Luann by Greg Evans and Karen Evans for December 18, 2014

Stub Hub™… Priceline™… Hotels.com™… Cars.com™ …. And now, “PopProfs.com”…. – So when a prof asks kids to review… he doesn’t really mean the material…. – And the Dean’s List? Well… let’s just say that it takes a lot of iPods draining for teachers to crack the Top 40.. – I can just imagine A professor having a “Greatest Hits Collection”…

There are websites for that. Where you rate your professor.

“Hey! Kids!… Leave Them Teachers Alone!” (♫)“Zagat 101”“Learning By Wrote "" Pop Quiz"“Life At Facebook State”“A Room With A Review”

“Learning On Demand”or“Would You Like To Take A Survey?”

Just a few months ago, Luann was being portrayed as a stage design genius (see the July 23 and 24 strips). Why isn’t she focusing on taking classes in the drama department? If she’s lost interest in that, it probably should have been mentioned in the strip sometime since then.

Frank took Econ 101 to “satisfy requirements”. What courses is Luann taking to satisfy requirements? The ones she was mentioning yesterday were all electives.

This is real world stuff…

both English and Algebra are “required” but is up to student what classes to take to get the required credit(as an example for English, a freshman would be able to take any of these classes from “fictitious university”, English101, E201, E301, E401, Reading, Criticism of Shakespearean art, Great USA Literature, great European literature, great Latino literature, literature of middle ages, Verne and Christie, College writing, critical thinking, History of Comic strips, USA through Doonesbury and women in literature), some students prefer to “refresh courses” taken in HS, some go a lil higher and do “the next step” going from their last HS class, and a few might have not taken a particular class in HS but elect to do a test for certain classes above their last HS class. pass it, and get credit for that one plus able to get the next level right away as a class

I like the idea of father and daughter just having a nice, quiet conversation…Regardless of the subject. Things will work themselves out…don’t they always??

A two-year associate degree doesn’t allow much time for shopping around, Luann. Community colleges work best for people who know what they want and need from their two years. Several semesters of shilly-shallying around and shopping a whole host of possible interests will stretch your program out to three, four, or more years with no guarantee of ever satisfying your aimlessness….

And you know this to be a fact because you read tea leaves? Or a crystal ball told you? Or you are actually Greg Evans? -Besides, Greg, Junior, these days, getting married is no guarantee that a woman and her children will be financially supported through life.

Frank was disappointed, because he couldn’t figure out why his favorite muzak wasn’t considered “pop music.”

A 2 year is usually a beginning for a 4 year, unless that license only asks for 2 years.That job license may get you a job that pays for a 4 year school.After requirements, not many electives left. Think of your next employer, or your future, not easy stuff!

So You Hated Your “Pop Music Class”, and Didn’t pursue a Career in Music, eh Frank?

Its Just as Well. There is ENOUGH Crappy Music Infesting the Nation’s airwaves these days as it is……,

History of Pop Music? Kinda pansy. History of Rock n Roll, now there is a subject with some heft.

Funny Luann says that about “evaluations.” Of course, at the end of each course, we were give the dreaded “Coruse/Teacher Evaluation Committee” form to fill out for each course. I recall one of the profs giving away free candy to the class on CTEC day. Not that he had to… he was one of the best profs there. and in “Fundamentals of Computer Language processing.” There were times when we totally looked forward to those forms….. <evil grin> ;-PPP

I wonder whatever happened to all that data, once collected and aggregated.

The opposite happened to me while earning my MBA; the required Econ course was so boring, it became drudgery. The elective introductory real estate course was so much fun, I concentrated in Real Estate and Finance.

Your wish is my command: try RateMyProfessors dot COM

Yesterday Luann mentioned modern dance. Modern dance would satisfy a physical education requirement.

Or even better, earlier: Gershwin, Berlin, Porter,Comden & Green….

Like I said yesterday, she needs to aspire to being a media producer in films/theater/television

“Most women then choose to stay at home and raise their kids”-———————————————The US Census states that 23% of married women with children under age 15 are stay at home parents. That means that 77% of married mothers are in the workforce. Being a stay at home parent is a perfectly fine life choice, provided both spouses agree, but it is not as common as you believe.

