English 115 Woes (Mark II)

[EUOL]

So, my freshmen just turned in research papers.  Last semester, most of the topics were pretty good.  However, this year I find myself confronted by several that make me itch to give them bad grades just because I find the topics offensive.

Example One:  A paper lauding 'Official English,' something I oppose.

Example Two: (This one is even better.)  A paper talking about how space exploration is a waste of time and money.  (Really.  Would you write a paper about this if you knew that your teacher was a SCIENCE FICTION WRITER!)

I'm put in the difficult position of trying to grade the papers based on their textual merits, rather than responding to the dumb arguments they make.  (Sigh.)

[Master Xaio]

Lol, stuff doing "textual merits" - I had enough of that in english.  Just mark it on how crap their arguements are.  And suggest they think about their answers for a change in future.  

And yes, I'm in a really crappy and bitchy mood tonight.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

trying to build sympathy here.....

sorry, just doesn't compare to getting yelled at by a moron who wants me to pay to ship his instrument back to him because he got charged $900 to repair something we don't cover under warranty because it was obviously damaged in shipment because HE declined to insure a package valued at over $20,000. I think the thrust of his argument was that he got in trouble with his superiors because of the damage, so therefore I should be responsible to pay for shipping. Yes.

[Master Xaio]

I'm not trying to  build sympathy! I'm so misunderstood... *dramatic sigh and tears welling, violins play*

And yeah, I kinda see your point.  But what the hell, I'll complain if I wanna.  Why? because I can, and I have nothing better to do.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

uhm... I wasn't talking to you.

[Master Xaio]

Hm, ok, it appears the caffeine is affecting my reading skills.  I apologise.  I now crawl back into my little hole in the ground.

[Tekiel]

Brandon, I applaud you.  I spent most of my high school and college years writing papers that expressed views that I didn't agree with, because I knew that the views expressed agreed with the teacher.  (Like how I praised Woodstock because my teacher kept talking about how wonderful all the hippies were).  It's nice to see you trying to be unbiased in your paper-grading.    One day it'll promote independent thought from all those freshman (even if their topics are simple and/or dull at the moment).

[fuzzyoctopus]

 However, this year I find myself confronted by several that make me itch to give them bad grades just because I find the topics offensive.

I also applaud your restraint- but I'm sorry you have to put up with it all, just because these kids don't know how to follow the 'rules' of english classes.

Heck, I wrote 3 papers on feminism this semester just b/c Dr. Snyder is a huge feminist. Now mind you that part of the reason for this is that all the texts he picked lend themselves to feminism...

[Mistress of Darkness]

Well, he is a huge feminist.

Am I the only person who actually wrote what they believed/were actually interested in for English? Maybe I just got lucky and didn't end up with those kind of teachers.

I'm sorry you have to slog through the papers of yucky, EUOL. If it makes you feel better, bleed all over their papers. And then at the end, deduct points for failing to convince you.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

I wrote about comics. And about Darth Vader as a Faustian figure. I think I did what I wanted. But most of those weren't English classes.

[Entsuropi]

And about Darth Vader as a Faustian figure.

Never mention this again.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

jealous? Or just uncomprehending?

[House of Mustard]

Ah freshman.  The other day, a girl at my work asked me to read through her research paper and see if there were any major problems.

I don't know how she ever made it into college.  Instead of writing the word "Money" she used the symbol "$$$".  She did it four different times.  In what reality is that even remotely acceptable?

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

Well as much as I hate the topics, they do seem like good papers to write. Slam the official english guy for every mistake though... and when he complains point out the irony of his failure to use proper English in a paper advocating "Official English".

And dont let the space age guy write his paper with anything more advanced than a mdchanical type writer....

[EUOL]

The space age guy, actually, made a very good argument.  I ended up giving him a pretty good grade--he deserved it, even if I disagreed with him.

The Official English girl, to my glee, wrote a terrible paper.  She didn't even make her own side's point very well--she just ranted about how American was going to become another Ireland, where the official language was overcome by another (ironically, English.)  She complained about all of the people who spoke Spanish in her high school, and said that the government shouldn't let them get by without knowing English.  The entire paper was poorly-documented and poorly-argued.  

Therefore, she got a D.

The average on this one is pretty low--it's hovering around 80%.  It might dip down to a C+ if the last few papers are bad.

What do you guys think of that?  Should the average in a class actually be a C?