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[Frumple]

Yeah... it's generally fair to note that the first good chunk of college in the US tends toward being "High School Mark 2" with a somewhat more flexible schedule (which, being fair, is a bit of a blessing.). Things (tend towards) improve(ment) once you get the general education out of the way and can settle in to your major (and most of the folks that aren't going to finish their degree this go around have been drummed out, massively improving class atmosphere) and suchlike.

Not sure about other countries, though. Maybe it's better up north (_{hahaha, doubtful.}).

[Flying Dice]

As a point of some relevance, I enrolled in my uni's honors program specifically to avoid that, and I was taking 300 level courses in my freshman year. So, small class size, professors interested in their material (and in getting good evaluations, which is a whole 'nother rant), and it was like that. I shudder to think what things would have been like if I had done the normal university studies curriculum.


Onward:

FUCKING STUDENT EVALUATIONS. They may very well be one of the WORST ideas which has ever crossed the mind of a new-age bureaucrat, stifling professors by making their continued employment based on how much their students liked them and the course. How much more IDIOTIC could this possibly be!? The best damned classes I've EVER had were the ones where the professor didn't give two shits if the students were insulted or offended, and wouldn't hesitate to tell someone that their stupid idea WAS FUCKING STUPID. I know how so many of my dastardly peers think, and they wouldn't hesitate for a moment to give a negative review to a professor just for grading them honestly. Those ROTTEN LITTLE SHITS deserve to be informed as SNARKILY AS POSSIBLE when they write or say something stupid. Cathartic pleasure aside, how is one supposed to learn if one's instructor is unwilling to be honestly critical because their job is on the line!?

[Skyrunner]

:/ College is that bad? >.>

[Frumple]

It's... a hell of a lot better than high school is, generally. It's got its downsides (especially before the folks that don't want to be there manage to find their excuse to drop out), but my personal experiences have been largely net positive.

[Araph]

...how is one supposed to learn if one's instructor is unwilling to be honestly critical because their job is on the line!?

While I agree about the idea of students evaluating teachers is terrible, I also have to say that there can be problems in the other direction. My AP United States History teacher is, by general consensus amongst the entire student body (I don't mean the people who hate it when teachers actually teach a hard class, because they never take an APUS. I mean the people whose opinions I actually respect, who can be objective and disregard bias), a terrible teacher, but she's tenured. Despite the fact that her lectures are meandering and often random, despite the fact that she grades work based on a glance at the assignment and how much she likes/dislikes the student in question, despite the fact that she fails to cover important topics on the AP test, she remains a teacher. Any profession other than teaching and she would have been fired many times over.

:/ College is that bad? >.>

I doubt it's that bad; this is the rage thread after all.

From what I've heard, it's a major step up from high school (particularly after the general education requirements are met). By the time you're getting farther along towards your major, the detestable people tend to get filtered out. Personally, I'm really looking forward to it!

[Euld]

College is neither useless nor the magic pill that will make your dreams (or dream job) come true.  You really have to find the right school, be willing to put in a lot of effort, and accept the fact you may have to take extra time to ensure you'll get the proper job experience you're looking for.

[Flying Dice]

It's not great, but it's also a heck of a lot better than high school. What you make of it, more or less.

...how is one supposed to learn if one's instructor is unwilling to be honestly critical because their job is on the line!?

While I agree about the idea of students evaluating teachers is terrible, I also have to say that there can be problems in the other direction. My AP United States History teacher is, by general consensus amongst the entire student body (I don't mean the people who hate it when teachers actually teach a hard class, because they never take an APUS. I mean the people whose opinions I actually respect, who can be objective and disregard bias), a terrible teacher, but she's tenured. Despite the fact that her lectures are meandering and often random, despite the fact that she grades work based on a glance at the assignment and how much she likes/dislikes the student in question, despite the fact that she fails to cover important topics on the AP test, she remains a teacher. Any profession other than teaching and she would have been fired many times over.

I completely agree. My issue is that student evaluations are a major portion of the considerations re: employment status for professors. I know of at least one department at my uni that uses student evaluations as the only tool for professor evaluation. Last semester a tenured professor in that department was given his final warning and a semester to attempt to bring evaluations up. Thankfully, mine is more sensible, and the evaluations only count for ~1/3 of the considerations.

