of fun to be around.
Of course, I haven't met every Mensa member (and definitely not every non-member).
Re:Mensa is the problem (Score:5, Insightful)
I have to say that most Mensa members I've met have been people I would consider intelligent, interesting and fun to be around
I have to say that everyone who has told me they are a MENSA member has been boorish and quite frankly not a lot of fun to be around no matter how intelligent they might be. When you have to tell people that you belong to a club for supposedly smart people, you aren't one. You're merely clever.
Re:Mensa is the problem (Score:3)
Its a bragging thing, you can always identify the losers by looking for the braggarts. .mil folks who brag and tell combat stories to civilians, generally, have never been overseas, or at most were ultra REMFs and are lying about the whole thing. The guys who try not to talk about it, or won't even talk about it unless they're drunk or with their buddies who were there with them, they're the real heros.
The mensa situation is the same. Most people bragging about their membership are not even members. Its not like HQ GPG signs your certificate and you actually check the sigs. Go to the Mighty GOOG, enter "mensa membership" and click on "Images" in the black bar, and you get a pages of membership certs and cards ranging from ancient to recent. Anyone who is not a total noob/idiot can print their own cert in at most an hours work. Making a really good fake cert is probably a better overall intel test than passing the official test, anyway.
How to handle mensa types (Score:5, Interesting)
Invariably the person will not have solved the problem themselves - they're simply repeating an interesting problem that they read about some time in the past. Oftentimes they read that it makes for a good interview question.
You handle this by exclaiming "you like puzzles? That's great! I love puzzles too, here's one for you..." and then give the simplest, least obvious, most vexing conundrum you have. Look this up ahead of time so you have one ready to use.
Let them sputter and hem and haw for a minute, then give them another one. "Or how about this one - it's one of my favourites!"
Depending on how trashed you think the interview is (from when the manager burst in the first time), you can turn the screws a little. If you're not getting the job anyway, you can reverse it so that it seems like you don't *want* the job because no one else in the company can pass *your* puzzle requirements. "Oh, I thought you had a lot of bright, motivated, self-starting individuals. That's what the job requirements said you wanted...".
I keep a Chinese block puzzle [basiccarpe...niques.com] in my pocket for just such occasions.
No interviewing manager has ever had the guts to refuse my puzzle after asking their pet puzzle question, and I have yet to find one who was any good at puzzles.
Oh, and I also got a lot of job offers.
Re:How to handle mensa types (Score:2)
I keep a Chinese block puzzle [basiccarpe...niques.com] in my pocket for just such occasions
Thanks for the link; I was a carpenter when I was younger and that's a very useful web site.
Re:How to handle mensa types (Score:4, Interesting)
See, I felt the opposite and feel he was turning it around on assholes. Asking a brain teaser at an interview is just plain stupid. Unless the job is solving brain teaser or alien languages what value is a question like that? None. It is a job and 99% of the time the job function will be mundane and routine.
Now a good interview would ask about current events, thoughts on direction in the industry of choice or any other manner of questioning that gets into who the person is, what they think about, and will they fit with a group. The next time I get asked what are the principles of Object Oriented Programming are, I may just sum it into one phrase "get the job done well", as to whether I know encapsulation, polymorphism, or the rest of the esoteric terms has no value to my work.
hyper spaghetti (Score:2)
See, I felt the opposite and feel he was turning it around on assholes. Asking a brain teaser at an interview is just plain stupid. Unless the job is solving brain teaser or alien languages what value is a question like that? None. It is a job and 99% of the time the job function will be mundane and routine.
Now a good interview would ask about current events, thoughts on direction in the industry of choice or any other manner of questioning that gets into who the person is, what they think about, and will they fit with a group. The next time I get asked what are the principles of Object Oriented Programming are, I may just sum it into one phrase "get the job done well", as to whether I know encapsulation, polymorphism, or the rest of the esoteric terms has no value to my work.
I disagree with the AC who termed the other person a a-hole. However, I disagree with you more - if you think encapsulation and polymorphism are esoteric terms of no value, I fear to ever see your code. You can't get the job done well with OOP without knowing those, unless by "done well" you mean it compiles and runs (which is just half the battle to a job well done.) Also, "get the job done well" is not an attribute specific to OOP. You get the job done well regardless of the paradigm (procedural, modular, or OOP.)
