[QUOTE=Caridwen]
I think they don’t get away with this as often if there are older students or returning students in the class. I know when I went back to school and I was paying for it, I didn’t have a problem asking a question until I understood it. I had professors make remarks but I didn’t particularly care. When I 18 I never would have asked a question much less challenged a professor. One of the benefits of getting older, you stop caring what people think. 
[/QUOTE]
I’m 40 - the school I go to specializes in “working adults” There are almost no 19 year olds in class - and a good portion of any classroom is over 30. In some ways, that has made the situation more difficult, the jerk prof insisted “college needs to be your first priority” - no, my first priority is my kids and husband, my second is my full time career type job, college is a distant third. College can be your first priority when you are 19, you don’t have kids and your job is part time at The Gap.
Some people are jerks. And while MOST college instructors I’ve had don’t fall into that category, a few, unfortunately, do.