Objection

This morning as I awaited for one of my classes to finish their last chapter exam I took a relaxing trip through my usual reads, beginning of course with rateyourstudents (RYS).  One of the posts that I read was the usual political/religious rant which proceded to perform the typical tradition of generalizing the political/religious views with which the author disagrees with the same, tired terms; “religious nuts”, “right-wing gun-nut”…the list continues.  While I can fully sympathize with the author’s irritated feelings concerning governments and two-faced “religious” individuals, the mistake should not be made that all religious people are two-faced (or hypocrites) or that all government decisions are bad (ok, ok, I know most decisions are pretty bad, but the gun bill mentioned in the link above sounds pretty good, and I’ll explain why).  When a generalization is used, it may include people who would not belong in the category at all (I believe racial issues best illustrate this point).  

First, I’m going to address the issues brought forth concerning “religious nuts”.  Luckily, the author decided not to point out the one religion I’m fairly certain she was thinking of (Christianity) and thereby giving me an easy time dismantling her arguement.  Since she attempted to be broad, albeit rather weakly, then I shall as well.  The author has apparently forgotten that many religions – if not all of them – have some variation of heretical cults or extremists, and while individuals who fall into this category are heard easily due to the nature of their actions and the entertainment offered subsequently on the major news channels, they are by no means truly representative of the parent religion from which they originated.  Religion has contributed greatly to society both in contemporary times and throughout  history.  For example, there are many hospitals which have been formed by Christians, as well as programs such as the YMCA (based solidly on a Christian foundation) which aim to help train our young ones in Christian values and morals.  In addition to this, there have been other positive contributions to the world from other religions which I am not familiar with.  Also keep in mind the atrocities that were permitted to occur in communist Russia, where atheism was the only permitted religion.  I’ll save the argument about atheism vs. thiestic religions for later…

Now onto the gun law.  In short, the state of Virginia is pushing a law through the works that would allow students with a legal gun permit to carry their weapon on college campuses.  The author percieves this as a very bad thing…hear it in her own words:

“[The bill] would give our self-centered, self-righteous adultolescents with anger management issues permission to carry handguns on campus. The alleged rationale for this piece of right-wing, gun-nut, ideologically-driven crapfest is that several 18-year-olds with impulse control problems are, theoretically, going to save me and their classmates in Room 330 from the next mad shooter to lose it. If the snowflakes’ aim is anything like their inability to hit the broad side of a syllogism, we’re up to our necks in deep shit.”

But you know what I think?  If she was in room 330 and they heard a gun being shot in the hallway and students screaming, I bet she would be thrilled if a student stood up and said “I have a gun, maybe I can defend us against the shooter”.

The issue at heart here is that allowing guns on campus or banning them has had absolutely no effect in preventing shooters from coming to campus and doing their violent work.  The only thing that has come from banning guns on campus is giving shooters unarmed targets to shoot at their leisure.  Imagine if a shooter was thinking of attacking a campus, but had heard that other students were allowed to carry guns on campus.  Maybe the knowledge that the intended targets have weapons of their own would be enough to cause the shooter to reconsider.

As a closing thought, I’m going to quote Andrew Kurtzman who writes for The Brown University Spectator:

“Those who object to allowing students to carry firearms seem to assume that schools would degenerate into “guns-r-us” zones, full of irresponsible, inebriated, and hormonal young adults firing every-which-way, without discretion. However, a number of states regularly allow students to carry concealed weapons, and their universities have not suffered for it; California and New York are prime examples. Individuals attending university are subject to the same concealed-carry laws that apply to any other citizen. Usually, this means being over 21 years of age, and having gone through appropriate education and training – a process requiring significant time, energy, and commitment. Exceptions to these restrictions simply argue, at worst, for their broader application, and not against the principle; it should not come as a surprise that licensed gun owners are orders of magnitude less likely to commit gun crimes than the average citizen.”

The excellent full article here.

Music for Monday

A nice long weekend and a very pleasant night’s rest has helped me recover from the initial mind-bending frustration I was experiencing a few days ago concerning that RMP post.  Something that’s really bothering me still, however, is the deterioration of the student’s work ethic.  I will avoid getting in depth with that right now, but to be short I think that at least half of the problem is the professors who, seeking to capitalize on a situation, decide to make their classes easy and essentially pointless and thus convince students that they are cool and I am an uptight half-wit.  I have been watching one such professor over the past three semesters (summer ‘07, fall ‘07, spring ‘08) and I’ve seen that his techniques are very much “student-friendly”, and that he will essentially allow students to dictate the entire course to him.  Maybe it’s just me and I am being too analytical…or something.  I’m sure I’ll have more thoughts/observances on this later (minus the anger, I promise!), but I’m moving on for now…

As far as the title for today goes, each Monday I’m going to try and post songs that I believe deserve mention (please understand the total arbitrary nature of these ratings!).  This Monday, I’ll give my “award” to Mr. Brownstone by Guns ‘n’ Roses:

I might be getting some pictures up from a recent trip to Atlanta, but that will wait (pictures from my travels will be commonplace eventually)

Something to read while I’m gone: Guilty until proven innocent; an excellent little piece by Radley Balko.

