Reading Response #6

Victor Volz
May 17, 2010

In Professor X’s treatise, “From the Basement of the Ivory Tower”, we are given a perception about how his or her students in a small private college and community college, so-called “colleges of last resort” come into either an Introduction to College Writing (English 101) or Introduction to College Literature (English 102) class that he or she teaches, as prior failures of the academic system and remain in that position throughout the time spent in the course. This can be attributed to either lack of motivation, too many additional duties, or, in the worst-case scenario, handicapped intellectual parameters. In any case, the professor’s initial glee of teaching the class inevitably turns sour with sorrow when he or she has to give, on an average term basis, a failing grade to most of the students due to the foregoing reasons. Professor X rationalizes from this outlook that university education and the operation of thinking that lies behind it is not intended to be assumed by everybody, especially for those who haven’t already experienced it.

In a sense, I do assent with the core assertion that college and university education is not oriented in favor for straightforward assimilation by everyone or even that formal academic education and obligatory schooling itself is geared toward being easily performed by everyone. Academia usually attempts to apply an explicit scientific and scholarly mode of thinking for its students to inherit that may not actually be considered optimal to the learning process, in this case, individual styles of learning which may be more beneficial to teaching could be, ‘defenestrated’ by conventional academics, so to speak. The consequence is that it could even have the chance to eventually kill creativity and perhaps even genius-hood that may or may not normally be bred within the classroom environment, but of course, I digress.

Professor X later asserts that, “We think of college professors as being profoundly indifferent to the grades they hand out.” “Professors can fail these young people with emotional impunity because many such failures are the students’ own fault: too much time spent texting, too little time with the textbooks.” He or she later goes on to talk about how pedagogues in other academic fields of study that are grounded on empirical evidence and absolute fact and knowledge have a much easier time grading other students since the answers don’t require a subjective perspective or platform to evaluate others on, the answers are either completely right or entirely wrong and how it is not so with classes like English.

First of all, Professor X’s assumption that college professors are “indifferent” to what grades they give others may not necessarily be correct, unless he or she were to give some sort of a questionnaire or survey to figure what his or her colleagues true opinions about the subject really were. In fact, evidence of the opposite is provided just by Professor X’s thoughts that he or she portrays in and of itself. He or she has become distraught by giving others failing grades, even if they were ‘trying their best'. This cites a definite example of caring and concern on the part of his or her interest in other student’s progression or regression in scholastic work, whether or not this is the genuine norm for other teachers and instructors alike to behave remains yet to be validated however. Professor X also directly blames cell phone use and lack of textbook browsing time to be the key causes of this issue. But once again, this isn’t necessarily the case, there could be many extenuated factors involved with this ineffective studying process, such as, under-explanation of a specific subject, too much extra work and responsibilities, or other distractions.

Professor X wants to see these students succeed but doesn’t want to delegitimize the grades being handed out in order give his or her students a false sense of accomplishment and triumph, which would denigrate and cheapen the successful grade for those few students who actually were able to conquer the college criteria with exceptional ability. Professor X proclaims that some students, if not most, “can’t” finish college with outstanding marks, meaning that it’d be nearly impossible to do so since if everyone did, then the marks wouldn’t be considered ‘outstanding’, they’d just be, ordinary.

In regards to Professor X’s previous remarks about the near impossibility of a majority of the student body being outstanding in education, I believe that it all depends on how the grading system works at those particular college courses, are the classes graded on a bell curve, or are they graded by pre-established criterions that aren’t to be reassessed based on the scores of measures of central tendency that students acquire? If it is the former, then yes, it would reasonably unattainable to have more than a few spectacular students in a class at any one time. But, if it is the latter, which it probably should be, and while the grades may not be ‘outstanding’ in the purest sense, then the grades are nonetheless, excellent.

All in all, while Professor X’s dreary viewpoint may be dismally enlightening, I think he has left a lot of information out about his or her profession that could be said as equally enchanting and gratifying. Granted, community colleges, technical colleges, and the like, may not necessarily bring the best of the brightest groups of people to engage in academic rigor and practice, but they certainly do lend a helping hand to those who are in dire need of academic assistance in an age where education and credentials is now becoming a paramount significance and facet in order to thrive in the occupational world.