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| Today's Big Thirsty! Even Guinan was pissed! |
Today, some of my students approached me with some shocking news. Apparently, the bookstore has it posted that a TI-83 calculator is required for my class. I was horrified.
Graphing linear equations is as advanced as we get in Basic Algebra. I can see the need to check their graphs against the correct one, but a TI-83 calculator is not necessary. There are so many free online applications for graphing, that it's not funny.
So, I took a trip to the bookstore to find out more about this, and they told me exactly what I suspected. Our department chair felt that since he requires graphing calculators in his class, then they might as well be required in everyone else's.
Yeah, um, and I took my bicycle into the repair shop the other day and they told me that I need a new transmission.
I have taught this class multiple times. Only a basic calculator is necessary. You know, basic arithmetic with a square-root button. I have informed my students of where to get these for cheap: thrift stores, dollar tree, etc.
Although it's not exactly my question, but I'm wondering "What the fuck is going on?" However, my real question is as follows:
Q: Could he be getting royalties for the TI-83's that he is causing to be sold?
No, I don't think so. I think you've fallen victim to the "I know how to teach this best" syndrome. If you don't require this calculator, obviously you're not doing something right. When your student evals come back and students bitch about having to spend money on a calculator they never used, you're going to hear all about how you should have been teaching the course. The analogy for those of us in other fields is when someone (usually a department chair or "lead instructor" of a course committee) decides we all must use Text X as part of our class. Academic freedom be damned; this will be ordered for all sections, and you will figure out how to use it!
ReplyDeleteNo, he's not getting a kickback for that calculator. If kickbacks were available, I'd be requiring a TI-83 calculator for my Literary Theory of Hamster-Fur Weaving course. He's thinking, in addition to what English Doc suggests (that He Alone KNows how to teach the course) , that many of the students are going to go on and take more classes in the Math department, for which they WILL need a TI-83 calculator. So they may as well buy a good calculator now, instead of wasting money on a cheap one and then having to buy a better one for the next course.
ReplyDeleteThat would be my guess.
Wow--that's some serious academic pomposity for ya. I'm now looking into how I can get kickbacks for requiring a TI-83 in my writing courses. I think I can get away with it, too, if I give the bookstore manager a cut.
ReplyDeleteNo the real kickback would be if they tried to force the kids to buy "Elektronika" or "Iskra" calculators*, then said "You know, these Texas Instruments TI-83 calcs do the job a lot better, and instructions are in English" then you would have something of a case. Truth be told, there is probably an iPhone app that emulates a graphing calculator; the days of the stand-alone calculator are probably numbered.
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* Soviet brands of electronic counting machinery, natch. By 1991 "Elektronika" could sell you a Soviet-made pocket computer, aping Radio Shack but off by eight years.
again, fubar.
ReplyDeletedamn.
"again, fubar.
ReplyDeletedamn."
What? A person can't write on the glories of Soviet calculating technology, especially the models that could do reverse Polish notation....
Any kind of Polish notation is evil.
ReplyDelete