The problem is letting others tell you who is good and who is not. Some of the most disliked profs I had were the best I had. It all depends upon why one is in the class.

Life in general-Sometimes, generalizations come back to haunt you. And this is definitely one of them.-In my ‘life in general’, I have to deal in facts, not suppositions. A frequent source of data I use is the US Department of Labor. -Women’s participation in the US labor force in 2013 was 57.2% of working age women. The Department of Labor projects an increase of 5.4% in the working age women actually in the work force between then and 2022.-The labor force participation rate of mothers with children under age 18 in 2013 was 69.9%. For mothers with kids between ages 6-17, the labor force participation rate was 74.7%. For mothers of infants, the labor force participation rate was 57.3%.-So you can see that the automatic assumption that most women who have children will stay out of the labor force to raise them is not ‘life in general’ in the US. -I also find your idea that a woman who stays home to raise kids after earning a degree to have rendered her college days ‘mostly worthless’ to be a mostly worthless idea (and that is as polite a phrase as I can use).-First off, the children themselves benefit from a mother who is able to motivate them to study and to help them learn. And secondly, as Mrs. Berger is trying to show, women do have lives even if they are mothers. Someone who decides to return to the work force after raising a child will still be at an advantage over a mother returning to the work force who wasn’t able to take time for a degree, or certification or any training beyond high school.-You also seem to ignore the fact that fathers are taking a greater role in raising kids these days (more so in the European Union than here, and it hasn’t hurt Germany at all). -Would you suggest for a minute that a man who takes a few years out of full time work to raise his kids rendered his college days ‘mostly useless’? I doubt that very much.-And your belief that only the STEM fields are lucrative, and that women mostly stay out of those are also both off, but this post is already too long. Maybe someone else can help you with THAT part of ‘life in general’….

Ratemyprofessor.com is a great tool for selecting classes, but it does not help you to choose a major

I suppose if Pitt CC has the same rigor of academic “standards” as Pitt HS, then you’re guaranteed to receive a diploma in 2 years no matter what courses you take or how much you learn in them (including nothing at all). Earning your Associate’s degree at Pitt is just a way of postponing your future job at Weenie World for another 2 years.

Actually tuition at local CCs in OC where I live is about $50. a unit or $750 per semester. At a State Uni. it will cost close to $4,000 a semester. Lots of people getting their Gen Ed requirements out of the way at CC and then off to a four year college.

One more thing I think that having an educated electorate is really important. I realize that not everyone can cough up the tuition. To say that the only reason to go to college (and if it isn’t in science then it’s a waste of time) is to get a high paying job is nonsense. Most of the founders of our nation had classical educations.

In any event, no student can get all the classes they might randomly want, let alone those they need for a major. When a student registers, they often find out that a class they were hoping to take is already closed out (this is more common in 4 year schools than community colleges, but it does happen.)-The advisor is supposed to be part of the process of helping the student identify which classes they need for a major once it is declared (and which classes are pre-requisites for those required classes.) The student is usually also required to take certain ‘core’ classes, such as those that Luann had already reported that she took.-Beyond that, the student is encouraged to take ‘electives’, and not just so the college can grab extra money. The electives can sometimes clue the student in on the fact that the major he or she is thinking of might not be what their particular skills can handle, whereas the elective might be. So you find someone who is attempting to major in, say pre-med, with a minor in math, and who discovers that she or he is much better suited for math.

http://www.ratemyprofessors.com/

The Department of Labor statistics that I work with deal only with the civilian labor force. The Census, which looks at everything, reports that the numbers of women active duty military also continue to increase.-In 2011, there were 153,000 women serving in the Army; 74,000 in the Navy; 62,000 Air Force and 14,000 Marines. So the total employment picture for women is not as low as you have concluded.-The Department of Labor does indicate that female participation in engineering fields is dropping off. But women are continuing to enter math occupations in increasing numbers.-The real world is not one in which all women either immediately marry after high school, have kids and stay at home, or get a college degree and then follow that path. There is no reason to assume that Luann will just take a few courses in Basket Weaving 101, and then get married, have babies and never leave her house except to shop for groceries. Very few folks can afford a single earner family life anymore; that was the ’50’s, and it was unique in our history.-And the real world continues to adapt to men who are interested in playing a larger role in their children’s lives. No one will condemn them and say they ‘wasted their money’ on college, whether they incurred debt or not.

ratemyprofessor.com I used it all the time picking my classes.

