As I have mentioned before, I love , love , love Rate your students. It has been my saving grace, my source of sanity and laughs, and a cathartic release of all my frustrations. But I have also disagreed (at times vehemently) with postings. Recently, I was so freaken mad that I almost wrote in. I have yet to write in to RYS. They verify people and I have a unsubstantiated fear that one of the gang that runs the compound will be here at TBU or know someone at TBU.
So here is the letter I was going to write in (a bit expanded for my blog's sake):
Recently, a young professor posted this --basically a request for help and advice. Were her ideas a bit Pollyanna at times (wanting students to view the course as more than just a course), a bit naive at times (expecting there might be a way to get all students to show on time, every time), and a bit misguided (wanting the students to think she is cool)? Yes. And I felt those things as soon as I read her post. At its heart, these aren't the worst things. A bit Pollyanna is better than cynical and bitter, right? Naive and optimistic must be better than pessimistic, right? And weren't we all misguided at the start? It was only from sage advice from those who came before us or getting through that first semester we taught that helped us realize that students didn't need to like us to learn or that them liking us might actually make things worse.
This post stirred up lots of feelings in others as well.
I wanted to share some of my reactions to the responses because it is the responses that made me almost write in (not the original post). I am going to include some snippets (or flava) of the reactions below:
Some gave helpful advice:
"* Some if not many of your students will feel your class is important. Others won’t. There’s not a hell of a lot you can do about it. Show you care about the material and they’ll come to their own conclusions. Some students are on this earth to recycle air. You won’t reach them. So what? Focus on the majority of them who really are worth a damn and ignore the ones who aren’t." [I love the phrase 'on earth to recycle air']
"*Every class is going to be "just another class" for most of the students in it. That doesn't mean you can't teach the shit out of it. No one ever, in the whole history of everything, ever seemed even "a little cool" by wanting to. You don't have to be cool to teach your students. You don't have to be cool for them to like you."
Or practical advice:
"*Make it a portion of the student's grade to submit, each class, a question or comment from the readings for class discussion. This will require that they do at least some of the reading. Some students still will not do it. Some will take the lower grade, and some will make up stupid questions 5 minutes before class. But, you will be able to tell who those students are and grade them accordingly."
Some addressed the misguided posts with harshness and humor:
"*There are so many things wrong with your point of view but let us start with the most obvious, the idea that you can get all of your students to show up on time, bring their books, and be prepared? You’ll be lucky if they even buy the books rookie! This imaginary fantasy student that you speak of is much like a cat that you train to use the toilet. Everyone has seen a clip of one on Youtube, or heard of a friend of a friend who had one. However every cat you ever have will just pee on your bed and crap in your plants."
But some were down right mean. I would have cried if I had posted the question and got the following responses, and I almost cried reading them even though they weren't directed at me. Here is the worst of the meanest:
"*Here's my response: Dumbass."
"*I absolutely know how to get ALL my students to come to my classes on time, every time. They love it so much they want to be there even AFTER class is over! But since I am most likely one of the lousy professors you had, focusing on minutiae (which, you dipshit, is necessary in my field), I am not going to fucking tell you the secret."
"*Just get your shit together, and teach. Given the desperate narcissism of your post, I can see why your students don’t come to class. I probably wouldn’t, either."
And one that was fairly condescending, but redeemed by offers of scotch:
"* It's so cute to see naiveté bud and blossom. When the students kick cynicism into your veins come on over to my house. I'll save some scotch for you."
There are more posts there, but my response was most strongly to the mean posts. If I could have written in to RYS, it would have sounded something like this:
How quickly you forget. We were all new at this game once. Some of us are new know, desperately tying to find our way, to do a better-than-good job, to get tenure or a job that we can stand, to feel good about our day, to find happiness in a job that we suffered through a decade of college to get. Why are those past this newbie stage so willing to cut the throats of the ghosts of their former selves? For me, RYS has to be a place where I get all the things my job doesn't provide me. I need this virtual water cooler to make me feel better about my day (love that smackdown), to laugh, and to find solace. When I see people with such vitriol, it breaks my heart and spirit. Don't ruin a good thing and consider giving a handout (instead of a bitchsmack) to those that follow in your footsteps.
