A personal example...

[alexpgp]

In continuation of yesterday's tappings about choice, I recall my senior year in high school as the year of the great "relevance" debate, although if memory serves, there wasn't much interest on the part of those who deemed the school's curriculum as "irrelevant" to do much else but demand that it be made relevant, echoing much of what was going on at various college campuses around the country. The one time I managed to ask a question at a student meeting—something along the lines of "How can we, who are coming to school to learn, pick and choose what is 'relevant' to our studies and what isn't?—the chair paused for a second, and then proceeded to recognize another speaker, leaving my question unaddressed.

As it turns out, I would have been my own best example of the kind of thing I had in mind, though it would be decades before I realized this to be the case.

Ninth grade, my last year of junior high school, saw a large percentage of my fellow students applying to special high schools throughout New York City; schools such as Stuyvesant, Brooklyn Tech, and the Bronx High School of Science. My goal was much more modest: I applied to and was accepted in the "Pre-Engineering" program at Newtown High, in Elmhurst.

A curious twist in my schedule at Newtown involved skipping biology, which is what most tenth graders in my college-bound academic track took, and dropping directly into chemistry. This didn't bother me at the time, as I didn't really see myself—as an engineer—needing any biology background.

From chemistry in tenth grade, I went to physics in the eleventh grade (and basically coasted in my senior year, by which time my parents had moved to Nassau County, outside of NYC). I never did study biology past the material I was introduced to in the first two years of junior high.

So what did I miss? Was biology truly irrelevant, as I had thought?

Oh, I could probably wax eloquent on the subject, but it'd all be high-level, conceptual stuff. The bottom line about what I missed is this: I have no idea. At least, not in terms of how it might have affected my life, on the whole.

What is incontrovertible is this: The decision to skip biology and schedule me for chemistry (and my subsequent ignorance—or lack of curiosity—of what I might be missing) basically shut me out of any field of endeavor where biology plays an important role.

As it turned out, this "hole" in my knowledge has not been any kind of show-stopper in my life or career (or more accurately: I am not aware that it has been a show-stopper, which only make such holes ever more insidious).

On a related note, I wonder what my life would have been like if I had pursued—or been made to pursue—say, music lessons?

Cheers...

Comments

[rozoviyslon.livejournal.com]

Just a guess... you could be a translator specializing in biology and/or music. Engineering background is always a big plus for the translator's career. In my opinion, American credit system is rather an advantage than otherwise. True, students have to decide about the relevance of classes they take when they still have a vague idea of their future career twists and opportunities, but at least they can think and make their best guess. In Russia it is different. You can't opt out of the course which does not seem relevant to you, neither at school nor at the university. The best you can is to pay minimum and sufficient attention to it, get only passable and excellent marks so that this course could not set you back from your primary studies (or otherwise you'd have to spend time on retaking exams). Moreover, some courses are totally irrelevant to the subject they are supposed to teach. For instance, I have heard more than once from economics students that the economics and finance they taught in the uni had nothing to do with the modern economy and finance. As a result, they graduate with almost zero knowledge about how businesses are conducted and have to learn from the scratch and on the spot. It depends of the department, though. We are lucky that medical students cannot graduate without having had a lot of practice and a full set of theory :)