 

…Is that bad?

As I perused my usual reads earlier this afternoon, I couldn’t help myself; I simply had to look at ratemyprofessor.com and see if there were any new stabs at my character.  Now, since this is the time in the semester when the developmental math students must take a state test their attitudes are at their worst.  Once I reached the site, I noticed some of the usual libelous material attacking my character and stating how inferior I am to other teachers (and even my fiance!), but a particular rating caught my eye:

“test are hard and and hes proud of it and if you dont show your work he takes off points also homwork is due on the test day with your lab sheet and if you didnt take the lab mastery before taking his test he takes of 5 points and the same is for homework to sum it all just dont take him half are class had to drop out cause he is horrible”

First, I would like to observe a moment of silence to remember all of the poor, pitiful brain cells shriveling and dying in this idiotic lump of flesh that I have the distinguished honor to call “my student”.

Now, I know the spelling and grammar are about as deformed as the un-pedicured toenails of a syphyllitic leper, but if we look beyond that we can see this student is criticizing me for a few of things:

1. Apparently being proud of making challenging tests is a bad thing.  Keep in mind that I do not make tests too hard to pass (I still have several students with A’s on each of my tests.
2. I teach a math class, and yet the student (remember now, this is a STUDENT) thinks that I am being unreasonable by requiring all scratch work to be shown on the test so that I know that they are doing the work correctly.  I’m so sorry, student!  I’m sure you, with your minimal high school education, can run a class better than I can!
3. First of all, I have no idea what “homwork” is.  But I can tell you all about my homework assignments. Homework being due on the day of the test is bad?  Even though I give a minimum of a week to complete one chapter’s worth of homework?  Should I give the full 15 weeks of the semester to let you turn in the homework whenever your poor little vegetable brain feels like it?
4. Yes, the lab assignments are also required on test day…but what the student didn’t say is that the lab is actually due before I require it in my class (the lab is independent from the lecture portion).  So, if it’s due before I require it anyway…why is this a problem?  Ah yes…I forgot; the snowflake doesn’t want to do the lab at all.  So sad.
5. “To sum it all just dont take him half are class had to drop out cause he is horrible”.  Wait, what?  Half are class?  Now, I can understand confusing “their” “there” and “they’re” (Hey I didn’t say excuse that mix-up, I just understand it) but mixing up “our” and “are”?  This is fantastic!  I had all of this excess malice building up in me with no place to unload it, so thank you student!  Thank you for crapping out a wonderfully idiotic review to confirm my growing suspicions that college students are becoming more and more stupid! 

I guess the student tried to sound at least a little smart by using the math term “sum” in the review…Unfortunately, my misguided fool of a student, you are still an idiot who is going to fail the class (and hey, that means you have to dish out another $350 for the class…a little insult on Ratemyprofessor doesn’t even compare!)

But after I finished reading the review (and finished the subsequent laughter), I realized something: there’s nothing truly wrong with having the characteristics the student complained about.  Having challenging tests, requiring homework to be turned in, requiring lab work to be completed on time…mon dieu! The student has actually pointed out several good qualities for a teacher to possess.  That’s when I had the realization that if students think that these characteristics are somehow negative, then they have lost sight of what it means to be a student.

By the way, this student wrote this during a semester when I’ve helped over 85% of my students pass that state exam (significant for my college, where passing rates of 43-52% are the average).

However, after reading the students poorly written comments, I simply asked myself “…is any of that really bad?”

-Professor J

 

The Pedantic Professor’s Weary Tales

Perhaps more than most jobs I have undertaken in my time, I have found teaching developmental math at a community college to be the widest mix of emotional and mental extremes.  Maybe that is too specific…teaching in general has shown me many new experiences.  I know that certain pressures and stresses are to be expected as a professor.  After all, I have the hopes, dreams, and aspirations of 75 people in my hands at the beginning of every new semester.  Add to this mix my debilitating characteristic of being unable to sympathize with the emotional needs of others, and let the madness ensue.  This is the beginning of a story, and I do not know where it may lead.  If you are reading this now, at the very beginning, allow me to welcome you to a tale of professors and students, a story about frustrations and aspirations, a narrative of life as a 22 year old college professor.