On the other, I've had an eerily similar experience. My I.B. history teacher was, among other things, prone to lecturing in a language composed of mumbles and one-syllable exclamations, regularly changed his information between the point of concluding a unit and giving the exam (Once, as a test, I cheated with a sheet of his definitions and identifications, word for word. Something like 3/4 of them were marked as being incorrect.), and graded certain students much more harshly than the rest of the section. Just about the only good point about him was that he assigned readings from Zinn's A People's History of the United States.

[Kadzar]

Motherfucking printer needing motherfucking color ink to print in motherfucking black-and-white.

[da_nang]

Motherfucking printer needing motherfucking color ink to print in motherfucking black-and-white.

Tell me about it. Luckily, I managed to configure the printer settings for my Canon MP550 and fix it to some degree.

[DrPoo]

Had another argument with my parents.
It always starts when i tell about something positive that has happended with me. They will always drown it in shit about how lazy or unruly i am(im not, im unlucky).

For example, when i told them about [redacted band name] wanted me to write their lyrics my mom would go insane and tell me how i am a stupid, satanic, dimwitted piece of shit i am and that k should clean their room or my guitar would get thrown in the trash.

They call me egocentric, egoistic, evil, stupid, weak, insane and idiot.
What my mom dosent get that its her who makes bad excuses for not vacuuming, who sits on her iPad all day onFacebook with the TV in the background, its her who always screams and starts fights, its her who never walks the dog and her who spends 50 minutes showering.

All i want to do is do my fucking homework, do my fucking chores, and relax.
What do i get? Even more punishments that they then claim to be for my protection...

They claim they are trying to make me less lonely. What those stupid motherfuckers dont get is that without my computer i AM FUCKING LONELY, THEN I AM FRIENDLESS, THEN I AM ISOLATED AND YET THEY KEEP PUSHING MORE AND MORE RESTRICTIONS ON IT

They think i am lonely because of the computer. Im not. I just cant bear those ASSHOLES in my area.
Fuck them, REALLY. Fuck them.

Theres so much shit they do and this sounds like nothing but i amso angry that written language cannot describe the ammount ofRAAAAAGE

[Jerick]

They claim they are trying to make me less lonely. What those stupid motherfuckers dont get is that without my computer i AM FUCKING LONELY, THEN I AM FRIENDLESS, THEN I AM ISOLATED AND YET THEY KEEP PUSHING MORE AND MORE RESTRICTIONS ON IT

They think i am lonely because of the computer. Im not. I just cant bear those ASSHOLES in my area.
Fuck them, REALLY. Fuck them.

I am in a somewhat similar situation only I'm legaly an adult and own my own computer so I have the fortune of being able to tell them to fuck off. But my parents are convinced that the time I spend on this computer is stopping me from going out and making "real friends", Now I live in a small ancient rural village with the nearest town being Drogheda which is considered by largely everone to be a shit hole, this is accurate. The only people my age who have lingered there or in this small village are not the kind of people I want to asscioate with. It is only on the internet or in collage do I ever find like minded people. Parents need to learn that the internet has become the primary social platform for the newer generations and cutting them off from it is cutting them off from comunicating with their friends.

They call me egocentric, egoistic, evil, stupid, weak, insane and idiot.
What my mom dosent get that its her who makes bad excuses for not vacuuming, who sits on her iPad all day onFacebook with the TV in the background, its her who always screams and starts fights, its her who never walks the dog and her who spends 50 minutes showering.

It's likely a form of deflection, we humans are very bad at admiting our flaws especialy when they cause us pain. It's possible she might be upset that she can't motivate herself to do simple things like vacuuming, yet can't admit to herself there is a problem so instead she takes it out on someone closeby and blames them for her own faults. Now this is just a theory based on the little info provided and i could be very wrong.

[Slayerhero90]

Had another argument with my parents.
It always starts when i tell about something positive that has happended with me. They will always drown it in shit about how lazy or unruly i am(im not, im unlucky).

For example, when i told them about [redacted band name] wanted me to write their lyrics my mom would go insane and tell me how i am a stupid, satanic, dimwitted piece of shit i am and that k should clean their room or my guitar would get thrown in the trash.

They call me egocentric, egoistic, evil, stupid, weak, insane and idiot.
What my mom dosent get that its her who makes bad excuses for not vacuuming, who sits on her iPad all day onFacebook with the TV in the background, its her who always screams and starts fights, its her who never walks the dog and her who spends 50 minutes showering.

All i want to do is do my fucking homework, do my fucking chores, and relax.
What do i get? Even more punishments that they then claim to be for my protection...

