Why are you here

Have any of you that went to college ever met a person and wondered "How did you get here and why are you here?"

The other day I was sitting in my child psychology class and this woman who is...lets just say a few eggs short of a dozen pulls out her cell phone and starts writing text messages in calss. The problem is its not on silent, she has it on the loudest setting and it beeps every time she hits a button and soon the entire class room is glaring at her to turn off the cell phone. The professor, being totally dumbfounded that someone could be this rude didn't really do anything just glared daggers at her. The funny thing is she was hunched over in her desk trying to hide it, which only made it more obvious. After about the 6th time she started writing a new message someone reached over and took her phone from her. The entire class applauded and we went back to learning about intelligence in late childhood(6-12 years of age, a very interesting topic). She on the other hand stood up, walked over to the girl that took her phone, called her a b**** and then took the phone back.

Does she not realize where she is...I mean really, you in class sweetheart act at least a little civil. Thankfully she didn't write any more texts for the rest of the class.

And if you heard some of the things that come out of her mouth...you would really wonder how on earth she got here...I have one idea but I'm not going to mention it(blond bimbo, male admissions officer, you put the two together).

Granted University of Wisconsin-Platteville isn't exactally Yale but we really should stop letting people with the IQ's of slugs in our school, there the reason we have the horrid reputation we have. We graduate some of the top Engineers in the country, two of which have gone on to win the Noble prize, and yet we get called a joke school because of people like that.

Anyone else ever had people in there classes that make you wonder...?

Truth be told the professor should have thrown her out of the class. She should only be permitted back into the room when she is prepared to leave the phone and her foul mouth outside. No discussion. If she's disrupting the entire class, then it's up to the professor and the school to protect the interests of the majority.

I feel the same way but some teachers are so scared right now to act on the authority given to them by the state they work in and the university they are employed by. I've had professors that will actually answer someone else's cell phone if it goes off in their class...that always makes for a good laugh. I completely agree the teacher should have thrown her out. This same girl about a year ago pulled out her ringing cell phone and answered it during a final exam. The professor asked her to put the phone away and she went "Do you mind I'm on the phone" really rudely. And that was the end of that, she ended up having a 30 minute conversation on the phone.

This is unbelievable! You say it's considered a "joke school" because of people like this rude girl -- but it sounds to me like it's because of these cowardly professors!

There's no controversy here, nothing for a professor to be afraid of -- the classroom is for class, and anything else needs to be taken outside. Why should that be difficult to enforce?

If anything, I'd think they'd be afraid of repercussions from students who complain that their grade is invalid because a test was disrupted!

Oh it gets better, not just student rudeness but plain stupidity.

I know I am a little bias towards this area because I have talent that most people don't when it comes to math but...I'm sorry if you can't do simple math you really shouldn't be here. I once got kicked out of a computer lab where I was working on a project for my 300 level computer science class so that this professor could teach her class how to Solve simple linear equations(like 3a=6)...I was livid.

A) She didn't have the room reserved
B) By the time your in college you should know how to basic math(add, subtract, multiply, and divide). I'm not expecting people to do what I did and come in ready to take calculus but come on people its simple math and your in college now.
C) I thought I should have presidence because i was doing something actually important.

But regardless I just smiled and left the room, fuming to my self to find another lab that had the programing software I needed.

I meet people everyday that I think are too stupid to share the air that I breathe! I honestly don't know how some people have managed to make it so far into their life span.

How old is she?

The girl is about 21-22, but she is acting like she is 15.

It never ceases to amaze me how people can be so rude and self-centered!!! I agree, I am shocked that she is even in college. Sorry you have to deal with people like that and that the professors basically ignore it. That lady needs a wake up call.

When I went back to school at 43 for Massage Therapy, I could not believe how some of the students acted. their attitude was "I am paying to be here, and I should get to do what I want." We had to wear burgundy scrubs in our program, but many of the girls would wear the bottoms, rolled down all the way to their bikini line, and tops with spaghetti straps and no bras. No wonder people think massage therapy is still a word for prostitution. A woman my age informed one of our instructors that she sat at work all day, and her breaks could not be limited, and what is the difference if she handed in her work. This was a very hands on course, and you had to be there to see what was going on. She was dumb as a box of rocks, and complained when her grades were bad, like she was buying a grade since she was paying to be there. I worked my butt off, drove 3 hours a day, worked in the school clinic to pay a portion of my tuition, and people were complaining about me getting good grades while theirs were not nearly so good. I was working 14-16 hour days including my commute for those grades, and got a higher score on my state boards than my instructor that taught at several very good schools. She was proud of me, my classmates accused me of sucking up or cheating.
Is it like that everywhere? People feeling entitled to their grades just because they show up and have opposable thumbs?

