The Pissed Off Professor

Spring Break officially begins today; however, as a Monday/Wednesday instructor, mine began a few days ago. I still have an armload of papers to grade, but I’m taking a few days off to recover from my last grading marathon.

The sun was shining on my world until I sat down to my e-mail this morning. On the heels of a recent assignment and the student messages from yesterday, it’s now tornado weather in my mind.

Just before the break, we had midterms and conferences. My students got what I think was a pretty sweet deal: over the course of the three class meetings leading up to break, I held conferences, and all each student had to do was show up for his or her 30-minute meeting, and in exchange, the student was done with my class until after the break.

There were two caveats to this: the assignments that were due needed to be dropped off by their due dates (one was due one week ago Wednesday, and the other was due this past Wednesday).

I am one of those instructors who is a poor planner: I pass out a syllabus on the first day of class that contains all of the major due dates for the course. That’s right folks, I’m so lazy, and I care so little about my students’ success, I let them know on the first day of class when things will be due.

Additionally, I wait until 2 to 4 weeks before a major writing assignment is due to pass out the specific guidelines. My students are given a mere 4 weeks to write a 4-page essay. Goodness, what am I thinking?

There was a real problem with the first essay: over 80% of my students had severe difficulty counting to four when preparing their papers, and of the remaining 20%, half of them couldn’t remember what I’d said about essay structure, so they gave me papers that contained neither thesis sentences nor connected analysis. (Of course, I don’t teach those things any more than I actually reveal due dates.)

Against my better judgment, I allowed those who were counting challenged and/or structure challenged to complete an alternate assignment to earn credit up to the minimum passing grade on that first essay.

Let me be clear: the extra assignment meant more work for me, but hey, it was my fault my students didn’t follow directions, right?

The due date for Essay #2 has come and gone, and I have been spammed by e-excuses regarding the variety of reasons another 4-page paper was impossible to manage in just under 4-weeks’ time.

The two that sent me into a mental frenzy are as follows:

1. One student claimed to have forgotten the due date of the essay. When on Friday, she realized she should have turned her work in on Wednesday, she put a copy of it in my box and e-mailed me a version—for my convenience. The student assured me the work was completed on time.

Liar-liar-pants-on-fire!

Let’s think about this, shall we? A student works diligently on a paper, gets it done, but forgets when it’s supposed to be turned in? In fact, she’s so forgetful that the Wednesday prior to our break comes and goes, and it doesn’t strike her that since we only meet on Monday and Wednesday the paper might need to be turned in? In her confusion (or joy over the paper’s being done early) she forgets my e-mail address so she can’t ask me the due date, and she forgets the course Web site address where she could check the due date, and she forgets to look on the assignment sheet that lists the due date, and she forgets to look at the essay prompt which also has the due date.

Wow—is there a doctor in the house? This student has a brain disease.

2. Add to this the student who finally finished his paper and dashed to campus last night at 8:00 pm on the Friday before Spring Break begins, and was shocked to find the campus locked up tighter than a drum. This student then badgered one of the janitors until he agreed to unlock the door, take the student’s paper, and put it in my box. Unfortunately, this horrible janitor man wouldn’t put his initials on the paper, nor would he verify the date and time for this ever-so-responsible-and-persistent student, so now said student is mad his paper might lose more credit than it should.

Now, I wasn’t a perfect student, nor am I a perfect teacher, nor am I a perfect person, but I like to think I operate with a certain degree of personal accountability.

I simply cannot comprehend the mindset of any student who feels his or her inability to be responsible is my concern or the concern of a janitor who could probably lose his job for unlocking a door after hours.

One of the major breakthroughs I experienced as a student was a direct result of Henry James.

During my time as a graduate student, I signed up for a Henry James literature course because I thought highly of the professor who was teaching it. I don’t think I’d really read much Henry James—“Daisy Miller” perhaps or “The Beast in the Jungle”: both are staples of undergraduate, survey literature courses, and neither is really indicative of what I believe makes James great—but I digress.

