I think the last point is rooted in some modern ideas about what it costs to develop and deliver an education.
Our education system cost (At least in the States) is absurdly overpriced and most of that money is not going to the professors.
You don't need to pay people to take biology courses. You need to pay people UBI so that they could choose to take biology courses. Then you only need a (relatively) modest amount of money to design the course, pay the graders, and deliver the content.
While working as an adjunct I got paid maybe $5k in total? For developing and delivering a new online Bioinformatics course for two semesters. What's sad is I actually got paid a bit more than other adjuncts.
While the pay could be increased to make it better it still doesn't require turning students into a revenue stream for % of their salary over X years.
> You don't need to pay people to take biology courses. You need to pay people UBI so that they could choose to take biology courses. Then you only need a (relatively) modest amount of money to design the course, pay the graders, and deliver the content.
I agree with your sentiment, forcing people into Biology is entirely the wrong approach--I was and I detested my HS level classes, and even most of my lower division classes in University as it was mainly just rote learning--but because I met a Community of students and professionals online when I was still in HS I got to learn what research they were focusing on and it intrigued me enough to go to the BS level, all while attending upper division University lectures in various subjects during my Junior/Senior years of HS.
While I'm a proponent of UBI, I still think a concerted effort is needed to make the Life Sciences appealing to the masses; I personally subscribe to the Biohacker and Community Science approach, and having (wet) lab extensions built into local community libraries would go so much further.
I've been out of the Industry for 8 years now, but I'd gladly volunteer and teach Plant Science and some Molecular biology labs for free if we had UBI and I could offset some living expenses. I know of 3 or so recent biology grads who wish they could do the same.
I think we're on the same page. Now I don't have the wet lab background (I come from comp sci and did a bioinformatics m.s.). But yea, if I had just a little money to be able to dedicate a consistent amount of time to developing courses I'd do it.
I've tried my hand at doing it completely free a few times, but when it doesn't pay the bills the effort quickly gets put on the backburner.
If you and/or those recent grads start putting something together feel free to reach out and I'd love to contribute. My github username is the same as my HN username and you can get everything else from there.
Life Sciences would be appealing to the masses if it paid better, more like Computer Science does. It would pay better if there were a need for more people to do Life Sciences.
Our education system cost (At least in the States) is absurdly overpriced and most of that money is not going to the professors.
You don't need to pay people to take biology courses. You need to pay people UBI so that they could choose to take biology courses. Then you only need a (relatively) modest amount of money to design the course, pay the graders, and deliver the content.
While working as an adjunct I got paid maybe $5k in total? For developing and delivering a new online Bioinformatics course for two semesters. What's sad is I actually got paid a bit more than other adjuncts.
While the pay could be increased to make it better it still doesn't require turning students into a revenue stream for % of their salary over X years.