Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau for June 26, 2011

And all those Hangovers!

Pouring over books is a bad idea. It wastes the beer and ruins the books.

With a country full of unemployed liberal arts grads, it is time to reconsider whether everyone “needs” a college degree. I’m a big believer in a well-rounded education, but it is something a young person has a lifetime to acquire AFTER learning to support him- or herself. The truth of today’s cartoon is not that one doesn’t need to learn anything anymore but that there are more efficient ways of doing it today. Watch for a collapse of the higher-education bubble over the next few years.

Job security lies in things like plumbing, air conditioning/heating, auto mechanics, etc. They don’t require college degrees, the pay is pretty good, and my plumber sure earned his last month…

I always felt that the purpose of higher education was to teach you how to think. It seems that the purpose these days is to teach you what to think.

I’m always wondering why/how Zipper’s family keeps spending their money on his college tuition when it’s obviously being wasted. Can’t they find a better use for it?

Last Saturday on Telegraph Ave, Berkley… a group of naked bicyclists road thru Telegraph… There was a group of parents and perspective students touring campus… A father after seeing the naked bicyclists turned to his daughter and said…“Your not going to Berkeley, your going to Bible college….”

I wonder how many college degrees have been issue to people who don’t know the difference between pour & pore, your & you’re, their & there & they’re, hear & here, and more homonyms? Scary actually.@pschearer I agree that not everyone needs a college degree. And the reality is that not everyone is college material but many of them go (or get sent) anyway. I read recently that the higher education field may be near collaps with the recognition of this. Now if only some of the good trade schools did not charge as much as Harvard to become a plumber or electrician.@sandfan I was thinking the same thing as your first statement. The purpose of college is not to stuff your head with facts but learn how to think. Learn how to take those facts and turn them into useful information on which to act. I do tend to disagree with your second statement, however.

You go to college to learn what questions need to be asked. Zipper hasn’t a clue what Guy Fawkes tried to do (blow up Parliament), where magnesium is found, or why ethics should be divided into three parts. He’s just POURING meaningless information into his sieve-like brain, which lacks the active power to PORE over it and analyze it.@pschearerYour vocational argument against a college degree is refuted in today’s NYT: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/26/sunday-review/26leonhardt.html?_r=1

Tex don’t forget heard, herd, and Hurd. It’s tough to show off yer education when the comment format won’t let you leave a space between paragraphs.

E.T.— They WILL teach her to spend her life on her knees, (either praying or before her husband) instead of standing on her own to feet and thinking for herself.

MajArkay— the skills you mention are also taught in “colleges” around the country- as the technology today, and in the future, goes beyond learning all those skills before leaving K-12.

More than a few politicians have proven that even a degree from Yale or Harvard often doesn’t prepare the frat folks for reading the manuals in those “trade schools”, just the labels on beer taps.

FriscoLou: there is a simple way to leave a blank line between paragraphs..Just put a line with a single period out there..At least it seems to work for me.

Unfortunately, the means/end inversion described by this strip has become fashionable at all levels of education. My local school district has redesigned its science curriculum, emphasizing process (the scientific method) over product (knowledge about how the world and universe work, which is the whole reason the scientific method exists in the first place). So the 1 percent of students who might go on to become scientists will get a slight advantage when they go to college, while the 99 percent who will go on to some other occupation will know a bit less about how the natural world actually functions, and therefore be a bit more susceptible to pseudo-science and magical thinking..Perhaps that is what the political/corporate/military elites want.

Maid your day didn’t it.

Zipper’s family keeps him in college because otherwise they’d have to deal with him living at home.College is indeed greatly about socializing. Don’t need to pay someone money to get you to read a book.

And…where did the hamburgers go?

But Palin, don’t you think that was because the article was written by the educated elite from journalism skool, and the NYT doesn’t want to admit it can’t publish as good as a 5th grader?

* Nice try puddleglum, but educated people know that a period at the beginning, ain’t makes a blank line not.*Heck even the elite have their moments. Look at this beaut from the Bulwer-Lytton School at San Jose State:* “Like an expensive sports car, fine-tuned and well-built, Portia was sleek, shapely, and gorgeous, her red jumpsuit molding her body, which was as warm as the seatcovers in July, her hair as dark as new tires, her eyes flashing like bright hubcaps, and her lips as dewy as the beads of fresh rain on the hood; she was a woman driven—fueled by a single accelerant—and she needed a man, a man who wouldn’t shift from his views, a man to steer her along the right road, a man like Alf Romeo.”*—Rachel E. Sheeley, Williamsburg, Indiana (1988 Winner)*

puddleglum’s idea

End a line using a “p” in angular brackets.

Make a blank line by hitting “Enter” twice followed by another bracketed “p”

@englishteacher; and the difference between “pour” and “pore”?Never mind, I know the answer… sigh.

@friscolou; Here’s an espearmint (sic) I am trying, to see whether I can imitate spaces between paragraphs: …weelllll? …so? …

Nope! That farshtunkene software moves the dots up to the previous line!grumble

ok, I shall try some of the things others have done: . attempt #1 * well? attempt #2?. well? are these angular brackets?

ok…………………………..

Well, the single period and the asterisk don’t work. The

does seem to work. And how do you make a hard space?

That ‘p in angular brackets’ doesn’t print! Sorry, I’m too tired to pursue this any further.

… and poor.

@Rina (next a p in angular brackets, followed by two CRs)

Farina

this is just to see If line breaks work for me Or what else could it be?

testing

Then I get to test

if paragraphs are best

and can the job be done

without closing every one?

and if you want it double

do you go to extra trouble?

Hey it works. Thanks everybody!

sorry for testing here.

College may not be necessary for all, agreed. But I heard some interesting statistics on NPR a couple of weeks ago. I don’t remember the exact numbers, but I do remember that the unemployment rate went down about 2% for each level of education you have. So for high school dropouts, the unemployment rate right now was 2% higher than for HS grads, which was 2% higher than college grads, which was 2% higher than those with advanced degrees. All this straddling the mean of about 10%. So before anyone starts telling kids, “Don’t waste your time…”, think about it. I would encourage any young person who wants to go to give it a try. If they get a degree it opens so many doors. If they don’t, at least they can say they tried as they wheel that big rig down I40 at 3am.

Define the Universe.-Give 3 examples.

Hope they don’t have robot-driven trucks too soon. They will eventually, but I hope not so soon that Mr. Evil is inconvenienced.

trting a paragraph

{p} thus!

paragraph test [p]

second paragraph

Third attempt the three dots at end of line ….

second paragraph

first paragraph

.

second one three spaces