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(Time) Interesting How was Barack Obama as a professor, anyway? Time magazine delves into this important issue and includes a copy of one of Professor Obama's tests   (time.com) divider line 141
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rikdanger [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 06:44:52 PM  
9/10. the question where the answer is that the doctor was a woman and the patient's mother tripped me up.

 
ZAZ [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 06:45:01 PM  
Rather than delve into the merits of teaching students how to argue that laws they don't like are unconstitutional, I will offer this true news story related to the hypothetical in Obama's exam.

A year or two ago the Supreme Court of Massachusetts approved "pulling the plug" on a girl in a persistent vegetative state with no hope of recovery, like the hypothetical Dolly. When news arrived at the hospital, the girl promptly got better.

 
GAT_00 [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 06:59:36 PM  
6 hour exam? WTF. It would be kinda odd to have a former professor as President though.

 
Tr0mBoNe [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 07:03:12 PM  
GAT_00: 6 hour exam? WTF. It would be kinda odd to have a former professor as President though.

Yeah eh... I've only had one 3 hour exam that I didn't get through by the end of my time. It was in Compilers and Translators. He graded it on a curve because nobody finished it.

 
Solid State Vittles 2008-09-12 07:04:16 PM  
I would have just answered "In what respect, Barry?" for all of them and then maybe accused the professor of appeasing Islamofascist terrorism that is hell-bent on destroying our country.

 
GAT_00 [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 07:12:36 PM  
Tr0mBoNe: Yeah eh... I've only had one 3 hour exam that I didn't get through by the end of my time. It was in Compilers and Translators. He graded it on a curve because nobody finished it.

Everyone at my uni has 2 1/2 hours for finals. Some profs, basically all the intro/non-science and engineering classes have exams that take around an hour, everyone else makes theirs take the full time. It sucks, but I can't imagine an exam that's budgeted for 3 hours with double time available.

 
ninjakirby [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 07:17:02 PM  
Students were told to act as attorneys in the make-believe state of Futura, advising the parents of a 23-year-old woman named Dolly, who had established a living will before sustaining near fatal injuries in a car accident. The will empowered her parents to make "any and all decisions regarding medical treatment," including terminating "life-sustaining treatment." The parents wanted to clone Dolly by taking a healthy cell from her body and inserting it into an embryo whose genetic material had been removed. The case hinged on a single question: Did the state's ban on such cloning violate the constitutional rights of Dolly and her parents?

Damn that's cool. People actually have a problem with someone this intelligent being president. It's amazing.

 
Tr0mBoNe [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 07:28:11 PM  
GAT_00: Everyone at my uni has 2 1/2 hours for finals. Some profs, basically all the intro/non-science and engineering classes have exams that take around an hour, everyone else makes theirs take the full time. It sucks, but I can't imagine an exam that's budgeted for 3 hours with double time available.

We had to stay in the exam room for at least the first half hour. I finished a multiple choice intro astronomy exam in about 20 minutes and had to wait to leave. About half the people were done in half an hour and nobody took more than an hour.

I love exams that consist of half of the 200 sample questions she gives you the week before.

 
Solid State Vittles 2008-09-12 07:28:57 PM  
ninjakirby: Damn that's cool. People actually have a problem with someone this intelligent being president. It's amazing.

That kind of imagination is an indication of an uppity elitist. I'd rather have a beer with a regular joe like John McCain or Bill Gates.

 
TheCharmerUnderMe [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 07:31:26 PM  
Solid State Vittles: ninjakirby: Damn that's cool. People actually have a problem with someone this intelligent being president. It's amazing.

That kind of imagination is an indication of an uppity elitist. I'd rather have a beer with a regular joe like John McCain or Bill Gates.


Obama teaches like a fag and his test's all retarded.

 
Tr0mBoNe [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 07:42:04 PM  
Solid State Vittles: ninjakirby: Damn that's cool. People actually have a problem with someone this intelligent being president. It's amazing.

That kind of imagination is an indication of an uppity elitist. I'd rather have a beer with a regular joe like John McCain or Bill Gates.


McCain would be a good drinking buddy but he would have trouble raising a beer with his left hand. Bill Gates would likely be more interested in a good game of duplicate bridge.