I always lament how we used to have those TV and newspaper ads for compilations of hits, and it tickles me (and also befuddles me at the same time) how it would sound to hear “Justin Bieber” as “one of the great artists you’ll enjoy on this 5 volume set…”

And not to mention, actually having to read the “notches” on any ruler or similar “analog measuring device”…

“Luann’s lackadaisical attitude towards college reminds me of most people’s attitude towards college. There’s a lot of money at stake and few bother to plot out a 10 year or even 5 year plan. They they complain that the system has failed”-—1) I agree utterly and completely with your first two paragraphs. 2) Our society infantalizes both children and teenagers in many ways. Children and youth are segregated from adults and adult responsibilities, so it is hardly surprising when they are clueless about what adult life entails. We tell them to follow their dreams without giving them the tools to dream about anything more meaningful than video games and celebrities. We fail to empower them to make a difference in the world, so they fail to engage with the world.3) The system has failed. A system where employers require a piece of paper to prove a person’s worthiness to be considered for a job is a failure. A system where people are expected to be educated once and then work the rest of their life in a single career totally disregards modern life. Colleges are not particularly well adapted as a training mechanism for jobs in a fast-changing world. Computer science degrees, for instance, are not particularly effective ways to train computer programmers when the entire field changes drastically every decade or less. By the time the degree is complete, the workplace has moved on. But the almighty Fortune 500 dictates that degrees are required, so we dance their meaningless dance. It is time to recognize that education is not something that you can do once and be done with it, but is rather something that must continue throughout our lives.4) As a female computer programmer, I agree with your wish that professions were more gender balanced, but disagree about why they are not. I know several smart young women who began taking classes for engineering degrees and then switched to something where they weren’t such a tiny minority of the class. I took those same classes and know what it is like to be treated with disdain by both your teachers and your fellow students. I also know a few men who really wanted to work in heavily female areas, such as working with young children or in nursing or dance. They found that those around them treated them with fear and contempt for being so deviant. We need some attitude changes to have a more even distribution of genders among different types of work. That attitude change needs to start with encouraging preschool-aged girls towards science and construction play and young boys towards nurturing play. I have seen parents react with horror when their little boys play in the toy kitchen or the dress up center. I have watched parents of my daughters’ friends push them to be more girly. Virtually every parent who has invited my children to birthday parties has told me “he likes boy stuff” or “she likes girl stuff”. It is likely that there are some innate tendencies for girls to be drawn to social and nurturing activities, and for boys to be more spatially inclined. However, I know from watching parents that they have some pretty strong attitudes about what boys and girls “should” be like.

Why are you mainly tough on women? It’s not their fault they are paid 77 cents for every dollar paid to men. And you seem to think parenthood should be completely thrown under the bus in favor of making the big bucks. I’m not gonna go into this, because I don’t want to spend all day here, it’s just that I do not get you at all on this topic! Peace out.

“it’s crazy that people spend the same amount of money for an engineering degree as a communications degree, even though the latter gives you little chance to pay back the debt”-My brother (who runs a computing company) has told his son and daughter that he will pay for their college only if they pursue a STEM degree. He isn’t convinced that a degree is effective in teaching computing (based on the people he has hired), but he recognizes that most employers treat a degree as a required check box. He would rather offer them experiences, such as the Peace Corps, that let them see a bit more of life outside school. It’s a little harsh, but I basically agree with him. I will only fund my kids’ college or other studies if they are likely to get them to a goal. Personal enrichment does not have to (and probably should not) come through college. I expect my daughters to spend the summer of their 9th grade year shadowing professionals in areas they might be interested in. The following years, we will try to find them relevant summer jobs or volunteer work. I want them to be as ready for adult life as possible by the time they graduate high school.

I can’t imagine my (well-paid) engineer brothers someday telling my nephew and nieces “Get out there and make money immediately! Get a degree in whatever high paying field there is as soon as possible and stop being a burden, ya punks! And don’t you DARE take an art class!”

