Education Rant

[birdgirl78]

Sorry in advance for those of you not interested in the current teaching of undergraduate English.
Feel free to skip this entry.

Those of you who know me IRL know that I'm a pretty laid-back teacher.  I want my students to do well; I want them to feel that they 'run' the classroom (although that is, to some extent, an illusion); I want them to make

Comments

[birdgirl78]

I consider myself a student advocate, and I'm pretty sure most of my students do as well, if their comments on evaluation forms are to be taken seriously. But there is a limit. And she's actually doing them an active disservice by perpetuating the stereotype that it's the student's worth that is being valued rather than his/her writing.

It drives me nuts to try to fit essays into rubrics, so I don't often use them (thank goodness that I don't have someone insisting that I do). Instead, I list the criteria on the assignment sheet and refer back to it in comments. I have, once or twice, given a student a good grade for something that didn't fit the assignment sheet, but it's because they really pushed and turned the essay into something greater. I once had a prof do that for me in undergrad, and I think I've done it twice now in my 8 years of teaching. And when I did it, I wrote the student a half-page note explaining that while this didn't exactly fit the criteria of the assignment, he went far beyond it in other ways.

It seems that the instructor who wrote the original email has stepped down from teaching a summer class, and I suspect she will be leaving uni if her blog posts are any indication. She feels like the form of university education and the system in our department is oppressive. And she has a right to feel that way...but then the choice is clear: conform and stick it out, or leave. I left CUA because I couldn't stand the hypocrisy and backstabbing in the department.

Thanks so much for letting me ramble, and thanks for taking the time to read and respond.
*hugs*