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On August 27 2014 06:53 ThomasjServo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 27 2014 06:18 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 27 2014 06:05 ThomasjServo wrote:
Benefits kick in in October where my company will cover some of the cost of education. I am thinking of heading to back to a community college to do the leg work for a stats degree or something similar. I don't regret Police Sci, but I'd like to gain some new knowledge and add some to my resume. If your company covers some of the cost and you have the time to spend, I strongly recommend getting the rest of your education out of the way sooner rather than later. As you get older, it tends to get harder to go back to school, and you never know if your company is going to stop its school coverage policy. Definitely, my new-ish job doesn't tie the coverage to my employment like Target did. At Target Corporate they keep you almost as an indentured servant for education benefits. Smart money, if you're already in the work force, is to find the right company to pay for higher education. I may even be able to put my loan payments on hold for a bit, which would be a welcome repas.
Good luck! What do you want to do with a stats degree?
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On August 27 2014 07:01 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On August 27 2014 06:53 ThomasjServo wrote:On August 27 2014 06:18 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 27 2014 06:05 ThomasjServo wrote:
Benefits kick in in October where my company will cover some of the cost of education. I am thinking of heading to back to a community college to do the leg work for a stats degree or something similar. I don't regret Police Sci, but I'd like to gain some new knowledge and add some to my resume. If your company covers some of the cost and you have the time to spend, I strongly recommend getting the rest of your education out of the way sooner rather than later. As you get older, it tends to get harder to go back to school, and you never know if your company is going to stop its school coverage policy. Definitely, my new-ish job doesn't tie the coverage to my employment like Target did. At Target Corporate they keep you almost as an indentured servant for education benefits. Smart money, if you're already in the work force, is to find the right company to pay for higher education. I may even be able to put my loan payments on hold for a bit, which would be a welcome repas. Good luck! What do you want to do with a stats degree?
We'll see as of yet, I kind of want a degree tied to formal reasoning in some way as in my experience they require/incur far fewer questions about, "Why you chose that degree?" in interview situationis. I've thought about an MBA as well, as that would alleviate the glass ceiling that is nigh omnipresent in corporate America circa 70-80k annually. I have no real interest in that though.
You can always get paid doing good analytics though, and I feel stats would only augment what I consider one of my strengths. My current company does a lot with retail metrics and point of sale data, so up the corporate ladder some, I could find a good, little nook.
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On August 27 2014 07:05 ThomasjServo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 27 2014 07:01 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 27 2014 06:53 ThomasjServo wrote:On August 27 2014 06:18 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 27 2014 06:05 ThomasjServo wrote:
Benefits kick in in October where my company will cover some of the cost of education. I am thinking of heading to back to a community college to do the leg work for a stats degree or something similar. I don't regret Police Sci, but I'd like to gain some new knowledge and add some to my resume. If your company covers some of the cost and you have the time to spend, I strongly recommend getting the rest of your education out of the way sooner rather than later. As you get older, it tends to get harder to go back to school, and you never know if your company is going to stop its school coverage policy. Definitely, my new-ish job doesn't tie the coverage to my employment like Target did. At Target Corporate they keep you almost as an indentured servant for education benefits. Smart money, if you're already in the work force, is to find the right company to pay for higher education. I may even be able to put my loan payments on hold for a bit, which would be a welcome repas. Good luck! What do you want to do with a stats degree? We'll see as of yet, I kind of want a degree tied to formal reasoning in some way as in my experience they require/incur far fewer questions about, "Why you chose that degree?" in interview situationis. I've thought about an MBA as well, as that would alleviate the glass ceiling that is nigh omnipresent in corporate America circa 70-80k annually. I have no real interest in that though. You can always get paid doing good analytics though, and I feel stats would only augment what I consider one of my strengths. My current company does a lot with retail metrics and point of sale data, so up the corporate ladder some, I could find a good, little nook.
