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I had a very different experience, going to an "elite school". Basically kids teach themselves most things, and professors are there for clarification, in my experience. Also, are you suggesting that professors at elite schools are not overworked? haha.

EDIT: I saw your edit. That's true, but is irrelevant. Most people lecturing are not in that position, unfortunately. Liberal art schools try to address that though. I tried to look up some stats for you, but unfortunately many schools do not publish. I tried to look for the distribution of classes being taught and the types of people teaching them.

What we would have to see is the percentage of students being taught by a person whose primary purpose is to teach.

>> Not to mention that MIT and other 'elite schools' barely teach well anyways.

> Ignore this person, they don't know what they are talking about.

I'm not sure that that's fair. Granted I didn't go to a great school; I went to community college because it was what I could afford. But I know many who have attended other, "elite" schools and most of them, barring a few exceptions, told me they basically learned out of the book and the only "hard part" about the school was a high frequency of difficult testing.

A few have told me about great professors but even they said most of their other classes was almost just reading out of a text box and doing typical work around it.

So, no first person information here but what I've been told by several friends and former colleagues is they're like most schools they just push students a little harder with more testing. Hell one of my friends dropped out of Stanford and went right into quite an important job at Microsoft stating he wasn't learning anything by just reading books.

> they basically learned out of the book and the only "hard part" about the school was a high frequency of difficult testing

I went to Arizona State. This is basically how I learned. That said, the most valuable moments in my college experience were when I made an effort to develop a relationship with my professors (and certain brilliant peers).

The insights from those interactions sound silly in words (e.g. "have your slightly neurotic friend or employee read securities' footnotes with you" or "you can model anything as an option" or "flow separation can be desirable"). That might be why they aren't taught in class. The moments preceding them (missing game-changing information in a footnote, struggling with yet another wonky security, or going crazy trying to control every factor between my computer and metal models) made them memorable. The bigger lessons (use your and your peers' stereotypically "negative" personality attributes as strengths, it's okay to master one thing and bend your universe of problems to look like it, and it's okay to let go of control) would not have been learned, as they were, without them.

As somebody who got a PhD from Cornell I've found that the opinions people have about the classes at Cornell are across the board.

I was involved in teaching introductory physics classes and I was proud of what we did. If you took a class oriented towards engineers you'd wind up with lectures in a big class with absolutely great demonstrations (we had a full time guy to maintain the hardware) and a large amount of material and support available so that a new prof could take it over pretty easily. Usually you'd get an experienced prof who was pretty good at it and maybe even a Nobel Prize winner to boot. On top of that you had sessions of maybe 20 students led by a young graduate student, a lab class, etc. Lots of office hours and the prof and grad students are very accessible.

We also had a (rare) autotutorial class aimed at premeds that works people very hard, forcing them to take each test multiple times until they get a passing score. Students who take this class do very well on the physics section on the MCAT. In particular, many students struggle silently through a conventional physics class and end up passing with a D or a C and have little mastery of the subject. The autotutorial class will kick the same students in the butt, make them work very hard, and they often end up with a B+ and a pretty good grasp of the subject. I've seen students from "disadvantaged" backgrounds struggle with the course but ultimately succeed in a way that they would not have in a conventional course.

A friend of mine got a PhD in computer science at Cornell and he teaches now at a Jesuit college and he was not so happy with the state of undergraduate education. I told him that I liked Jon Kleinberg's new algorithm book and that I thought he was taking undergraduate education seriously and my friend seemed skeptical of that.

That's a lot of conclusion from one data point. I went to Stanford, the teaching was top-notch and the students motivated and upbeat. Had guest lectures from Silicon Valley stars, had Stanford facilities to visit (they have their own particle accelerator!) and clubs everywhere.

However my youngest tried to attend Cleveland Institute of Music (a well-respected conservatory). Depressed and burnt out in 1 year. They forgot somewhere that young people are actually living there. The only thing on the online student calendar was Weight Watcher's meetings. No karaoke nights, no community visits (students were instructed to never leave campus), dark dormitory like a submarine. He lost weight and ultimately gave up on the career that led him there.

So I guess that's just 2 data points. Anybody else got a story?

That's Cleveland. I went to Case/CWRU once. Freshman orientation started by covering where the high crime areas were.

>> Not to mention that MIT and other 'elite schools' barely teach well anyways.

> Ignore this person, they don't know what they are talking about.

On the mean these schools have more knowledgeable professors, and regardless of teaching talent will push a course as far as the class can take. So, I found that when reaching grad school students coming from the Ivy's simply covered more in their courses (though not necessarily with more effort or better technique).

State schools aren't always better teaching wise: at many research universities a teaching award can be a kiss of death for gaining tenure, and gaining it tends afflicts professors in the same way.

the primary reason to go to any ivy league school is network. The universities dont magically turn someone around to be an amazing student if they didnt already have it in them. you make your own education it doesnt make you.

> These are professors whose sole job is to teach

No, no it really is not. It's getting grants, advising grad students, etc etc. From my experience, professors spend very little time on classes besides lectures.

> No, no it really is not. It's getting grants, advising grad students, etc etc.

You are talking about tenure-track or research professors. A teaching-track professor (typically) does not have PhD students so they do not have to get grants.

https://www.cmu.edu/policies/faculty/appointments-teaching-t...