 
HulkHands [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 07:56:05 PM  
This only matters if he was a bad professor. If he was a good professor, this is a throw-away story.

/brought to you by the GOP

 
davidovitch [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 08:19:55 PM  
certainly tougher than my con law exam, but we didnt do much beyond the 14th amendment anyway...and we had 10 hours...

 
Crosshair [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 08:27:55 PM  
Students were told to act as attorneys in the make-believe state of Futura, advising the parents of a 23-year-old woman named Dolly, who had established a living will before sustaining near fatal injuries in a car accident. The will empowered her parents to make "any and all decisions regarding medical treatment," including terminating "life-sustaining treatment." The parents wanted to clone Dolly by taking a healthy cell from her body and inserting it into an embryo whose genetic material had been removed. The case hinged on a single question: Did the state's ban on such cloning violate the constitutional rights of Dolly and her parents?

The answer hinges on the question of the constitutionality of the ban on human cloning. People don't have a "right" to do illegal acts in the name of "life-sustaining treatment". (Like killing someone for their organs.) So if the ban on human cloning is constitutional, then their rights would not be violated as far as the law is concerned. If it was found to be unconstitutional there would be no question as the law would be void.

They could ignore the ban and go ahead anyways in an attempt to get the law overturned and clone their daughter, but they would also have to accept the consequences if they loose.

 
Somacandra [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 08:29:36 PM  
Comprehensive exams for Masters and PhD level are often budgeted for 4-6 hours at a stretch. Sometimes you're allowed to take a weekend for them, but then the answers have to be much, much better and coherent. In my experience, a three question PhD exam in the humanities taken over a weekend averages 8-9 hours per question to answer well, and ends up averaging about 10-15 page answers per question.

 
Pope George Ringo [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 08:30:18 PM  
What about the test from when McCain attended the Washington lobbyist's Senate Obedience School? Professor Keating was pretty demanding I hear.

 
Outtaphase [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 08:32:34 PM  
Didn't we do this in July?^ I see Time is looking up old NYT stories to reprint.

 
bulldg4life [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 09:16:59 PM  
Didn't we go over this a few months ago?

 
SkinnyHead [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 09:34:34 PM  
TFA: "What are the principles we can glean from this case?" he'd often ask as he began each class. Sometimes he'd wait for students to voluntarily make their arguments; other times he'd "cold call" them by name. Obvious answers wouldn't work. Nor would a simple "Yes, I agree." It was like a conversation.

Wow, a give-and-take, almost like a Socratic dialog. What an innovative way of teaching law! I wonder if anyone else has ever thought of this Socratic dialog way of teaching law.

 
UberDave [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 09:38:53 PM  
Tr0mBoNe: We had to stay in the exam room for at least the first half hour. I finished a multiple choice intro astronomy exam in about 20 minutes...


You took Astronomy as an elective while getting a CS degree? Join the club. My last semester, I had about 21 to complete. I didn't want to take twelve one semester then another nine. I knew this way ahead of time. That last semester saw Diff-EQ, Probability and Statistics for scientists and engineers, and Op. Systems. I saved my science and general elective for that semester. I took Astronomy and Introduction to the Internet. The CS department head laughed and almost didn't let me take Intro to the Internet....but he had no way to stop me really.

The Astronomy test was just the same - 20 minutes...but I got to leave.

 
noneyourbase 2008-09-12 10:08:18 PM  
the engineer at me recoils at the idea of taking this test

 
Halli [recently expired TotalFark] 2008-09-12 10:08:47 PM  
SkinnyHead: TFA: "What are the principles we can glean from this case?" he'd often ask as he began each class. Sometimes he'd wait for students to voluntarily make their arguments; other times he'd "cold call" them by name. Obvious answers wouldn't work. Nor would a simple "Yes, I agree." It was like a conversation.

Wow, a give-and-take, almost like a Socratic dialog. What an innovative way of teaching law! I wonder if anyone else has ever thought of this Socratic dialog way of teaching law.


Was your professor like that when you got your GED in law?

 
LocalCynic 2008-09-12 10:09:28 PM  
SkinnyHead: Wow, a give-and-take, almost like a Socratic dialog. What an innovative way of teaching law! I wonder if anyone else has ever thought of this Socratic dialog way of teaching law.

