Really? It's really that hard?

[Shalom]

Keytar!

You mean like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85ekf...eature=related that one?

(OK, it's an ARP 2600, but still...)

[RootedPhoenix]

I tried to look at college as a major purchase I was making and tried to get the most value for my money as I could, but there are definitely those EW's who look at as a "purchase" that should be taken out to the car, taken home, set up for them, then spoon fed every last detail about operating.

I had the same problem with my English class a few years ago. So much whining about how haaaard the reading was and whyyyy was she (my prof) making the class so haard?! So. Much. Whining.

They refused to participate in class discussions. I think they just wanted to open their heads and have the teacher dump knowledge in there. They didn't want to be challenged or anything. I wonder now if they wanted to be able to sleep their way to an A or something.

One day, she got so mad that she lectured for the whole class period. No discussion at all. I'd like to think that doing that helped, but I really don't know for sure.

[Chromatix]

I have four classic experiences from college and university...

In college, I took a C++ course. I was told towards the end of it that the pass rate was 1% - and I wasn't surprised. The lessons usually involved me surfing the Internet (then a new experience) while the lecturer, er, lectured - then when he asked a question of the class, there'd be about 10 seconds of stunned silence, after which I'd calmly turn around and answer it. Usually correctly. I got a Distinction out of it (the grades being Fail, Pass, Merit, and...).

In my very first lecture at university, we discovered that the rather elderly projector was incapable of coping with Courier New in a Dos box on the lecturer's laptop. At the end of it, I went to the front and showed him how to put it in full-screen mode (Alt-Enter), which produced a thicker terminal-style font. This was the Java professor...

In the computer lab class that year - first year being used to gather prerequisites for the actual major course, and experimentation being encouraged at this point - one girl was having trouble getting her simple Java program to compile. Both the lab tech and the assistant, as well as at least one other student, were trying to figure out what was wrong. I had a look... and *everything* was in the wrong order. The individual statements were mostly okay, but she just hadn't realised that the order of them mattered. Once I pointed that out, everything became clear... but I don't think that girl went forward to the major course.

But in *third* year, I had the misfortune to be paired in one lab session with someone who had somehow managed not to learn how to read and write in C. Despite C and Java being very similar in many respects. We were asked (I forget exactly why) to quickly implement a simple cipher routine (one step above ROT13), which I promptly did in about 2 or 3 lines of code. Then I asked him whether he understood what I'd just written. He didn't - even though the fragment I'd written was in fact also legal and sensible in Java. Which we'd had since first year.

ETA: Here's a facsimile of the actual code we're talking about. Most of you should be able to puzzle out what's going on, even if you aren't programmers.

char *p = input;
while(*p) {
    if(*p >= 'a' && *p <= 'z')
        *p = (((*p - 'a') + 3) % 26) + 'a';
    if(*p >= 'A' && *p <= 'Z')
        *p = (((*p - 'A') + 3) % 26) + 'A';
    p++;
}

To be fair, most of the students in university were basically competent, but there were some absolute losers and a few real geniuses. Good preparation for the real world, I suppose.

[jedimaster91]

I took the highest level English class my college offered which was a combination of your basic 101 and 102 classes. So it wasn't that bad. My algebra class on the other hand.....

....Ugh. Four years later and it STILL pisses me off. When I enrolled for my first semester I was told by my advisor that college algebra was a requirement for my major and there was no way I could test out of it. I later found out this wasn't true, which only pissed me off more. I think the algebra class was the highest level of math the instructor taught, so naturally she thought everyone in the class was stupid. The last math classes I had in high school were AP Stats and AP Physics. To say college algebra was a snoozer is being generous.

So anyway, I delt with being pretty much the only person in the class with a working brain cell and even a basic understanding of algebra. One of our quizzes had an extra credit problem where we were supposed to find the unknown exponent by using the graph function on our graphing calculators. For some reason, my calculator was acting wonky and not doing what I wanted it to, so I solved the problem logrithmically by hand. I showed my instructor and asked her if that was what she wanted. She looked me dead in the eye and said in the most condesending tone, "I haven't taught you how to do that yet. Do it on your calculator." I wish I could have dropped the class then and there, but alas, there was that requirement issue. And attendence was part of the grade so I couldn't just show up for tests and call it good. So I watched cars circle the parking lot all semester.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Actually saw a documentary about this. Graduating is getting way less meaningful, and kids entering college are woefully unprepared to do so.

