If you could add one required course for all students what would it be?

[Paul Hanson]

English is a contradictory language by nature. That's common knowledge.

[MrWhereItsAt]

How to compose written and spoken presentations. It hardly matters what job you get, if it is in any professional field (which is surely the reason you go to Uni), you need to present stuff.

This would cover public speaking, interview technique, personal presentation, and making sure your presentation has a clear beginning, middle and end.

[Sava]

Common Sense 101.... I know it doesn't exist, but some people definitely need to learn this.

[Aeson]

How about uncommon sense? Or better yet... nap time!

[Akka]

Spelling course (of your native language).
I'm plainly horrified when I see many people's spelling after ten or more years of school.
The very basic understanding of the language is not even barely understood by some.

[Provost Harrison]

English is a bugger of a language. I have had what is considered to be a very good education, and by general standards, my English is very good. But still, I **** up certain words, forget how to spell them. It is mad.

[Akka]

Originally posted by Provost Harrison
English is a bugger of a language. I have had what is considered to be a very good education, and by general standards, my English is very good. But still, I **** up certain words, forget how to spell them. It is mad.

You think english spelling is a bugger ?
Try french.
I promise you you'll come back to english faster than light

[Provost Harrison]

At least French has some kind of rules and system for spelling, just about...English seems completely random

[Akka]

Well, trouble is, each rules has about two thousands of exceptions each.
So you have to learn both the rules AND the random stuff
At least in english you just have to learn the random stuff

[MrWhereItsAt]

English is the bastard son of every language - it doesn't have no rules, but it has almost every (in some case conflicting) rule.

[Wraith]

Some kind of logic/critical thinking course. Way too many people getting out of schools in the US are totally lacking in that. Unfortunately, this would totally undermine the public education system, so it'll never happen (the latter bit being the unfortunate part).

--"too superficial, too blunt..."

Well, he does have a point, but I'd have to say that those topics should be covered in existing history classes.
Wait, forget that. Lots of US schools don't have history any more, they've got something called "social studies".

Wraith (who is just waiting for US k-12 schools to run the same kind of classes US undergad level colleges are... like TV appreciation and wine tasting.)
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you. If you really make them think they'll hate you."
-- Donald Marquis

[Sliparac]

Renaissance music.

[Provost Harrison]

Of high practical necessity is that one

[Seeker]

I remember taking 'Entrepreneurial Business' in HS.

Useless.

Home Economics? Mia mama was a much better teacher.

Basic accountancy/bookkeeping? Kind of useful, but not what I'd call necessary.

'Shop'/ design, whatever class. Tits on a bull.

English. I would rather have preferred free reading/writing time, but I guess one has to teach the proles how to write a proper essay.

HISTORY:
Nothing is more important for a student who is not planning on being a welder/plumber whatever for the rest of their lives.

Of course, it has to be GOOD history. It has to be critical, but patriotic at the younger level. It has to be a bit of political philosophy, a bit of art history, a bit of world religion, a bit of technical history, but I believe that, done properly, history is one of those few disciplines that can teach you how to think.

Philosophy and Logic could, but it is dominated by Marxists and crypto-Marxists.

Come to think of it, most history is ALSO dominated by Marxists...

Thank Odin for my HS History teacher, and his great paper topic "Benefits of British Imperialism in India"

That was also the class where we tried to form a phalanx for one class, very amusing...

Another very inspirational class we had was Law & Order, the teacher was amazing. A little bit of a Marxist at times, but passionate, inspiring, combined philosophy with practical matters. We would analyze real RDs* (actually, this part was a lot like 1st year law at a real law school), sit in on real court, attended a students traffic violation hearing, debate the 'issues'.


Worst Class: A Bull**** 'internet business' or something course. Taught by an obnoxious bee-atch, who locked the door precisely at 10:00AM, we used Mavis Beacon as our mid-term (don't ask; total incompetance was the answer), and my 'project' was a retarded HTML page with: single colour blue background, an animated goat .gif, and a counter. That was ALL.

[Vlad Antlerkov]

Critical thinking/logic.

However, as Wraith pointed out, this would cause the American educational system-- perhaps even all of American society-- to collapse.

Which isn't always a bad thing.