Texas Colleges on top 20 list (Houston, Austin: top school, salary, costs)

[UnfairPark]

That's not true, overall society doesn't over-think or even think college too much. Majority attends their state schools or legacy schools or where ever they can get in and recieve financial aid. It's a smaller section of educated and affluent families who over analyze everything including college, others only criticize them for over thinking.

[TheOverdog]

Majority attends their state schools or legacy schools or where ever they can get in and recieve financial aid.

Actually the majority doesn't even go to college long enough to complete it. Only like 1/3 of the population has a college degree. So yeah, it's not at all true that 'we' overthink college.

[War Beagle]

Originally Posted by UnfairPark

That's not true, overall society doesn't over-think or even think college too much. Majority attends their state schools or legacy schools or where ever they can get in and recieve financial aid. It's a smaller section of educated and affluent families who over analyze everything including college, others only criticize them for over thinking.

I think we have very different ideas about the value of college. I have a BS and an MA. The only value either has for me is as a pass to get me by the first round of gatekeepers when applying for a job. I've always had "professional" jobs and not a single one of them couldn't be done by a high school graduate assuming they had a high enough intelligence and received the proper training. Of course there are some careers that require formal education (medicine, engineering, architecture,etc.) but the vast majority do not.

My opinion is that we as a society, and parents, are pushing far too many kids on to the college track. In some cases, the kids aren't academically suited or have talents that are more vocational in nature. Not enough public schools advocate vocational opportunities and schools and parents fixate on college for everyone. Part of that fixation is fretting about colleges and not letting kids be kids because their entire childhood is about building a college application filled with extracurriculars.

I know this isn't the topic you made this thread to discuss. Tertiary education in the USA is a pet peeve of mine and I tend to get carried away.

[Austinite101]

So many of the jobs that require degrees vs those that do not, on average, typically differ in that those that require a degree tend to demand some combination of critical thinking skills, original thought, reasoning, or writing skills in my experience. In general, the average high school graduate in Texas is far from prepared for that type of job.

That's not to say that a sufficiently intelligent high school graduate has/can develop those skills, but it's not the rule that high school graduates in Texas can do jobs that require them.

I also agree with the posters pushing vocational studies as an alternative. A big chunk of high school grads are either not cut out for college, or desire a technical career that does not include the standard 4-year degree path.

[UnfairPark]

Originally Posted by Austinite101

So many of the jobs that require degrees vs those that do not, on average, typically differ in that those that require a degree tend to demand some combination of critical thinking skills, original thought, reasoning, or writing skills in my experience. In general, the average high school graduate in Texas is far from prepared for that type of job.

That's not to say that a sufficiently intelligent high school graduate has/can develop those skills, but it's not the rule that high school graduates in Texas can do jobs that require them.

I also agree with the posters pushing vocational studies as an alternative. A big chunk of high school grads are either not cut out for college, or desire a technical career that does not include the standard 4-year degree path.

You are right, vocational studies are really underrated and usually curriculum is unbalanced as well, if we can improve on that, there is lot of money to be made there. We don't serve fraction of students who are not academically inclined but are smart and willing to work hard for a decent living. There is little point in pushing them into colleges.

[H'ton]

The State of Texas is so backwards, when it comes to education...Where do I begin.

Ok, I'll start with the PUF (Permanent University Fund).

The state constitution mandates that the state's education fund (PUF) ONLY go to support TWO state University systems (UT & TAMU). The rest of the STATE public Universities were not expected to get state funding. In 1984, the rest banded together and forced the state to create a much smaller secondary fund, that is to be divided among the rest...Texas Tech, University of Houston, Texas State, North Texas, etc. Compare that system to California's UC- system which churns out some of the best public schools in the country. That is our competition, and we have Texas kids leaving the state (and leaving money on the table) to attend schools in the SEC and elsewhere. Imagine if Texas decided to elevate the public schools they already have in place.

And then there was this....

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/...um/1316956002/

I don't care if you are PRO or ANTI Hilary Clinton, I'm pretty sure she was the First Lady of the United States of America for 8 years and was the FIRST woman to run as a candidate of major political party for the President of the United States.

Refusing to officially put that in your textbooks/curriculum only fosters Texas students being ignorant of legitimate historical facts.

[Trainwreck20]

*sigh* As I understand it, it is not taking it out of the books. It is just removing it as one of the mandated points you have to learn for the standardized test. I don't know if that is good, bad, terrible, whatever, but they aren't actually proposing to erase her. At least as I understand it, anyway, could be wrong. And it isn't finalized at this point. But they do have a limit what all is mandatory at some point.

[ScoPro]

Don’t know why they needed to spend so much time on each of those historic personalities, a 5 minutes mention would suffice for the losing politicians. Maybe a few more for Keller.
When the PUF was set up by the legislature, most of those “other” schools did not exist, IIRC.

Unfortunately, our previous governor’s agenda has turned Texas A&M into a trade school, but luckily the University of Texas successfully fought his attempts to do the same with the state flagship campus in Austin. Both UT and its branch A&M will resist any moves by politicians to further divide up the PUF with the latecomers.
Instead, a new & separate PUF should be set up to help elevate those universities, and another to develop a stronger trade school system for the half of the kids who should not be wasting their time & taxpayer money pursuing useless degrees that don’t benefit them or the state economy.

[eddie gein]

Originally Posted by EDS_

I've been an on and off professor for a long time ergo I'm very interested in higher education. For the record Wash U. in St. Louis is one of the best universities in the world. For example Wash U. has a very highly rated medical school.

Cal Poly Pomona is a solid school but should not be on the list vis a vis academics.

I'm glad you posted this about Wash U. StL.

I've always said that Wash U is probably the best university in the US that nobody has every heard of.

I'd say it is right in there with Rice being really top notch. It seems like UT and A&M have dropped some in recent years but are still really highly ranked for state schools.

[Snowpacked]

Originally Posted by Trainwreck20

*sigh* As I understand it, it is not taking it out of the books. It is just removing it as one of the mandated points you have to learn for the standardized test. I don't know if that is good, bad, terrible, whatever, but they aren't actually proposing to erase her. At least as I understand it, anyway, could be wrong. And it isn't finalized at this point. But they do have a limit what all is mandatory at some point.

Why do you *sigh*? This state is a horrible place to be "educated", mandates, right. It is interesting how the GOP touts freedom, but now mandates what people learn.
If it is not obvious to you by now their work is done with you and on to next. My first question would be - Why do we still use books?