[AT] Old trains/now NC State foolishness

Larry Goss rlgoss at insightbb.com
Fri Dec 11 08:41:43 PST 2009


Amen, Farmer.  I couldn't agree more with your comments -- and I'm looking from the other side of the desk!  I had to fire a couple of faculty members because of their ineptitude and incompetence.  IMHO it doesn't make much difference where the degree is from.  There are winners and losers all around us all the time.  There is more variation among individuals, than there is between schools.  Unfortunately, the general public doesn't "see" that and wants to think that having a degree from a particular institution has merit just by itself.

As I understand it, one of the things going on in the economy today is that people are starting to appreciate that fact that they have a job and are working to keep it.  The result is that the productivity of the economy is increasing without an increase in the actual number of jobs.  But I digress.

I've been following the thread on NCSU with interest.  Even the long-term residents in Raleigh are starting to refer to the area as a metro-complex rather than the separately named urban areas that they used to be.  The last time I was there, I spent an afternoon at the arboretum down by the railroad tracks.  I thought of that this week when I heard the news from Seattle that someone stole a rare tree from their arboretum because they mistook it for a suitable Christmas tree.

Larry

----- Original Message -----
From: Indiana Robinson <robinson46176 at gmail.com>
Date: Friday, December 11, 2009 8:42
Subject: Re: [AT] Old trains/now NC State foolishness
To: Antique tractor email discussion group <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>

> On Thu, Dec 10, 2009 at 6:04 PM, Al Jones 
> <farmallsupera at earthlink.net> wrote:
> > I felt pretty fortunate to take most of my classes in the 
> College of Ag.
> > and Life Sciences.  Most of those professors were leaders in their
> > respective fields, but at the same time were pragmatic enough 
> to realize
> > that they had a responsibility to their students as well as 
> their research.
> > And I hit it at a good time--a lot of the "greats" retired not 
> long after I
> > graduated in '97:  Dr. Carm Parkhurst in Poultry Science, Drs. 
> Al Rakes and
> > Ray Harvey in Animal Science, Dr. Roy Larsen in Horticulture 
> (the only one
> > of the bunch that didn't seem to do that much teaching--just 
> talked for an
> > hour than gave you a hard-a$$ exam on stuff he'd never 
> mentioned in class)
> > and Dr. J.C. Raulston in Horticulture---he got killed in a car 
> accident> right near the end of the following fall semester 
> after I had him the
> > previous fall.
> >
> > Dr. Carm Parkhurst was probably the best teacher I have ever 
> had, anywhere.
> > He could lecture to a group of 40-50 students and make you 
> think he was
> > talking directly to you and no one else. At first I thought it 
> was just me
> > until some of us were talking before class one day and 
> realized that we ALL
> > felt that way.
> >
> > The only classes I came close to struggling in were the other 
> classes> outside of Ag. Education or CALS.  Modern American 
> History was tough.  I
> > had a professor for 20th Century American Lit. (or something 
> like that)
> > that literally couldn't see my papers unless I printed it 
> about 16 font in
> > boldface.  Anything I wrote was never right.  I already mentioned
> > botany--that was a farce.  The maths I took were ok but it was 
> amusing to
> > watch people try to get help from the TA from China that spoke 
> maybe 25-30
> > words of English.
> >
> > Al
> >
> ==============================================
> 
> 
> I went to BSU for a year and had some of the best professors around
> and some of the worst... One lady psychology prof that was just awful.
> She basically sat at her desk and read the textbook to the class 
> in a
> flat monotone voice. Ruined what could have been a very interesting
> subject. At the other end of the scale I had a history prof that
> really knew and loved his subject and was amazing at teaching 
> it. The
> rest fell somewhere in the middle but a sad number were in the lower
> middle... Just a job, show up, go through the motions etc. etc.
> (yawn). One Lit prof was an arrogant egotistical twit of a human but
> was still a good teacher. Another should have just kept playing
> basketball...
> BSU was on quarters instead of semesters so you were exposed to 
> a lot
> of different profs over a short time.
> -
> My drafting prof was very good. I helped a guy that had 
> transferred in
> from Purdue who made A's in drafting at Purdue but was failing 
> at BSU.
> I think he had been cheating his way through at Purdue, huge classes,
> nobody looking... He had already taken the beginning drafting 
> that we
> were in together but he didn't have a clue.
> That is what is wrong with judging people from their degrees... The
> person that learned well and kept learning afterward and the guy who
> cheated his way through and shut down learning as soon as it was
> convenient both get to hang the same degree on the wall. That is even
> more scary if the latter is your doctor.  :-)
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Have you hugged your horses today?
> 
> Francis Robinson
> aka "farmer"
> Central Indiana USA
> robinson46176 at gmail.com
> 
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