Seriously, do you really believe encapsulation and polymorphism are esoteric terms of no value? If you do, more power to you in the land of OOP hyper-lasagna and procedural hyper-spaghetti spread across un-cohesive classes.
Re:hyper spaghetti (Score:2)
Do you use those words everyday, every time you talk about a program or programming? Most likely you just design and develop without even thinking much about the definitions. I did not say I don't use those practices in building a OOP, I just don't focus on the definition. When I go into an interview I would hope the interviewers want to focus on how I solve problems, deals with design questions, or interact with people, because skills can be taught or refreshed, but thinking...teaching that takes a lot longer then companies want to spend money on.
So yes, I still think they are esoteric terms that have very practical use in day to day development, but show little value when trotted out for defining in an interview. Anyone can memorise a sentence.
Re:hyper spaghetti (Score:2)
I agree with you inasmuch as brainteasers being useless, but I'm 100% with the parent on being fluent in terms of the art.
Trying to decide when to use encapsulation to hide implementation details isn't esoteric -- it's something that should be coming up in design reviews regularly, and in my experience, does. If you aren't thinking about your designs -- and having the vocabulary to recognize patterns and discuss them in higher-level terms is an important part of being able to reason about just about anything[1]... well, it's a relevant concern.
(A similar example applies to databases -- it's one thing, and valuable, to have a feel for what "smells like" good schema design... but if you don't have the vocabulary to talk about schema normalization, you're not the right person to be on a design review for decisions that will be impacting folks writing code for a product for potentially years to come).
[1] - ...if you give the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis any kind of weight.
Re:hyper spaghetti (Score:2)
I agree with you inasmuch as brainteasers being useless, but I'm 100% with the parent on being fluent in terms of the art.
Trying to decide when to use encapsulation to hide implementation details isn't esoteric -- it's something that should be coming up in design reviews regularly, and in my experience, does. If you aren't thinking about your designs -- and having the vocabulary to recognize patterns and discuss them in higher-level terms is an important part of being able to reason about just about anything[1]... well, it's a relevant concern.
(A similar example applies to databases -- it's one thing, and valuable, to have a feel for what "smells like" good schema design... but if you don't have the vocabulary to talk about schema normalization, you're not the right person to be on a design review for decisions that will be impacting folks writing code for a product for potentially years to come).
[1] - ...if you give the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis any kind of weight.
Yes, yes, yes. Absolutely. Having the vocabulary, and using it right goes a long way to discuss matters of design. Incidentally I remember an incident where I had to work with a CORBA-based system, and I'm trying to communicate with other developers. And I'm telling them about a CORBA sequence (as per the specs), and they wouldn't understand a flying f*ck what I was talking about. Apparently they had developed their own lingo using CORBA terms completely wrong. You can imagine the pandemonium and the quality of their code base.
Another more recent example - I had to deal with a software shop where *supposedly* they were using a MVC architectural design... except 1) the model determined what controller to use, and 2) the controller was embedded in the view classes. Talking about missing the point.
The correct usage of a vocabulary is everything in design. Flunk that and bad juju is bound to happen.
Re:hyper spaghetti (Score:2)
Do you use those words everyday, every time you talk about a program or programming?
In my current and past jobs, we have had regular get togethers to discuss what's up in the software world, including what are currently (and what were at some point in the past) best practices. Also, we do regular code inspections where, if the necessity is evident (and if it is affordable to make), we suggest changes in the code structure along the lines of established principles. We also find it important to be aware of them (by constantly talking about them) because some times technical management is pushing for a hack whose repercutions are not apparent unless you actually brings the pros and cons to the table in a consive manner using an unambiguous language.
Similarly, I regularly attend (typically once a month) a programmers' user group where we have round tables on the issues we face in our jobs, and what is going on in the industry and the state of the art of software engineering.
Most likely you just design and develop without even thinking much about the definitions.
Nope. I actually do think about the definitions whenever they make sense to the business problems I'm trying to solve as well as to non-functional requirements like maintainability and extensibility.
