Monday's Most Active Threads

Yesterday's most active thread was titled, "How to fix our crisis" and posted in the "College and University Discussion" forum. The "crisis" in question pertains to the U.S. education system, which the original poster believes is failing on many levels. According to her, the SAT is not rigorous, American students are dropping out of STEM programs "like flies", and students are not graduating with the skills needed to compete for entry-level jobs. This is a 19-page thread full of fairly dense posts and, as such, not easy to summarize. Two things the thread demonstrates are the acute politicalization of education and how data can be manipulated to support an argument. Almost immediately, posters associated the original poster's argument with recent statements by failed businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, who has similarly argued that American culture has accepted mediocrity instead of striving for excellence when it comes to education. When a poster described a comedian who had joked about "MAGA friends", a poster immediately assumed that this was a rebuke of rural White kids, and one poster instinctively posted about alleged deficiencies among urban kids, presumably meaning Black and Hispanic children. It is not clear why posters made the connection between "MAGA friends" and rural White students or even why remarks about MAGA attitudes about education are considered derogatory. After all, it was President-elect, cult leader, and convicted felon Donald Trump who famously said that he loved the "Poorly Educated" and attacks on higher education have been a hallmark of MAGA ideology. While many posters preferred to support their arguments with data, there was considerable disagreement about how data was used. For instance, some posters referred to data showing that American students lagged behind those of other countries as evidence that the American education system is failing. On the other hand, posters suggested that if the U.S. data was limited to the performance of White and Asian students, the U.S. performance would be near the top. This, the posters argued, showed that the U.S. education system was clearly capable of producing high-performing students. If true, however, this data does show the inequality in our system. Similarly, some posters refused to accept that the U.S. education system is failing or suffering from significant problems. Other posters agreed with the original poster that there is room for improvement, but there was little agreement about what exactly should be done. The original poster proposed that calculus be made a requirement for high school graduation. Many posters objected to this, arguing that, for most people, calculus has little value. The original poster also proposed not awarding high school diplomas to those who failed to meet the increased graduation requirements. It is not clear to me that the original poster's proposals would actually increase the education level of American students. Rather, it would probably just create a larger number of individuals who lack a high school diploma. A better strategy might be to ensure that calculus classes, as well as classes necessary to prepare for the course, are widely available as options for those students who want to study the subject.

Yesterday's next most active thread was posted in the "Family Relationships" forum. Titled, "Do you say anything if visiting family are dressed inappropriately?", the original poster says that she recently hosted an annual party at her vacation home and her late-teens niece came dressed in an extremely short miniskirt. The original poster considered the outfit to be inappropriate and regrets not saying anything to the young woman's parents about it. Threads in which posters express disapproval of how others dress — especially young women — have become a regular occurrence on DCUM and I have discussed many such threads in this blog. The consensus of those replying is that the original poster should not say anything. Most posters don't consider it the original poster's place to police her niece's clothing. Many argue that this is a role for the mother. Moreover, if anyone was wrong in this situation, posters seem to agree that it is the original poster. Some believe that the original poster is uptight and wrong to have been bothered by the miniskirt. Others believe she is at fault for not clearly communicating a dress code to her guests. As is usual in this sort of thread, there is considerable discussion about whether it is ever appropriate to comment on the appearance of others. A number of posters argue that it is not. Many posters are particularly sensitive about criticism of young women who, they explain, are often simply following current fashion trends and who have always pushed the boundaries of clothing choices. There is also debate about miniskirts, with several posters arguing that such an outfit would be entirely appropriate at the party. Moreover, short minis are said to be in fashion right now. There was an offshoot of this discussion involving "pencil minis", something with which many posters — including me — were not familiar. I now know, however, that if I ever have the need to walk up stairs in a miniskirt, a pencil mini would be a better choice than a "skater mini". There was also quite a bit of confusion about the original poster's preferred attire for the party, which she described as "cozy business casual". Nobody seemed to know what this actually meant, and, despite repeated requests for an explanation, the original poster never provided additional information.

