In which I pit a certain subclass of my students

The BBQ Pit
1

Subclass I: The mindless masses who can’t be bothered to look up the documentation. Dammit, read the fucking webpage. You can use the web to download your fucking porn, to fucking-bay your sundry crap, to steal copyrighted music, but you can’t read the course webpage? Fuck you!

Subclass II: The wanderers who can’t be bothered to drop the course. By all fucking means, simply stop attending class, stop takig tests, even don’t take the final. Way to go, fuckers, triple the failure rate for my class. Why have 5% F’s when we can another 10% due to you feckless fuckers.

Subclass III: The Come Latelies, who can’t be bothered to participate in more than 5 sessions out of a 5-month course, who then, of course, want “special consideration”, because, well, mommy and daddy think that you’re the Fucking Center of the Fucking Universe.

Subclass IV: The Whingers. Stop fucking whinging! You’re old enough to drink/vote/drive/fuck, so you’re old enough to stop whinging. Fuckers.

Subclass V: The Cellphone Addicts: turn off the goddamned, fucking cells in my class. That retarded fucking ringtone that you actually bought off of a 3AM TV commercial skeezer website is not appropriate ever, specially when it goes fucking off during a 40%-of-the-course-grade-final-examination.

Subclass VI: The careless: When I actually buy your fucking story of woe, and let you take the final on a different day, don’t fucking show up 2 hours late, motherfucking ingrate.

Subclass VII: The Bratz: when I make a decision, Fucking Princess, I’m quite finished. Asking for extra credit after you blow an examination? No. Even if you aslk repeatedly.

As for the other 97% of my students, I love and miss you, ya ignorant bastards.

2

I pit Britons who don’t post that in their location lines. I’m like “What the fuck is ‘winjing’?”

3

I see where she made the error. :smiley:

4

Are you sure you’re not one of my colleagues?
Are you sure you’re not me?

5

As someone who dropped out of college I have to comment on this:

When you’ve already dropped 30 grand for your first year of college and decided you don’t want to finish, and thus are never going to be getting anything more for your 30 grand than a few life experiences (which are valuable, but you had them mostly outside of class anyway), it really doesn’t leave you feeling like you owe a whole lot more to the school. Hell, I didn’t even notify the university I was dropping out. I just stopped going to class/taking exams/paying tuition bills, and that was that.

6

cerberus, I take it you teach something other than math (or English)? “A subclass” with seven entries is a violation of math rules of numbers (and at least one rule of grammar).

You have been here HOW long and you have never noticed the Brit use of whinging (“g”, not “j”) to indicate constant complaining as indicated by one of the American definitions of “whining”? We have even had threads on the topic. C’mon, pay attention (or enter “definition: whinging” into Google™).

7

I do teach mathematics. I have defined seven subclasses … but I take your point.

Although they aren’t necessarily proper mathematical classes or sub classes, at least if you prefer that they do not overlap, because, my friend, select miscreant nee students occupy, simultaneously, several of these subclasses.

8

As a math teacher, you might want to check on your percentages. If you have an additional 5% failing your class because they’re wanderers, plus all those other subgroups, you probably don’t miss 97% of your students.

It’s a good rant, but the numbers just don’t add up.

9

My numbers are fine. A few of my D/F students simply did an honest failure, or at least owned their failure in a non-whinging way. These few were a pleasure to have, I rooted for them, but in the end the standards had to prevail.

I actually have a small cohort of students who D/F the course the first time out and then repeat the course with a C or better. I might have one come around for a third attempt, though she might get kicked out at this point.

10

Hmmm, I took “Winjing” as a pronunciation. If it’s pronounced “wIn gIŋg”, I’m sorry, he’s right: that’s screwed up :slight_smile: Same as if it’s pronounced “wIŋ Iŋg”, in which case if I heard it aloud I’d think it referred to flying.

Or am I right and it’s pronounced “wIn jiŋg”?

11

May you someday be in charge of employees who decide to quit without telling you.

People who want to quit their jobs or their school enrollment have every right to do so. People who do so without letting the administration/management know about it, thus causing extra work and annoyance for all the people who have to figure out and deal with their vanishing, are jerks. Way to go, taking out your frustration with college in general on a few staff members and teachers who aren’t even directly controlling the college’s policies.

