Term Papers

Kathryn is stressing out about grading papers. Some kids just aren't trying and want good grades anyway. Others appear to be trying but don't have the communication skills to aptly transcribe their arguments. Or follow directions.

I can't stand this crap. Ages ago, from the student side of things, I hated the fact that I had to write papers for my major. My roommate, Alec, agreed with me.

"With technical topics," he'd explain, "there's always a right or a wrong answer. You either did it correctly, or you didn't. With English papers, it's all interpretive. You can have two papers which absolutely say opposite things and they'll both get passing grades."

And I took some bullshit classes to fill my English breadth requirements. I loved my theatre and poetry classes, but my Southeast Asian Studies and Repression Stories classes were both a waste of time and traumatizing, respectively. They fit my schedule, got me the credits I needed, and taught me a very formulaic way of cranking out papers that got me a good grade.

But all in all, I agree with Alec's sentiment. It's never about what you say, it's about how well you write. Which they can teach you in writing 101. But which they grade you for over and over in courses where the intention of the material is to teach you something else useful, not writing.


Maybe it's my harsh engineering-style black-or-white way of looking at education, maybe it's the fact that I'm not tasked with teaching these kids anything-- I don't have to see their faces every day, I don't humanize them. But if you're in a college-level course, and you're making me strain to understand the gibberish you've written to make some poorly constructed argument that's not even on topic, then eff you. You're not putting in any effort to write the paper, then why should I put in the effort to read it?

Chances are you will fail. No, I won't hold your hand and give you a C so you don't have to retake the course. I refuse to devalue the grades of the students who excelled in writing their papers, or even those who did a pretty good job, by polluting their ranks with your sorry excuse of an essay.

Deal with your failure, learn to write better, and try again next quarter.

Stop stressing my girlfriend out.

Sincerely,
Chris

PS: I can't tell if my hard line stance on grading would make me an excellent or a terrible teacher. I'd hope it's the former.