To the editor:

The following is a parable. I am expressing my opinion regarding undergraduate education in story form.

Once upon a time, there lived a king named Jischke.

This king was informed by his advisors that the peasants outside the castle weren’t doing well with their crops, so he walked out in the courtyard and looked around.

His educated peasants were doing all right, so he dismissed the advice as “bad luck.”

Later, when his majesty’s advisors came to him again with news of bad crops, he again looked out into the courtyard.

Blindly seeing nothing to be wrong, he returned to his throne room.

Years later, when all his educated peasants had left the kingdom, crops were at an all time low.

King Jischke sent for learned scholars from other regions to come and help grow better crops.

Upon arrival, the peasants were forced to meet with these scholars on a regular basis to learn how to grow better crops.

Except it didn’t work out.

The scholars couldn’t communicate well with the peasants, as they were from a far away land.

As a result, the peasants stopped meeting with them.

Instead, the peasants worked with each other to develop new ideas and ways to grow better crops.

It was all they could do.

Moral of the story: If you want to train your people, you train them the best you can or both you and they will suffer in the long run.

Rob Adams

Freshman

Computer science