Remarkable story via Joanne Jacobs: A[n] "English composition professor, assigned freshmen writing students to read and write about Howard Zinn's polemic History of the American People. One [of the prof's] students thought Zinn was wrong.
My student claimed that equality can never exist and that American capitalism is as good as it gets, saying that we live in a violent world and any claim that a people's movement will change that is laughable.After the first draft, I pressed him on his claim that "most people have it pretty good," because it was clear to me that his definition of "most people" did not correlate with Zinn's definition of "most people," and that my student was ignoring the plight of the lower class and underprivileged groups in his analysis. He turned in a revision that continued to tiptoe around the real assumptions he was making.
I wrote to him--and this is probably the result of poor teaching on my part, I'm still learning how to do this effectively--that he wasn't countering Zinn's logic directly because he was comparing apples to oranges. The only way his argument "works," in my opinion, is if he has some fundamental belief that economically underprivileged individuals are basically evil. If that were the case, as he implies, then he'd be right-- equality couldn't exist, and even if economic equality were achieved, violence would continue to plague our society.
So I decided to test him. I told him that if he typed out the following paragraph with his signature and date at the bottom and turned it in, I would award him a perfect score on this draft of his essay (he was in the "C" range under my rubric): "I, [name], believe Zinn is wrong because socially and/or economically underprivileged individuals are inherently evil; that true freedom, justice, and equality can never exist because the world is a dark and violent place; and that those who bear the burden so that the upper class can exist deserve their fate."
OK, at least the prof makes the admission that it may have been the result of "poor teaching" on his part -- because it certainly is. He even states that "in his opinion the only way the student's argument works ..." Geez, even as a mere public school teacher I was trained to never "box a student in," like the prof. did, on matters of opinion. It comes off as just a power trip and belittles the student's views. Aren't we supposed to encourage critical thinking?
The prof in question has his own blog, and has posted a follow-up. It's subtitled, "Or why I don't think what I did was wrong." It's certainly worth reading, and remember -- it is the guy's first year teaching. ;-)
By the way, speaking of Joanne Jacobs, her new book Our School: The Inspiring Story of Two Teachers, One Big Idea and the School That Beat the Odds is now on sale.