Back With Some Old-Fashioned Smackdown

Hey all,

I got into CM pretty early in the game and was an occasional poster a few months back. Some of you know me from then (or from my comments). For those of you who don't, I'm a GTA who has to keep quite a few more than one office hour a week (where the hell do you others work!?) and teaches comp courses. I took some time off from posting for a lot of reasons, the biggest being that I had one of my classes quite literally mutiny on me last semester. They nearly managed to get me fired, so I got a little spooked about being on here, posting things. I'm finally getting to where I feel a little safer, though, a little sturdier on my feet. Maybe enough to actually post something instead of just commenting and reading.

I'll have to start slow, though, so here's some old-fashioned smackdown for your enjoyment.

Tennis Timmy
Look, I know you're not here that often, what with having a bajillion away tournaments that you have to go to. Totally get it. But don't look at me with that stupid expression on your face (you know, the one where every muscle in your face seems to melt, leaving your eyes wide as saucers and your tongue just sitting in your slightly agape mouth like a dead fish) when I tell you for the fifth time you can't make up points for crap you should have turned in through email the day you were gone. And if the posh country clubs or the swanky hotel rooms don't have wifi, sorry, but that's your fault for not doing it before you left. I have absolutely no pity for someone who gets free weeklong vacations to California so they can network with country club CEO assholes. Also, when I tell you it's your responsibility to get notes from a classmate, don't look at me with above expression when I mention a concept we discussed while you were gone. I know you didn't actually ask anybody what we did, but you could at least not make it so painfully obvious.

Gone Gone Gina
I know you're trying to make up for your previous absences, and you should given that you are one tardy or absence away from failing my entire course. But no, your excuse of "running out of ink and not wanting to be late so I couldn't go buy any because otherwise I'll fail so can I just email it to everybody?" isn't going to fly. Everyone else has to scrounge up the money to pay for 20 copies of their workshop paper and you're not that special. When I tell you that you can bring it Monday, don't then argue with me and try to get what you want. That just shows me that it's all about being inconvenient for you, not running out of ink. By the way, if you don't have them on Monday you can kiss your grade goodbye, because you'll be losing yet another letter grade.

Frat Boy Fred
You've been good all semester. Every time I ask a question, you can answer it. Every time no one else has read the reading, you have. You almost always have all of your assignments, your books, and the handouts I've given out. You aren't the best writer I've ever seen, but you try. So what the hell is up with this shit? Did you really just send me a rough draft that does everything we've been talking about not doing in lecture? Fucking really? And then ask me for comments like I won't notice that it's completely opposite of what we've been talking about for the past three straight weeks? Jesus, man. Your reiteration over and over (in class and multiple times through the email that accompanied the rd) that you've "never done this kind of essay" isn't going to help you either. I know you haven't -- most of your classmates haven't either. That's why we've been, oh, I don't know, practicing various ways of doing it, talking about it at length in class, going over examples from various sources, and even doing some group work. You aren't going to get a free pass just because this is your first rodeo. Get on the goddamn horse and get your ass moving!

Slackers
In order to drop my course all you had to do was click a mouse three times. Or, hey, go the the registrar and fill out a tiny form, whichever. Neither way is AT ALL difficult. But no, no you decided that even though you've either never been in my course to begin with or stopped coming long ago and even though I sent each of you multiple emails telling you you were absolutely without a doubt going to fail my course, you'd still stick it out. What exactly do you think is going to happen? Do you think the Easter bunny is going to magically fart out an A for you? Or are you on academic probation, so you could only take 12 hours to begin with? If so, it was super smart of you to just decide not to come to one of the few gen ed courses that has a strict attendance policy. Gold star for you. Not that it matters, but your GPA will not be thanking you.

Everyone Else
Do not email me to freak out about your low grade. Yes, you have an F. Yes, that's entirely your doing. Do not say "well I think I was gone that day you gave that quiz..." -- doesn't matter in the slightest. If you'd read the syllabus you'd know that already. This class is an introductory gen ed course. Because of that it is ridiculously, stupidly easy. I give points out like they're candy. All you have to do is contribute to class discussion once a week and you'll get all your participation points. Do your homework and that's another 100 points. Write in a damn journal about ANYTHING YOU WANT and you'll get even more. So why, why the hell do half of my students have an F right now and no one has a better grade than a C+? Oh yeah, they don't want to do the stupidly simple work that would keep them at a passing grade. Good thing there are more papers that will help them raise those grades...If they actually do those, anyway.

Frustrated as always,


Midwest May