LordShiva and DaShi's homework: Teh Disadvantages of Elite Education

[Elok]

I'll have you know, Asher, that a full 100% of all WMD were invented by scientists! :scarymusic:

[Kuciwalker]

"pure as the driven snow"?

edit: huh, apparently it's a legitimate simile, though I still don't get the "driven" bit.

[Ben Kenobi]

Think sandblasting.

In the north when it gets cold, the wind makes the snow drift just like sand. So "pure as the driven snow" is snow that's been blasted by the wind.

[Ben Kenobi]

driv·en (drvn)
v.
Past participle of drive.
adj.
1. Piled up or carried along by a current: driven snow.
2. Motivated by or having a compulsive quality or need: a driven person.
3. Caused, sustained, or stimulated: an export-driven economic recovery.
4. Powered, operated, or controlled: a piston-driven airplane; a menu-driven software program.

[Drake Tungsten]

I have to say, Asher really hit the nail on the head with this thread.

[ShaneWalter]

After reading the thread, I have a few thoughts.

First of all, I'm not really convinced that arts educations are subsidized that heavily, if at all.

Three of the classes I'm taking use Moodle, this allows me to get an accurate count of how many people are enrolled in each class. They are all arts classes. The first class, Introduction to International Studies has 93 students. The second class, Economic Development has 57 students. The third class, World Politics, has 37 students.

Tuition at the U of R is approximately $500 for a resident of Saskatchewan (It is more expensive for international students). That means, that in total, for all my 3 classes, the university is recieving $93,500 in tuition from all the students enrolled. (The number would actually be higher because there is a lot of foreign students in both my Econ and Intl class, but we'll take 93,500 as a conservative estimate).

I highly doubt it costs $30,000 to offer a 3 credit hour Arts class for one semester. These classes aren't taught by tenured professors, in fact two of the classes (International Studies and World Politics) are being taught by professors in their first year.

My second thought is, Ben you're an idiot. Nobody made any claim that Hawking was some morally great man. The argument was that Waterloo must have a good physics department because Hawking is considering going there. The fact that Waterloo would have given him a $400 million budget doesn't disprove that at all, it actually reinforces the point.

[Zevico]

Thanks for your reply. Very informative.

[Ben Kenobi]

My second thought is, Ben you're an idiot. Nobody made any claim that Hawking was some morally great man. The argument was that Waterloo must have a good physics department because Hawking is considering going there. The fact that Waterloo would have given him a $400 million budget doesn't disprove that at all, it actually reinforces the point.

It's all about the Benjamins. If the 400 million of funding wasn't there, do you think Hawking would come to Waterloo? No. It's like the Yankees. Does ARod consider playing there because the Yankees are an excellent ball-club, or because they were the only ones who were willing to pay him what he thought he deserved.

Hawking is no different. You offer him that much money, of course he's going to take it into consideration. It could be Purdue, and his answer would be the same.

[KrazyHorse]

I highly doubt it costs $30,000 to offer a 3 credit hour Arts class for one semester.

It costs at least 3 times that.

[ShaneWalter]

I highly doubt it costs $30,000 to offer a 3 credit hour Arts class for one semester.

It costs at least 3 times that.

$90,000 to offer one 3 credit hour course? That is not even possible. Maybe at Harvard, not a typical Canadian public university.

The total budget of the University of Regina is about $120 million. There's over 8,000 undergraduate students that are going full time (3 classes a semester, 6 classes a year is the minimum for full time). Even assuming that all classes cost the same, all classes have an enrollment of 50, none of the students take more than 3 classes a semester, and none of the $120 million pays for graduate students or part time students, you arrive at a figure of about $120,000 a class.

Though, you have to consider that science classes are going to cost more to offer than the Arts classes, there's about 1,500 post graduate students, there's about 3,000 part time students, most full time students take more than 3 classes per semester. So there's no way a Introduction to International Studies class costs even near $90,000.

[MRT144]

Ben needs killing and that's all there is to it. This thread and Asher are great. Ben is a steaming pile of ****.

[Lorizael]

Ben needs killing and that's all there is to it. This thread and Asher are great. Ben is a steaming pile of ****.

And you've crossed the line. Goodbye!

[notyoueither]

After reading the thread, I have a few thoughts.

First of all, I'm not really convinced that arts educations are subsidized that heavily, if at all.

Three of the classes I'm taking use Moodle, this allows me to get an accurate count of how many people are enrolled in each class. They are all arts classes. The first class, Introduction to International Studies has 93 students. The second class, Economic Development has 57 students. The third class, World Politics, has 37 students.

Tuition at the U of R is approximately $500 for a resident of Saskatchewan (It is more expensive for international students). That means, that in total, for all my 3 classes, the university is recieving $93,500 in tuition from all the students enrolled. (The number would actually be higher because there is a lot of foreign students in both my Econ and Intl class, but we'll take 93,500 as a conservative estimate).

I highly doubt it costs $30,000 to offer a 3 credit hour Arts class for one semester. These classes aren't taught by tenured professors, in fact two of the classes (International Studies and World Politics) are being taught by professors in their first year.

My second thought is, Ben you're an idiot. Nobody made any claim that Hawking was some morally great man. The argument was that Waterloo must have a good physics department because Hawking is considering going there. The fact that Waterloo would have given him a $400 million budget doesn't disprove that at all, it actually reinforces the point.

Is there a summer semester?

How many courses per year do members of faculty teach?

I don't think I had an average of 50 classmates per class at the UofA.

[ShaneWalter]

Is there a summer semester?

How many courses per year do members of faculty teach?

I don't think I had an average of 50 classmates per class at the UofA.

There's a summer semester, but outside of certain faculties (engineering and business are two I can think of) there are few classes offered during the summer semester.

It seems to me that faculty members generally teach six classes, as usually in the fall and winter semesters they teach 3 classes each. I'm not sure how the summer semester works into it (do they get paid extra for teaching a summer class or does it mean that they don't have to teach as many classes in the fall and winter semesters I don't know).

There's another class I'm taking which doesn't have a moodle component to it (so I can't just click participants and find out the enrollment), but it isn't an Arts class anyway, it is calculus. That class probably only has about 35 people in it, but it is in a huge auditorium that could probably seat 150. It just happens that not many people want to take calculus in the evening.

[notyoueither]

You are in first year?

I recall first year classes with 20 to 250 people in Arts. I enrolled in an English for English majors course by mistake. It had 16 to 20 people. Art History was in an auditorium with at least 250 students.

Second and third year classes were on average much smaller. A couple of fourth year were five or six people.

I think your average of 50 is a tad high.

You might want to reverse it. Find out what the faculty budget is, the number of faculty, and divide by the number of students.