So its time for a post about something that annoys me. Don’t worry this won’t be the last one.
I attend college at Ivy Tech Community College in Greencastle. One of the classes I picked up this semester is English 112. Its a persuasion and exposition course. Which basically means you’re writing persuasive arguments on a topic of your choice. This is natural for me seeing as I’m very, extremely opinionated, in case you haven’t already noticed. And, as I almost always do, I tend to aim for topics that aren’t really covered that much. I mean anybody can write a paper about the death penalty, or abortion, and every other one of those hot button issues that have been coming up a lot lately since it is an election year. So those are pretty much covered by the other students in the class. So I go after the ones that nobody really thinks to write about. And as I always due with almost any writing project that I embark upon; I tear into it with my quick wit, and my cynic’s tongue.
This can tend to pose a problem when it seems that I’ve been stuck with, in my opinion, what seems to be somewhat of a closed minded professor. This woman does not seem like the kind of person who should be teaching a class in which the assignments are based on one’s opinions. It would seem that if I wrote a topic that she did not approve of, I’d get a bad grade. It seems like she’s the kind of straight laced, black and white, please color within the lines type of woman. I fail to see how she’s teaching a college course where she’s going to be subjected to opinions other than her own on a regular basis. On the very first day of the class I looked forward to it with enthusiasm, because she said that one thing for her class was required, that the students had to be very opinionated. But it doesn’t look like she is. And now I look forward to every class of hers that I actually show up to with disdain.
Personally I think she should be teaching high school where she could plant her opinions into the minds of the students. She’s more the woman who would give you a topic and say, “Write about this.”. Not a woman who says here’s what your requirements are for your assignment are, do it to it. It seems like her job would be better served by a cardboard cut-out and a tape recorder. I don’t feel that she even needs to show up. I’m normally not so quick to judge people. But she just gives off this strong vibe.
I find it hard to deal with this woman. I came home from her class this morning, it wasn’t even eleven in the morning upon my return home, and yet I felt compelled to have a beer. Of course I just write that off to being Irish.
One thing that irked me today is our next assignment. Our previous assignment was a big paper on a topic of our choice. I didn’t even have the option of turning in my assignment for the fact that I had a printer that refused to cooperate with me. And I didn’t even have the option of turning it in on Thursday the next time the class meets. I’ll tell you what though, I’m going to turn in that paper on Thursday whether she likes it or not. That way whether or not she takes it and grades it is on her after that.
Moving on, our assignment in class on this cold Tuesday morning was to tie in with our previous assignment. We had to write an annotated bibliography for our sources for our last paper. I found this to be problematic due to the fact that she refused to accept my paper. How is she to know that I’m just not pulling sources out of my ass? For all she knows I could just link to Kotaku or some other related sites. All she knows is that my paper was disproving the relation between video games and violence. Something that her and her preconceived notions would probably disapprove of. If she refuses to accept my paper, how is she going to know if my annotated bibliography was pulled out of my ass or not?
Another thing that bothered me about this assignment is that our annotated bibliography is supposed to have ten sources. Even if our paper didn’t have ten sources our annotated bibliography has to have ten sources. What does that mean for some of us that chose an abstract topic? Something off the beaten path? What are we supposed to do? Pull five or so more sources out of our asses? She recommends that we add the sources that didn’t go into our paper into the bibliography if we didn’t have enough. I don’t know about most people, but I only look for research that would be productive to my topic. And I only research things that will go into my paper. I don’t take the time to gather sources and then throw half of it out. So far I’m assuming that I’m not going to enjoy the rest of this class. I’ll only be showing up for the grade.
My new mission is to test how open minded this woman really is. I’m going to pick topics to write about for my papers, that she won’t agree with, that would piss her off. And we’ll see how well she receives them, and how well I do.
Well, I’m drawing a black here so that’s all for now.
Drawing a Blank 