Yes, I don't belabor on whether this class hierarchy obeys the Liskov Substitution Principle, or whether something is-a as opposed to has-a. But I'm keenly aware of what is possibly right and what is possibly wrong when I look at code, my code and others.
Unless you are Sheldon Cooper, there is absolutely no way you can develop software of good quality in large quantities without being aware and actively discussing what is and what is not good software design.
I did not say I don't use those practices in building a OOP, I just don't focus on the definition.
Ok, question for you, and you are not allowed to use google or wikipedia. How do you tell if a class has low cohesion or high cohesion? To tell the difference, you need to know the definition. And I'm not asking you to tell me some abstract and useless definition of what cohesion is (.ie. how well the class is put together.) I'm asking you to precisely measure a class cohesion or lack thereof, where and how a class fails at being cohesive.
Why? Because that is typically the only way to know where and how to refactor an uncohesive class or module. If you can't tell me that, and if a person has never, even empirically done that, I can guarantee you that the resulting code base tends to be a monster hyper-spagetti plate past a certain code size or age.
So, tell me how do you identify a class lack of cohesion and how you use that to fix it? I'm sure you do not need an actual definition</sarcasm>
When I go into an interview I would hope the interviewers want to focus on how I solve problems,
Here is a problem for you: you have a legacy app that needs refactoring because code changes are too expensive to make. How do you go about it? Where do you need polymorphism and why? When composing your solution, where do you use inheritance or delegation? Why? What are the pros and cons?
deals with design questions
Here is another one: Design me a solution for X problem. Then I'll ask you how you justify your design decisions. Do you think you will not have to explain your usage of polymorphism, inheritance, encapsulation, SOLID principles, and the like? (assuming the interviewer cares about code quality as opposed to simply be content with sh1t that compiles and runs)
, or interact with people
Here is another one: A technical manager is opposed to the idea of refactoring a legacy application, or finds your design too complex (or too simple, it can happen both ways). How do you go about explaining to him/her the merits, pros and co
Re:How to handle mensa types (Score:2)
You sound like a giant asshole.
No, he's not. He's being smart about a very dumb thing people do in interviews - asking innane puzzles. They are irritating and seldom relevant to a job (unless you are interviewing with a predominantly algorithmic company.)
Now, there is a difference between puzzles directly related to one's expected academic background - if you have a CS degree, expect to be asked about the Towers of Hanoi or how to implement a recursive Fibonacci function amenable for tail recursion (or at the very least describe in high level the FTP protocol or a binary queue.)
OTH, if your background is in MIS or if the job at hand is systems administration or web development, none of the questions mentioned above should ever come to the table. Why? Because it is irrelevant to one's job and it is typically a dick move designed to show ZOMG I'm teh intelligenx0r/ (or worse, that you have no f* clue.)
Unfortunately the first case is rarely seen, whereas the second case occurs way too often. The later is a waste of time, and typically insulting. So yeah, it's good that the person you were replying to is ready to turn the tables. An interview should occur in an atmosphere of consideration and respect. Throwing a puzzle back (within reason) is a good way to remind the interviewer that you are not a job-desperate monkey available for personal entertainment.
Re:Mensa is the problem (Score:2)
Re:Stanford Grads are Awesome (Score:2)
I wonder whether people who take great pride in their mensa membership realize that it's the bottom tier in a hierarchy of brainy-clubs that's at least 4-5 layers deep.
Re:Stanford Grads are Awesome (Score:5, Interesting)
Exactly. Consensus hiring is Stanford voodoo clubhouse bullshit too - "we all thought you were awesome, but Arnie here wants to hire the girl with big tits who is almost as good as you, so...see you later!"
I live in Silicon Valley and most of the recent Stanford grads I meet are like West Coast Romneys: legacy kids, well-heeled by their own rich parents and friends, and already assured of that new 5-series or a spot at the VC table, no matter how stupid the idea is (paying 1 billion for Instagram...).
Yeah - I resent the hell out of the culture here. It's gone from what you know to who you know in 20 years. Now, instead of building things in Silicon Valley, we just reinvent the same scams to fleece money from consumers - thanks in part to your Stanford MBAs.