Sounds smart  You'd be surprised at how many people want a degree just to say they have a degree... and yet have no idea how they're going to use it, or why they really got it in the first place. The whole "going through the motions of college just because that's what you're *supposed to do* " thing. Seems like you have a good plan though ^^
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On August 27 2014 07:10 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On August 27 2014 07:05 ThomasjServo wrote:On August 27 2014 07:01 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 27 2014 06:53 ThomasjServo wrote:On August 27 2014 06:18 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 27 2014 06:05 ThomasjServo wrote:
Benefits kick in in October where my company will cover some of the cost of education. I am thinking of heading to back to a community college to do the leg work for a stats degree or something similar. I don't regret Police Sci, but I'd like to gain some new knowledge and add some to my resume. If your company covers some of the cost and you have the time to spend, I strongly recommend getting the rest of your education out of the way sooner rather than later. As you get older, it tends to get harder to go back to school, and you never know if your company is going to stop its school coverage policy. Definitely, my new-ish job doesn't tie the coverage to my employment like Target did. At Target Corporate they keep you almost as an indentured servant for education benefits. Smart money, if you're already in the work force, is to find the right company to pay for higher education. I may even be able to put my loan payments on hold for a bit, which would be a welcome repas. Good luck! What do you want to do with a stats degree? We'll see as of yet, I kind of want a degree tied to formal reasoning in some way as in my experience they require/incur far fewer questions about, "Why you chose that degree?" in interview situationis. I've thought about an MBA as well, as that would alleviate the glass ceiling that is nigh omnipresent in corporate America circa 70-80k annually. I have no real interest in that though. You can always get paid doing good analytics though, and I feel stats would only augment what I consider one of my strengths. My current company does a lot with retail metrics and point of sale data, so up the corporate ladder some, I could find a good, little nook. Sounds smart You'd be surprised at how many people want a degree just to say they have a degree... and yet have no idea how they're going to use it, or why they really got it in the first place. The whole "going through the motions of college just because that's what you're *supposed to do* " thing. Seems like you have a good plan though ^^
Well I've done the former, I had a good internship at the MN state capitol, but as I graduated there was an abundance of much more experienced government professionals/bureaucrats that were far better qualified for government work than I was at the time. I temped around, got hired by Target out of a contractor position, and just have gotten really tired of bringing up the vague, Aristotelian quote that Politics is essentially the study of all disciplines and that to be lacking in one is to be a lacking politician. Plus I am out of shape, so I am really selling BS as Aristotle included physical discipline in that bit as well, so anyone who knows better would do well do call my bluff.
I have a very good, proven record in analysis though, once I get some SAS experience under my belt it should be smooth sailing until 30.
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On August 27 2014 07:21 ThomasjServo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 27 2014 07:10 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 27 2014 07:05 ThomasjServo wrote:On August 27 2014 07:01 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 27 2014 06:53 ThomasjServo wrote:On August 27 2014 06:18 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 27 2014 06:05 ThomasjServo wrote:
Benefits kick in in October where my company will cover some of the cost of education. I am thinking of heading to back to a community college to do the leg work for a stats degree or something similar. I don't regret Police Sci, but I'd like to gain some new knowledge and add some to my resume. If your company covers some of the cost and you have the time to spend, I strongly recommend getting the rest of your education out of the way sooner rather than later. As you get older, it tends to get harder to go back to school, and you never know if your company is going to stop its school coverage policy. Definitely, my new-ish job doesn't tie the coverage to my employment like Target did. At Target Corporate they keep you almost as an indentured servant for education benefits. Smart money, if you're already in the work force, is to find the right company to pay for higher education. I may even be able to put my loan payments on hold for a bit, which would be a welcome repas. Good luck! What do you want to do with a stats degree? We'll see as of yet, I kind of want a degree tied to formal reasoning in some way as in my experience they require/incur far fewer questions about, "Why you chose that degree?" in interview situationis. I've thought about an MBA as well, as that would alleviate the glass ceiling that is nigh omnipresent in corporate America circa 70-80k annually. I have no real interest in that though. You can always get paid doing good analytics though, and I feel stats would only augment what I consider one of my strengths. My current company does a lot with retail metrics and point of sale data, so up the corporate ladder some, I could find a good, little nook. Sounds smart You'd be surprised at how many people want a degree just to say they have a degree... and yet have no idea how they're going to use it, or why they really got it in the first place. The whole "going through the motions of college just because that's what you're *supposed to do* " thing. Seems like you have a good plan though ^^ Well I've done the former, I had a good internship at the MN state capitol, but as I graduated there was an abundance of much more experienced government professionals/bureaucrats that were far better qualified for government work than I was at the time. I temped around, got hired by Target out of a contractor position, and just have gotten really tired of bringing up the vague, Aristotelian quote that Politics is essentially the study of all disciplines and that to be lacking in one is to be a lacking politician. Plus I am out of shape, so I am really selling BS as Aristotle included physical discipline in that bit as well, so anyone who knows better would do well do call my bluff. I have a very good, proven record in analysis though, once I get some SAS experience under my belt it should be smooth sailing until 30.
