Missouri Loves Company

Well, if not solved it, I can safely say that I know what to gripe about: aphorisms. We must eradicate aphorisms.

"Now you know, and knowing is half the battle." Actually, this is half of our problem. Children have been taught that all they have to do is to be aware, but not necessarily do anything, which brings me to my next aphorism.

I was walking to class this morning and passed the ROTC sergeants in the hallway. We exchanged the typical pleasantries, and when he asked how I was doing, I offerered that I was here and upright, so I must be okay. (I have a number of these banalities that roll off the tongue and allow me to pass amongst humans.) He replied, "Hey, man, showing up is half the fight."

These dang aphorisms are our problem.

We've been teaching kids for years to simply show up and know how to write their names on a piece of paper, but we haven't really taught them earn their keep. If all a student has to do is show up to get 50% of his grade, how can we possibly be surprised that we're ranked so low in education among comparable world powers? How many jobs are there in the world (or this country, or this city, or this neighborhood) wherein the only requirements for earning pay is to occupy space? Yet, this is exactly what we ask our students to do: show up and fill a seat and get a diploma.

I don't really have a solution for this, mind you. The great state of Texas has determined that the minimum grade of 50 is no longer state law, that students are supposed to get exactly what they earned in class. One would think that this is a good idea (and truth be told, I like this new law), but the law assumes that all students want to rack up straight A's and go to a traditional four-year university. The vast majority of students have little to no inclination to do this, nor do they have any clue that the cushion against failure they once had that has been removed. If we give a student anything lower than, say, a 35 or 40, that student cannot pass the semester and receive credit. Never mind that he could potentially make it up next semester if he maintains his grades; all the kid hears is that he can't pass, and he checks out. Now that kid is required to sit in a class he or she cannot possibly pass--and probably doesn't really understand anyway, which is why he failed in the first place--shuffle around increasingly difficult paperwork and feign interest while his idiot friends cavort and gambol outside the classroom in the sun.

I want to punch people who say that teaching is an easy job for people that can't do anything else. I want to punch them with a claw hammer.