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I have graded over 200 essays in the past two weeks. As a college instructor of writing for the last 23 years, I think I know what elements make college writing. Yet the last two semester I& #39;ve seen an uptick in, and I& #39;ll say it, mostly white, male students who
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can& #39;t write their way out of a wet paper bag (terrible analogy because it is a situation that is highly improbable, and writing wouldn& #39;t help one escape such a predicament). The point is, I& #39;ve had quite a few white, male students tell me how great of a writer they are
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and that they don& #39;t understand my expectations or my grading scale. It is rather simple. I expect to be able to read and understand what I& #39;m reading. An A or B paper will have superior vocabulary, and much more extensive explanatory writing than the average. Mechanics
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punctuation, and grammar will be controlled. At the higher level, say an A paper, the only errors I will find will be the occasional typo. A C paper will have a few errors. A D paper will have errors all over the place. But I think this is something just given.
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But I always allow students to evaluate their own work. Of course the first essay of a term, students give themselves the highest grade. But as we continue through the semester, students become much more cognizant of their own efforts, and I tend to agree with their
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assessments much more. But there is a phenomena happening in my courses. White, male students, especially (not exclusively) are becoming much more aggressive and insistent. They are often offended when their work is deemed "average". I suspect that there is a corelation
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between white, male student self-assessment and our current president& #39;s leadership style (or lack of leadership or style). After all, he is mediocre at best, yet has never once honestly assessed his performance as the evidence is clear that he is a failure at all endeavors.
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This behavior makes it impossible to then have an honest and productive relationship with these students as all they want is to have validation that their lackluster abilities are indeed superior. And this is the failure of the educational system since I& #39;ve been in it
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both as a student and now as an instructor. Persons of color have always had to prove their worth, even when their work was superior to those of their peers from the white community. White students, however, have often been given a pass because, well, they
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have the benefit of the power structure and that endorses their mediocrity. Ultimately, what this is doing in my situation is forcing me to spend more time on "average" work than helping those who can benefit most from my expertise.
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I don& #39;t have a solution other than I don& #39;t engage in this behavior. I don& #39;t reward what I deem as bad behavior. But I can tell you that this is something that can be directly attributed to our horrendous leadership at the federal level. And while this is a
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a small issue in comparison to the much bigger ones that we have, it is a canary in the coal mine (to borrow an analogy). This behavior will remain with us for quite some time, and we must be vigilant in the future to call out white mediocrity as it has been proven to
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deadly for many of us. At this moment, it has killed over 18,000 (over 300 since I started this thread) from one disease that we were warned about but failed to take action upon. We need good thinkers in the future. I hope that& #39;s you.
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