Non-Traditional Students
I had one of these moments yesterday. Now, I don't generally mind "non-traditional students"; some of them are rather cool. I have a good buddy, M@, who turned twenty-five a few weeks ago. Non-traditional student. There's an older (mid to late sixties) lady who I've had a number of ancient history courses with. Non-traditional student. hell, I've taken all sorts of classes with guys who either have been or are currently on active duty with the military. Non-traditional students. No problem whatsoever.
However, a growing trend on American campuses, according to a Wall Street Journal article I read in November, is non-traditional students auditing classes. Now, the guy who's in my math class isn't as old as most of the folks in the article (who were pensioners who paid to audit courses); he's probably in his thirties, a bit of a gut, and balding. Still, not unlike the Cuban lady in the aforementioned article who was kicked out of a class for challenging the instructor's description of Cold War era Cuban politics, this guy couldn't seem yesterday to keep his mouth shut.
Now, I realize I'm somewhat hypocritical on this; in some classes, I tend to be the first one to give an answer whenever possible. (Not always, but often.) However, this idiot was guiding the teaching assistant through the problems she was doing. When another student asked for the TA to demonstrate one of the problems from the homework assignment, the aforementioned fat bald loser said, and I quote: "I could show you that one; I finally figured it out at two in the morning."
Congratulations, dirtbag. You can do college level math at two in the morning; I didn't even do the whole assignment, and I got the same amount of points as you did, so who's chuckling now? I'll give him a couple of weeks; if he doesn't shut his damn pie hole, I may just tell him, publically, for all to say: "Hey, buddy, I'm paying a hundred twenty bucks to hear her talk, not you."
This post is dedicated to Manda. Hopefully she won't screech at me for doing so.
However, a growing trend on American campuses, according to a Wall Street Journal article I read in November, is non-traditional students auditing classes. Now, the guy who's in my math class isn't as old as most of the folks in the article (who were pensioners who paid to audit courses); he's probably in his thirties, a bit of a gut, and balding. Still, not unlike the Cuban lady in the aforementioned article who was kicked out of a class for challenging the instructor's description of Cold War era Cuban politics, this guy couldn't seem yesterday to keep his mouth shut.
Now, I realize I'm somewhat hypocritical on this; in some classes, I tend to be the first one to give an answer whenever possible. (Not always, but often.) However, this idiot was guiding the teaching assistant through the problems she was doing. When another student asked for the TA to demonstrate one of the problems from the homework assignment, the aforementioned fat bald loser said, and I quote: "I could show you that one; I finally figured it out at two in the morning."
Congratulations, dirtbag. You can do college level math at two in the morning; I didn't even do the whole assignment, and I got the same amount of points as you did, so who's chuckling now? I'll give him a couple of weeks; if he doesn't shut his damn pie hole, I may just tell him, publically, for all to say: "Hey, buddy, I'm paying a hundred twenty bucks to hear her talk, not you."
This post is dedicated to Manda. Hopefully she won't screech at me for doing so.
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