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Author Topic: Hilarious urban legend
Destineer
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Making the rounds on Facebook:

quote:

An economics professor at a local college made a statement that he had never failed a single student before, but had recently failed an entire class. That class had insisted that Obama's socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer.
The professor then said, "OK, we will have an experiment in this class on Obama's plan". All grades will be averaged and everyone will receive the same grade so no one will fail and no one will receive an A.... (substituting grades for dollars - something closer to home and more readily understood by all).
After the first test, the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy. As the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too so they studied little..
The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around, the average was an F. As the tests proceeded, the scores never increased as bickering, blame and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else. To their great surprise, ALL FAILED and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great, but when government takes all the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed. It could not be any simpler than that.
Remember, there IS a test coming up. The 2012 elections.

These are possibly the 5 best sentences you'll ever read and all applicable to this experiment:
1. You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity.
2. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving.
3. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
4. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it!
5. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that is the beginning of the end of any nation.

http://www.snopes.com/college/exam/socialism.asp
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Synesthesia
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Ugh. Not this. Folks just ADDED Obama to it. I dislike urban legends and worse of all GLURGE. Or that story about some guy punching an atheist.
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Glenn Arnold
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I would have to point out that grading students equally on work they do together on group projects is a mainstay of pedagogy. While there is likelihood that group dynamics will allow some to coast while others do the work, teachers usually find that the better performing students will coach the underperforming students, which provides the better performing students the opportunity to be the expert, the underperforming students with one-on-one tutoring, and the teacher can spend less time focusing on individually needy students while managing the lesson more effectively.
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Samprimary
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I still feel for my friends who get chain emails forwarded to them from their conservative families. It hurts a little to know that the people who done born and raised you are acting examples of the importance of a critical thinking curriculum in our schools.
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James Tiberius Kirk
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quote:
Originally posted by Glenn Arnold:
I would have to point out that grading students equally on work they do together on group projects is a mainstay of pedagogy. While there is likelihood that group dynamics will allow some to coast while others do the work, teachers usually find that the better performing students will coach the underperforming students, which provides the better performing students the opportunity to be the expert, the underperforming students with one-on-one tutoring, and the teacher can spend less time focusing on individually needy students while managing the lesson more effectively.

You know what they could do? They could take the top students from prior semesters, who are working toward additional degrees, and force them to invest their time and energy in aiding the students with the lower grades. They could call these students "teaching assistants" and make their work a key component of a scheme called "grad school."

--j_k

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Samprimary
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damn you, socialism, damn you
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Jeff C.
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Lol, James has a point. It's sad how exploited TA's are.

This story was entertaining, though, so at least there's that. It's a nice comparison if you dumb down the system. However, I don't think Obama is a socialist and I don't think it's fair to sum up everything he does into one idea (I also don't think you can blame him for everything that happens, because let's face it, he's just one man and he can only do so much, be it right or wrong).

Most people tend to agree that Socialism is not the way to go (after all, we've all been told it's evil, right?), but I don't think Obama has the ability to implement a system like that, even if he wanted to. Not really. And even if he did, he's only got (at most) another 5 years before another guy in a suit replaces him and tears the whole thing down because he wants to do things his own way. Honestly, if I was the President, I'd wonder what the point of it was. In fact, I would probably focus my energy on science and discovery, like JFK did when he said we'd get to the moon within the decade. He didn't live to see it happen, but he still gets the credit. Stuff like that doesn't fade or get replaced, but changing laws does. Of course, if he had actually pulled off universal healthcare, that would have been something for the history books.

But I digress. It was a fun read. I can see a lot of people I know using it as a point in their arguments. It's sort of like that other urban legend about Einstein arguing with his college professor. You guys know that one? I forget how it goes.

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BlueWizard
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There were a bunch of Republican students recently who went around and ask other students if they thought their good grades should be lowered and given to students with poorer grades.

The analogy was, why should rich people give their money to poor people, and the implication was that this was somehow related to the ridiculous notion that Obama was a Socialist.

It is pure BUNK, ass gravy of the worst kind.

The Rich are paying unconscionably low tax rates at a time when the country is in desperate need. The Repubs are more than willing to cut essential services from the poor, but won't cut a single penny from subsidies to the Rich.

Asking the Rich to pay a fair and reasonable tax rate it not Socialism, it is common sense. And to do otherwise is unconscionable in the extreme.

Whether such a college professor ever existed or not is debatable, but the concept is ridiculous. Obscene wealth that creates massive debt that must be paid off by the middle class, is not even remotely the same as averaging grades.

The two are not analogous.

Steve/bluewizard

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Glenn Arnold
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quote:
Lol, James has a point. It's sad how exploited TA's are.
I must say that when I was a TA I loved every minute of it. I was free to teach. Once I became a teacher it turned into a grind, where I was the students' adversary. Is it an urban legend that about half of all new teachers quit the profession within 5 years?
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Orincoro
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Not only is this meme anciliciously stupid, bargaining and games theory suggests that this is not the likely result anyway. So it's both cloyingly stupid and obvious *and* wrong.
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Itsame
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My grandfather emailed me this. He forwards to me so many things like this.
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Orincoro
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I'm sorry to hear that.
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Glenn Arnold
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quote:
Not only is this meme anciliciously stupid, bargaining and games theory suggests that this is not the likely result anyway.
That was my point.
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Jeff C.
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quote:
Originally posted by Glenn Arnold:
quote:
Lol, James has a point. It's sad how exploited TA's are.
I must say that when I was a TA I loved every minute of it. I was free to teach. Once I became a teacher it turned into a grind, where I was the students' adversary.
I have a few friends who are TAs and they have mixed feelings on it. One really enjoys it, but the other doesn't at all. However, they both agree that the pay is crap, even compared to easier jobs (I think they each get about 175 a week for roughly 20 hours of work, not including the time they have to sit at home grading papers). On the other hand, the enjoyment of teaching someone, passing on knowledge, and the flexibility that is sometimes afforded, all seem like solid reasons to do the job. I feel like I would probably enjoy it. Also, it looks pretty snazzy on a resume, especially if you plan on going into teaching full time.
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Itsame
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Maybe I just have an easy post, but I get 275/week and work about 7 hours after grading. I think it varies a lot but let's not forget tuition remission too, which is especially valuable,

[ January 30, 2012, 12:34 PM: Message edited by: JonHecht ]

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Jeff C.
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quote:
Originally posted by JonHecht:
Maybe I just have an easy post, but I get 275/week and work about 7 hours after grading. I think it varies a lot but let's not forget tuition remission too, which is especially valuable,

You know, I thought that every TA got the reimbursement, but apparently not everyone does. One of the friends I mentioned is only doing it so he has something for his resume. I feel like he's probably getting screwed over on that deal, but to each their own, I suppose.
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