Ask a lecturer II.

ecksor wrote:

Yes, and you're disagreeing based on the fact that you got a bad reaction. That's fallacious reasoning. You are a sample size of one. By analogy, it doesn't matter how much experimental evidence supports a particular conclusion if the experiment is badly designed to begin with.

That's sophomoric nit-picking. It's not an experiment in any scientific sense (obviously).

Students (and, perhaps, others) on here knew exactly nothing about me other than that I was a lecturer. Yet it has been quite clear that they harbour a great deal of resentment against lecturers. Not against me personally: again, they didn't know anything about me personally other than that I was a lecturer.

That tells me that my experience here can be generalised and that any lecturer who dared to come into the playpen would be rewarded for his trouble with similar treatment.

Amz wrote:

So you're not currently a lecturer?

Yes, as I stated in my first post and several times afterwards, I am currently a lecturer.

OfflerCrocGod wrote:

Incorrect, there is no shortage of people disliking a supercilious, arrogant and obnoxious person.

Try reading the thread again from the beginning and check out who was supercilious to whom first. I suggest it began with syke's 'interesting opinion' comment, which could hardly have been more dismissive.

Amz wrote:

There's no need to talk down to me like that.

I was merely trying to confirm that you were currently a lecturer.

What is it with people on this board? Nothing in my explanation could be construed as 'talking down' to you. I simply explained, since you seemed to have trouble with it, that what I said didn't imply that I had ceased being a lecturer.

Actually, what I did was first answer that I am still a lecturer and then, when you seemed to indicate that the tense of my verb was troublesome, I attempted to explain why it wasn't and added another example to make it clear.

[edit: I did this mostly because your sig has a link to something called the 'English Language Forum' so I assumed you wanted a clarification]

This really does confirm something I've noticed quite a bit in UCD students: an anti-intellectual mindset (and I don't say this as an insult, I say it because it is widely recognised and discussed among my colleagues and you ought to know about it; I promised I'd be honest). It seems to be getting worse. It is quite frequent for UCD students to confuse knowing things or expressing an informed opinion, on the one hand, with being haughty, high and mighty and arrogant on the other. But they are not the same thing. I haven't put myself above you just because I tell you something you don't know.

Consider what happens in some tutorials: students sit around and nobody says anything because to express an informed opinion or, god forbid, to show some enthusiasm for the material is to be a 'kiss-ass' or a 'show-off'. This attitude is reflected in the question I was asked earlier: how do we lecturers feel about the incessant question-asker? I take it from my experience and from the fact that the question was asked that students generally have nothing but contempt for the incessant question-asker. Yet, as a rule, lecturers love them because they are the ones who don't allow themselves to be intimidated out of an education by groupthink and cliquish anti-intellectualism.

For as long as you think that knowing things or believing them in an informed way and saying them is nothing more than pomposity, you'll be cheating only yourselves.

peachypants wrote:

maybe if we were still in secondary school. this is third level education mate, and i have to say that i don't agree with that statement.

I'm afraid that you'll find that many if not most of my colleagues don't agree with you and are actually quite alarmed by the anti-intellectual culture among the students. Check out the thread on 'missing lectures' to see what I'm talking about: students increasingly see UCD as one big party that is also a credential factory. There is less and less of a culture of learning--one where learning is valued above almost all else. The scarce attendance of students for even the most prestigious academic speakers is testimony to this. Now, you say you're not in secondary school. And you are right. But far too often my students are unable to shed the secondary school mindset. Take, for example, what you write here:

there are often times where i sit in my tutorial and say nothing purely because i'm not confident enough in my opinions on the subject being discussed.

Of course you're not confident in your opinions on the subject. That's why you're there! So why are you not the 'incessant question-asker' in that class? Is there shame in not knowing? If we all knew already, what need would there be for class?

there have been times where, like you say, nobody talks. a lot of people aren't that comfortable talking in small groups especially when the majority of times we are in tutorials with people that we don't know.

