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| Do you know what love is, Kristel? It's finishing your degree, and then working for 20k a year for a few years. Photo credit: imdb.com |
Undergraduates across the country are choosing to leave science, technology, engineering and math programs before they graduate with those degrees. Many students in those STEM fields struggle to complete their degrees in four years, or drop out, according to a 2010 University of California, Los Angeles, study.
The study, conducted by UCLA's Higher Education Research Institute, found students in science, math and engineering take longer to complete their degrees than students who start out majoring in other fields. The study tracked thousands of students who entered college for the first time in 2004.The article goes on to describe universities that have devoted some of their resources to changing their teaching style to attempt to stop some of this attrition. Good for them, I suppose.
But I'm amused to read a response in the comments (which, natural to any large website, is a treasure trove of headdesk), which I find typical of some people:
I have been a scientist in academia for almost 40 years and am at a top-ranked university. From personal experience, most U.S. students who arrive on our doorstep wanting to major in STEM are not at the same level academically that they were 20 years ago and are not prepared to make the sacrifices it takes to succeed. Foreign students are willing to work and sacrifice for their education, realizing that in these fields monetary success is often deferred. Our youth in general are not trained to look at the long term but instead want 70K jobs when they graduate with a B.S.I think it's silly to make the assertion that the kidz are not willing to defer gratification -- that's why they're in school, right? Because if it's Money Now they're after, waiting tables or selling
Ultimately, I suspect that it's true -- some people aren't willing to defer financial gratification. For them, STEM majors aren't a good idea (and they don't typically end up there to begin with.) But I suspect that many students are looking long and hard to see if their deferred gratification is actually that -- and finding out that the answer might be no.
Your photo caption is missing the bit about how, after working for those few years, you are going to be laid off in your 30's and will have to retrain so as to re-join a fresh and exciting new "career ladder" on the bottom rung.
ReplyDeleteThe comments in that original article are pure gold. Good gravy.
ReplyDeleteI spent about 30 minutes scrolling (and scrolling and scrolling) over the weekend. One that I remembered was the "these classes are hard, and that's because the teachers suck!" comment. Sure, buddy.
ReplyDeleteI think most people can find much satisfaction in deferred gratification, and work being it's own reward. But there is a limit, and that limit is largely based on the individual. It also doesn't help when that person may or may not know his limit until it's too late, or when the goal posts are constantly moved back.
ReplyDeleteOr maybe I'm wrong, maybe we should just "lower taxes" and send our comi-liberal-socialist-Kenyan president back to Indonesia.
I <3 CNN
Yeah the the "gratification" in "delayed gratification" just doesn't seem to be there anymore. Some people realize it early enough...others do not.
ReplyDeletePfft. More like deferred mediocrity these days.
ReplyDeletehahaha, the comments are hilarious.
ReplyDeleteI am glad to see that most people have figured out that the benefits of a science career are pretty low. And that 12 years of deferred gratification is ridiculous.
Many graduates who were still optimistic about the job climate had some reality smacked into them after 2006. A job loss now often leads to almost a year of unemployment, especially for the more experienced. Many scientists are looking at unemployment as a time to switch out entirely.
Somehow I doubt the press would pay much attention to a study claiming too many people were dropping out of med school.
ReplyDelete"I think it is true that some students are looking hard at whether their time spent in school will lead them to a modicum of return; their expected return, I suppose, might be higher than some foreign students."
ReplyDeleteOne problem is that the financial return for foreign students is much higher than those in the US, particularly in synthetic chemistry. A job in China for 20K and low cost of living is much better than no job or low paying job in the US where there is very high cost of living.
There is a great deal of cynicism associated with this site.
ReplyDeleteBut let us not assume that all people are up to the challenge of chemisty.
Inferior students dominate chemistry departments today (yes they were once better). Today's graduate student is undereducated and somewhat coarse in their aspirations. They complain, they whine and moan about trifling issues.
