Michael Wesch, a professor at Kansas State University, produced a video called “A vision of Students Today” depicting modern educational systems as impersonal, hopeless, and a waste of time. Wesch’s video featured students holding up signs with little notes giving the viewer insight into the student’s person life, and personal problems. The vast majority of the signs contained morbid messages; many implying that time spent in the classroom is a waste of time, most students claimed to be texting, or using Facebook through most of their class time. Though most of the signs contained student issues, some dealt with world issues, like poverty, making the students situations appear less dire. The video ended with the lingering statement “some have suggested that technology can save us” which was shown in negative fashion, indicating that the author of this video text feels just the opposite.
I think that this whole video was ridiculous; the majority of the problems that the students presented were of their own making. Many students indicated on their signs that they were distracted in class because of Facebook, which is a very fixable problem, all the student has to do to not be distracted by Facebook during class, is to not get on Facebook during class. One student says “I will read 8 books a year, and 1241 Facebook profiles” which does not seem to be relevant in any way to anything. The purpose of that statement seemed to be that we, as students, use more time socializing online than studying, or outside for class, which was an extremely obvious thing to say. To say that 8 books is not enough for a student to read in a year is extremely ignorant, if the professors feel that 8 books is all you need to be properly educated in their courses than that is the proper number to read, no matter how small it seems comparatively to your away from class reading. This video attempted to make an issue where there is none, it does not deserve to be viewed by anyone.
Welcome!
Welcome to our Eng 100 Blog “Conversations Beyond the Classroom”! The title of this blog refers to the community of active readers & collaborative learners we are creating by sharing our academic writing for Eng 100 with each other + a larger group of students, instructors, academics, and just about anybody who chooses to follow our blog! When you write and post your reader responses here (and, later, as you write your essays for the course), I encourage you to use this audience to conceptualize who you are writing for and, most important, how to communicate your ideas so that this group of academic readers and writers can easily follow your line of thinking. Think about it this way: What do you need to explain and articulate in order for the other bloggers to understand your response to the essays we’ve read in class? What does your audience need to know about those essays and the authors who wrote them? And how can you show your readers, in writing, which ideas you add to these “conversations” that take place in the texts we study?
As students of Eng 100, you will use this blog to begin conversations with other academic writers on campus (students and instructors alike). We become active readers of each other’s writing when we comment on posts here. And, best of all, we are using this space to share ideas! We encourage you to use this blog to further think through the topics and writing strategies you will be introduced to this quarter. As always, be sure to give credit to those people whose ideas you borrow for your own thinking and writing (you should do this in the blog by commenting on their post, but you will also be required to cite what you borrow from your peers/instructors if and when it winds up in your essays. More details on that later…).
Finally, keep in mind that writing to and for this audience is a good way to prepare for the panel of readers (faculty at WCC) who will be reading and assessing your writing portfolio at the end of the quarter. We hope that as a large group of active readers, we can better prepare each other for this experience. But, in the meantime, let’s have fun with it! I am really excited see how far we can take this together!
--Mary Hammerbeck, Instructor of Eng 100
As students of Eng 100, you will use this blog to begin conversations with other academic writers on campus (students and instructors alike). We become active readers of each other’s writing when we comment on posts here. And, best of all, we are using this space to share ideas! We encourage you to use this blog to further think through the topics and writing strategies you will be introduced to this quarter. As always, be sure to give credit to those people whose ideas you borrow for your own thinking and writing (you should do this in the blog by commenting on their post, but you will also be required to cite what you borrow from your peers/instructors if and when it winds up in your essays. More details on that later…).
Finally, keep in mind that writing to and for this audience is a good way to prepare for the panel of readers (faculty at WCC) who will be reading and assessing your writing portfolio at the end of the quarter. We hope that as a large group of active readers, we can better prepare each other for this experience. But, in the meantime, let’s have fun with it! I am really excited see how far we can take this together!
--Mary Hammerbeck, Instructor of Eng 100
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