The school I teach at has the worst college students EVER

I can't imagine a school having students worse than ours unless that school has rapists, pedophiles, and murderers. That's the only good thing I can say about our student body. At least they aren't violent. For your information, I teach at a nationally accredited, for-profit college.

Many of my students read at the 3rd grade level. They didn't test high enough to get into any other program except for criminal justice. That just goes to show you what academia thinks about criminal justice. Even the local community colleges have little to no English prerequisites for criminal justice courses.

Our students steal all kinds of things. Most of my students had children as teenagers. Some of them had 2 kids before the age of 21. All of my female students are on welfare. One had her children taken away from her, but she wants to work for Child Protective Services. One of my male students has warrants, and he's wants to be a cop! He's also about 350 lbs. I know there are a lot of fat police officers, but they get fat after passing the physical ability tests and getting through the academy.

Then, there is the male student who blatantly plagiarizes. He was taught in two different classes about plagiarism and how to avoid it. Another female student also plagiarized in two different programs. She was kicked out of the first one. She is failing 4 courses and facing expulsion. This particular student is afraid of Asians and Middle Easterners, but she wants to work in social services. Chinese people, in particular, freak her out. I thought she couldn't shock me any further, but she asked me the other day if it's hot or cold in July. We are in Texas! She was raised in Texas! How can she not remember the 100 degree days? She even asked me how long was it going to be cold. She admitted that she doesn't know the seasons of the year! Also, she asked me what's 14 - 9. I told her 5, and she asked me, "Are you sure? That doesn't sound right."

She didn't go to the best schools, but I don't blame them at all. This student has no interest in learning or doing any kind of work. She is all around lazy. She won't even walk to a store that's an eighth of a mile away, and she hasn't kept any job for more than 2 or 3 months. Usually, I can tell when a student has a learning disorder. I have a student who is dyslexic. This student is just lazy.

 

Sounds like a bunch of home schooled religous kids.

 

Sounds like potential command staff material.

 

There are schools that have programs for the incarcerated. From your post, I'd say there are likely many convicted offenders who are better-motivated and hence better students than your bunch.

A triple-murderer from my home town killed his wife and two young children. That was 31 years ago and he is still unrepentant -- but he's earned three degrees while behind bars.

He's likely a better student than any of your bunch -- but a far worse individual. :sad:

Johann

 

Holy crap, I don't know if I should laugh or gasp in amazement, oh WOW!

 

You have a point there. I've lost count of the number of Fs I've given out in the past month. The way our program is set up, the students can pass just by completing the work. It doesn't even have to be right.

I forgot to mention that, according to that girl, all East Asians are Chinese. Korean, Japanese, Thai, and Vietnamese food are all Chinese food. I think she was the one teen mom who was homeschooled after getting pregnant her first year of high school. Again, I don't blame public schools or homeschooling in and of itself for her deficiencies. Either her parents were just bad at parenting or she's just a problem child. Another student of mine didn't know the difference between "Arabians" and Indians. So, I've been forced to give impromptu lectures on cultural diversity especially since some of my students have used racial slurs in the classroom claiming they didn't know they were racial slurs.

I've heard students use racial slurs for white people and Hispanics even though our CJ student body is about 90% Hispanic. Before I was hired, a student was suspended twice for using the n-word.

 

How could I forget about the creepy, stalker boys? The female students have complained about 3 boys (I refuse to call them men) sexually harassing them. One of the boys is known by all of his instructors for constantly hitting on girls and disrupting lectures. He even hits on the instructors and known lesbians. He will flirt with anything with a vagina. Then, there is the boy who quietly follows girls around the school freaking them out. He also quietly stares at them in class. The last boy will repeatedly send Facebook requests. He doesn't get the hint that these girls aren't going to accept his requests.

 

Again, I'm completely speechless. I feel your pain and frustration. Have you spoken with other instructors about it? Do they feel the same way? What about the administration? Is this school's purpose solely to make money? I'm afraid this is the reason why the public has a very negative view of for-profit colleges.

 

All of the criminal justice/paralegal instructors feel the same way. However, when I tried to grade based on quality, the interim chair for my department said I was just making myself do unnecessary work. I'm sure many of the instructors in other programs are frustrated; I just haven't talked to them personally. Some of the administrators used to be instructors, so they know what we're dealing with. They tell us we have a "special clientele" that likes to be entertained. All the school cares about is being in compliance with our accreditor (ACICS cares more about an excessive amount of paperwork than quality), the Texas Workforce Commission, and coddling the students so that they can stay as long as possible. We have to call students everyday they are absent. After a student receives an F for a course, they are given 3-4 weeks to complete the work for a C-. If they miss the new deadline, their counselors will just extend it. Students are only terminated in very extreme cases. Students who plagiarize are initially given an F and suspended for two days, but they are given the chance to change the F to a C- like everyone else.

 

Part of being a good teacher is understanding that the school you work for is meeting a need. It may not be a need that you're on board with, and in that case, you'll likely be a short-timer and move on to something else. Despite your shock and awe at their ignorance, they deserve a teacher who gives a crap about them. Sorry, but as a long time teacher, I find your (public) opinion of them shameful. For what it's worth, if you regain your composure- decide not to be an onlooker, and instead take charge, you might be able to make a difference to at least 1 of them. And it's worth it!