Originally Posted by algebrapro18

Oh it gets better, not just student rudeness but plain stupidity.

I know I am a little bias towards this area because I have talent that most people don't when it comes to math but...I'm sorry if you can't do simple math you really shouldn't be here. I once got kicked out of a computer lab where I was working on a project for my 300 level computer science class so that this professor could teach her class how to Solve simple linear equations(like 3a=6)...I was livid.

A) She didn't have the room reserved
B) By the time your in college you should know how to basic math(add, subtract, multiply, and divide). I'm not expecting people to do what I did and come in ready to take calculus but come on people its simple math and your in college now.
C) I thought I should have presidence because i was doing something actually important.

But regardless I just smiled and left the room, fuming to my self to find another lab that had the programing software I needed.

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Coming from someone who is "mathmatically challenged" (my degree is in English, although you probably couldn't tell from some of my posts! ), she WAS doing something important. She was teaching, which is her job and what she gets paid to do. People who are brilliant in other fields aren't always good in math, and may need a refresher course. I know when I see numbers and letters together in an equation, my brain freezes (but, even I could figure out 3a=6! Took me a second though. )

Originally Posted by algebrapro18

I feel the same way but some teachers are so scared right now to act on the authority given to them by the state they work in and the university they are employed by.

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I understand that they are afraid and know, from all the press of college shootings, why they are afraid. But they have to take a stand. They're getting walked on by little punk brats who grew up in an 'I'm entitled to do whatever I want' environment. Since this has been an ongoing thing, go talk to the professor during his/her office hours. Maybe even bring at least one other with you. If the teacher still wavers, then march yourselves (assuming you bring others with you) to the Department head... that person has even more authority and can possibly do something. At the very least, they can talk to the professor as well.

I had to do that in college due to an extremely inept new professor. The Dept. Head had no clue what this jerk was doing until I started talking to the Dept. Secretary. She passed the info along to her boss. I felt more comfortable talking to her, so she recorded everything. He was let go at the end of the year because he was a horrid teacher (you do not verbally abuse your students). Now, I'm considering going back for my graduate work and becoming an English Professor. ON the syllabus and the boards first day, I'll remember to put "No cell phones allowed. 1st warning, you get to turn it off. 2nd warning, it gets taken away for the duration of class. 3rd: you get kicked out for that class." If my future students don't like it, they can drop the class. I work in a library right now... we get all kinds of rudeness there.

Originally Posted by algebrapro18

I'm sorry if you can't do simple math you really shouldn't be here. I once got kicked out of a computer lab where I was working on a project for my 300 level computer science class so that this professor could teach her class how to Solve simple linear equations(like 3a=6)...I was livid.

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Ahem... I've never been the best at math... but 3a=6 is not basic math... beginnings of algebra (well, pre-algebra), but when you add those letters into the mix, it's not Basic Math. I'm actually very good at math, when I want to be, but it's not my forte (now, English, OTOH). I was held back in high school math classes and was never allowed to go beyond basic math... primarily because my guidance counselor and teachers never bothered to try to challenge me. They labeled me 'stupid' and figured everyone was happy. I'm not. I probably have a higher IQ than those same teachers. I'm not stupid, I'm actually very intelligent. I'm not slow, I'm just methodically perfectionistic. I want to get that equation/formula done right the first time.

Although, she shouldn't have been using the lab... if she had her whole class... isn't that what the classroom is for?

Originally Posted by krazy kat2

I was working 14-16 hour days including my commute for those grades, and got a higher score on my state boards than my instructor that taught at several very good schools. She was proud of me, my classmates accused me of sucking up or cheating.
Is it like that everywhere? People feeling entitled to their grades just because they show up and have opposable thumbs?

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Yes, unfortunately. Rudeness and backstabbing has become a way of life. If someone is doing better than that person, they automatically think 'that person is cheating to do that.' Entitlement for silly stuff is the norm for the 'kids' these days...

Oh, to bring back corpora- oh, that comment would probably send this thread to IMO. Never mind...

teens (the average that I've seen, at least) have no sense of boundaries. Many probably grew up with no enforcement of house rules... and now that they're unleashed into society, we have spoiled rotten brats who don't just break the rules set upon them, but they flaunt the breaking of those rules. Is everyone of that age like this? No. But far too many are.

I have to get my bee-hind to work. let's just hope the teenagers decide not to torment us at the library today...

Amanda

Yeah Libraries are bad...I had a couple of friends lose their virginities at the library by my high school...though thats a different topic.