One of the first reading assignments we were given was The Portrait of a Lady—in chunks of 10-15 chapters per week.

I was anxious to get into the text, and I remember with absolute clarity sitting down to begin this novel. After an hour, I had finally untangled the meaning in the first paragraph of the text.

Here’s that first paragraph:

Under certain circumstances there are few hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea. There are circumstances in which, whether you partake of the tea or not–some people of course never do–the situation is in itself delightful. Those that I have in mind in beginning to unfold this simple history offered an admirable setting to an innocent pastime. The implements of the little feast had been disposed upon the lawn of an old English country-house, in what I should call the perfect middle of a splendid summer afternoon. Part of the afternoon had waned, but much of it was left, and what was left was of the finest and rarest quality. Real dusk would not arrive for many hours; but the flood of summer light had begun to ebb, the air had grown mellow, the shadows were long upon the smooth, dense turf. They lengthened slowly, however, and the scene expressed that sense of leisure still to come which is perhaps the chief source of one’s enjoyment of such a scene at such an hour. From five o’clock to eight is on certain occasions a little eternity; but on such an occasion as this the interval could be only an eternity of pleasure. The persons concerned in it were taking their pleasure quietly, and they were not of the sex which is supposed to furnish the regular votaries of the ceremony I have mentioned. The shadows on the perfect lawn were straight and angular; they were the shadows of an old man sitting in a deep wicker-chair near the low table on which the tea had been served, and of two younger men strolling to and fro, in desultory talk, in front of him. The old man had his cup in his hand; it was an unusually large cup, of a different pattern from the rest of the set and painted in brilliant colors. He disposed of its contents with much circumspection, holding it for a long time close to his chin, with his face turned to the house. His companions had either finished their tea or were indifferent to their privilege; they smoked cigarettes as they continued to stroll. One of them, from time to time, as he passed, looked with a certain attention at the elder man, who, unconscious of observation, rested his eyes upon the rich red front of his dwelling. The house that rose beyond the lawn was a structure to repay such consideration and was the most characteristic object in the peculiarly English picture I have attempted to sketch.

With the same clarity with which I recall paining myself over this paragraph, I recall the outrage I felt when I finally grasped what I had battled over for so long:

Men—men are having tea. Men are sitting on a porch in the approaching sunset enjoying tea—a scene generally populated by women.

What kind of a jackass takes almost 500 convoluted words to tell his readers men are at tea?

(Remember, I’d spent an hour getting through what amounted to 3/4 of one page, and to keep on a reading schedule, I’d need to get through another 50 pages before putting the book down.)

Had I not been assigned the text, I’d have tossed the novel aside and never thought of it again—ever. But I had to get through it: it was an assignment, so I went on.

By the time I’d plowed my way through another ten pages, I was exhausted, and I gave up. I had begun to feel as if the class was going to be beyond my reach, and I was pretty depressed.

When next I took up the book—about 48 hours had passed—I held it in my hands feeling as if it was the thing that had finally beaten me—I’d met a book I couldn’t handle, and as a graduate student in English, it felt like the greatest form of failure.

For reasons I may never understand, I went back to that first paragraph and began reading it to reaffirm how pointless it had been.

That’s when it happened: suddenly, the words that had been so meaningless to me—the words that felt like such a waste—seemed to paint a picture so strikingly vivid that I felt the setting sun beginning to blind me; I heard the clinking of cups on saucers; I smelled the acid aroma of the tea.

I was there. Oh, I was there.

I wondered to myself how a person could manage to describe three men having tea with such clarity and detail in only 500 words, and I wondered further what drove a writer to paint the picture when it was simply an introductory image: it serves no great point in the storyline but to vaguely introduce some of the characters.

The feeling of really having connected with the text after having struggled with it was unlike anything I had ever experienced, and that high is what I seek when I read and when I teach.

