Usually I hate having to anser student e-mails about grades they think they didn't deserve.
I just had an email from the homophobic woman who decided to write about same sex marriage. Her stellar arguments included things like, "gay people know they are doing something wrong, this makes them unhappy and angry and their anger is bad for society' -- blah blah blah. She probably thinks Rick Santorum and Ann Coulter make good, common-sense arguments. She scares me.
In her case, she's actually lucky I didn't drop her from the class for non-attendance. I gave her a break because she's a single mom who says she has a sick kid... I hoped she'd learn from the rest of the class and open her closed little fundy-Christian mind just a crack. I also hoped she'd follow directions and include arguments for same sex marriage in her paper.
She didn't open her mind, nor did she include the arguments in favor of same sex marriage.
Since I can't grade her down for not opening her mind, at least I can grade her down for not following my directions to include both sides of the issue.
Sadly, her grade was below what she wanted to get out of the class... just barely... and her crappy attendance didn't give me reason to increase her grade.
It was kind of fun to write this e-mail. It is more fun since I have tenure and a complaint to my Dean won't go anyplace. Just in case, when I graded her paper, I papercliped her first verion, with my comments, to her final version. If she complains, she can't say she wasn't warned.... haaa haaa. Take that.
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1 comment:
I have seen the same thing in my Critical Thinking class. When are students going to realize that they must make reasonable arguments with solid information to back it up? And, while they don't have to agree with a position, they certainly have to respect it and give the same level of credibility as their own!
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