The local technology alliance (TalTech) is proudly presenting its third TechExpo tomorrow. I thought I’d go and see if there was anything interesting. So I took a look at the website and had to laugh, although it’s rather sad, not funny actually.
Here are some of the bloopers I found on their websites. Now, keep in mind, this is an organization “focused on uniting our many technology-oriented corporations, small businesses, entrepreneurs, service providers, investors, civic lenders, individuals and students from all sectors of our community.” Mission and History.
I hope they didn't get the award for best HTML.
Then, there’s this one:
Not to mention creating run-on sentences.
Or:
I think I’ll suggest they hire an IT undergraduate from the School of Library and Information Studies at FSU to help them figure out this new-fangled web-thing.
This belongs in the series “What’s wrong with our educational system.” I saw this Ford Exploder on campus (Florida State U.) the other day advertising two things. One is a worthwhile fund raising dance marathon. The other is the level of education many of our students get here! It just goes to show that you can buy them a nice big SUV but you can’t buy them an education… that they have to work for.
Please contact your system administrator.
I’ve been collecting the increasingly easy-to-find examples of American ignorance for a while now, so I think it’s time to start displaying them. Most of these come from two primary sources, Florida and airports. You’ll see what I mean as the collection grows.
I think I’ll start out with one of the most common indicators that something is terribly wrong with the way we’re educating our workforce. You, no doubt, have yourself seen examples of the kind illustrated here. They seem to plague airports more than anywhere else, except the desktops of the hapless “knowledge workers” who must sit in fear everyday of a similar event occurring on their “information appliance.”
I’m glad the auto industry doesn’t hire the same computer “science” graduates to program the computers that run our cars. Can you imagine what your daily commute would be like if you never knew whether you speedometer might suddenly (and sometimes did) display the message “Please contact your system administrator”?
Filed under: Education
A recent article on the San Francisco Chronicle web site mentions one of the author’s concerns about the use of e-textbooks, particularly those now being offered for the iPhone and iPod but it applies generally to any source of information — specifically he states:
“Then there’s the potential for cheating at exam time when students can stealthily view their iPod to get information from an e-textbook to answer a tough exam question. Hey, it could happen. Maybe you’ll have to leave your iPhones and iPod Touches at the door as you enter the exam room to prevent cheating. Could we eventually see students being patted down by hand for their iPhones or iPod Touches at exam time as they enter the room?” Read more: http://tinyurl.com/n5gddd.
It’s obvious that the whole idea of cheating needs to be totally rethought in this age of information overload and instant access. To think that your doctor, lawyer or IT professional will solve all your problems without referring to some reference material is ludicrous. Tell me, quick, IT nerds, what port does kerberos use? If you have to look it up, well, you’re cheating, right? Crazy. No sane professional relies entirely on their memory for important information these days, there’s just too much information to memorize. Would you feel comfort after describing a complex series of symptoms to your family physician to have her instantly prescribe a costly medicine? Of course not! We need to be teaching our students how to look up and utilize the information they need, not to memorize a tiny subset of facts that most likely won’t be sufficient to solve any real world problem.
The same can be said about collaboration. Ever had your doctor call on a specialist for help? Is your doctor incompetent? No, of course not. There are just too many known conditions in every professional field for any one professional to have a complete understanding of all of them.
Just in case you didn’t catch it the first time around, we need to forget about expecting our students to memorize factoids and help them learn to locate, evaluate and synthesize answers to problems that may never have come up before. That is the true role of education.
