Posted on 12/25/2001 3:41:22 AM PST by Yellow Rose of Texas
We celebrated Christmas early this year so I have had a lot of time to spend with a niece and nephew who attend College. My Niece attends Brown University in Rhode Island, a freshman this year and my nephew is a Junior at Colorado School of Mines.
The subject of the nationalities of their professors came up after my nephew mentioned that he had dropped several classes he needed for his degree as he could not understand the professor, as the professor was not American born or raised but Chinese, and still a Chinese citizen.
This came as a shock to my brother and his wife as they fork out mega bucks for these schools and the advanced education they offer. After my nephew mentioned this lack of American born professors in this subject my brother started asking how many non-English professors my nephew had as teachers in any classes. Now remember he is a second semester Junior. My nephew replied, none, not one American born professor to date.
My brother than asked my niece a second semester Freshman. Her reply was the same, not one American born professor had taught one class my niece had attended, nor was preregistered for this coming semester.
My reply was no wonder all the Foreigners get the good jobs in the Computer industry, engineering, and at our secret labs. Only the foreign students can understand the professors.
To all of you with your kids home from College right now, ask them how many American BORN Professors do they have in the sciences, mathematics, the advanced level classes and how much harder it is for them to understand what is being said in class than it is for the foreign students from China, India, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan, Kuwait, etc.
In physics for example, we simply aren't turning out a lot of native-born PhDs - native-born people, for the most part, don't go into physics here. It's these PhDs which become the next generation of university faculty.
Candi
Why not, is it that the American born can not understand the teachers and therefor find it to difficult and drop out?
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What a scam these .edu are running. Pay big bucks and your kid can't even understand his professor's English? AND NO ONE REALLY SQWAKS OUT LOUD BECASUE THIS WOULD NOT BE PC. WOULD NOT BE CULTURALLY SENSITIVE. These cheap jack colleges could easily run classes to help improve these foriegn "prof's" English communication skills.
Los Alamos looks the same with Chinese nationals and Pakistani nationals doing sensitive resaerch.
Better paying jobs? Both my wife and I have one of these "better paying" jobs and I can only say "yeah, sure."
Some of the best teachers I've had have been foreign born. Same goes for physicians.
The Iranian students were an odd lot. They did not mingle with others. They studied in one block as a unit, I saw no individual effort on their part. They cheated their way through exams. I latter worked for a firm who hired an Iranian. He was sociable but usless as an engineer.
My second algebra teacher was from China. We had much the same problem with her.
The reason is that US citizens can get good jobs in the private sector that pay much, much more money.
I know a PhD from India whose specialty Electrical and Nuclear engineering. In India he would be working on the bomb, but here he's teaching electrical engineering at a small college. Why? they sponsored him for a green card.
Similarly, many foreign docs in the US specialize for years (as long as they train, they keep a student card). Then they practice in areas without a lot of doctors. That's how my husband got his green card, and many of my friends.
As for "American professors": Remember, many of them DO become citizens. But when they study, they have a student visa. After they graduate, they get a green card, and then they have to wait years to become a citizen. (It used to be eight years, but I don't know the law how).
My only foreign instructor, my calculus professor, this past semester was a native of India and in addition to teaching three sections he worked part time at the cafeteria to make ends meet. How many sons and daughters of America - those born and raised in affluence and in many cases effluvia - would be willing to do that?
All American raised people who can do well in physics usually choose to become lawyers, investment bankers and doctors. You know, physcs is a very demanding field with a very low rewards.
The 'problem' with foreigners taking high tech jobs is that native-born kids don't migrate into the sciences. Many are called by the lure of stable, high-paying jobs, but few make it through, and there are numerous reasons for it. One of the biggest ones is that they weren't properly prepared in high school. Science isn't one of those disciplines where '2 + 2 = 5 if you feel good about it' is going to cut it. My Physics I class was held in an auditorium classroom, whereas Physics III was held in a normal sized classroom (an "intimate" setting compared to Physics I).
Another reason, IMO, is that native born kids don't have the persistence it takes to work through a difficult college program. I saw a lot of kids drop out of science programs because they 'didn't have time' to pursue such a difficult subject (translation: college is supposed to be fun and I'm not having any). Meanwhile, I was working full-time to support myself while I went through school.
Did you see many American born people picking tomatos in say California ? I doubt that there are any. Class room teaching is somewhat similar to picking tomatos: pay is low, work is bitch and requirements are high. No doubt that it is filled with the most disadvantaged of the most disadvantaged of our educated elite and hence there is no surprise that it is 100% filled with immigrants (in most cases who even do no have greencards yet) - everybody else can find a better job.
So, you can sleep well for a while: these jobs are extremely low paying ones and our universities are in a firm grip of rich white liberals, all of whom speak perfect English and they simply use educational coolies, because as true liberals they do not like to do anything which even remotely looks like a work.
It may change someday, however, it there is looooong loooon way there.
Altogether I only had 4 professors that semester and one of them was a wardhealer for the Democrats. That meant I had three Jeffersonians and 1 totalitarian.
Not bad as professors go.
The point is that many of the foreign professors have always had motives other than their field of study to be here. Your typical American professor these days is more like that wardhealer I had so many years ago.
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