Next was a thread titled, "Will Wake ever be in the #30s again?" and posted in the "College and University Discussion" forum. One of the threads that I discussed yesterday was about the drop in U.S. News & World Report rankings of several universities. One of the responses in that thread linked to an article in which changes in the U.S. News metrics were discussed, as well as the impact of those changes on the rankings of various schools. The original poster of this thread linked to that very same article and quoted a portion of it. While a number of universities were mentioned in the quote, the original poster focused on Wake Forest University, which the quoted portion said had previously ranked in the 30s but dropped 18 places. The original poster asked whether the school will ever recover. Let me be clear, though probably ill-advised, by saying that I think this is a stupid thread. While I have no real evidence to support it, I suspect that the original poster is trolling. At any rate, currently ranked at 46, Wake Forest is still a very prestigious university. If you are worried about a difference of 16 places, I would suggest that you have your priorities wrong. Many posters argue that Wake Forest never deserved to be in the top 30 to begin with and, as such, its current ranking is more realistic. Others disagree with this assessment and, as in the thread I discussed yesterday, blame the new metrics. As I said yesterday, the new ranking prioritizes social mobility. A college that has a large number of poor students but high post-graduation employment rates will rank highly under the new criteria. Many posters describe this as "DEI". Regardless of your feelings about the new criteria, there is no dispute that Wake Forest, as an extremely expensive university with little diversity, suffers from the new system. Wake Forest supporters argue that the school has small classes, a highly qualified faculty, and delivers a high-quality education. Therefore, they claim, it deserves a higher ranking. As some posters point out, if you value small classes and a great faculty, and you can afford the school, you should choose it. What difference does its ranking make? While I didn't read every post in the thread and, therefore, may have missed it, I did not see a good response to this question. Some posters argued that regardless of Wake Forest's quality, the cost of the school harmed its popularity in many cases. For instance, one poster argued that in terms of academic quality, it is similar to the University of Virginia. However, for Virginia residents, UVA is much cheaper and, therefore, the more likely choice for Virginia's students. This thread is not extremely long, only nine pages, but it is debatable whether it is worth anyone's time to read it. The number of people to whom it makes a difference whether Wake Forest is 30 or 46 is probably infinitesimal. But, for whatever reason, all of them seem to have found their way to this thread.

The final thread that I will discuss today was posted in the "Jobs and Careers" forum. Titled, "National Day of Mourning will be Jan 9th", the entire text of the first post was "FYSA". By the time I got to this thread, I was already a little grumpy from the previous one. The fact that the original post completely lacked substance didn't improve things. To make matters worse, I didn't know what "FYSA" meant and I guessed wrong about what the "F" and "Y" stood for. For anyone else who is concerned that this might involve a suggestion of an unnatural act, the meaning is "For Your Situational Awareness". To be fair, the original poster followed up 3 minutes later with a link to the official announcement, but it didn't provide much information either. The biggest question from posters was whether or not federal workers would get the day off. Since a National Day of Mourning is not a federal holiday, the government doesn't automatically close. Therefore, many posters suggested that federal workers would be expected to work that day. Other posters, correctly as it turned out, predicted that President Joe Biden would issue an executive order closing the government on the Day of Mourning. When a federal contractor complained about federal employees getting frequent days off, days for which he doesn't get paid, a dispute about federal employment broke out. Conventional wisdom is that federal employees accept lower salaries in exchange for job security and benefits. Contractors, in contrast, are believed to give up job security and benefits in exchange for higher salaries. In the real world, it doesn't always work that way. A number of posters who identified themselves as federal employees said that they actually make more money than contractors. Others, however, said that they still earned less than they might in the private sector. There was also a debate about the frequency of presidential deaths, with some posters saying that they are rare but some claiming to have experienced as many as five. This then provoked a debate about presidential lifespans. Some posters pointed out that giving federal employees the day off had practical advantages as well. It would limit the number of people on the roads and the Metro, making room for mourners and making life somewhat easier for security personnel. Others pointed out that as head of the Executive Branch, Carter had been federal employees' boss and that it is understandable that many might like the opportunity to mourn him. By the end of the thread, most posters had accepted that federal agencies would close, regardless of the impact on contractors, and moved on to wondering about schools and other institutions.