It’s the reason I chose to teach Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw in my upcoming literature course: it is written in the same rolling, verbose, image-filled manner that makes Henry James the master he is. It is also one of the greatest ghost stories I’ve ever read.

I have no idea if I can convince a room of summer-session students to take a solid bite out of James’ words, to chew his text vigorously, and to keep masticating until they can taste every juicy bite he has to offer, but I am sure going to try.

It was well after dark when I got home this evening, but through the small gaps in the pines trees that surround my home, I was able to catch a glimpse of my front porch. I saw the small package on the doorstep: it had arrived early.

With the giddy excitement of a child on Christmas morning, I hurried to the box, grabbed it, headed inside, and tore it open. Inside were three items: The Turn of the Screw (a novella by Henry James); A Modern Treasury of Great Detective and Murder Mysteries (an anthology of contemporary mystery and suspense fiction); and A Treasury of Victorian Murder (a graphic novel that recounts several of the famous, unsolved crimes of the Victorian Age).

These are the books I’m using for the literature course I am teaching over the summer: the theme is murder, and I cannot wait to get my hands dirty.

[Extended evil laugh here.]

Reading and grading papers is a bit like what I imagine peeling back my skin would cause—if the peeling back of my skin didn’t kill me—it would hurt a lot, but it would heighten my perceptions.

After a long grading session, many of the idiosyncrasies (good and bad) embedded in what I read remain in my head influencing my awareness of words. The most common result is my being super-sensitive to meaning. After reading 50+ papers that contain vague thoughts like,

Everyone’s life is hard, but sadly, Angelou’s was harder than most.

The world is a cruel place, and everyone knows it.

We are all unique people.

you can understand how I can’t help but analyze everything for real meaning.

Well, it’s post-midterm conference week for me, so much of my last few days has been spent frantically grading midterm exams, a pre-essay analytical assignment, and my students’ reading journals.

I would normally spread this amount of grading over two or three weeks’ time, but to be as productive as possible during my conferences, I’ve done it all in about four days.

You can call me Sponge Shawn Drained Brain.

Recently, I’ve reconnected with a childhood friend via e-mail, and we’ve been discussing a variety of life and grammar issues, and given my skinned condition, I am now on a mission to wrap my head around three words: tall, grande, and venti based on our last e-versation. (Hey—I think I just coined a new term!)

It’s not these three words in general that I care about; it’s their being used to describe sizes at a business I frequent.

What is the word tall French for? Skinny model?

I get the grande and venti references, but tall? (Okay, I don’t really get the point of calling a medium a grande, but I can live with it.)

Do you remember working those “which of these things doesn’t belong” puzzles as a child? I’ve fallen into one of those, and I can’t get out.

I know TALL doesn’t belong, but my beverage of choice is a TALL, and TALL isn’t like grande or venti, so am I wrong if I order a TALL? If I order a petite, will I be understood?

This is the reason I love words. When you give yourself to them, they are frighteningly powerful little things.

But, they can be venti confusing.

One of the things I do in addition to my teaching duties at Sacramento City College is read the English Assessment exams in-coming students must take to ascertain where they’re to be placed within the parameters of the offered English courses.

I read about fifty exams this afternoon, and I find I am troubled anew by what I observed. Of the exams I read, most of the writers (i.e. most in-coming, first-year, college students) are going to find themselves in English Writing 50: Developmental Writing.

English Writing 50:

offers individualized and group instruction for students who need to improve their ability to write increasingly complex and varied formal paragraphs and to advance to the writing of short essays.

This is no joke: a vast number of students are heading into college with the writing skills of children. Let me tell you when this gets to be extremely painful: one of the many possible topics for this exam asks students to reflect on their career goals, and while many of the essays I read disturb me, it is when this topic is assigned that I find I am most saddened.

