Student "edition" found at {csi dot journalspace dot com}.

Maybe I shouldn't have started this blog now, not with everything that's been going on.

One thing I forgot to mention here yesterday that I wasn’t sure I wanted to write in the student accessible version: my expecting co-teacher, whose in-laws are in obstetrics and pediatrics, recommended for her a caesarian section set for tomorrow, and she didn’t put up any resistance.

Am I wrong for wanting to avoid any detailed discussion of pregnancy from the general students’ reading?

Well, if I was a biology teacher it would be appropriate, probably. But on a personal writings web page, I think, no.

It would be, I feel, like counting chickens in front of someone too young to even be thinking of fertilizing eggs.

@@ On to board exam reviewer horror stories: when I visited them in their dormitory last Sunday, they told me that one of their number was not attending the Saturday mock exams anymore.

He’s only going through the motions anyway of taking the exam once, since he uses his older brother as an excuse – or a model of someone who got a high paying job even without passing the board.

In fact, besides there being two students who are taking the review even though they have not finished their classes yet (so there’s no guarantee that they will be able to get their transcript in time for applying for the exam early next year) there are also a couple who will, in fact, just take the exam after finishing all of their courses at this time WITHOUT going for the review.

And there’s also talk that these people will just be taking that one time. If they pass then that’s great. If they don’t they don’t consider it a big loss, but they won’t review anymore and take it again.

So, why, in the first place, take a course that has a board exam, when there’s another being offered - computer engineering - that has most of the same courses and doesn’t have a board exam?

Is this now really the state of how the new generation sees education now? That if they can pass their courses every three months with varying degrees of focus then that’s fine, but if they are being asked to concentrate on going through everything they’ve been taught for five months straight, that’s too much effort to ask of them? Do they think they’re different from the guy from their ranks who actually passed, who talks about giving up his hobbies for all that time just to have more time to review? Don’t they realize getting a good job without having a license is more of an exception than the rule? I guess there really is no sense in trying to emphasize to people the importance of something until they see it for themselves, even when it’s going to be a bit too late by that time, and they will have to spend more time and money catching up.

There really are times when I wish this was one of those science fiction worlds where those of differing views are just put up in their own planet so see first hand if their minimum-effort rules work.

Session 2481 somehow feels the years teaching them are now considered to be a waste. Class dismissed.