The problem isn't them. It's that I'm burning out. Mustering up the energy to lovingly guide students from their excuses and the crazy myths they have about college has made me decide it'd be cathartic to write a "shit students say" list. I am fully aware that there are just as many idiotic excuses that I make as a professor and academic, so I list these in full acknowledgment that a) it's not always their fault, for sure, and b) the stuff coming out of my own mouth is often just as ridiculous.
Apologies for the cynical undertones in what follows. Rest assured that I truly believe that the kids are awesome. They give me hope in the future, and I do cry almost every time I think about how honored I feel to have this job. My students' beautiful souls make all the other crap worth it.
But again, I'm burning out. It's not them, it's me. Or rather, it's the systems that leverage too much love out of faculty and too much debt and doubt out of students. Fuck those systems!
If you're a student of mine and you ever said any of these things to me, I promise I love you. I said many of these things too, when I was a student. Once, on the last day of my Chinese Literature and Thought class, I played frisbee on the grass--outside the very classroom I was supposed to be in!-- because it was sunny, and I figured it was within the philosophy of Taoism to follow one's bliss rather than do work. I told the professor I was "following the 'way'."
For another class on Buddhism, I wrote a 2-page final paper about how I couldn't write the required 7-10 pages about the topic because it would be against Buddhist teachings to try to understand it through reasoned writing.
I've done it all too, so I'm not on my high horse here. But as a result of hearing all these excuses so many times, I have come up with some mantra I find myself saying multiple times a day in response to these things students say to me, which I also list, below.
First, however, I hope you enjoy some of these doozies, which, again, I list here as a form of catharsis for myself, not as a criticism of my students:
Shit Students Say, Bless Their Beautiful Souls
1. "Professor, do you have a stapler? Is it OK if I just fold over the corners?"
Read: I need permission every time I forget to keep my pieces of paper from separating from each other, and want your reassurance that it's not annoying to have to keep them all together as you grade my work.
2. "Can we talk? Can I close the door?"
Read: I'm about to unload some heavy shit. This will take at least an hour.
3. "Wait, so, everything I learned in high school was wrong?"
Read: I had no idea that K-12 education was a hoax. Is all education a hoax? What am I doing here?
4. "Why doesn't your syllabus state that, by the end of the course, the planet will be saved, the 2016 election reversed, and that you're available for one-on-one hour-long sessions of existential crisis therapy?"
Read: I can't figure out how to take the gift of critical tools where I find them.
5. "Professor, you work too hard. You should relax more."
Read: give more time to one-on-one hour-long therapy sessions, but do less of the other ridiculous stuff your job requires. Also, being a professor must really suck.
6. "I didn't want to submit an assignment that doesn't reflect my best work, so can I have an extension?"
Read: I didn't prioritize doing the work, but I want you to think it's because I care TOO much.
7. "Why can't you teach me how to overturn capitalism in 15 weeks?"
Read: What good is this class in the world?
8. "Why don't your classes solve more problems directly, with like, direct action and real-world, immediate change?"
Read: I have swallowed the anti-intellectual pill and don't think that learning how to think is valuable to real change.
9. "Can I leave class early? I have a thing I have to do."
Read: I'm special. All the other students who stay in class the whole time aren't as important as I am, and the things you have planned for my time here are not important to me.
10. "This material is really depressing. I can't come to class because the material you're teaching me is causing me anxiety."
Read: I thought I was supposed to only do things that make me happy. Why are you asking me to be unhappy?
11. "You mean, the world didn't begin the day I was born?"
Read: As an Anglo-American, I have no history. I'm told to believe that I'm the center of the universe, rather than a moment within a long arc of time. I don't believe there's anything worthwhile to learn from anybody who's lived longer than I have, or who came before me.
12. "You look tired."
Read: If I make you feel insecure, you'll go easy on me. OR, depending on the context: I really care about you as a human being.
13. "I can't write this paper because I don't know what I think."
Read: Tell me what to think. And then write the paper for me.
14. "I am lost. I can't do that thing you're asking of me. Pump my ego up by telling me that I'm great, and tell me what I think and what I should do."
Read: Imposter syndrome.
15. "Nothing any scholar has ever said has any relevance to me. Scholarship is created by academia, which is bought out by capitalism, so the only worthwhile thoughts in the world are the ones in my head right now, and maybe the thoughts in my favorite singer's head."
Read: I've swallowed the anti-intellectual pill and don't want to spend the time it would take to read all those articles and books.
16. "Sorry I was absent. What did I miss?"
Read: I want you to think I care about what I've missed.
17. "I don't have the rough draft done, so I won't be in class for the peer review."
Read: I procrastinated and am embarrassed that I don't have much to show.
18. "Could we meet sometime to talk about this amazing idea I have?"
Read: I think the job of a professor is to wait for each individual student to have an amazing idea and to carry it through to its conclusion with them.
19. "Needing to write a clear sentence is a form of oppression, so no, I will not fix all these fragments and run-ons, or choose precise words that say what I really mean, or get rid of all the "really"s and "very"s and "totally"s."
Read: I'm too lazy to care about it.
20. "I need to drop out of college because I need to do something more radical."
Read: You have nothing to teach me. Hanging out here is a waste of my time.
My Mantras/Responses:
Get that Shit Done.
Just Write.
It's in the Syllabus.
Sure, whatever you need to do.
Fake It 'Til You Make It.
Get that Shit Done.
You Got This.
Just showing up is 90% of the battle.
Get that Shit Done.
Did I mention, JUST GET THAT SHIT DONE.