When the career-goals topic is given, I read responses from 18-20 year olds who are entering college dreaming of becoming doctors or lawyers or small business owners, but who cannot write well enough to assess into a freshman composition course. (I am not even going to get into the grade-level at which they are reading.)

Someone needs to give these students a large dose of reality: if one hasn’t picked up basic literacy in the K-12 years, one is not likely to have a miraculous turn-around in college.

Think about this: these students don’t know how far behind they are.

Please don’t misunderstand me. I come from a family of dreamers, and I spent my childhood being encouraged to seek my life and career happiness regardless of the reigning social construct. My family still encourages my dreams—as long as there is a certain rationale to them. After all, at some point, much of one’s childhood must end, and adult reality has got to take over.

For example, it is no secret I have long wished to be a writer by profession, and while the chances of this are slim, I have followed one of the educational paths that might make this dream possible, and I do what I can on a regular basis to put my work out in the universe. I am still hell-bent on making this wish come true.

My other dream is to be an attorney; however, at 42 years of age, I understand that unless I make drastic changes and make them, uh, right now, I am not likely to make this particular dream a reality. I’d have to get through the educational requirements, then pass the bar exam, then find a firm willing to hire me, and THEN, I’d have made that dream a reality. Whew!

Remember, I’ve made my way through an advanced education, have relatively strong critical thinking and writing skills, and am a strong enough reader I can get through law-based materials, so much of the issue for me is time and effort not skill.

Now, let’s go back to the 18-20 year olds who are reading and writing and thinking like 8-10 year olds and are probably maxed out in terms of real learning potential, and the idea that these students want to go to medical school or law school or run a business is both frightening and sad.

I don’t know whose job it is to burst certain bubbles, nor do I know when the best time to do that bursting might be, but I know this: if an 18-20 year old enters college unable to read and write at an age-appropriate level, she is not someone I want cutting me open, defending me in court, or supplying my goods.

Yes, there will be exceptions, but these students are not the rule.

As an educator, and as a person who cares about other people, this makes me very sad.

Today’s post is my way of letting each of you experience a bit of my daily routine: reading, marking, and grading papers.

This is one of those areas I have little room to complain about; after all, papers are a staple of a teacher’s life, right?

Okay, while that might be is the case, I can still complain about things surrounding the issue of papers that simply shouldn’t exist:

1. I don’t get paid to do it.
2. There’s way too much of it.
3. It’s often obvious that I spend more time reading a piece than a student took writing it.

Therefore, I give you the way the above statement would look had one of my far-too-typical students (or several of my colleagues) written it:

Todays post be my way uh lettin’ each uh ya’ ‘espuh’ience some bit uh my daily routine, dig dis: eyeballin’, markin’, and gradin’ sheets.

Dis be one uh dose areas ah’ gots’ little room t’complain about; afta’ all, sheets are some staple uh a teachers life, right?

Okay, while dat might be be de case, ah’ can still complain about de stuff surroundin’ de issue uh sheets dat simply shouldnt ‘esist, dig dis:

1. I dont git paid t’do it.
2. Deres way too much uh it.
3. Its often obvious dat ah’ spend mo’e time eyeballin’ some piece dan some student took writin’ it.

Okay, I know, if it had really been written by one of my students, the grammar might have been a bit better, and surely there would have been more text-message-based spelling involved, but ya’ git whut ah’ mean, right?

Want to know what your thoughts would look like if a witless and or/lazy individual from your life wrote them? Go here, and enjoy!

Okay, so we’ve talked about it already, but our conversation simply can’t end with yesterday’s post.

I have to keep going with this because the article is a fine example of the oh-so-common poor writing that is routinely released into the world by those who know no better.

I’ll remind you of the horrible sentence in question:

[The 2002 No Child Left Behind law] offers intensive reading help for low-income and struggling schools.

Setting aside the previously mentioned dangling modifier, I want to focus on the phrase “low-income and struggling schools.”