Well, as you say, it's not secondary school. If college is not a place to shed insular and provincial habits, what is?

i seriously doubt that people fail to talk because they are worried that people will make "kissey-kissey" noises or mutter "teachers pet" under their breath.

OK, then I ask you: what are they afraid of? Or is it just that they don't care? And before any of you are tempted to turn this into some sort of referendum on me or my teaching, I can tell you that I get on very well with my students, get very favorable evaluations and, in general like teaching and like my students, most of whom are dead sound people. But most of my colleagues, if they are being candid, will voice the same complaints. In other words, this is not just me.

you clearly underestimate the majority of students in this college and to be honest so far you have deserved the hostile reaction that you have received.

Well, I don't agree with either of those statements.

but you need to realise that the majority of people in UCD are there because they want to be and they want to do well.

I believe you are right both that they want to be there and that they want to do well. But that's not incompatible with seeing the place as a party palace (so you want to be there) and a credential dispenser (and you want to do well). What I question is whether more than a small minority want to learn, have an enthusiasm and a thirst to know rather than simply being interested in getting their degree with the least amount of bother.

Amz wrote:

Do you not understand why people might have trouble accepting that you're a lecturer?

No, I do not understand it. That's because: 1) I am a lecturer; 2) it would be extremely difficult for anyone who is not exactly what I say I am to be able to post what I have posted in this thread. Not impossible, I grant you. But next to impossible.

Given the nature of this site anyone could register and post claiming to be a lecturer and know enough to "blag" their way through a few questions posed to them by "students".

True, but there's such a thing as taking skepticism too far.

I accept that anonymity is important to you, but because of this desire to remain anonymous it is impossible for people to confirm that you’re a lecturer thus anything you post will be viewed with some scepticism.

OK, well, what do you think? Do you think I am or not? Do I seem like I'm faking it?

Unless you can prove somehow that you are in fact a lecturer you’re just going to have to accept that.

I offered to prove it--provided I could retain anonymity--to the mod who first locked the thread. I offered to send him a scan, with all identifying information blanked out, of a copy of my pay bulletin from any month in the last five years (his choice). He didn't choose to take me up on it.

The fact that you accused members of the medical faculty of having an “obvious arrogance” is not something that should be let go, as it is a generalisation that has no basis in fact. Syke was right to pull you up on this.

First, he didn't pull me up on this. He didn't call it into question at all and certainly not in any constructive way. Second, it wasn't an accusation and it wasn't directed at the entire medical faculty. It was directed at the current administration. And if you think it has no basis in fact, then I'll have to try to show you that it does. In any case, I can tell you that my colleagues in Arts and in Commerce and in Human Sciences are almost unanimous, as far as I can tell, in believing exactly what I've just said: that these people are arrogant in the extreme.

You corrected people’s spelling and grammar, you mocked people for not meeting your standards of English and assumed that they were not intelligent enough to discuss issues raised with you because of this.

I didn't assume it, I came that conclusion. There's a difference. I also did so on the basis of syke's general inarticulateness and the poverty of his arguments.

But really your bringing to bear things that happened very late in the thread: really only in my last post to syke. Basically, if you're going to go around calling someone an idiot, you'd better at least know how to spell it (no, I don't mean that literally).

You were greeted with hostility because it appeared that you were avoiding Syke et al’s questions and your tone was arrogant and somewhat dismissive.

I initially wanted to avoid them because they were rude and dismissive (and not questions at all). I was goaded into engaging with them. That was a mistake. But, again, let the record show that I was nothing but respectful until syke's post and that, by and large, I've been respectful to all other than those who disrespected me (syke, offlercrocgod, and a couple of others)

I’m assuming English is your first language? That may or may not be the case for everyone responding to your thread so a little tolerance would not go amiss.

Is it not the case for syke? If so, my apologies.

I sincerely hope that if any of my lecturers were to come to boards to post that they’d conduct themselves better than you have done in this thread.

You are certainly entitled to your opinion. But for all you know, I am one of your lecturers! I don't think I've behaved badly: I fought condescension with a smallish dose of the same but mostly with reasoned argument. That is more than I can say for syke.