1 billion (Score:2)
Re:1 billion (Score:2)
Re:Stanford Grads are Awesome (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Stanford Grads are Awesome (Score:3)
Re:Stanford Grads are Awesome (Score:2)
Re:Stanford Grads are Awesome (Score:1)
Yeah, that's it. Not that if you filter for other unrelated attributes (hair color, polyester shirts), you'll also potentially lose a few talented programmers. Notch filters gotta filter for the right shit or all you get is noise.
Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:3)
the mission of the university as a place of refuge, contemplation, and investigation for its own sake
It was really nice when the college's mission used to be refuge, contemplation, and investigation for its own sake, but in today's shrinking economy that is (more and more) no longer the case. Now-a-days not only does the college as a whole feel immense budget pressure, but if individual departments don't ante up each year then they'll be on the chopping block [slashdot.org]
Re:Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:3)
the mission of the university as a place of refuge, contemplation, and investigation for its own sake
It was really nice when the college's mission used to be refuge, contemplation, and investigation for its own sake, but in today's shrinking economy that is (more and more) no longer the case. Now-a-days not only does the college as a whole feel immense budget pressure, but if individual departments don't ante up each year then they'll be on the chopping block [slashdot.org]
It's unfortunate, IMO, that most people go to college to get a job rather than to get an education.
Re:Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not wealthy enough to spend $50k on the joys of an abstract education. I need a job to pay for my loans.
Some people are rich, and don't have to care about that. That's great. The rest of us just gotta do what we gotta do.
Re:Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:2)
Some of us live in countries where you don't pay tuition to attend tax-funded universities. Of course, it's still wise to at least consider the usefulness of your education once you have a degree (or feel sufficiently educated for those who don't care about the piece of paper).
Re:Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:3)
What is so bad about taking money from a rich asshole who produces nothing but pain, suffering and occasional death, and use those money to pay for education of thousands of people who both benefit from it and do something helpful for others?
Re:Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:2)
Doing that would eradicate the culture of entrepreneurship that Stanford so excellently exemplifies.
Good! It's like lawyers -- you only need them because your enemies have them.
Re:Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:2)
And if there was no slavery, there would be no classical culture. Let's all go back to obsolete crap!
Re:Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:2)
Also, it's only a net drain on the economy if you assume that no good will come from an educated population.
You have yet to demonstrate that it benefits society. Most "education" at university is useless, because most people in this world are in-fact stupid and incapable of ever achieving any kind of noteworthy accomplishment.
How did you get to "most education at university is useless" from "most people in this world are in-fact stupid... and some more..." ? That only makes sense if most people get a university education, which they don't. Also, how do you support the statement that "most people are stupid and incapable ever achieving any kind of noteworthy accomplishment"? How do you quantify that statement?
As a hard working research scientist myself somehow I relish on negative generalizations like the one quote above
TFTFY.
I am sure as hell glad that the government doesn't rob me of my hard earned money to give it to some loser to study Philosophy or Art History or some other rubbish that can be simply understood by reading a few books on your own time.
But that's because you are assuming that a tax-paid, free college education is available for all. There are things called entrance exams. Some countries have it, some do not. To assume that a tax-paid, free-for-all higher education will inevitable means "robbing" your hard earned money to give it to some insert degree you despise student, it makes me question your ability to construct logical arguments (considering you are a research scientist.)
Pray tell, do you feel robbed that your taxes also pay the same roads people without an education use as well?
Re:Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:4, Interesting)
That's why I wish vocational schools had more prestige. There needs to be clear a distinction made between learning skills and getting an education. Neither is a bad thing in itself. I believe that learning skills, at a School (could be anything, ranging from Engineering to Law, Medicine, Journalism, Design, etc), can be viewed as an investment in the future (in terms of getting a job), and as such it is ok for it to rely on tuition fees. But getting an education, at a true University (with Arts, Math, Physics, History, Social Sciences, etc.), should be something that is fully subsidized. It wouldn't cost as much as you think to fund, since not many people would gravitate toward it in the first place. Once it's made clear that a University won't get you a job, you will only have people who go there who don't quite yet know what to do with their lives (until they figure out that to get a job they should go to a School), or people who have truly scholarly interest in the topic at hand.
