| From: | Wordman wordman@*******.com |
|---|---|
| Subject: | the value of education (OT-rant, long) |
| Date: | Mon, 12 Jul 1999 23:20:18 -0400 |
> judgmental delineation between appearance and behavior.
Thank you. It was a dream, I made it happen.
> 1. Is it *really* private school that makes kids turn out that way?
There is never a single thing that affects behavior; it is always a mix. But
it does seem to me that private school did have a great deal to do with it.
> 1a. If so, how?
I'm not sure, since I went to public school. I think part of it is a kind of
insulation from aspects of the real world. For example, I'd wager that most
private school students don't give much thought to being shot or stabbed by
a fellow student. Not that I dwelled much on that as a student, but it
crossed my mind once in a while. Being forced to deal with that kind of
thing is better preparation for the real world, where not everything exists
just for you. Private school students that I knew seemed to have trouble
adapting to activities that were not terribly complicated, like doing your
own laundry or navigating a subway system.
In Shadowrun terms, they had a very low Street Etiquette skill, which seems
to me a huge disadvantage for someone living in America.
Also, how diverse is your average private school? Being from Colorado, my
schools were fairly mixed between Hispanic and white students, with a
handful of Black, Asian and Jewish students. I'm not sure you get that at a
private school. The thing is, when you go to a school like that, you don't
realize that most of the country isn't mixed like that. It didn't even seem
like an issue to me until after I left.
It also seems to me that public school students (Americans, anyway)
generally treat other people the same way regardless of who they are.
Private school students that I knew seemed to reserve politeness and respect
for their peers and those who they perceived as above them in some way,
while distaining everyone else. Public school students didn't mix it like
that; they either were polite to everyone or distained everyone, regardless
of "status".
> 2. Didn't you go to Harvard?
Yes. Maybe that is the source of my bias; Harvard probably had more snobbish
morons than the average college. I was very surprised at the number of total
idiots who were at Harvard. To be sure, there were true geniuses there
(enough to let me know that I am not one), and a great deal of pretty nice
people, but, man, there were sure some dolts. And by this, I don't really
mean stupid. It was a strange kind of dolt. They would have 1600 SAT scores,
but would sit on benches that had Wet Paint signs on them, or ask questions
in class that the professor had answered not 30 seconds before.