Next time you feel inclined to bail out on something you formally signed up for, send in the proper notification. If you want to inflict your grievances on somebody, send a letter to the authorities at the same time, explaining just why you think their institution sucks monkey ass and why you therefore no longer choose to be associated with it. (If it’s a school, send a copy of the letter to the campus newspaper, where it will definitely attract some attention.)

12

What’s really fun is when you’re a student, and you’re doing group work, and one of these wanderers is in your group.

Good rant!
Daniel

13

I know I’ll sound like an old fart, but when I was in college, we didn’t dare to eat in class–cell phones not having been invented yet.

I cannot imagine fielding calls while in class–even if that class is a 400 student lecture on organic chem-zzzzz. See, I can’t even type the word without getting bored!
:eek: How bold are these kids? Has college changed that much since 1984?
I had a professor once who gave multiple choice tests. If you wanted to argue a wrong answer you had to come to his office during office hours AND have had participated in class by asking questions, looking like you had a pulse etc. I did so, argued a point, got credit for the question which took my exam grade from a B to an A and got an A in the course(microbiology) due to that test. It really can and does work–too bad about the nimrods who try to exceed by doing nothing. Oy.

14

There’s a big difference between a job and a school.

I have never, and would never quit a job without notifying my employer no matter how much I hated the job - because in a job, the employer has been paying me and so I would feel obligated to let them know.

In the example I gave, I had been paying the school (a lot of money) and simply didn’t feel like I owed them anything additional - I’m sure they’ve figured it out by now, and if it meant a little extra work for them, I’m not playing my violin.

15

Thread title changed from “In which I pit a certain subclass of my …” to “In which I pit a certain subclass of my students”.

As much as everyone likes the excitement of cliffhanger titles, if they’re too generic it sort of defeat the purpose of having thread titles in the first place. Also, everyone hates them.

16

Old people are so ignorant about technology! You don’t eat cell phones, you make calls on them.

I’ve done the same thing, although I’ve done it in class. Last night I took a final exam from a professor who’s really a great person, and is very good at teaching the active part of her job (it’s a health/PE for children class), but who is awful at creating exams. Questions included things like (drawn from memory):

“People derive most of their energy from consuming and breaking down ________.” Umm, food? Carbohydrates? Protein, if they’re on Atkins?

“Respecting yourself, others, property, and the environment is ____________.” Uh, nice? Admirable? Nifty? The sign of a loser? Good citizenship?

“This is a substance that affects your mental state, or otherwise may change the physical condition of your body:______________.” You know, prof, I know you mean “drug,” but white flour, salt, and hollow-point bullets are drugs by this definition.

College is just fun for everyone, students and profs alike.

Daniel

17

Actually, when I transferred from a college in CO to a college in IA, I called the Office of Admissions or whoever (it’s been 20 years) and asked about this. I said I was leaving and did I have to notify anyone? She said no-just don’t pay the tution bill or the dorm fee or sign up for classes and that was that. Dunno if it works that way everywhere.

18

Oh yes. Now, my colleagues and I are so frustrated that we want to start up a mandatory class for all incoming students called “How To Go To College,” in which people would learn things they should know already, such as:
turning off the damn cell phones and pagers while in class; not flipping through catalogs and newspapers during lectures and presentations; not eating and drinking in the classroom without permission (because it’s, you know, a classroom and not a dining room; and we get rodent problems when people drop stuff on the floor); not showing up whenever you feel like it or not at all, and then expecting work to be accepted late; attempting to turn in a pile of stuff during finals week that should have been done weeks earlier; failing to communicate with profs about long absences and then getting miffed when they drop the student in question; plagiarizing like crazy despite all the warnings; not bringing the book or any supplies to class and then claiming that the work cannot be done; taking extra time off before and after holidays and spring break; treating Friday classes as if they are less important than classes on the other days of the week; never reading the syllabus or paying attention in class and then claiming not to know the due dates for assignments or when the final is; and so on.

I could go on for a mile, but you get the idea.

19

Isn’t that called “freshman orientation”? I don’t think I attended my orientation back before college, but (because) I thought that’s the sort of thing they covered. It sure seems to me like it’d be a good idea.

On the one hand, I think most college students already know that they need to do all this stuff: it’s laziness and lack of discipline that keep so many from doing it. On the other hand, hearing someone in authority tell them explicitly what they need to do might just make an impression on them, give them something to think about when they’re feeling slackish.

Daniel

20

AND who one day put you down as a reference! Seriously.