There would be bridges between the two, of course. Schools would most likely require some courses to be taken at a University (this way, Schools would also partially subsidize Universities).
Re:Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:2)
The general upshot of this would be your working classes would have to pay for their schooling anyway, and the idle rich who have the ability to spend several years of their life doing something that isn't economically productive would get a free liberal arts education. This would only serve to deepen the divide between the very rich and everyone else.
Re:Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:2)
How would that be worse than the current situation? Right now those who do non-professional degrees spend all that time AND money on something that won't get them a degree. What I'm proposing is to make the state subsidize those degrees so that at least student's aren't in debt once they've completed a program that doesn't lead to a job. If anything, this should mean that we'll see MORE lower and middle classes in university, aided in that by everybody's taxes.
then make community college that base level (Score:2)
then make community college that base level and say that jobs can't say you need a BA or higher when the job does not need it.
For lot's of tech jobs tech training is better then BA in CS.
Re:then make community college that base level (Score:2)
There is no job that needs it. What asking for a BA does is provide a filter to limit the number of applicants to a manageable level. If you ask your parents, they'll probably tell you that in their day you only needed a high school education, a result of a time when many did not graduate high school. Today everyone does, so the filter has been stepped up to the University level.
In industries where labour is short, like software development is right now, you can walk in and get a high paying job without having spent any time in the classroom of any level. There is no need to apply the filter as the number of applicants are already low.
It has never been about the education, just a trick to make hiring easier.
but what happens when it goes to MA, PHD for base (Score:2)
but what happens when it goes to MA, PHD for base level?
Also what about trades like training?
Re:but what happens when it goes to MA, PHD for ba (Score:2)
but what happens when it goes to MA, PHD for base level?
The student debt will just get that much higher. Unless the education bubble eventually bursts, the day people start defaulting on their debt repayments.
Re:but what happens when it goes to MA, PHD for ba (Score:2)
I would say that to some degree this has already started. If more people choose to obtain BA level educations, it will become more widespread. After that, some new filter will have to be found. It doesn't necessarily have to be education-based. Education has just been the easy target so far. But perhaps the educational institutions will accommodate by offering increasing levels of education, or maybe you'll need multiple degrees to even be considered?
Many trades built their own filtering framework outside of the university setting, typically through apprenticeship programs. From what I gather from those industries, there isn't a huge fight to fill the available spots, so it seems to serve them well. If, in the future, more people want to enter those industries, you might need a degree before you can start apprenticing as means to filter the number of applicants again.
Re:Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:2)
That's not a bad way to look at it either. I'm just afraid it would cost more than my solution. I also wonder if everybody would go straight to a vocational school first and then never bother with a non-professional degree, meaning you'd never see the kind of Renaissance Man model you wished for in the first paragraph (and that I would like as well).
Re:Such a quaint definition of college... (Score:2)
Also wanted to add that there's nothing to stop vocational schools to also require their students to be well-rounded, and to expect them to take many courses at University as part of their curriculum. As I said in an earlier post, that would in fact provide a great way to further subsidize university, through the offering of these "service courses" to the vocational schools.
a misunderstanding of science and engineering (Score:4, Insightful)
It's more than a little insulting when scientists and engineers are painted with the "uncreative and money grubbing" label simply because we work on things that have practical value.
I don't understand why anyone would criticize a university for training students to "serve the public" and for having an unusually happy and diverse student body.
Re:a misunderstanding of science and engineering (Score:5, Informative)
I think you're misunderstanding the primary complaint about the venture funding bias:
1) Stanford admissions selections, while probabilistic, are dominated by socioeconomic status (this also highly correlates with several often used measures of 'smarts', like the SAT).
2) Stanford students and graduates have privileged access to venture capital funding for their start-ups.
3) This gives incentive for a certain type of highly achieving student to apply to Stanford -- those interested in receiving VC money.
4) That incentive compromises Stanford's ability as a top-tier research institution to attract students who are interested in basic research in proportion to those interested in immediately applicable research topics.
