Relevant.



So some high school teacher isn't the most brilliant programmer on the face of the planet. So what? There's a reason people like that end up in teaching careers. I'm sure you've heard the saying.


Life is too short to worry about such things. If I wrote even two sentences about every bad experience I had in my educational career, I'd spend all my waking hours compiling a massive tome of woe, and no time getting anything interesting done. Excessive negativity about other people and their skills is a great way to ruin your life being stressed over inconsequential things you can't control. Focus on your own betterment, or, if you are genuinely concerned about your fellow students and not just in the mood to vent, do as someone else suggested and take it on yourself to help them in a more productive way.


In general, though, just move on. And I think that applies to the OP as well as a good number of the respondents.

"What do you want me to do? LEAVE? Then they'll keep being wrong!" -xkcd

edit: By total coincidence this was an xkcd random button that I hit while reading this thread. I did not seek it out......... destiny? o.O

Can anyone confirm this? I doubt it will absolutely, unquestionably, have to be for 40+ years or for 60 hrs/week.

Yes. Welcome to the future, where it's all [s]sunshine and rainbows[/s] mundane work. It may not be 60 hrs/week, but that hours is typical for programmers, especially in game industry. Let it not deter your, however. A CEO of a startup might pull off longer work hour.

Once you step outside of that comforting high-school, you better know what you want to do in life because that's what you are going to do for the rest of your life. So..this is your time to slack off and play. Who cares if your teacher can't teach programming.

Once you step outside of that comforting high-school, you better know what you want to do in life because that's what you are going to do for the rest of your life. So..this is your time to slack off and play. Who cares if your teacher can't teach programming.

Hi. I feel the need to rebut. In my opinion what you said is invalid. There's no "ultimate truth" to a career path as your implying.
Thinking you only have a single chance in your entire life makes the act of taking this decision become considerably overwhelming and doubtful, while a career choice should be taken with enthusiasm and confidence.

People change their minds. A couple of people in the same acting course I took were over 30 years; they were changing directions. One of them said to me that he had been working with something before, in his first career choice in an office job, but had acting so much in his mind that he had to make this change.
Several career-planning books make mention of a secondary, "life-changing" career choice that you take after working on something for a long time and maturing your mind. When you know what you want.

I think a far more valuable high-school plan is: play sports, go to parties and befriend the popular kids (if you aren't one yourself), while still pursuing healthy study and cultural habits. Don't go out saying to everyone you study a lot, though! it's the cost of social value.

I disagree with your dismissive attitude towards high-school and extra-curricular study ("slack off") and the discouragement towards critiquing your education ("who cares"). If we were to take what you said as valid, "slacking off" would be the worst choice possible as you would need all the study, preparation and focus you can get for this "lifetime, single choice" you think it is. Disagreeing with someone in charge (in an argumentative, well-fundamented and most importantly, humble and open-minded form) can be seen with good eyes. It demonstrates consciousness and, in my opinion, is what the OP should've done: did he ever talk to the teacher and exchange ideas? seek out the reason why the teacher say the things she said? either one would have learnt something new in the process.

At least your high school has CS classes ... mine had a typing class which used 15 year old computers, and that was canceled after my freshman year.

Most CS teachers suck, but then again lots of programmers suck too.

imo any good programmer learned most of what they know on their own, school is like the first 20%

If any high school had a good CS teacher I would be asking myself, what the heck are they doing there? I would figure that someone that knows there stuff and wants to teach would prefer to know that the students they're teaching really want to be there (more likely to be found in college). To put it politely, on average in high-school CS classes, what percentage of students intend on making programming a significant part of their career? If the percentage is low then perhaps that explains the choice in the teacher for the class.

Even if the teacher doesn't meet your hopes or expectations, make use of whatever resources that the school makes available to you to advance your education the way that you want to.

Start a study group if it bothers you that much that what is being taught is inadequate. In general though, high school doesn't have quality education - especially when it's something like CS; any teacher worth his/her salt will have a university or college level position, being stuck in high school classes either means
a) the teacher isn't all that great
or
b) s/he really likes teaching high school kids.

I'll give you five guesses which one is more likely.

There's no "ultimate truth" to a career path as your implying.
Thinking you only have a single chance in your entire life makes the act of taking this decision become considerably overwhelming and doubtful, while a career choice should be taken with enthusiasm and confidence.

