Pretentious LA teachers

<p>Ok, so I don’t mean to brag but this is the only way for me to introduce what I want to talk about. </p>

<p>I’m currently in University and I have a perfect A+ average. I’m enrolled in some of the hardest courses there is to offer such as chemistry, and I get 96+ on exams. I excel in both the sciences and the arts; I have a 99 average in psychology, top of my class. </p>

<p>In the second part of my school year, I enrolled myself in a language arts course because I required a writing credit to graduate/enter most faculties. The general difficulty of university has been foreboding throughout, but especially that of the LA course because all throughout my life, I’ve had nothing but pretentious LA teachers almost inventing reasons to give me bad marks on my work. Well, university teachers must be slightly more dignified, no? Wrong. </p>

<p>My father writes articles for a living. Not just any articles; scientific articles of which some have been published in Nature; others in various prestigous journals and he is also known as a worldwide authority on a famously known disease (disease I will not mention due to possible identification), attributed to the quality of his writing and research. Before writing my first paper for the class, I thought to myself, “what better standards to set my research paper against than my father’s? Surely if he approves then my teacher must as well”. So I set my father’s standards as a reasonable benchmark - or so I thought. </p>

<p>After laboring over a 15 page research paper for nearly a month, I handed it into my father for review. He said that the writing was “very good”. I asked him if it was somewhat decent even by his standards, of which he replied “yes”. Obviously my paper was nowhere good enough to be published in Nature, but my hypercritical father had nothing bad to say about it, so that was good enough for me. I handed it in - proper format, grammar, spelling and everything - and waited a week for it to be graded. </p>

<p>Today, I got the grade back. 78%. What? That’s a joke right? A random bloke who worked on it for a day could’ve gotten that grade. I didn’t work twice as hard as I normally do for usually much harder assignments to get a measly 78%. No offense to those who do receieve such grades; objectively it’s adequate, but for me, it’s not in line with my normal grades. How stupid do you have to be to give an A+ student a 78 on an immaculate work? A work that I’m willing to bet my legs that no one in the class can match? I don’t need some pretentious loser to give me a 78 because he’s some weird sadist. </p>

<p>Honestly, what is with LA teachers? Are they actually that out of touch with reality? I haven’t spoken to the teacher yet but I guarantee he has some completely BS reason to give me that grade. “You forgot a comma, so I took off 22%”. Pig. People like this make me suggest taking LA out of the curriculum, it’s just some sink where useless pretentious teachers can aggregate and break people’s morales. ***, seriously.</p>

<p>Are you serious? YOU seem to be one of the most pretentious people I can imagine. Your post is now circulating around our college by email as the laughing stock of the day.
Get over yourself, work harder in the class, and you can probably keep your “perfect” record</p>

<p>People get published in Nature because they’ve made groundbreaking scientific discoveries, not because of their great language arts skills. (Especially given a lot of them are from outside the country and can’t write good grammar to save their lives.) If you want essay advice, you’d do better to ask a friend good at English. Or go to your writing center, if your college has one.</p>

<p>Well, if your dad writes articles for Nature and he thought your research paper was good, then it couldn’t have been that bad…</p>

<p>LA is certainly one of the most subjective classes a person can take. I have a HS friend who changes the style of his essays for every English class he goes into to suit the teacher. In one English class, he might have a very straightforward, detached style. In another class, he might write eloquent, emotional papers with run-on sentences. Experience tells me that you can actually receive lower scores if the teacher just doesn’t like the way you write.</p>

<p>“YOU seem to be one of the most pretentious people I can imagine.”
I think this could be justified considering the circumstances. But, I haven’t read the research paper, so obviously I can’t say much on it.</p>

<ol>
<li><p>You can be Shakespeare or Hemingway, but you still won’t be perfect. English is a pretty subjective subject. </p></li>
<li><p>Could it be content that’s bogging down your mark? I assume your teacher didn’t tell you to write an essay just to see how well you wrote. I know guys who get 100% in Physics, but 65% in English. You might just not have the mind for it. By the way, big difference between the human sciences, like psych, and art, like literature. If you didn’t throw psychology in there as proof of how great you are at art, sorry I misunderstood. </p></li>
<li><p>You signed up for CC just to rant about LA teachers?</p></li>
</ol>

<p>Wait to talk to the teacher until you’re able to speak with him/her in a civil manner. Then listen to what he/she has to say. You may learn something.</p>

<p>I think that you should respect your teachers no matter what. In America some people don’t teach you respect for teachers and students think that they can say whatever they want to them. I never wanted to teach but as a tutor in my school, I discover that I would enjoy being a teacher. What makes me feel good about it? Because the students I help are interested in the subject and don’t look down at me even if I make a mistake. Your teachers are teaching you because they love you otherwise they wouldn’t waste their time with a snoby like you. Please understand that they are making some efforts in teaching you, at least give the “pretentious LA teacher” respect. You just started college and you think that you know more than him? Humility is the best thing that willget you far in life dude.</p>

<p>MiqueMaus,</p>

<p>Actually, if we are to believe Leiter’s rankings, then Berkeley does pretty well up against the likes of most of the “bottom t14” law schools in things like SCOTUS clerkships, and isn’t too bad when it comes to prestigious firm jobs.</p>

<p>Most of my Cal law grad friends did pretty damn well for themselves. I’m talking Gibson Dunn(e?) well.</p>