Obviously, nobody thought of hunting moose before Sarah Palin, or joining the military before John McCain. Trailblazers, those Republicans.

 
organizm 2008-09-12 10:10:47 PM  
An education? That's so east coast, big city elitist.

Get a clue Obama. Try learning some real American values.

Like um, uh, Nascar? No, no. Fishing. Yeah, like fishing!

 
LocalCynic 2008-09-12 10:11:14 PM  
Darconix: No, there's no liberal bias in academia, not at all.

Uh, the idea that something may get close to the line, but not violate the law, is not a liberal position. Quite the opposite.

 
Fart_Machine 2008-09-12 10:11:46 PM  
Old news is old.

 
hillbillypharmacist [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 10:13:25 PM  
Darconix: No, there's no liberal bias in academia, not at all.

Sometimes, constitutional rights clash. Who knew?

Apparently not yourself. Mostly because you're an unimaginative fraud.

 
The Great EZE [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 10:14:24 PM  
"This exam consists of two parts. In grading the exam, I will treat each part as roughly equal in weight."

See? TOTAL Communist!

 
defects 2008-09-12 10:14:34 PM  
FTFA: "Sometimes my poop is organic. You know it has kernels of 'wisdom' in it."

/gross

 
ninjakirby [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 10:15:19 PM  
LocalCynic: SkinnyHead: Wow, a give-and-take, almost like a Socratic dialog. What an innovative way of teaching law! I wonder if anyone else has ever thought of this Socratic dialog way of teaching law.

Obviously, nobody thought of hunting moose before Sarah Palin, or joining the military before John McCain. Trailblazers, those Republicans.


One time I was with Sarah in the back of a pickup truck, along with a live moose. Sarah goes up to the moose and says, 'I'm Sarah Palin! SAY IT!' Then she manipulates the deer's lips in such a way as to make it say, 'Sarahpalin' ... It wasn't exactly like it, but it was pretty good for a moose!!

 
Peter von Nostrand 2008-09-12 10:15:26 PM  
organizm: An education? That's so east coast, big city elitist.

Get a clue Obama. Try learning some real American values.

Like um, uh, Nascar? No, no. Fishing. Yeah, like fishing!


Bowling.

 
fosborb 2008-09-12 10:15:58 PM  
Darconix: No, there's no liberal bias in academia, not at all.

Please return your tin-foil hats to the full and upright position, and offer up your progressive prayers of change to your Messiah.


If you didn't explore the possibility of encroachment there wouldn't be anything to write about.

Unless liberal bias means appending a painfully obvious "clue" to an essay question for adults who really shouldn't need it.

 
Lunchlady 2008-09-12 10:17:41 PM  
Darconix: FTA: Students were told to act as attorneys in the make-believe state of Futura, advising the parents of a 23-year-old woman named Dolly, who had established a living will before sustaining near fatal injuries in a car accident. The will empowered her parents to make "any and all decisions regarding medical treatment," including terminating "life-sustaining treatment." The parents wanted to clone Dolly by taking a healthy cell from her body and inserting it into an embryo whose genetic material had been removed. The case hinged on a single question: Did the state's ban on such cloning violate the constitutional rights of Dolly and her parents? "You do not need to arrive at a definitive conclusion," Obama advised in the five-page exam. "Instead, make the strongest possible argument for each claim. Be sure to consider the possibility that Futura's ban on cloning does in fact encroach on some constitutionally recognized rights, but is nevertheless constitutional."

No, there's no liberal bias in academia, not at all.

Please return your tin-foil hats to the full and upright position, and offer up your progressive prayers of change to your Messiah.


What the hell was the point of this post?

A living document able to amended can be amended? That's absurd! Messiah, messiah, closet muslim.

 
fosborb 2008-09-12 10:18:24 PM  
ninjakirby: One time I was with Sarah in the back of a pickup truck, along with a live moose. Sarah goes up to the moose and says, 'I'm Sarah Palin! SAY IT!' Then she manipulates the deer's lips in such a way as to make it say, 'Sarahpalin' ... It wasn't exactly like it, but it was pretty good for a moose!!

I had a philosophy professor who had to run out of class to kill the deer in the back of his truck that he thought was already dead.