It has been said that “you are what you read.” So, if you read nothing but tech manuals or business related books, you are about as interesting and colorful as a computer. You need a dash of literature or history or art to add some spice to your personality.

Best classes were the ones I actually learned something. English lit, not one of them.

Ratemyprofessor already exists!

I didn’t want to take art history but ended up loving it

Clearly Greg Evans has never heard of ratemyprofessor.com.

“Luann’s only interest is boys; she has randomly excelled at multiple things but never pursues them further”.While she IS interested in some boys, they are not her only interest..Further, she has many interests she has stuck with even though not in the all-consuming way you seem to insist on..People are allowed to be unlike us.

“I’m mainly tough on women here because in a perfect world there’d be more of a 50/50 split on men and women working in the same industries, but looking at the numbers the men are going into more lucrative jobs that I wish women would as well.”.Yep, in a perfect world, women would be indistinguishable from men.???.

I hope your son is very sure of what he wants to do. Otherwise,I’m sorry that his school allows him little latitude to discover an aptitude for a different field of endeavor…

Science may be very plain now, but it wasn’t while my younger brother was pursuing his degree. He reported regularly to us on some of the women students who gave up after being ignored during question sessions during labs.-Way back when I was an undergrad at U of Michigan, one of my friends was one of the first women to be admitted to U of M’s law program. She was a determined, hard working person, of a very conservative political persuasion who often was skeptical of claims of discrimination. That was until it happened to her. She once arrived half a minute late to hand in a paper, after falling on the notoriously icy campus grounds – and the professor waited till she walked up to the door, bloody knees and all, to slam the door in her face.-She completed the first year,and decided to switch to the business college after that. Said life was too short to be constantly fighting for acceptance from those determined not to grant it.-I’ve seen similar treatment given to black men in both engineering schools in past, and when they managed to graduate and went out looking for jobs.-It may be true that some professions are more attractive to women than to men and vice versa. But the fact that engineering, and, to some extent, science are still ‘white boys clubs’ suggests that the disparity in number of both women and black men in these fields is due to more than lack of interest by women and black men. This is especially the case when you consider how ‘over represented’ men of east Asian heritage are in engineering and science. Because it is expected of them…

Oh, OK, so the requirement was for a course in the general field of art or music, but the specific course (art history) was an elective. That makes a lot more sense.

Myself, I just graduated with a split associates degree in IT. Now, most call centres in my area require a bachelor’s degree at least. I’m getiing whatever job I can find, then getting a bookkeeping and accoubting degree. So, count one less woman in the IT field.

SPOILER ALERT!!

I know a lot of the posters here hate it when some of us who ‘read ahead’ at the ArcaMax site drop hints, but I think many of those who have been hyper-critical of Luann in the past few days will be stunned at what Frank says in the December 19th ’toon…

"..I bet you think this post is about you, don’t you, don’t you ..” ^Aw, you shouldn’t have!!!!

“…that’s not far off of possible!”^Ha ha, maybe not!! Amazing how a tiny SD card can hold more than practically any other media, given it’s size as compared to the others…

LOL, I think I’ve heard about that… – LOL, saying “that’s too rich for my blood” in regards to that, is like saying “No, take more taxes, please”… don’t think you’d find anyone with the dough and time to deal with that nice collection! – Okay, maybe Gates, Winfrey and a few others like them would be able to win that bid on Ebay….

“not you ar”…^Had a pirate moment, did ya?…or were you talking to a customer from Haaavad Yaaad?

Actually, it’s been mostly black and white all week. I wish there was a way to find out why…

I have a pretty nice vinyl collection, but after our last move (it ended up with just 2 people to move a lot of stuff), I also seriously considered moving strictly to MP3 or CD… well, for as long as it took to catch my breath after I put all of my crates down, that is….

Yeah, the time factor is definitely a serious obstacle in ripping it all…. – I should know, I’ve put stuff down on enough tapes, CDs and digital (not just albums, but my own “sorting method” for songs with different categories to take with me for whatever mood I’m in on that day) and it does take some time, here and there….

https://www.ratemyprofessors.com

The professor can make a world of difference.