5
/ 6 Byrne 1Charles ByrneProfessor BohnEnglish 1020, Section 0xx9 February 2016What DoesthatFuture Hold?Place: Biology II at Belfield High School, the home of the fighting Bantams.Time: 10:00a.m., during my junior year. Mr. Robbins, our biology teacher, hasplaced several labeledgreen or grayfrogs, lizards, and turtles that were either pinned onframed corkboardorsuspendedinsmallformaldehyde-filled jarson each of the classroom’s eight laboratory tables.Pointingout that we were studyingfor the period-long test set for the following day, wewere to break into groups and make notesand/or draw each table’sspecimensbeforemoving to another. And, as we worked, Mr. Robbins made sure to qualify anyquestionswe hadby classifying them into what …show more content…
Thus, manycollege studentsfeel dissatisfiedbecausethis isnotwhat wethought wesigned up for.And, we’re paying for it.Specifically, Jacobsblamesthis dissatisfaction onhowhigher educationis advertisedas an individual investmentmade by college students and their families rather than for thesocietal benefits it provides. For example, apopularargumentcitesthat attending college benefitsthe long term, financial well-beingof a student. As a result,Jacobs writes thatincoming“students understand perfectly well what they are buying with four years of their youth and associated tuition and living costs,” even creating a marker where “student enrollment statistics have become an unofficial appendix to stock market performance” (164-65) as students flock to major in the most currently promising career fields.Of course, this creates a conflict inmostclassrooms, whose professors insteadsee college as existing for societal benefits. Specifically, mostchose to become professors for reasons dependent upon their major field: to developa clearerpicture of the forces that shape ouridentities, world, and society;to study and understand the human (or perhaps an animal’s) body in order to find treatments and possibly even cures for various sicknesses;to study and invent new technologies that willhelp eliminate hunger or even to decrease pollution and help “save”the Earth;to understand the psychology of individuals to create a more peaceful society whose inhabitants are happier and more empathetic to one another;and the countless other reasons why a person would choose to attendschool—and not have a real paycheck—until he or she is thirty yearsoldor more(twelve years of elementary school and high school, four or five years as an undergraduate, and anywhere from six to ten more years of graduate
/ 6 Byrne 1Charles ByrneProfessor BohnEnglish 1020, Section 0xx9 February 2016What DoesthatFuture Hold?Place: Biology II at Belfield High School, the home of the fighting Bantams.Time: 10:00a.m., during my junior year. Mr. Robbins, our biology teacher, hasplaced several labeledgreen or grayfrogs, lizards, and turtles that were either pinned onframed corkboardorsuspendedinsmallformaldehyde-filled jarson each of the classroom’s eight laboratory tables.Pointingout that we were studyingfor the period-long test set for the following day, wewere to break into groups and make notesand/or draw each table’sspecimensbeforemoving to another. And, as we worked, Mr. Robbins made sure to qualify anyquestionswe hadby classifying them into what …show more content…
Thus, manycollege studentsfeel dissatisfiedbecausethis isnotwhat wethought wesigned up for.And, we’re paying for it.Specifically, Jacobsblamesthis dissatisfaction onhowhigher educationis advertisedas an individual investmentmade by college students and their families rather than for thesocietal benefits it provides. For example, apopularargumentcitesthat attending college benefitsthe long term, financial well-beingof a student. As a result,Jacobs writes thatincoming“students understand perfectly well what they are buying with four years of their youth and associated tuition and living costs,” even creating a marker where “student enrollment statistics have become an unofficial appendix to stock market performance” (164-65) as students flock to major in the most currently promising career fields.Of course, this creates a conflict inmostclassrooms, whose professors insteadsee college as existing for societal benefits. Specifically, mostchose to become professors for reasons dependent upon their major field: to developa clearerpicture of the forces that shape ouridentities, world, and society;to study and understand the human (or perhaps an animal’s) body in order to find treatments and possibly even cures for various sicknesses;to study and invent new technologies that willhelp eliminate hunger or even to decrease pollution and help “save”the Earth;to understand the psychology of individuals to create a more peaceful society whose inhabitants are happier and more empathetic to one another;and the countless other reasons why a person would choose to attendschool—and not have a real paycheck—until he or she is thirty yearsoldor more(twelve years of elementary school and high school, four or five years as an undergraduate, and anywhere from six to ten more years of graduate