The piggish desire for wealth by most US students makes them unworthy of ever achieving the intellectual heights achieved by most chemistry professors (they alone have shunned the trappings of snobbery and wealth. They alone seek true intellectual gratification!)
Chemistry is not a career, it is a religion. I dare you to be brave enough to join us!
(Slow clap)
ReplyDelete@4:07 You should apply for a Saudi grant and start a synthetic chemistry madrasa. I think you want to raise more synthetic chemists who will martyr themselves in this job market.
ReplyDelete@4:07
ReplyDeleteWhat do you know about challenges faced by students of today?!?
From your comment, I suspect you are a professor tenured long ago. What do you know of layoffs and unemployment? Or trying to enter the 'real' world? What do you know about spending a 1/3 of your expected lifetime preparing for a career you will love (encouraged by greedy pyramid scheme professors), just to be later offshored out of a job? What do you know about seeing talented folks denied work because they are over the age of 40 or 'have too much experience'?
The folks I have met in industry are far above the vast majority of professors in scientific merits. Perhaps you should get your nose out of your latest Tet. Lett. submission describing the use of microwaves to XYZ known reaction and think about people who strive to make a difference in the world through industrial chemistry.
Additionally, all the accomplished professors do not shun money. Far from it. But then you have probably never been asked to consult anywhere with your pious self-righteous attitudes.
Monetary success is not deferred in chemistry. It is entirely absent. Salaries are on the decline. Cushy professor 4:07 are you willing to offer your salary to a poor out of work chemist looking for someone to fund them hood space? I seriously doubt it.
ReplyDelete@ Anonymous 4:07. I hope you are being sarcastic. To be honest they try to sell that hyperbolic passion to everyone in ALL fields these days. If you aren't getting off on your job working at subway or as a marketing intern, then you are not a good worker.
ReplyDeleteSure I love chemistry, but the B.S. martyrdom is lost when you have to forsake love, money, job security to sell something as trivial as car finance insurance.
Hell, these days you should be proud to work for free and live in your parents basement, if the damn government wouldn't stand in everyone's way.
@ Anonymous 4:07
ReplyDeleteI really hope that dude was joking. Due to outsourcing and H1B's, chemistry has gone down the toilet. I would never encourage anyone into this field. I, along with many others, feel like they screwed up their lives by studying chemistry. If I can convince 1 student to avoid this profession, then I feel I have accomplished a great task.
I have to say, watching all my lib-arts friends mess around 24/7 while rushing from lab to lab, having easily 50% more work, there were times I thought I had to be insane. Unless you're seriously motivated, it's not hard to see why "kids" switch to other arenas...
ReplyDeleteFor a mad dog, seven miles is not a long detour. -Russian proverb.
Another Russian saying goes like this: "The church is near but the icy road is slippery. The pub is far and we will walk there very cautiously"
ReplyDeleteRegarding the comments of 4:07, it seems like its author has very successfully baited a number of folks who responded to his/her hyperbole. In other words, they have become victims of a troll.
ReplyDeleteI don't think he was trolling, per se - I am assuming that he was trying to funny and rather than to annoy and run.
ReplyDeleteThe picture is very nice, though. The only thing more appropriate would be to overlay Lithgow's head with Ian Read's.
Bull S$@t those academics who have never even tried to find a real job out in the world can go screw themselves. They're just upset that they can't trick people anymore into advancing their own agendas while getting them to work for poverty wages. The problem isn't that we don't have qualified or enough students. The problem is much much more frightening than that--our problems are structural. The US is no longer an economic super power, manufactures nothing, hardly does any R and D, and has become a service economy. Students don't want to put in the work because they don't want to waste their lives away working for $12/hr in terrible permatemp jobs with $50,000 in student loan debt. Chemistry is a horrible "profession" (if you can call it that) and is nothing but a dead end that you will waste countless years of your life in.
ReplyDelete