D in the ix magazine about "programming today"

[Walter Bright]

Nick Sabalausky wrote:
> "Sean Kelly" <sean at invisibleduck.org> wrote in message 
> news:hhetss$26er$1 at digitalmars.com...
>> Intro courses in the sciences are often intended to weed out the people
> 
> There's a *lot* of things wrong with the way schools work. Deliberate 
> "weeding out" is a clear red flag that a school cares more about their own 
> statistics (graduation ratio, etc) than actual education:

That may be true for some schools. But there are incoming students who 
simply don't belong, for a variety of reasons. I don't think it serves 
those students to string them along with both the school and the student 
pretending they can hack the material.

Have you ever watched the tryouts on the TV show "So You Think You Can 
Dance"? They have some applicants who clearly just don't belong there. 
They are often asked if they've had training, and they'll say they've 
had 5 years of dance training. They cry when told by the judges that 
they have no talent.

Apparently, none of their instructors told them this, they just 
continued to take the tuition money and compliment the student on how 
well he's doing.

It's like me going to basketball camp. I will never, ever be a good 
basketball player, no matter how hard I try or how much coaching I get. 
It will never happen. For a coach not to tell me this is doing me a 
grave disservice, because I should be expending effort at something I 
can succeed at.

Of course, if I then choose to take basketball anyway because I just 
love the game, that's fine, too. But it would be unreasonable of me to 
expect a top coach to be willing to coach me, even if I paid him $$$. 
He'll want to be coaching people who can succeed at basketball.