 
Bacontastesgood 2008-09-12 10:18:52 PM  
bulldg4life: Didn't we go over this a few months ago?

In what respect?

 
Lunchlady 2008-09-12 10:19:11 PM  
I want to apologize for not catching the "ed" in my Boobies, oops.

 
milk_plus 2008-09-12 10:20:40 PM  
hillbillypharmacist: Darconix: No, there's no liberal bias in academia, not at all.

Sometimes, constitutional rights clash. Who knew?

Apparently not yourself. Mostly because you're an unimaginative fraud.


Republicans aren't know for handling complex issues or shades of gray. Simple false dichotomies and knee jerk reactions are easier than thinking and it looks like taking a strong stance if you're a dumbass.

 
Peter von Nostrand 2008-09-12 10:21:59 PM  
Didn't the NYT do this a month or so ago?

 
lexslamman 2008-09-12 10:22:04 PM  
That is a hell of a test. I bet Obama was a hell of a great teacher.

He'll be even better as a president.

 
SkinnyHead [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 10:22:19 PM  
Halli: Was your professor like that when you got your GED in law?

No, I got my GED in law off a match book. You can learn a lot of law off a match book. Just remember to close cover before striking.

 
quizzical 2008-09-12 10:28:19 PM  
SkinnyHead: TFA: "What are the principles we can glean from this case?" he'd often ask as he began each class. Sometimes he'd wait for students to voluntarily make their arguments; other times he'd "cold call" them by name. Obvious answers wouldn't work. Nor would a simple "Yes, I agree." It was like a conversation.

Wow, a give-and-take, almost like a Socratic dialog. What an innovative way of teaching law! I wonder if anyone else has ever thought of this Socratic dialog way of teaching law.


I'm in law school right now, so I'm getting a kick out of these replies...

 
hasty ambush 2008-09-12 10:29:54 PM  
I would be more interested in what Obama thought what were the correct answers.

 
fosborb 2008-09-12 10:30:26 PM  
Darconix: The fact that it centers around cloning, perhaps? Stem cell research come to mind?

When this test was written, Dolly the recently cloned sheep and the morality of human cloning was an incredibly hot topic. Stem cells, not so much.

Pull your head out of your ass and get some perspective.

 
Soup4Bonnie 2008-09-12 10:30:55 PM  
and use that to accomplish their agenda from the beginning, full re-integration, both socially and politically, with Europe.

You left out Plate Tectonicaly.

Oh, Europe! How I long to rejoin with thee! I want to mash our continents together!

 
hillbillypharmacist [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 10:31:12 PM  
Darconix: I genuinely believe that the Democrat Party loves to bandy about these imaginary infractions on your personal rights under a "what-if" basis, and use that to accomplish their agenda from the beginning, full re-integration, both socially and politically, with Europe.

We tarred and feathered these asshats in previous days, which was a lot more painful than any of you farkers have experienced or given it credit for, and still the Loyalists are a major force in politics.


You really truly believe that liberals are the modern forms of Tories in revolutionary times? I mean really?

 
Coco LaFemme [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 10:32:22 PM  
If Obama wins, those students he taught have a great story to tell their kids/grandkids. What depresses me is that so many people look upon his education and the fact he was a law professor as a negative; as though being educated was a crime. What happened to seeing someone advance in school and being PROUD? Is there no pride in academia anymore?

 
ninjakirby [TotalFark] 2008-09-12 10:34:37 PM  
Coco LaFemme: If Obama wins, those students he taught have a great story to tell their kids/grandkids. What depresses me is that so many people look upon his education and the fact he was a law professor as a negative; as though being educated was a crime. What happened to seeing someone advance in school and being PROUD? Is there no pride in academia anymore?

There is plenty of pride in academia. The majority of people fail to get into academia (or are simply not interested/lack the opportunity), and if responses I have heard are any indication, are simply envious, so they put it down to bring themselves up.

 
Banky_The_Hack 2008-09-12 10:35:39 PM  
noneyourbase: the engineer at me recoils at the idea of taking this test

Given the preposition you used there, I totally believe you are an engineer :)

 
cburkard 2008-09-12 10:38:12 PM  
How does him being a professor impact his ability to be president?

 
sinanju 2008-09-12 10:39:09 PM  
Can we make Palin take this exam?

 
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