Education as an Afterthought

“One of my most memorable experiences as a college student was an insult I received from my professor. I had missed an exam due to work, and I asked him if I could make it up on another day. He reluctantly agreed. But when the day for the make-up arrived, I forgot about it. I needed an excuse: if I got a zero, I’d fail the course. I should have told him the truth and asked for mercy. But I lied. I told him that I had to work again. To my surprise, he looked at me and said, “If your work interferes with college, then you shouldn’t be in college.” I was offended (which is ridiculous, since I had lied). His remark struck me as “classist” and “exclusionary”—words I wouldn’t have used at the time. How much students are required to work in college depends on their family income. Should people be excluded from higher education because they can’t afford to study full-time? What an elitist! The thing was that I didn’t have to work much in college. My parents made sacrifices to pay for my tuition, room, and board. They didn’t give me any discretionary money, so I had to work some . But about ten hours a week at the library was enough to keep the drinks flowing and a pack of cigarettes in my pocket. I was a budding scholar! A student of promise! --> In truth, my anger at Dr. Johnson’s quip was a way to ignore the humiliation I felt. Humiliation for lying, yes. But more for the assertion that I shouldn’t be in college. Me? I was a budding scholar! A student of promise! “I’ll show him,” I thought. His rebuke played a small role in transforming me into a very serious student. Ten years later, I had a tenure-track job as a professor. My run-in with Dr. Johnson happened in 1999. And the intervening time has vindicated his position. I have resisted teaching online courses. --> Since the explosion of online education in the wake of the pandemic, I have resisted teaching online courses. Even at the peak of Covid hysteria in 2020, I insisted on teaching face-to-face. I thought that many students took online courses because they assumed they would be easier. These assumptions put pressure on professors: one must choose between lowering standards to satisfy student expectations or insisting on as much rigor as the digital medium allows (thereby risking negative evaluations from frustrated students who felt their online course was “too hard”). Scheduling constraints have occasionally forced me to teach online. Sometimes, these have been successful courses. But it’s always the case that those courses would have been better if we had been in the classroom together. The prerequisites for a good online class are low enrollment and strong students. Often, though, it is the weaker students who choose online classes. They assume virtual courses will be easier: they don’t want a challenge. Other students choose to “attend” online because they have many competing responsibilities. They have jobs, children to look after, ailing fathers, and appearances in divorce court. For them, school is an afterthought —the time they devote to it is whatever time is left after all the important obligations are satisfied. If you’re a serious student, it ought to be a priority. --> These are the students who remind me of Dr. Johnson’s insight. His point was that school shouldn’t be an afterthought: if you’re a serious student, it ought to be a priority . And if it isn’t a priority (or if you’re not a serious student), then why do it? This semester, scheduling forced me to teach the Freshman English course online. We met two days a week on Zoom. The first-year composition course is a critical one. It aims to equip students to effectively manage the writing demands of college—demands for which many are ill-prepared. Such a course probably shouldn’t be offered online. The students who need it the most often arrive with the expectation that the “left over” time will be sufficient for the class. This jeopardizes their prospects for success in the course—and in college at large. As this semester progressed, I imagined Dr. Johnson rolling in his grave. My class started at 11:30 am. Some students were routinely arriving as late as 12:15 pm—halfway through the session. They had things to do, after all: flat tires, job interviews, moms who needed help moving. At the start of the course, most of the students had their cameras off. Our university has a policy that requires students in online courses to have their cameras on. I tried for weeks to get everyone to comply. It’s harder to teach a sea of black squares. Is anyone even there? I contacted the leadership in my department to see what I should do about students who refuse to turn their cameras on. The answer was “nothing.” After all, some of them might be embarrassed for people to see the interior of their house. Allow them their dignity. I ignored this advice and told the class that I’d begin imposing penalties on their participation grades if their cameras were off. Some students were driving during class. --> Most of the cameras finally came on, and I’m glad Dr. Johnson wasn’t there to see it. Some students had clearly just awakened—close to noon. Some students were literally still in bed. Some had posted a photograph of themselves as they sat in front of their computers to make it appear that their cameras were on and that they were present. Some students were driving during class. One was in a classroom serving as a substitute teacher. Others were clearly conversing with people off-camera. Courteously, they had their microphones turned off. Some participants were dealing with small children. When I (repeatedly) asked an individual with his camera pointed at the ceiling to answer a question about the class material to make sure she was paying attention, I got no response. She wasn’t in earshot of the computer. One student who missed half of the semester (and handed in none of the assignments) showed up in Week 9 and was surprised when I informed her that she would fail the class. When I asked what had kept her away from the course for two months, she explained that her dog had surgery. Remember, this is a writing course. On some days, I expect students to write during class. How does one write while driving an automobile? How can one compose while being intermittently interrupted at her desk by the children she substitute teaches? One student informed me that he wasn’t able to write because he was using his phone to attend class—long-form composition was impossible. Why would you use a phone to “attend” a class? --> Questions continued to dart across my mind. Why would you use a phone to “attend” a class? Why would you sign up for a class that starts at 11:30 if you have “things to do” that keep you from logging on until 11:45 every session? Why would you enroll in a course that meets every Tuesday and Thursday if you can’t attend on Thursdays because of work demands? Why would you think substitute teaching can be done while participating in an online course? Why does the school you are working at allow it? Why is the federal government loaning (and in many cases, granting ) students money for this? The answers to these questions don’t matter. The class was an afterthought. That’s sad, but doubly so, since it means that education as a whole is an afterthought. It’s just something to fill the “in-between” time. Some students seemed mystified that I expected any learning to occur at all. For so many American students, “college” is just another consumer item. The time they spend in class is a service. I am the “server.” They’ve paid for the class. My job, like any waiter, is to ensure customer satisfaction. If the patron of a restaurant orders a filet mignon, it’s his prerogative to watch the Yankees game while he eats it. And if the chef implores him to turn off the game and really enjoy the steak, it follows that the guest will see this as an imposition. Nevertheless, if the game is turned off, the patron still gets the enjoyment of eating the steak. But what happens when the waiter asks him to do something he doesn’t enjoy— like washing his dishes? That’d be an outrage. School can’t be reduced to an exercise in customer service. --> This is why school can’t be reduced to an exercise in customer service: a serious education requires students to do many things they don’t want to do. Adding insult to injury, it’s not enough just to do those things: students are expected to do them well . In short, education is a job . Trying to maintain academic standards in this environment creates a lot of dissatisfied customers. The customer isn’t always right, but he always thinks he is. This transactional mindset now dominates our colleges and universities. This was the “future” we chose for education when we forced all schooling online in 2020. The resulting decline in student performance is well documented, but the damage done to the vocation of education is less noticed. What was lost is what Dr. Johnson wanted to preserve: students for whom the pursuit of education is a spiritual commitment. He wanted (and deserved) students who would put learning first because they saw it as an end in itself. He didn’t want students who were in it for a diploma, for an increase in pay, for this or that job, or for something to occupy their extra time. Simply put, he wanted students in the true sense of the word. It took almost three decades, but man…he showed me. Adam Ellwanger is a full professor who studies rhetoric, writing, and politics at the University of Houston-Downtown. The post Education as an Afterthought appeared first on The James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal .

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