Did I miss the day the schools began earning their own incomes? Are the hallowed halls of education more than brick-and-mortar structures? Are they sentient beings suddenly faced with the horrid task of making their ends meet?

Let’s be honest, shall we?

What that sentence should say is:

[The 2002 No Child Left Behind law] offers intensive reading help [for students attending] low-income and struggling schools located in neighborhoods in which the amount of money earned is so insignificant that the politicians and the machination of government doesn’t have to worry about the parents in the area fussing or cancelling six-figure campaign contributions.

Schools are neither low-income nor struggling; however, the American citizens living around them might be. This situation results in a frighteningly common phenomenon: poor neighborhood, lesser-funded school; minority area, under-equipped school.

Am I still a nit-picker?

I do my share of complaining about the lack of attention my students pay to what they write, and one of the reasons for this is the long-term consequences I foresee when poor writers and thinkers are released into the world.

Let’s face it: common sense is no longer common.

I was scouring the news this morning for more details regarding the CSU strike when I came across a masthead that read, “Report Shows Misstep on Reading Program.” I temporarily abandoned my initial search and clicked on the link. Here is the fourth sentence:

[The 2002 No Child Left Behind law] offers intensive reading help for low-income and struggling schools.

Now, for those of you who think there is nothing wrong with this sentence, go back to your English teachers and pummel each of them!

Let’s take a closer look, shall we?

This sentence is reporting that a program offers help to schools. Are you kidding me?

(Oh no, you still don’t get it, do you?)

ERRRRRRRRRR

Schools are not alive, and they do not need help: the STUDENTS in them do!

What that sentence should read is:

[The 2002 No Child Left Behind law] offers intensive reading help for [STUDENTS ATTENDING] low-income and struggling schools.

I know: you’re thinking to yourself that I am being a nit-picker. You’re also thinking that you understood what was meant, so I ought to find something better to do.

I suppose you’re right.

I’m going outside to work on my backyard: I think I’ll put up some Bob Wire to keep out the idiots.

I spoke about the need to revamp the college system a few posts ago, and part of what I proposed has been undertaken in the United Kingdom: recognizing meaningful educational needs and their equal importance.

The Government has today set out detailed proposals so that from 2015 all young people will remain in some form of education or training until their 18th birthday.

If this were only about age, I wouldn’t care too much one-way-or-the-other about it; however, there is more, and the more is what I think is important:

To make sure the right provision is in place the new requirement would not be implemented until 2013 by which time the new Diplomas will be a National Entitlement. This will give young people a choice of A levels, GCSEs, the International Baccalaureate, the new Diplomas, Apprenticeships, and accredited in-work training.

The article makes clear that the educators, business people, and citizens in the UK recognize the importance of a varied workforce that has been educated in diverse areas. They’re even planning to confer degrees to acknowledge this rational, necessary, and productive approach.

While I realize we (pretend to) have a similar system in place, we really don’t. In America, individuals who pursue non-academic education are marginalized and treated as sub-standard. We simply do not acknowledge the importance of education as a means to learn a trade or secure a labor-based career; we pretend general education courses and declared majors are the only path worthy of study and the hallowed halls of academia.

It seems the great minds and leaders in the UK get it. Wouldn’t it be nice of our leaders spent some time getting it too?

Last time on “Lest We Forget Teaching Is a Business,” I filled you in on the basics of teachers’ unions and the fact that the workload among the disciplines isn’t equal. I also explained that my current concern was over my job, and not the other issues I have with adjunct representation within the union. I left you hanging regarding the consequences, so let’s get to the next installment:

Because the union refuses to take a stand for any individual departments, the results are a scrambling within the disciplines to increase the number of units certain classes are worth. This is nothing more than a smoke-filled slight-of-hand trick.