Maybe not the way I implied it "Freshman, find your career now, pronto!", but there is the "ultimate truth" to choosing your career path, and that is to follow your passion. Enthusiasm and confidence will come along with it.

People change their minds. A couple of people in the same acting course I took were over 30; they were changing directions. One of them said to me that they had been working with something before, in their first career choice (I think it was sales or commercial relations. Office job.), but had acting so much in his mind that they had to make this change.[/quote]
Good for him for following his call now, but I bet $10 that he took his sales job back then because he was either too lazy, too afraid to follow his passion of acting, or he didn't bother trying.

Several career-planning books make mention of a secondary, "life-changing" career choice that you take after working on something for a long time and maturing your mind. When you know what you want.[/quote]
You don't need books for that. That's mostly trying out new things to see if you end up liking it. It all boils down to doing what you enjoy doing -- not so much about maturing mind and knowing what you want. Did Johnny Cash like to play music because he had a mature mind when he was 5 years old? No, he found his passion when he was 5 and stuck with it. Maybe your true passion was iceskating, but you never found out about it because you never tried it. Who knows.

I think far more valuable high-school plan is: play sports, go to parties and befriend the popular kids (if you aren't one yourself), while still pursuing healthy study and cultural habits. Don't go out saying to everyone you study a lot, though! it's the cost of social value.[/quote]
I stay away from suggesting people to be "popular", especially hanging out with popular kids. Popularity is a disease. Be who you are, and don't be afraid of anybody. That alone will put you above popularity in highschool and beyond. Playing sports and parties should be all-time activities that you should still be doing even when you are 60. They are not a subset of popularity, and certainly not of high-school.

I disagree with your dismissive attitude towards high-school and personal study ("slack off") and the discouragement towards critiquing your education ("who cares"). if we were to take what you said as valid, "slacking off" would be the worst choice possible as you would need all the study, preparation and focus you can get for this "lifetime, single choice" you think it is.[/quote]
I ain't dismissive. Is it better to slack off when you are 30? Try that, and see if anybody is putting food on your plate. High school leaves so much room for slacking off that it doesn't affect you much when you get lazy once in a while. Well, depends on what you call lazy. Does skipping your history class so you can hang out in the computer lab writing programs count as lazy? Oh wait, that's exactly how Blizzard was founded because the co-founders were skipping classes and somehow met in the computer lab.

It all boils down to doing what you enjoy doing -- not so much about maturing mind and knowing what you want. Did Johnny Cash like to play music because he had a mature mind when he was 5 years old? No, he found his passion when he was 5 and stuck with it.

I disagree. For one, I think there's a bit at the start of almost any career which sucks, and you need the maturity to stick that out or to approach it in the right way. I don't think it's uncommon, at least based on my experience, to see someone experienced doing something which you think is really cool, only to be disheartened and even give up when you can't figure out how to do that thing in a reasonable time frame.

Not necessarily because you're lazy, but because that spark that ignites your interest doesn't seem accessible to you. Maybe you think you don't have the talent. Sure, it helps, but it can often be supplanted - and almost always need be at least augmented - by hard work and dedication. I think the ability to see this not as immediate failure but as, to repurpose a horrible expression, a deferred success comes with maturity. Certainly the ability to distinguish this situation from actual failure does.

I think, on a much smaller scale, it's analogous to the way that an undergraduate student is more likely to keep working through a maths problem, still in the conviction that applying their knowledge will ultimately lead them to the right answer, even if they can't see the full path yet. That's not just because they know how to do a path integral and the average 12 year old doesn't. It's because they have more experience of tackling larger problems which aren't tractable as a single work unit.

Relevant.



So some high school teacher isn't the most brilliant programmer on the face of the planet. So what? There's a reason people like that end up in teaching careers. I'm sure you've heard the saying.

Sorry, but that's BS, of the extreme. I had a physics teacher (PhD no less) long ago that couldn't teach worth a damn. He didn't set expectations properly, didn't present material in an organized manner, etc. Half of his class was failing.

Then there was the engineer that was moonlighting and that guy made a lot of sense.

Teaching is its own discipline and even the best can fail at it. It's an independent skill set, not a tired old adage.