Nice Good luck ^^
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On August 27 2014 07:23 IgnE wrote:
What happens at 30?
I hopefully have enough experience to break the six figure barrier. *Knock on wood
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Why is it ok if an admin derails this thread, but if a normal pleb like one of us derails it we're in trouble D:
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On August 27 2014 07:42 MtlGuitarist97 wrote:
Why is it ok if an admin derails this thread, but if a normal pleb like one of us derails it we're in trouble D:
You answered your own question 
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To be honest this is the most derailed the thread has been for a while, so in the interest in keeping things in order...
youxigamer was just banned by Shellshock.
That account was created on 2014-08-26 10:37:34 and had 1 posts.
Reason: Advertising.
Did you know that Youxi (Yo See) is Chinese for game?
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On August 27 2014 07:45 ThomasjServo wrote:To be honest this is the most derailed the thread has been for a while, so in the interest in keeping things in order... Show nested quote +youxigamer was just banned by Shellshock.
That account was created on 2014-08-26 10:37:34 and had 1 posts.
Reason: Advertising. Did you know that Youxi (Yo See) is Chinese for game?
So "game-gamer"? I bet the pbu knew that ^^ Maybe he was advertising redundancy?
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On August 27 2014 07:51 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On August 27 2014 07:45 ThomasjServo wrote:To be honest this is the most derailed the thread has been for a while, so in the interest in keeping things in order... youxigamer was just banned by Shellshock.
That account was created on 2014-08-26 10:37:34 and had 1 posts.
Reason: Advertising. Did you know that Youxi (Yo See) is Chinese for game? So "game-gamer"? I bet the pbu knew that ^^ Maybe he was advertising redundancy?
Maybe he was advertising games within games. :-O
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https://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/LockhartsLament.pdf
In fact, if I had to design a mechanism for the express purpose of destroying a child's natural curiosity and love of pattern-making, I couldn't possibly do as good a job as is currently being done --- I simply wouldn't have the imagination to come up with the kind of senseless, soul-crushing ideas that constitute contemporary mathematics education.
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On August 27 2014 08:13 IgnE wrote:https://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/LockhartsLament.pdfShow nested quote +In fact, if I had to design a mechanism for the express purpose of destroying a child's natural curiosity and love of pattern-making, I couldn't possibly do as good a job as is currently being done --- I simply wouldn't have the imagination to come up with the kind of senseless, soul-crushing ideas that constitute contemporary mathematics education.
I've read that before... I feel like his arguments are a mix between idealistic nonsense, the occasional really good points, and just sucking the dick of anyone who's ever disliked math class.
He's right though that mathematics education needs to be improved. Hell, I think a lot of subjects could use a facelift, although math is the subject I care most about.