It just really annoys me to have to sit in classes with students that don't want to be there...don't get me wrong their are days where I don't want to be there but I want to be in school at least. And I'm sorry for the sexist statement but at least on this campus its mostly the girls that don't give a rats ass about school, their to busy sleeping with the majority of the Engineering department, or stumbling down to Second street(ALL the bars are on that street) and then walking back and getting sick in front of my apartment. I really think Platteville, which prides its self on being a small school, should really think about some of the people there letting in here. If your best assets are your breasts, butt, and thighs sorry sister but hit the road we need intelligent girls here. One of the major problems is that this is an Engineering school thats all people do here(pretty much, education is also big) and there are a lot of women who don't think they can make it in Engineering so they go somewhere else.

Of course on the other side, if your smart why would you go to a school with such a bad reputation when UW-Madison is one of the best schools in the Big 10 and is only an hour away from here.

And the professors really need to step up and stop expecting so little from the students...I know I am going to regret going on this tangent but really...I'm in my fourth year and I'm a little insulted that most of my professors flat out don't believe that I can write more than a 2 page paper coherently. We need to do a much better weeding out the people that shouldn't be here by making more of our classes(especially the gen ed classes) passable while drunk. Hell most of the students do show up drunk to some of my classes...and again I wonder why bother coming at all.

our maths class teacher quite because the kids in my class used too go on theire phones stand on tables and throw paper planes and draw on the board mens genitals, apparanty she had a nervous breakdown,

and the next teacher didnt last long he told the class were all failures and should give up

We gave one of our teachers a nervous breakdown. We were 13 at the time, I think she taught us dance. I don't remember much more about her.

During the first year of my GCSEs, my English class who were top set had a newly qualified English teacher. She was useless.
We studied A View From The Bridge, which consisted of us taking weeks to read the short play, then we copied the spark notes analysis of the play into our work books, and had to write an essay analysing the play. She read our essays, corrected just our spelling mistakes and paragraphing errors, and then sent them off to be examined.
We all got Ds and Es.
We complained, started taking our work to other teachers to be marked/critiqued, and suddenly we were getting As and Bs again.
She was fired fairly soon afterwards.


If the students were at the university to study a maths related course (ie engineering) then they should be fluent in basic algebra.

I'll go back to the students. I went to Cornell as an undergrad. In my freshman dorm, there was a woman who kept asking what we got on exams we had. If she didn't get the highest grade, which she usually did because she had no life outside (or inside) the library, she was devastated. She had a nervous breakdown and never returned. Her roommate, a really nice girl from OH, who had a life, took a leave of absence for a year because the roommate drove her crazy. She worked in an amusement park for the year off, returned happy and graduated.

On to grad school at the U of M. I lived in a beautiful dorm. My roommate was getting a Ph.D in nuclear engineering/physics. She was so smart but boy did we party! However, we had an adjoining double and one of the women in the adjoining room, who was an undergrad math major, had a conversation with us about twins we knew - a girl and boy. She said, "I wonder if they are identical?"

Lastly, there was a guy in my MBA program that everyone hated. He was the type that always talked to make sure everyone knew how smart he was (he wasn't) and the one that asked questions requiring long answers at the end of each class.
He was a finance major. We were in a business econ class and the professor was talking about the musicians union strike at the Met. He raised his hand and said that the strike wasn't about money it was about the musicians just wanting to work fewer hours. I raised my hand and said, "If the musicians are working 5 days a week for, say, $100 and want to work 4 days for the same $100 then they are getting a 25% daily pay raise, so it is about money" The entire class me.

Originally Posted by algebrapro18

The other day I was sitting in my child psychology class and this woman who is...lets just say a few eggs short of a dozen pulls out her cell phone and starts writing text messages in calss. The problem is its not on silent, she has it on the loudest setting and it beeps every time she hits a button and soon the entire class room is glaring at her to turn off the cell phone. The professor, being totally dumbfounded that someone could be this rude didn't really do anything just glared daggers at her. The funny thing is she was hunched over in her desk trying to hide it, which only made it more obvious. After about the 6th time she started writing a new message someone reached over and took her phone from her. The entire class applauded and we went back to learning about intelligence in late childhood(6-12 years of age, a very interesting topic). She on the other hand stood up, walked over to the girl that took her phone, called her a b**** and then took the phone back.

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err, well, i had similar happen. i explained to them press on more button , and i will break every finger on there hand.i have taken people phones, taken the battery out handed it back, tossed one phone into Pacific Ocean.

what can i say i was a hot head when young.
maybe the army was right, i dont play well with others.

Without reading most of the responces, Can you spell EF?

Spell EF? What about response?

And another thing.... A phone in the Pacific Ocean? Why didn't you throw more in there?

I'm sorry but just because someone isn't good at maths that doesn't mean they shouldn't go to university.

Basic math is adding and subtracting, at school maths was my weakest subject. I got 2% in my algebra test and i could never learn it. For me numbers and alphabet do not go together.
But there for i excelled in other subjects.

I agree that most people are ignorant these days but if your professor wont do anything about it then you have to go to the head department.