The other day, I was explaining to my students the process profs use to grade research papers, and the more I explained, the more I kept thinking, “This is insane! This whole system is insane!”
The strange beast that is our education system
Tales of your teacher’s failures
My first wall hit me in second-year university. It seemed as though every course was a “weeder” course. Organic chemistry, biochemistry, calculus—all these classes were utter beasts.
Do good ideas get crushed at your job?
What we have, here, is a value conflict. The powers-that-be have a budget to manage, and so they value fiscal sustainability. Instructors, conversely, have students to teach. They value quality education. Who should win?
Developing Wisdom: Reflection Journaling
Are we a wise civilization? Can we grow wiser? Being cynical about these questions is easy. The news shows us we are always on the brink of disaster, and, let's be honest, the comments section of most social media posts does not engender a spirit of optimism about humanity's collective wisdom. Yet, consider the following.
Idiot teachers and their idiot classes
Some years ago, I assigned a failing grade to a student's report. She was pissed.