[TexasT]

Actually saw a documentary about this. Graduating is getting way less meaningful, and kids entering college are woefully unprepared to do so.

I think this contributes to the entitlement whores we experience all around us. It used to be if you had someone else doing something for you, you thought of them as experts and trusted them to do their job. Nowadays it seems like everyone thinks of themselves as an expert on everything.

This reminds me of a class I took in college. I took it as a night class since the only time during the day it was offered didn't work for my schedule (and by that, I mean sleep schedule). I was the youngest one in there by far; most of the other students were old enough to be my parents. It was a technology in the classroom (education major) class. So there was a woman in there that was the IT director for one of the largest districts in the state. I was having to show her how to do things like save files and change font. I'm not sure how she got her job at all. When I asked her how she fixed computers, she said she just pushed buttons and hoped it worked and if it didn't, she'd send it back to the manufacturer.

It had to be watered down that I could've literally taught it myself and practically did. I'm not a computer expert by any means, but I'm computer savvy enough to handle almost and software thrown my way.

[Gawdzillers]

There will always be those who don't want to do the work. My sister is teaching a literature course with vampires as the main focus and she had students complaining that she required them to read "Dracula". Not the whole book, mind you, just a 40 page excerpt. I would have killed to have had that as required reading when I was taking english.

It's because they thought they would be reading Twilight, I guarantee you.

[mikoyan29]

Actually saw a documentary about this. Graduating is getting way less meaningful, and kids entering college are woefully unprepared to do so.

this is a symptom of the "everybody is a winner" syndrome that seems to be prevalent in the low grades. I mean papers can't be graded in red ink because someone might feel bad. So these kids get passed on through the grades and are basically told they can do anything they want except someone forgets to tell them that sometimes they might have to work in order to do so.

Anyways, in college there was an English profressor that I really hated and he reminded me of John Houseman in "The Paper Chase" but now that I look back, he wasn't that bad and only wanted to make sure everybody learned the subject matter. People can get away with lots of things but no really poor English.

[draftermatt]

I saw this in English 101.

We had to write a paper, I knew mine blew, I kept telling myself if I were back in my highschool Brit Lit class (senior year) he'd fail me.

I got a B.

Everyone around me was pissing and moaning about how hard it was to write the paper, and how unfair she was in grading it.

A girl asks me "Don't you think it's ridiculous?"

I told her that no, I think I would have failed that paper in high school, and certainly in a 4 year institute (community college).

They argued that it shouldn't be as hard because it's "Community College, it's not real college"

Well since the credits transfer it better be a fucking real college.

That same girl ended up moving classes to a "easier" class.

Where they spent 1 hour a week in the library doing research for their weekly essays, while we had 4 more the entire semester.

My wife (then girlfriend) and I got a guy to drop. He wrote a paper on abortion and during peer editing we tore it apart. Not because of his stance, but because he couldn't back it up. He used 1 personal experience, a quote from a law (that had been repelled) and that was about it.

At the end of 1 of his "this will make you see my way" sentences I literally wrote "So?" because he couldn't finish his thoughts.

He dropped the class and joined the Army because "it's easier"

[Victoria J]

Finally someone says "Uhh, is it a keyboard?"

Prof looks hopeful, says "Could you be more specific?" Student says "Ya know, a synthesizer." and Prof yells "No!!"

The rest of the examples I'm with you in finding pretty stupid. And there's no excuse for not doing the basic work (reading the book, tunring up at class or int his case listening to the tape).

But I'm not sure this is was stupid. Given how rarely most of us are going to run into pipe organs (other than some churches having them, I've never seen one) and that some synthesizers do make organ-like sounds it may have been the only instrument he'd ever encountered which made a similar noise.

Possibly slightly ignorant but not stupid. (And I don't see why he should have assumed it wasn't a modern instrument given pieces can be reworked in that way).

There are great positions out there that the school counselors never seem to mention to students *sigh*

I do a job I didn't know existed until I started - and it's a great fit for me.

I guess there are just thousands and thousands more jobs than the obvious ones people tend to think of immediately. Too many for a careers counselor to tell all of us about - but niches available for many of us

Victoria J

[Broomjockey]

Friendly Fratching reminder people: Whys and how-it-should-bes are for Fratching, here is for "this happened to mes." That includes treatises on the edumacation system.

[EricKei]

100+ students, where the average on the first test was about 46 and the high grade was 68 or so. At that point, the teacher decided he needed to re-evaluate his teaching strategy. (Sadly, I was not the high grade, although I was close.)