They claim they are trying to make me less lonely. What those stupid motherfuckers dont get is that without my computer i AM FUCKING LONELY, THEN I AM FRIENDLESS, THEN I AM ISOLATED AND YET THEY KEEP PUSHING MORE AND MORE RESTRICTIONS ON IT

They think i am lonely because of the computer. Im not. I just cant bear those ASSHOLES in my area.
Fuck them, REALLY. Fuck them.

Theres so much shit they do and this sounds like nothing but i amso angry that written language cannot describe the ammount ofRAAAAAGE

As I've said before, we need to get Chuck Norris, Saxton Hale, Brian Blessed, and Matt Shultz together. The awesome/ham will be a convincing argument.

[Hanslanda]

Had another argument with my parents.
It always starts when i tell about something positive that has happended with me. They will always drown it in shit about how lazy or unruly i am(im not, im unlucky).

For example, when i told them about [redacted band name] wanted me to write their lyrics my mom would go insane and tell me how i am a stupid, satanic, dimwitted piece of shit i am and that k should clean their room or my guitar would get thrown in the trash.

They call me egocentric, egoistic, evil, stupid, weak, insane and idiot.
What my mom dosent get that its her who makes bad excuses for not vacuuming, who sits on her iPad all day onFacebook with the TV in the background, its her who always screams and starts fights, its her who never walks the dog and her who spends 50 minutes showering.

All i want to do is do my fucking homework, do my fucking chores, and relax.
What do i get? Even more punishments that they then claim to be for my protection...

They claim they are trying to make me less lonely. What those stupid motherfuckers dont get is that without my computer i AM FUCKING LONELY, THEN I AM FRIENDLESS, THEN I AM ISOLATED AND YET THEY KEEP PUSHING MORE AND MORE RESTRICTIONS ON IT

They think i am lonely because of the computer. Im not. I just cant bear those ASSHOLES in my area.
Fuck them, REALLY. Fuck them.

Theres so much shit they do and this sounds like nothing but i amso angry that written language cannot describe the ammount ofRAAAAAGE

Your parents are abusive. Period. You need to get away from them as fast as possible.

You are a good person. Period. Don't listen to what they say to you. People that are fucking shitty always want to bring people that aren't fucking shitty down to their level so they can say, "Look! I'm not bad! Everyone is like this!" This is something you should fight with every ounce of strength you have, for the rest of your days. Fighting against shitty people and their attempts to make you shitty is one of the best things a person can do, because it means you want to improve yourself and be better then they think you can be.

You. Are. Not. Friendless. We may not be able to communicate with you, you may be isolated, but you are not friendless. You are not unthought of. We made a thread for you. Just for you. We know shit sucks for you. We can't understand, but we can sympathize. We can offer advice. We are here for you, night and day. People from every little corner of the earth, from every walk of life, are here all the time. If you need to talk to someone, I am absolutely certain you could find someone to talk to on here at any time. I'm somewhat less confident that you could get phone numbers or somesuch, to be able to talk to people when you don't have the computer, but I would be willing to PM you my number if it would help.

"Do not go gentle into that good night... Rage, rage against the dying of the light..."

[Akura]

Been a shitty week. First, think a I figured out why money has been missing from my Visa card: they're charging a $.50 fee on each transaction, even when I buy small things like $1 worth of candy. A fee they neglected to warn me about when I got the card, especially when all their Prepaid Debit and gift cards specifically advertise "NO FEES!".

Second, I've had weird back pain all week. Not sure why, but sitting is especially hard.

Third, found out that the guy who killed a family member(one I'm assuming wasn't a total shitbag) got about a year and a half. Reading the newspaper article on it, her immediate family pressed for the maximum sentence(which is still a slap on the wrist in my opinion) for hit-and-run while DUI, resulting in the death of someone, particularly since this guy has had his license suspended four times for DUI and was suspended at the time of the accident. Right now, the victim's 2-year-old daughter is living with my aunt. This girl is still going to be too young to explain what happened to her mother when this guy gets out.

And the reason the judge let him off easy? He said "I'm sorry. I take responsibility". I'm going to stop here, since the rant I have on that might run afoul of the forum rules.

[RedKing]

I think if I was the judge, my response would be "You've had your license suspended four times, and were driving with a suspended license at the time you killed someone. No, you don't take responsibility. That's the problem."



EDIT: Saw the other day that the NRA supports a national computerized database of the mentally ill.
THE IRONY, IT BURNS!!