Thursday, July 23, 2009

...from Addræssa Part 1

We don't subscribe to the main newspaper in Trondheim - Adresseavisen - for several reasons. One such reason is experience from having tried a weekend subscription and found the distribution to published issue ratio not to be in our favor. As a matter of fact, we kept complaining and getting the subscription extended due to nondelivery enough times that I think we could've had a lifetime weekend subscription had we not actively cancelled the deal.

Another reason is that Adresseavisen sucks more than the combined efforts of a White House intern festival during the Clinton administration.

Still, we get a copy for free every now and again, like yesterday. Among other things, Addræssa has a "comments from raging lunatics at adressa.no" section. One such gem follows here (regarding a more than 10% increase in student numbers at NTNU):

"Vil i denne omgangen heller foreslå at en sikrer kvaliteten på de tilbudene som finnes og gir de studentene som har fått plass det beste som kan fremskaffes av undervisning,veiledning og studiemiljø. (I'd like to propose that NTNU should prioritize securing the quality of the existing studies and make sure that the existing students have access to the best possible teaching, guidance and student environment.)" Signed Ce.

One problem with your suggestion there"Ce"; following the "Quality reform", the funding structure was altered so that themoney now follows the students, or rather the number of completed study points/credit hours at the various departments. Thus, your brilliant suggestion of putting a cap on the student number that's lower than full capacity would net NTNU a grand total of 0 NOK with which to improve the existing studies beyond their current budget status.

2 comments:

Anders said...

the funding structure was altered so that themoney now follows the students, or rather the number of completed study points/credit hours at the various departments.

I always thought this encourage the institutions to pass students that should have failed. And lowering the standards are not a billiant way of reforming the educational system, in my opinion...

On a side note: Maybe the dude in Addræssa meant that by submitting more students, weaker students whom are more likely to fail subjects are acceepted and thus pulls down the average completed study points per student? In your face, W-boi! ;-)
Yeah, like the keyboard warriors of online newspapers are able to do any kind of complex thinking...

Wilhelm said...

...pass students and get funded...fail students and get no payoff for work that's already done....decisions decisions