5) Without the broad basic research base, the quality of Stanford alums starts declining because their applied ideas don't use the best current science.
I don't think, even if this cycle perpetuates that it spells death to Stanford or anything, but it sure is non-optimal in terms of technological development, and it will surely also cause a dip in the quality of Stanford's research output, which has generally been extremely high in the past 40 or so years... and given the amount of GDP the Stanford has access to and their research record in the past 40 years, that's bad news not only for the US tax payer but humanity as a whole.
Stanford Management Company, the real reason (Score:5, Interesting)
Stanford has become more like that. Some of this comes from a big organizational change.
I went through Stanford in the 1980s. (MSCS, 1985). Stanford hadn't really started operating innovation as a profit center at that time. Their biggest revenue patent was the one for FM music synthesis, the technology used by electronic keyboards before sampling. There's been much financial progress since then.
In 1991, Stanford spun off the management of its endowment to the http://www.smc.stanford.edu/ [slashdot.org]">Stanford Management Company. Many universities have an organization to manage their endowment, but Stanford's is more active than most. SMC isn't on campus. It's located on Sand Hill Road, next to the famous office park where all the major venture capitalists have offices. SMC invests in venture capital firms, and this has worked out very well. Stanford directly owns part of Google, part of Cisco, part of Sun, part of Facebook... Stanford has $27 billion in investment assets. (Harvard is still ahead, at $32 billion, but Stanford is catching up.)
Arguably, Stanford is a venture capital firm which runs a school on the side for the tax break.
Re:Stanford Management Company, the real reason (Score:3, Interesting)
The whole idea of a non-profit entity is a myth. The money always goes somewhere. In a typical well-run and well-meaning non-profit charity, some of the money goes to the charity's beneficiaries (they profit), and some of it goes to pay non-volunteer employees (especially upper management), who also profit. Because the profits aren't at the "corporate" level, but instead disbursed to "beneficiaries" and "employees", we senselessly call it non-profit. In a for-profit public corporation, the shareholders form a collective entity which acts like an upper management position, and they take home profit in terms of market returns. In a private one it's the same thing, but the pool of shareholders is a small private club. There's really not a huge difference here, especially when you start bending the rules by calling SMC a non-profit university when they're raking in $27B via private equity investments. I guess the students and professors are the ultimate beneficiaries of the profits, and then buy into the system through tuition, time served, and using their talents to promote Stanford's name.
I'd take the original description a step further. Stanford is a venture capital firm which re-invests some of its profits in operating a side-business school which very successfully specializes in creating more entrepreneurs which will create more tech startups for Stanford to invest in. They've created a feedback loop of money, and the students/profs-cum-entrepreneurs and various Stanford faculty that derive money on the side from their positions in this scheme all benefit from the profits of the system as a whole.
Label it whatever you want, but they certainly don't need to steal from my income taxes to fund themselves at this point, so I'd rather they didn't get free tax-break government handouts :P
Interesting focus (Score:2)
Here we have a nice article about one certain school becoming too tightly focused, and perhaps overspecialized... conveniently ignoring "sports" schools which are a complete farce as degree granting institutions.
At least Standford is dealing with marketable, long-term job creating fields. If you think they need to tweak their focus a bit, that's fair. But if you're really interested in improving the collegiate scene as a whole I'd start with the students who are lined up for the picking this Thursday (that would be the NFL Draft, for those not in the know)
Re:Interesting focus (Score:2)
The first overall pick in that NFL draft is going to be a Stanford alum.
Just sayin'
Isn't Stanford within Silicon Valley? (Score:3)
Sure Stanford is 'close' to Silicon Valley, although depends on what one means by 'too close'. If by Silicon Valley, one is talking about the Santa Clara county cities, like Santa Clara, Sunnyvale, San Jose, Milpitas, Mountain View, and just outside it, Fremont, then yeah, Stanford is just a 10 minute drive on the 280 and 20 minute drive on the 101. Fifteen minutes on El Camino Real.
TFA, it's good that Stanford & Berkeley are there to service the Bay Area companies, or whatever's left of them.