(He's been a math teacher for years, so I can at least appreciate that he has expertise. Here's a little bio about him: https://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/devlin_03_08.html )
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On August 27 2014 08:13 IgnE wrote:https://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/LockhartsLament.pdfShow nested quote +In fact, if I had to design a mechanism for the express purpose of destroying a child's natural curiosity and love of pattern-making, I couldn't possibly do as good a job as is currently being done --- I simply wouldn't have the imagination to come up with the kind of senseless, soul-crushing ideas that constitute contemporary mathematics education.
Lockhart's got some good points, but he sort of over-focuses on his "math is art" and "learning should be fun" ideas. At some point in any discipline, you have to learn to deal with some pretty hard stuff that just isn't fun, whether it's your native grammar, your foreign-language-of-choice's vocabulary and structure, muta micro, polynomial division - whatever.
I'm a math teacher at the middle and high school level; there's a huge tension between covering sufficient material, teaching concepts thoroughly, and not being completely uninteresting. I saw above in the thread someone talking about how people use Excel etc. without really understanding that some of that is math; I'm leery of a lot of the more gung-ho "bring back the liberal arts" people but one thing I find interesting about that older conception is the idea of a group of "literary" subjects and a group of "mathematical" subjects - if we see math (especially things like basic algebra) as a sort of "grammar" for a group of subjects including physics, probability, etc. how does it change presentation?
I don't have any serious training in education theory, and only a bachelor's in math, so a lot of this is kind of rambling thoughts, not expertise.
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Norway28842 Posts
I don't know how autonomous american teachers are, but at least here, despite the curriculum being relatively strict, so much depends on the individual teachers that putting forth this type of hyperbolic criticism of the system seems flawed..
I mean unless you're making some overarching argument that school stifles student creativity through focusing on gradable content and teacher creativity through forcing them to spend way too much time on not-teaching/preparing class, which I could certainly agree with.. but the idea that math is like music and ruined by being mandatory (that was way too long for me to read all of it when I was put off by the first paragraph  )? I like music a lot, but I'm sure I would find being unable to divide 900 by 160 much more annoying than not being able to play guitar.
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On August 27 2014 08:32 Liquid`Drone wrote:I don't know how autonomous american teachers are, but at least here, despite the curriculum being relatively strict, so much depends on the individual teachers that putting forth this type of hyperbolic criticism of the system seems flawed.. I mean unless you're making some overarching argument that school stifles student creativity through focusing on gradable content and teacher creativity through forcing them to spend way too much time on not-teaching/preparing class, which I could certainly agree with.. but the idea that math is like music and ruined by being mandatory (that was way too long for me to read all of it when I was put off by the first paragraph )? I like music a lot, but I'm sure I would find being unable to divide 900 by 160 much more annoying than not being able to play guitar.
Unfortunately, that's becoming a bigger and bigger issue here in the United States, where the teachers are often pigeonholed into teaching certain ways because they'll be observed and graded on how well they can stick to the plan... and the days that the students aren't taking standardized tests, they're learning how to prepare for those tests.
That's a bit of an exaggeration on my part, but politics has been stifling teacher freedom for a while now, and it's been getting worse over the past 10-15 years. My mother's been teaching for over 30 years (high school chemistry), and she's just become so jaded with all the new bullshit and hoops she has to jump through. Teachers want to be able to teach. After I did my student teaching at the high school level and spent a little more time teaching secondary education, I realized that I wanted to teach college, because I get so much more freedom to actually be an educator. And that realization saddened me, because I had always wanted to teach high school math. But the politics and bullshit just isn't worth it for me, whereas my university gives me a syllabus, says "Just make sure the students learn the material", and then that's it. It's wonderful.