If a class is currently a 3-unit course and it becomes a 4-unit course, three things happen: first, the full-time faculty can teach fewer classes to fulfill their contractual obligations; second, the students pay more for the same class; third, well, that’s my issue, and I’ll get to that, but first, a bit more in the way of explanation.

When I was a Sac City Student (mid-1980s), most math classes were 3-unit courses, but before I was done, they had been upgraded to 4-unit classes. The explanation I was given was that math classes met more often or for longer periods of time than other disciplines. (Apparently, under certain circumstances, differences can be assessed without a complete breakdown in the system.)

This was only an issue for me because of the fee increase, but it wasn’t much more than a blip in terms of my greater educational picture.

What I didn’t know until after I began teaching at Sac City was that the increase of units in the math department set off all kinds of internal issues in other departments. The English department pointed out that the work done in the classroom by math teachers (e.g. feedback, examples, and corrections) was the same work being done outside the classroom by its instructors.

Remember, in most disciplines there is a right answer, and only one best way to get there; however, in a composition course, the number of right answers is a multiple of the number of students sitting in a classroom, and the best ways to get to that answer are infinite.

For example, a math teacher needs to help her class get through the following problem:

X = 4 (12-3)

The problem has to be solved like this:

X = 4 (9)

X = 36

No matter how you slice it, the mathematical order of operations requires the equation within the parentheses be completed prior to the external multiplication. There is no other way to do this and arrive at the right answer—period.

Now, let’s take an equally easy English “problem”:

X = I cooked dinner + I made the dessert

Here we have two complete sentences a student needs to combine in order to vary his sentence structure.

X = I cooked the dinner, and I made the dessert.

X = I cooked the dinner, so I made the dessert.

X = I cooked the dinner after I made the dessert.

X = After I made the dessert, I cooked the dinner.

X = I cooked the dinner before I made the dessert.

X = Before I made the dessert, I cooked the dinner.

I could go on for hours with this, and it’s only a simple sentence. Now consider that while math deals with numbers and operators, English deals with words, punctuation, and ideas. An English teacher simply cannot put a writing “problem” on the board and show the class how to solve it because there are few concrete answers to be had.

Theoretically, I think most English composition classes should be 4-unit courses: the work students and instructors do outside of the classroom dictate as much.

Here’s that third problem: if the average English class is upgraded to a 4-unit course, I will not be able to continue teaching. The reason is the union’s position regarding adjunct faculty members. We are prevented from teaching more than 15 units per calendar year. Currently, that means an adjunct with my level of seniority can count on at least two classes per semester (6 units) and often has the opportunity to take on a third course (9 units) in alternating semesters.

If composition courses are bumped up to 4-units, instructors like myself will have to settle for even less money or hope to teach more courses to make up the difference.

Instead of my teaching 2 sections of English Writing 300 (6 units and 1 prep), I’d have to take an English Writing 300 course (4 units and 1 prep) and couple that with a lab class (2 units and 1 prep). With the 4-unit average, getting 9 units becomes nearly impossible, unless I am willing to teach 4 classes (3+2+2+2 units and 2-4 preps).

This change is going to happen; it’s only a matter of time.

The one silver lining I can find on this otherwise gray black cloud is that unlike the math department (which is staffed almost exclusively by full time faculty members), the English department full-time-to-adjunct faculty ratio is roughly 1-to-4. This semester, there are 44 sections of English Writing 300, and only 3 full-time faculty members are teaching this course.

English Writing 300 will be the first class to go to 4-units because of the workload: the very reason only 3 of the full-time faculty members want to teach it.

I have been involved in several department meetings regarding this issue, and as the only adjunct present and/or willing to speak, I have been verbally assaulted by more than one full-time faculty member as not understanding because I am an adjunct.

I hope they get what they want, but they’d better be careful what they wish for. If the union doesn’t make changes to the number of units an adjunct is allowed to teach, there are going to be an awful lot of 4-unit English classrooms filled with students, but there won’t be enough contractually eligible instructors to teach in them.