The other way around... (Score:5, Interesting)
It's not that Stanford is too focused on Silicon Valley. It's that Silicon Valley is too focused on Stanford.
As an outsider to the valley, I find it pretty creepy how obsessed everyone is about Stanford and Stanford grads. It's as if, when one of them walks in the room, I'm supposed to cream my jeans over his very presence. Sure, some of them are smart, but so are some east coast state school graduates, community college graduates, and non-college-grads. I don't quite understand the "oooooooh Staaaaaaanford!" aura.
It's also pretty shitty that "Went to Stanford" is often an un-spoken, "soft" job requirement for more than a few valley tech companies.
Re:The other way around... (Score:3)
Thank you for echoing what this silicon valley transplant has seen and felt during nearly 20 years here.
Stanford University is pretty much a "free hire" pass at many companies here. Based on many of the project and product managers I've met who graduated from there, that tendency has cost valley companies a lot of money, but at least the BMW dealerships and Coach stores are happy.
absurd notion (Score:3, Interesting)
Labyrinthine Mind (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Labyrinthine Mind (Score:2)
What shade of madness caused HR to hire an economist for a programming position?
Nothing new (Score:2)
This is nothing new [johntaylorgatto.com], and nothing unique to Stanford. Here's a page from history:
(That page is a chapter in a much larger book [johntaylorgatto.com] about the modern education system, by the way, which is well worth a read in its entirety.)
tech / vol / community schools need more respect (Score:2)
Tech / Vocational / Community do need more respect and yes some jobs do need post high school trading. But there is Too Much Emphasis On College Education ,ECT when some kind of Badges system is a better fit.
http://www2.ed.gov/pubs/CollegeForAll/intro.html [ed.gov]
and not all trading is a good in to a 2 year or 4 year or more College plan. Part or issues of tech schools and some class plans in community is that they try to fit a trades / tech class plan in to a BA, AA
http://chronicle.com/article/Badges-Earned-Online-Pose/130241/ [chronicle.com]
tech / vol / community schools do offer night , on line , drop in and take in non-matriculated students. Tech does have a lot of needed on going learning and 2 more years of college is not a good fit.
It is a issue when you have a DIGITAL MEDIA that offers a 2 (college class load) year very hands on Film + Broadcast plan but then you have things like a TV channel wanting a 4 year degree in Communications to work in master control? For one thing a communications BA is a poor fit for a very tech / hands on job.
You also have issues in tech jobs where mainly on the College site you have the big catch all CS that can very a lot from school to school that is mostly geared to programming / high level design work. The tech / vol / community do offer more classes / a better over all plan that covers the needed skills with less of the high level stuff that does not help you on the job.
Re:tech / vol / community schools need more respec (Score:2)
Tech / Vocational / Community do need more respect and yes some jobs do need post high school trading.
But there is Too Much Emphasis On College Education
http://www2.ed.gov/pubs/CollegeForAll/intro.html [ed.gov] [ed.gov] and not all trading is a good fit in to a 2 year or 4 year or more College plan.
Part or issues of tech schools and some class plans in community is that they try to fit a trades / tech class plan in to a BA, AA ,ECT when some kind of Badges system is a better fit.
http://chronicle.com/article/Badges-Earned-Online-Pose/130241/ [chronicle.com]
The tech / vol / community schools do offer night, on line , drop in and take in non-matriculated students. The tech Feld does have a lot of needed on going learning and 2 more years of college is not a good fit.
It is an issue when you have a DIGITAL MEDIA that offers a 2 (college class load) year very hands on Film + Broadcast plan but then you have things like a TV channel wanting a 4 year degree in Communications to work in master control? For one thing a communications BA is a poor fit for a very tech / hands on job.
You also have issues in tech jobs where mainly on the College site you have the big catch all CS that can very a lot from school to school that is mostly geared to programming / high level design work. The tech / vol / community do offer more classes / a better overall plan that covers the needed skills with less of the high level stuff that does not help you on the job.
No problem (Score:2)
A few shifts of the San Andreas fault and they'll be farther apart.
Indeed (Score:2)
They really should get their heads on straight and focus on the stuff that matters like a top notch football and basketball team.