What the hell am I doing with my life?
Think about your job. Think about your friends' jobs. Think about the jobs of people that aren't really your friends, but you still would say "hi" to them if you saw each other at Big Y. Or at least give them the 'sup head nod. Think about every job that you have ever had.
How many of these jobs required you to know how to divide polynomials? What about factoring quadratic trinomials? Graph rational functions? Simplify exponential expressions? Do you even know what any of these things are, or do you think that I'm making words up?
The answer is probably none, or maybe one if you happen to find an engineer that specifies in a very odd form of engineering. Other than that, there are almost no jobs that require a mathematical background beyond the ability to do basic maths and possibly work with percentages. And most people probably possess a cell phone that can handle those tasks. Yet high schools and colleges require everyone to take more advanced math classes, and I can't figure out why.
None of my students this semester are going into any fields that require a background in mathematics. So basically I'm wasting their time 4 days a week (or however many they show up for, since I don't have an attendance policy). Which means I am wasting my time as well. Teaching math to people who aren't going to use math is about as productive as counting grains of sand or digging holes to fill in later. Yeah, I kill some time, but what have I accomplished?
Nothing.
What a waste.
-Jon
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