This idiot needs to read a history book or a newspaper:

[Sikander]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
Interesting concept, Pekka. I like free.
Free beer rocks, as does free food.
Free, yeahhhhhhhh.

I'm sorry Sloww, as any lecherous economist can tell you, there is no such thing as a free beer. Nudge nudge, wink wink.

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Pekka
FrantzX, best colleges? Do you have anything to back up your words!?

I'm not saying this is impossible, they very well might be the best, but is there anything to back you up? In what way? The best system? Best teachers? Best results? Best food? Best in what?

Firstly, we have a lot of colleges per capita, and probably the most foreign students of any country. So you have a lot of competition, which improves quality and price. Secondly, we do much more than our fair share of research in the U.S. (a lot by those same foreign students), so you have a great chance of working on a cutting edge project if you are in the sciences. Finally, we have a bewildering array of public, private and religious colleges and universities. Some concentrate more on research or publishing, others concentrate on the quality of education. With so many choices you should be able to find the sort of education that you want, probably in a part of the country you want to be in.

The problem in American universities is that our k-12 system is so bad that a lot of effort is spent getting the recently graduated high school students up to college speed. There are a lot of remedial courses being forced upon a lot of students, and frankly they don't really work very well. It's a tall order for a college in a semseter to fix what 13 years of neglect have wrought.

[Space05us]

imho if you're smart enough you'll succeed anywhere regardless of what you've been taught for the last 13 years.

[H Tower]

are you kidding? 11,000 a year is CHEAP. If i went to an out of state school i'd be paying twice as much. One of my friends from california who is also going to the University of Illinois pays more than 20,000 a year. And he's taking almost the exact same schedule as I am. However, I'm told that we have one of the top five engineering school in the US and one of the better business schools, so I guess out of staters still feel like they get their monies worth.

[Pekka]

H Tower, if 11 000 is cheap for you, then congragulations.

Sikander, Good points. Those won't make them best alone though? But comptetition is good. Which one do you think is better for the quality: having many colleges per capita, or fewer?
Many colleges have to compete each other to get the best students. On the other hand if there are fewer colleges, only the best students get in, and they Really compete each other, so colleges have the best material to work on. You could go either way, please try to see my point.

in my opinion the best would be something in the middle, when it comes to quality.
Foreign students are almost in every college/university around the world. It can't be denied that US has the most of them, making them even more international than others, which is a good thing. I think you can also get to research with cutting edge technology in everwhere, depends on the field you're studying.

[Sarxis]

Originally posted by Vesayen
...but I hate idiots who think America rules the world....because it dosent even come close.

This is true; the US does NOT come close to being a global empire. It is an overstatement used to incite hatred.

[Zoid]

Originally posted by Vesayen
Keep in mind im a patriotic American, but I hate idiots who think America rules the world....because it dosent even come close. Anyway with the many inteligent non American posters on this board(most boards im on 90% of the people are Americans.....I find I like this board the most out of any board I post on though heh).

I was just talking to my friend, who is an idiot and he said the following:

Things he's said:
-Any special forces officer could take out any of the martial arts masters in hand to hand, unarmed/melee, one on one combat.
-The US Military can take on any enemy force without a problem and is the most battle ready.
-All the extra security since 9/11 is unnecessary since we *obviously* got all of Al-Qaeda and no other group would DARE attack us, no sir!
-Just general "US has the best..."
--Energy Production
--Economy
--Cars
--Sports (He totally disregards the World Cup since its not a major America-based championship)
--Education system
--Etc....

Idiot or not, he sounds you average stuck up american... Just look at some of the posters on Poly...

[Space05us]

unfortunately that is average for a dumas$ American to say, but I'm sure you guys over in Europe have your share of people saying stupid things about everything.

[Clear Skies]

At least we say them in amusingly cynical ways...

Europe is a lot more self-loathing than the US, who tend to think they're the best at everything. In some cases they're right, in a lot of others...

Reminds me of a quote from Mostly Harmless:

"What's that odd game that you British play?"
"Um...cricket? Self-loathing?"
"No...parliamentary democracy."

[Space05us]

I doubt the ignorant population of Europe know how to be "amusingly cynical" considering the fact that people are people and in America our ignorant people aren't, but we have our fair share of "amusingly cynical" people just like you

[Dauphin]

By far the most amusingly cynical person on this site is European.

[Space05us]

that has nothing to do with people in general though

[Dauphin]

Just commenting.

[Akka]

Originally posted by H Tower
are you kidding? 11,000 a year is CHEAP. If i went to an out of state school i'd be paying twice as much. One of my friends from california who is also going to the University of Illinois pays more than 20,000 a year. And he's taking almost the exact same schedule as I am. However, I'm told that we have one of the top five engineering school in the US and one of the better business schools, so I guess out of staters still feel like they get their monies worth.

If you consider that 11 000 $ a year is cheap, then you probably don't really have the same standards as I have.
Here, a year in university is about 150 $. That include the social security payment.

[Arrian]

If you count tuition, meals and housing, the college I went to cost $30,000 per year... actually, I think it's probably a bit more now. By contrast, I think UCONN is under $10k (again, tuition, meals + housing) for CT residents.

-Arrian

[rah]

Originally posted by H Tower
are you kidding? 11,000 a year is CHEAP. If i went to an out of state school i'd be paying twice as much. One of my friends from california who is also going to the University of Illinois pays more than 20,000 a year. And he's taking almost the exact same schedule as I am. However, I'm told that we have one of the top five engineering school in the US and one of the better business schools, so I guess out of staters still feel like they get their monies worth.

Had to chuckle on this one, (at least until I try to get my daughter in there)

I got in to the engineering school at U of I (yes it was ranked equally high then) back in 1972. My first semester's tuition was $375.00 But it's still (for residents) the best education bargain in Illinois.

RAH
And just to be more annoying, it had just been raised and people were *****ing about it.

[Kropotkin]

There's that kind of morons everywhere. Your so called friend just seems dumber than most since he lives in a country where people doesn't get much exposure to other cultures if they don't want to.

As for the school-systems, everywhere its possible to get a education without actually learning anything more than getting grades. My perception of the american colleges are that although there's bound to be big diffrences between schools and cources its pretty basic and simple in average as many college-students are very young and immature. The american supremacy lies at a higher level than ungraduate cources.

[Pekka]

I just thought what kind of a pressure parents go through when child borns.. i bet they go like 'oh my, we have to send our kids to college, we have to start saving NOW', and then they have like ten kids. I would hate myself if i had to say 'sorry, you can't go to college because daddy can't afford it, but hey there's always scolarships'...
Tough luck.

[rah]

You get out of it what you put into it. The US has some excellent undergraduate programs.


It's too bad that buttheads like this one give all Americans a bad name.