 

It's not all that public if the school and students remain anonymous. I lecture to them and do some side counseling, but it's like talking to a brick wall. I even went out of my way to find several dozen contacts for internships even though that is the responsibility of the students and career services. The school is predatory. Several of my students have said the admissions reps lied to them. They told them that they would make a lot of money with their certificates and associates in CJ. When they finish their programs, the career services department tells them to expect $8 or $9 an hour. The certificate program for CJ costs $18,000. The associates program is $28,000. The school makes all new students take a laptop which adds another $1,000 on to their degrees. The laptop is worth less than $500. They say this is to cover IT services, but the services stop being free and have to be paid for after a certain period of time.

The Texas Commission on Law Enforcement will not give them credit toward higher levels of certification (which can bring higher pay) for their degrees since they are not regionally accredited. The two largest agencies in our area will not give them education incentive pay because, again, the school is not regionally accredited. Some of the agencies in Texas that require an associates degree to even be accepted into the academy also won't recognize their degrees.

Everyone is not cut out for academic programs. These students should be in technical or vocational programs, but they should not have to pay tens of thousands of dollars to get paid $8-13 an hour as medical assistants. Criminal justice is not a vocational program in Texas. It is only good as an academic degree. The law enforcement academy is needed for what most of these students want to do, and their associates degrees aren't getting them any closer to their goals. Two of my students already have plans to start all over. One student wants to start a social work program, and she knows none of her credits will transfer. Another student of mine does not want to attend the only two 4-year schools in the area that will accept her credits because they are also predatory, for-profit colleges. She's starting fresh at a local community college because she has no interest in online programs.

One of the administrators told me I had to make my students believe that they need their certificates and associates degrees to get jobs in CJ. I'm sorry, but I cannot lie to my students. I told them the truth about the accreditation and how cheap the community colleges are. They didn't even know that the CCs were a small fraction of the cost of what they are paying now, but I teach students who are almost finish with the program. If you think that being realistic and truthful is more shameful than "meeting a need," then I will have to vehemently disagree with you. The people who are shameful are the salespeople who got them into this mess and anyone who just goes along with the ride. Their parents shameful especially the ones who have been to prison.

For what it's worth, I am the only instructor in the CJ program who they respect because I'm the only one who tries to teach them something and doesn't give them attitude. The other instructors have multiple complaints against them. I was told that one counselor said the students do nothing but praise me, so you can stop with the assumptions of what I do in the classroom. My students feel they can relate to me since I'm close their age and came from poverty. They also respect that I keep it real. I don't sugarcoat stuff. I'm not an enabler. Someone needs to tell them what they're doing wrong since people not telling them what they're doing wrong got them into these situations.

 

Oh, and even though I have the least amount of teaching experience in my department, I was offered the position of criminal justice chair for a reason. As I noted on the other forum, I had to turn it down because I can't work their split, full-time schedule and attend my night courses.

 

I think she does care, and she is making a difference.

She's just doing it in a tough-love way.

And haven't we all seen this movie?

 

sanantone:

Could you tell us about the students who are a pleasure to have in your classes?

 

The student who I called lazy (and she knows I think she's lazy) said I was the only instructor to check up on her when she was missing a lot of school.

Yes, these students need structure. This school let's them put off deadlines; they can't do this at a job. Young people who don't get any kind of structure end up like the kid with "affluenza." The judge went easy on him because she believed the parents never punished him for anything. Unfortunately, she is just continuing the child abuse by not holding him accountable for his actions. This IS child abuse.
Texas prosecutor seeks to put 'affluenza' teen behind bars - Chicago Tribune

 

I only have one or two students left who are sort of a pleasure to have in class. I still have to tell them repeatedly to put away their cellphones and to stop gossiping with each other during lectures. If one of the administrators walks into a classroom and sees a student with a cellphone out, the instructor gets chewed out. These two also bully one of the other students. My other 3 sort of pleasant students finished the certificate program, so I won't see them anymore. One is finishing her bachelor's degree at a predatory, for-profit college. She plans to go to the worst law school in the state, but at least she has a decent plan. One student, like I said earlier, plans to start all over in a social work program. That's $18,000 down the drain. The last student finished all of her work way before the deadlines, but she cared more about speed than quality. She happened to be one of the hybrid students who had to take quizzes. She barely passed them, and she rarely showed up to class; but, she had the nerve to say that the hybrid format took away the teaching. She would have heard the same lectures as everyone else if she had shown up; she just had to turn in her work online instead of on paper.

 

I should give my fellow instructors more credit. Some of them started out being nice and extremely flexible with the students until the students backstabbed them. The students not only talk about each other in a very public way (they actually name names but they won't confront anyone personally), but they also talk about the instructors. They have even said insulting things about instructors right in front of me. Because one instructor got a student (the lazy one) suspended for plagiarism, that student said she was going to try to get that instructor fired. She went to a director exaggerating about what the instructor does in the classroom.

 

I applaud you for accomplishing so much at a young age and not letting economics deter you from reaching your educational and professional goals. I have a soft spot for underdogs. Just a stepping stone for you for greater things to come. One day you'll be teaching at the University of Texas or equivalent and reflecting on this and you'll be like, "Holy cow I've come a long way!"