From my days in the military I dealt with many junior officers who had come from the "prestigious" service academy of my service, but I often found myself questioning how they even graduated. There's all of this talk on here about grammatical skills, etc. But when I see graduaties of a service who have no idea how to write letters, use correct punctuation, have some of the poorest spelling I've EVER seen, I find it frustrating to know that a person with a degree from (insert service academy here) will go towards the top of an applicant list someday simply because of where it came from. So, with all of this talk about "accredited vs. unaccredited", "national accreditation vs. regional", state approval, etc. It seems to be that there's needs to be a systematic way of evaluating a person's knowledge no matter what school it came from (except diploma mills of course). Any thoughts? Comments? Captain Uno "The One Eyed Pirate"
Welcome a-board, captain! This thread is not about distance learning, so you should have posted it to "Off-topic discussions". Although there is some correlation between good spelling and being educated, there's not as much as most people think. Some extremely well-read people just aren't good at spelling! It should be viewed as in inborn specific mental deficiency (like dyslexia), not related to general intelligence. Never having attended a military academy, I don't know what they teach there. Maybe they should devote more time to teaching English, or get better professors. "A systematic way of evaluating a person's knowledge no matter what school it came from"? Well, standardized exams do exist for some professions.
The Naval, Air Force, and Coast Guard Academies, and to a lesser extent West Point, emphasize scientific majors. That's no excuse if a graduate can't use proper punctuation, but it's been my experience that scientists aren't the greatest writers. Incidentally, I think the service academies are prestigious simply because it's so hard to get accepted. Academically, I wouldn't compare them to a top-tier college.
Uncle Janko: it wasn't when it was first posted! Italiansupernova: Proposition question: School Prestige = Better? Inverse true?: School Lack of Prestige = Worse? Neither proposition is sufficient; both require data that tests them, and exceptions would proliferate the debate.
For what it's worth, my 2003 USNews 'America's Best Colleges' has the Air Force Academy and West Point tied for fourth best engineering school in the nation among schools that don't offer a doctorate. The Naval Academy is tied with RIT for sixth. In aerospace engineering, ERAU (FL) is #1, the Air Force Academy #2, the Naval Academy #3. West Point is #2 in civil engineering behind Rose Hulman. (The best engineering school that nobody has ever heard of.) The Air Force Academy is tied with Cal Poly San Luis Obispo for fifth in electrical engineering. West Point is tied with Cal Poly SLO and RIT for fifth in mechanical engineering.
