language and the internet

[kandrathe]

In my experience, it depends on the professor. I feel brevity, clarity, and sound construction of your presentation should be encouraged over meeting a particular word count. Mostly I found that my grades improved vastly when I started being sensitive to my audience, rather than expressing my own opinions. Meaning, I wrote the paper I knew my professor would want to read. In essence, like it or not, there is the professors way, or the wrong way.

The lesson I learned was that you need to set aside your thoughts, and regurgitate the spew that the professor believes is "the truth". In that, then I found that my University experience was more of a deception, rather than a true intellectual engagement. Why would a professor want to engage in an intelligent debate with a mere student? Yes, I harbor resentments against the class hierachy of educational institutions, and their systematic humiliation of the intellects of youth. My greatest fear for higher education is that it is more focused on teaching people what to think, rather than on how to think.

I know many people of extreme intellect who would not surrender, as I did, to that machine, and thus fought an uphill struggle to be successful without any "degree". I only made it through finally because I discovered a set of honors courses designed for the "best" students. I was not well prepared for college, and so I would not neccesarily be considered "honors" course material. But, once I talked my way in and worked my arse off to catch up to that level of work I found the level of patronization and other BS I had encountered in my other courses dropped to nil.

I actually had an honors professor call me into his office and apologize for having to give me a B on a paper. Pretty funny to me, as I had come to expect professors to be rude, condecending, and sometimes just plain mean. I still remember the biggest slam I ever got from a professor was the first Calculus test of a new semester. I remember I had not properly studied for it, but he wrote on the top "How did you get here? Just ringers?" Ouch. I dropped that class the same day, signed up for the same course at a nearby college, got an A, and transferred it back to the University.