Someone asked me to tell the story of the time I was part of a classroom mutiny. I was a sophomore in college and at the time I was intending to train as a high school English teacher.
I was in a class where the point of the class was to make visits to schools. This required the class to be a solid four hour block of time five days per week. We only visited schools 6 times during the 6 week term. Most of the sections of this class let students out after a two hour lecture, but my professor was determined to fill every single hour. He did it with the most mundane stuff. It is ironic that my first “How to be a teacher” class is the only one where I’ve seen students successfully mutiny against a professor.
It started with an extremely poor decision on the professor’s part. He decided that there would be a grand total of 100 points possible for the entire term. This meant that any time he gave a 5 point quiz, we all argued vehemently about every single point. The professor was very frustrated by this behavior and kept saying “It’s just one point!” But 5 lost points meant no A, and a lost A could mean a lost scholarship, so we fought hard.
Then we spent hours and hours taking personality tests just to fill up the four hour block of time. One personality test can be interesting, but taking 8 different ones was a little excessive and none of us could see how it was training us to be teachers. To make matters worse, we began to lose respect for the man who was supposed to be teaching us how to be teachers.
The students began to band together. We all had to pass this class and the professor had become an obstacle. The level of frustration continued to rise as people lost points over personality tests or other inane things. Groups of students discussed walking out of the class after two hours, but the professor held our points hostage, so no one did. Instead we sat like uncooperative lumps in class and only did the work which had points attached. There were no class discussions because none of us would discuss.
In hindsight I feel sorry for this professor. Things had gone horribly wrong, he had no control over the class and he had to stand up in front of us for 4 hours to lecture to what must have felt like a brick wall. And yet he refused to back down, even though he was overheard complaining about what our class was doing to his blood pressure. He kept us there for the full four hours and would not expand the point range. My sympathy dries up when I think how he refused to negotiate at all.
The stand-off ended a week prior to the end of the term, when a group of students went to the Dean and complained. We don’t know what the Dean said, but the professor surrendered. He increased the number of points possible. He also stopped teaching us. Instead he brought in guest lecturers for the last week of classes. It was the best week we’d had. The lecturers were fascinating and I learned more about teaching and life than I’d learned all term. I didn’t mind staying for 4 hours to hear the guests. I still remember some of those lectures.
To my knowledge that professor never taught that class again. He may have taught other classes, but I never again put myself in one. In fact, I can’t even remember his name.
A bit spooked here.
It is rather coincidental that you posted about this experience today, while I am doing my best to keep my temper over an assignment for a masters level college course being taught by someone who doesn’t have the background to actually be teaching it.
I had just decided to take a break from my work to get my stress levels down, when I saw this entry of yours. Understandably, I had a rather emotional reaction to reading it. Now, I think I am going to find myself some chocolate while I contemplate its significance.
If you’re curious, I changed the filters to a post I did recently and a post I did a week ago describing a promise I made to another professor in regards to the situation. I think you can read them without friending me. If not, then Howard will be able to read it.
*off to find chocolate…*
Re: A bit spooked here.
Sorry to add to the stress of your day.
It looks like the situations aren’t exactly analogous. You have a young teacher who is trying to bluff her way into expertise. My professor was an old guy ready to retire. In fact he’d taught the same course many times before in exactly the same way. It makes me wonder what was different about my class that things got so bad.
Politics are never fun. I think that your promises to the other professor are wise ones. Just keep your eyes on your goal and try to navigate the obstacle of this class in such a way that you don’t create greater obstacles in the future. The way to win a war is to pick your battles carefully.
Hang in there.
Your experience illustrates perfectly one of the biggest problems with higher education. In order to teach in primary or secondary education you must be “certified” which seems to mean that you have taken the classes that departments of education at various schools of education have decreed are required to be a “good” teacher.
On the other hand, the only requirement that you need to teach at the college level is that you have gotten a doctorate, or even masters in you subject area. There is no attention given to ability or training in teaching your subject. If you have a doctorate your are assumed, magically, to be a good instructor of that subject. Nothing could be further from the truth. Even more ironic is that there are professors (ie one who “professes” to know something) teaching in schools of education who themselves have never taught in elementary or secondary education. Yet, they, somehow, are qualified to tell others how to teach in primary and secondary education. The irony is monstrous.
Your experience only makes my point, and it is why once I’d gotten my bachelor’s degree that I ran swearing never to be involved in the mess again. Most days that feels like a good choice, until someone comes along and says something in the order of “oh, you don’t have a masters, too bad.” But that really is a different rant.
Re: A bit spooked here.
No, not directly analogous. You also had a class of young adults, while most of my class are middle aged students who are more determined to get their money’s worth. In fact, several of them work at the same mental health facilities and have gone back to school so they can qualify for a professional counselor license (state given examination) for promotions. Those are the ones I see going to the dean. I’m planning to stay out of their way.
Some of the reason the old counselor program was retired was because the school I received my BS for has an excellent counseling masters program, designed especially for the older student. It is very well known and I did think of going back there, but with my desire to be an art therapist, I really do need to go to a school that offers studio art classes too.
The program I am currently in looks like a very stripped down version of the one I was in. Basically, the director took the accelerated time part (working people are more likely to go for accelerated programs), but did not incorporate the better learning environment part. For instance, we older students are sitting three and a half hours in desks made for younger people who normally never sit more than an hour and a half in them at a time. And we only get a 6 minute break. At the other school, we sat in cushioned office chairs at tables and while it was a four hour class, we had 30 minutes to eat dinner. Something our diabetic students really appreciated and it made our brains clearer for the rest of the class. It’s like the director said, “We’ll do what they did, but we’ll do it without the extra investment.”
With another school offering a better program (and they have the most friendly admission process I’ve ever been through), most of the working students in the class really don’t have anything to lose by demanding they get the education they and their workplace are paying for. The established program starts a new cycle every 2 months. They probably won’t even need to wait for long for the next one.