Sex Ed in Higher Ed

College instructor teaching human sexuality rants about the dumbing down of America, the lost art of manners, grammar and (the perfect combination of both) the thank you note. Also includes random rants about life, pet peeves, and sometimes raves about favorite things.

Wednesday, May 03, 2006

When Bad Things Happen to Bad People

Karma is a bitch. This is what I get for making fun of my students all semester long.

The university uses this "online learning software" for all kinds of good stuff, including posting grades. Because of my past life, I've actually used 3 other types of online learning software and this one happens to be the worst. By far. Anyway, yesterday, I have two frantic e-mails from two different students telling me their grades aren't quite right. No, they're not being whiny brats groveling for an "A" - their grades aren't right at all. Something has gone wrong with the software (J. says a database is corrupted somewhere) and now I have 50 students with 13 quizzes, 2 exams, 4 reactionary reviews and more extra credit than they deserve whose grades are scrambled.

The person who is responsible for this software has told me there is "nothing she can do," while J. has been my knight in shining armor and told me she's full of it. We'll go get those old tapes from when they backed up their server and he'll go in and kick some fellow-tech-geek ass if he has to! Gotta love that man!

I have my own paper due, a presentation and two finals. And MOUNTAINS of their papers to grade because they all waited until the last damn minute to do all four of their papers. And let's not forget an 8-hour-gig at a wedding on Saturday. I will not be sleeping much in the next week and a half.

My post was going to be more of my favorite mistakes from their papers, but I figured gob was angry enough.

Oh, but when have I ever really worried about the wrath of gob? Here are just a few of my recent faves:

The AIDS patient was suffering from a bad disease called Chaos. (The AIDS patient was actually suffering from Kaposi's Sarcoma - KS for short; if the student had cracked open his textbook, he would have known this.)

In class on Tuesday, we watched an episode of Opera about sex addicts. I guess I am impressed - clearly she doesn't watch a lot of television.

Having unprotected sex is like playing roussin roulette. Again, I am impressed. This student doesn't spend a lot of time playing online games or visiting casinos. Although I could also argue that she's clearly never opened a geography or history textbook either.

Dr. S. told us that sexually transmitted infections known no racial or ethnic boundaries; they are an equal opportunity fender. I couldn't decide if the student thought Dr. S. was saying "fender" or if this was a typo. Or worse.

Jennifer clearly suffered from low self of steam. The winner.

10 Comments:

Blogger Sara said...

gob help me, but "Chaos"?!! That's just too good to be true.

I'm not sure if you can laugh about these anymore, but that one had me rolling.

May 03, 2006 10:38 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Am de-lurking because I just love "low self of steam". I think I sometimes suffer from low self of steam too.

May 03, 2006 10:38 AM  
Blogger Antique Mommy said...

Yes, but I suffer from low self of steam - and that is worse.

May 03, 2006 11:08 AM  
Blogger Antique Mommy said...

Okay I read that wrong, I read Jennifer suffered from self of STREAM - which is worse, my bad. Coffee, where is it??

May 03, 2006 11:09 AM  
Blogger Liberal Banana said...

Holy $hit, those kids are stupid. Good luck getting through the next week and a half!

May 03, 2006 11:28 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

These are hysterical.

'A disease called Chaos.' '...low self of steam.'

You couldn't make this stuff up.

May 03, 2006 8:35 PM  
Blogger Sharon L. Holland said...

Ahem. From here:

"The name Roussin is an ancient French name that was given to a Languedoc person who was a person with a pleasant singing voice having derived from the Old French word rossinhol, meaning nightingale."

So it's sex and birds now? Was this IA again?

May 03, 2006 10:51 PM  
Blogger Teacher lady said...

No - it was the author of the two worst sentences ever written. But now I have something else I can write on her paper! And I learned something, too!

May 04, 2006 9:30 AM  
Blogger Jess Riley said...

"low self of steam." "Equal opportunity fender." Oh my God that's funny.

Reminds me of a good friend of mine who, until very recently, thought that tigers were female lions. Oh, and she teaches fourth grade.

May 04, 2006 11:55 AM  
Blogger HappyChyck said...

I'm suffering from low self of steam, too. Is it break yet?

May 06, 2006 8:30 AM  

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