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On August 27 2014 08:27 VGhost wrote:Show nested quote +On August 27 2014 08:13 IgnE wrote:https://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/LockhartsLament.pdfIn fact, if I had to design a mechanism for the express purpose of destroying a child's natural curiosity and love of pattern-making, I couldn't possibly do as good a job as is currently being done --- I simply wouldn't have the imagination to come up with the kind of senseless, soul-crushing ideas that constitute contemporary mathematics education. Lockhart's got some good points, but he sort of over-focuses on his "math is art" and "learning should be fun" ideas. At some point in any discipline, you have to learn to deal with some pretty hard stuff that just isn't fun, whether it's your native grammar, your foreign-language-of-choice's vocabulary and structure, muta micro, polynomial division - whatever. I'm a math teacher at the middle and high school level; there's a huge tension between covering sufficient material, teaching concepts thoroughly, and not being completely uninteresting. I saw above in the thread someone talking about how people use Excel etc. without really understanding that some of that is math; I'm leery of a lot of the more gung-ho "bring back the liberal arts" people but one thing I find interesting about that older conception is the idea of a group of "literary" subjects and a group of "mathematical" subjects - if we see math (especially things like basic algebra) as a sort of "grammar" for a group of subjects including physics, probability, etc. how does it change presentation?I don't have any serious training in education theory, and only a bachelor's in math, so a lot of this is kind of rambling thoughts, not expertise.
I think if you convince students that learning at least a bit of math is necessary to being a well-rounded individual and opening up doors to other STEM-related fields, they might humor you. But you're still going to get those future journalism majors who couldn't give two shits about trigonometry.
+ Show Spoiler + I didn't know Blonde was a college major. Pythagoras is rolling in his grave.
It should certainly be emphasized (each year, imo), that mathematics builds on itself over the years of primary and secondary (and tertiary) education. If you don't know arithmetic, then you'll probably struggle with algebra. If you struggle with algebra, then you're pretty much fucked in high school (except perhaps during part of geometry, but most students are awful at proofs anyway, because they don't know how to think for themselves... "what do you mean I can't just mechanically plug a numerical expression into PEMDAS and automatically be rewarded with the right answer any more?"). I tell my students that the hardest part of calculus is the algebra- the ability to massage and manipulate your functions and limits and derivatives and integrals into a form that allows you to actually implement those rules you spent all night memorizing.
I also like to refer to mathematics as the language of science, since high school chemistry and physics use quite a bit of math. Unfortunately for the math teachers, the science teachers get all the cool applications of math (thanks to labs and experiments), whereas the "real world" problems that math textbooks use are things like "If Bob bought 700 watermelons blah blah total cost" and "If a ladder is falling blah blah related rates". I try my best to come up with applications that my students can relate to, or generate interest in the math some other way (e.g., math paradoxes and games).
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United States97276 Posts
On August 27 2014 07:53 cLAN.Anax wrote:Show nested quote +On August 27 2014 07:51 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 27 2014 07:45 ThomasjServo wrote:To be honest this is the most derailed the thread has been for a while, so in the interest in keeping things in order... youxigamer was just banned by Shellshock.
That account was created on 2014-08-26 10:37:34 and had 1 posts.
Reason: Advertising. Did you know that Youxi (Yo See) is Chinese for game? So "game-gamer"? I bet the pbu knew that ^^ Maybe he was advertising redundancy? Maybe he was advertising games within games. :-O
he was advertising "Free mmorpg" because he doesn't like shooting games!
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On August 27 2014 09:08 Shellshock wrote:Show nested quote +On August 27 2014 07:53 cLAN.Anax wrote:On August 27 2014 07:51 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On August 27 2014 07:45 ThomasjServo wrote:To be honest this is the most derailed the thread has been for a while, so in the interest in keeping things in order... youxigamer was just banned by Shellshock.
That account was created on 2014-08-26 10:37:34 and had 1 posts.
Reason: Advertising. Did you know that Youxi (Yo See) is Chinese for game? So "game-gamer"? I bet the pbu knew that ^^ Maybe he was advertising redundancy? Maybe he was advertising games within games. :-O he was advertising "Free mmorpg" because he doesn't like shooting games!
Please don't derail this thread, Shellshock. We're talking about teaching the best subject ever
+ Show Spoiler +
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EPT