I would actually applaud that teacher for realizing that, rather than what a few of my old teachers would have done (called the whole class stupid)

In my college, everyone had to take basic English Comp -- realistically, this was High School Junior-Senior level stuff. Sadly, even Testing Out (which I did) just meant that you too Class 2 and a course on Ancient Greek Myth/literature...which, tbh, was pretty damn cool, come to think of it The thing is, the 2 "normal" courses were literally the same thing every day: Read a chapter from a book of essays at home, then come in the next class day and write a short essay on the general topic included in the assigned reading. If you did this every day, you passed, likely with an A. It was the dreaded "every English teacher has to teach this at some point" class. A the end of Class 2 (semester 2), you had to sit for a proper final and...Write a five paragraph essay. In other words, what you'd just been doing every class session for a full year. You don't want to know how many people failed the final, requiring them to repeat the course. The thing was, tho, if you could not pass this course, you would NOT have been able to hack anything else at this school. State school, but rather tough, nonetheless.

As for the flip side...I think I have you guys beat.

Senior year, Juniors/Seniors-only course: "Special Topics Course in Science Fiction". "Special Topics" was the school's code for "A teach wants to try something new; this course is unlikely to ever be offered again, so jump on it NOW"

The teacher was a Modern English Lit teacher who had written several books about the subject, which he mercifully did not assign.

He just wanted us to really read and understand sci-fi books. Among the titles were:

Frankenstein (considered the "first sci-fi book ever" according to Prof)
Rendezvous With Rama
Solaris
I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream
Who Goes There? (novella which inspired the movie "The Thing")
The Cold Equations

The best part was, the students are basically the same folks you'd expect to see at a Con ^_^ No reference, no matter how obscure, was new to these people. No lame cultural joke or Trek/Wars allusion went un-caught. Hell, the *teacher* caught many of the refs more readily than the students did. It was, to parrot Dilbert, Nerdvana, and a wonderful way to finish out my year.

[otakuneko]

My wife (then girlfriend) and I got a guy to drop. He wrote a paper on abortion and during peer editing we tore it apart. Not because of his stance, but because he couldn't back it up. He used 1 personal experience, a quote from a law (that had been repelled) and that was about it.

Reminds me of a girl in an English comp class I once took.

The entire semester had a theme of exploring one particular topic, then writing a persuasive paper on it at the end. Over the course of this, we'd write an exploratory paper on the issue and various analyses.

One of these papers was one in which we had to demonstrate understanding and empathy for the opposing viewpoint.

This girl's paper began with, "I utterly, completely, and totally loathe the Catholic faith and everything associated with it."

"Oops" doesn't quite cover the epic fail that followed (and yes, it went downhill from there). I'm not saying this because I'm (technically, anyway) Catholic--I couldn't care less her views on any particular faith. She just absolutely failed at following directions. Instructions? Empathy? Understanding? What on Earth are those? She's lucky I wasn't the one doing peer review on her paper.

Incidentally, as to page number requirements, I struggled with keeping my papers within the limits. Much material was left on the proverbial cutting room floor to make my position paper fit into 10 pages! Imagine my dismay when I discovered that what I thought had been hard limits were merely suggestions. Crapola.

That still doesn't match the dismay I felt when reading other students' papers. Though at least they were better than "personal experience and a repealed law."

[elsporko]

My saddest grade time was one lecture class, 100+ students, where the average on the first test was about 46 and the high grade was 68 or so. At that point, the teacher decided he needed to re-evaluate his teaching strategy. (Sadly, I was not the high grade, although I was close.)

I give props to that professor. I've always said that if all the students fail a test or class then its the teachers fault.

[Andara Bledin]

...Holy crap! I want to take that class! That would be like the accumulation of all of my dreams!

My Intro to Lit class when I was at the community college included Interview With a Vampire among the available reading material. That's actually how I got introduced to the series.

As for minimum lengths, I've always had difficulty with that, as I tend to write in a somewhat concise fashion, even if I am also wordy. I don't know how it works, but I've had to rewrite papers for school and take out contractions as well as making 2 or 3 sentences out of what could have been stated with only one.

If it were typewritten and they didn't specify, I'd use Verdana for my font, as it tends to be rather wider than most, in addition to the 1, I, and l characters all being distinctly different (important when working with part numbers and email addresses).

^-.-^