Tristan

“What actually happens is that nothing happens. I feel no pressure from the colleges in either direction. My department chairpersons, on those rare occasions when I see them, are friendly, even warm. They don’t mention all those students who have failed my courses, and I don’t bring them up. There seems, as is often the case in colleges, to be a huge gulf between academia and reality. No one is thinking about the larger implications, let alone the morality, of admitting so many students to classes they cannot possibly pass. The colleges and the students and I are bobbing up and down in a great wave of societal forces—social optimism on a large scale, the sense of college as both a universal right and a need, financial necessity on the part of the colleges and the students alike, the desire to maintain high academic standards while admitting marginal students—that have coalesced into a mini-tsunami of difficulty. No one has drawn up the flowchart and seen that, although more-widespread college admission is a bonanza for the colleges and nice for the students and makes the entire United States of America feel rather pleased with itself, there is one point of irreconcilable conflict in the system, and that is the moment when the adjunct instructor, who by the nature of his job teaches the worst students, must ink the F on that first writing assignment.”

In this paragraph that I chose Professor X is discusses how colleges do not care what happens to a student in their classes. He implies that he himself does feel remorse for his many students who repeatedly fail his class but it is never brought up in any school board meetings. He says that other teachers and board of staff ignore the fact completely, never coming to discuss the vast amount of kids who are failing classes and chose to not go to school. X explains how the society we live in sets a high standard on our era attending college even if it is not wanted by the student, most jobs require it. In an earlier paragraph X talks about the kids in his class that want to be cops, or need schooling to obtain a raise or to move up in their company. When these are needed and we are paying money to go to school X displays that he thinks higher expectations should be placed on students.

This passage relates to the other ideas in the text because like I said earlier, X thinks that a higher emphasis should be placed on students. He states earlier that students come for a variety of reasons and need these credits for legitimate reasons. X thinks that college English is the hardest class to grade because it is not simple answers or multiple choice, he is grading someone’s hard work. When bringing Ms. L into his writing he explains how she was so proud of herself for writing a college paper at the age of 40, even though she received an F on the paper. Later he refers to her again while talking about how college has become so focused on using the internet as a teaching source that students who have never used a computer struggle immensely with school. Again this brings us back to how X thinks students should receive more support to pass their classes.

When I read this paper I react with complete acceptance. I can fully understand why an adult or a kid who rarely uses the internet and/or relies upon support could fail classes. While trying to set up my classes I had to come into the open counseling where you had to wait and one or two counselors helped multiple students with a ratio that should be unacceptable. While attempting to decide what classes I needed and wanted I received no support at all accept for a sheet giving requirements to gain your AA. I thought this was extremely annoying and made me not want to attend the school at all. This passage makes me think of this exact moment and how other people have had reactions just like mine.

As far as intellectual thoughts on this paper I do not have many. I wonder how a teacher or counselor can see students struggling and not offer help or support to get their grades back up. It is not morally correct to want students to fail classes just so they can make more money on the tuition fees to take the class again. Our world has become so corrupt that thing like this are extremely common, and I want to know when someone is going to step up and make a difference. If I was in a university and paying 20 thousand dollars a year for school and I started failing a class I would hope to have a counselor or teacher step in and offer to help.

While reading this paragraph I sense some remorse in X’s writing, it is almost like he regrets not bringing up the topic of all the failing kids to the board but he knows it would not be productive at all because they would just ignore it. His tone did not change much but you can see this change from the style of writing he uses and his language used.