I Want to Strangle my TA
As you may or may not know, I recently started my education again and have quickly become disillusioned with the entire institution.
This first class is so banal I want to scrub my brain with comet cleaner and bleach. My fellow “students” wouldn’t know a spell-check button if it leaped up and bit them in the ass, they cannot seem to communicate in anything other than rudimentary Neanderthal text slang, nor can they form coherent sentences.
If I read their posts out loud in a Russian accent, they may on occasion make some sense. The “Instructor” (and I use the term loosely) has not ever actually responded to a discussion directly, as in, give actual personal feedback.
NO.
He posts only links to YouTube Videos, I’m serious. Not a single OUNCE of personalized direction to a single student. Never once address the complete and utter mutilation of the English Language that takes place from EVERY SINGLE ONE OF MY CLASSMATES.
EVERY.
SINGLE.
ONE.
I think I am the ONLY student who is seeking an actual degree and not “Homeland Security” or “Medical Billing” dime-a-dozen online degree programs.
Then, the TA marks me down for; get this, not INDENTING Paragraphs.
1.) This is online discussion and never is it stated that is a requirement.
2.) In fact your PDF on “Paragraph Guidelines” never mentions it; the document itself does not have indented paragraphs.
When you marked me down you cited that I was expected to know that you follow antiquated APA guidelines and the Purdue OWL method. Another University’s guidelines. How was I supposed to magically obtain this information when it is not presented in any instructions or your own universities PARAGRAPH GUIDELINES PDF DOCUMENT?
You also marked me down for a “Failure to provide personal examples of my key points.”
How did you expect me to do this when I am LIMITED to two paragraphs? That is rather inhumanly possible to do. I gave you a concise and to the point THREE paragraph essay (I already went over the limit and that was nearly the death of me frankly.)
So I protest my lowered grade and you frankly insulted me with this sentence describing how to provide detail in 2 paragraphs:
“This compels the writer to be specific and concise, which is an important skill to learn.”
I believe I have this concept understood. Especially, and I hate to sound arrogant, when I am just beyond frustrated, but in dealing with the online classroom environment so far and the terrible spelling, grammar, chatspeak, and similar nightmares of mutilated English language skills that I have encountered in just a few weeks I’m beginning to question my choices in choosing Ashford. The standards don’t seem particularly high if what I have seen so far is anything close to the “norm”. So sufficed to say I was rather shocked that I was being marked down for demonstrating restraint and “being concise and to the point” when the comparative “curve” is anything but.
Compared to my classmates written communication skills, I feel like I’m in a room full of chimps that can maybe “sign” for a banana after they fling POO at that janitor.
Not to mention your god damn enrollment ”cheerleader” calls me every fucking day to “check my progress” and I tell her point blank I think I’m in a room full of morons, the teacher is absent and not earning his paycheck, the TA is grading on standards NOT DISCLOSED and I’m seriously considering yanking myself out of your university completely.
I’m paying for an education I am NOT receiving and if I have to look at one more post in comic sans with a person who cannot spell the word “you” or “step” or another BASIC three or four letter WORD correctly I will stop being politically correct and giving people HONEST feedback that will NOT be sugar coated anymore.
Or I will simply tell you to shove my financial aid up your ASSES, call Sallie Mae and revoke my approval of funds and sue you for breach of contract. Because I am certainly not learning a damn useful thing in this BOGUS introductory class of nothing but COMMON SENSE bullshit. I am ready to gouge my eyes out with a spork if I have to read one more post that reads like Ralphie Parker’s “Theme” on the Red Ryder BB Gun from a Christmas Story. I expect that kind of essay from a ten year old, NOT from a working professional adult who should have cultivated communication skills beyond that of a forth-grader!
At least Ralphie knows how to spell. He shames every single one of my classmates in that department.
Why yes, I’m slightly pissed off can you tell?
This first class is so banal I want to scrub my brain with comet cleaner and bleach. My fellow “students” wouldn’t know a spell-check button if it leaped up and bit them in the ass, they cannot seem to communicate in anything other than rudimentary Neanderthal text slang, nor can they form coherent sentences.
If I read their posts out loud in a Russian accent, they may on occasion make some sense. The “Instructor” (and I use the term loosely) has not ever actually responded to a discussion directly, as in, give actual personal feedback.
NO.
He posts only links to YouTube Videos, I’m serious. Not a single OUNCE of personalized direction to a single student. Never once address the complete and utter mutilation of the English Language that takes place from EVERY SINGLE ONE OF MY CLASSMATES.
EVERY.
SINGLE.
ONE.
I think I am the ONLY student who is seeking an actual degree and not “Homeland Security” or “Medical Billing” dime-a-dozen online degree programs.
Then, the TA marks me down for; get this, not INDENTING Paragraphs.
1.) This is online discussion and never is it stated that is a requirement.
2.) In fact your PDF on “Paragraph Guidelines” never mentions it; the document itself does not have indented paragraphs.
When you marked me down you cited that I was expected to know that you follow antiquated APA guidelines and the Purdue OWL method. Another University’s guidelines. How was I supposed to magically obtain this information when it is not presented in any instructions or your own universities PARAGRAPH GUIDELINES PDF DOCUMENT?
You also marked me down for a “Failure to provide personal examples of my key points.”
How did you expect me to do this when I am LIMITED to two paragraphs? That is rather inhumanly possible to do. I gave you a concise and to the point THREE paragraph essay (I already went over the limit and that was nearly the death of me frankly.)
So I protest my lowered grade and you frankly insulted me with this sentence describing how to provide detail in 2 paragraphs:
“This compels the writer to be specific and concise, which is an important skill to learn.”
I believe I have this concept understood. Especially, and I hate to sound arrogant, when I am just beyond frustrated, but in dealing with the online classroom environment so far and the terrible spelling, grammar, chatspeak, and similar nightmares of mutilated English language skills that I have encountered in just a few weeks I’m beginning to question my choices in choosing Ashford. The standards don’t seem particularly high if what I have seen so far is anything close to the “norm”. So sufficed to say I was rather shocked that I was being marked down for demonstrating restraint and “being concise and to the point” when the comparative “curve” is anything but.
Compared to my classmates written communication skills, I feel like I’m in a room full of chimps that can maybe “sign” for a banana after they fling POO at that janitor.
Not to mention your god damn enrollment ”cheerleader” calls me every fucking day to “check my progress” and I tell her point blank I think I’m in a room full of morons, the teacher is absent and not earning his paycheck, the TA is grading on standards NOT DISCLOSED and I’m seriously considering yanking myself out of your university completely.
I’m paying for an education I am NOT receiving and if I have to look at one more post in comic sans with a person who cannot spell the word “you” or “step” or another BASIC three or four letter WORD correctly I will stop being politically correct and giving people HONEST feedback that will NOT be sugar coated anymore.
Or I will simply tell you to shove my financial aid up your ASSES, call Sallie Mae and revoke my approval of funds and sue you for breach of contract. Because I am certainly not learning a damn useful thing in this BOGUS introductory class of nothing but COMMON SENSE bullshit. I am ready to gouge my eyes out with a spork if I have to read one more post that reads like Ralphie Parker’s “Theme” on the Red Ryder BB Gun from a Christmas Story. I expect that kind of essay from a ten year old, NOT from a working professional adult who should have cultivated communication skills beyond that of a forth-grader!
At least Ralphie knows how to spell. He shames every single one of my classmates in that department.
Why yes, I’m slightly pissed off can you tell?