I'm hoping you old-timers will be patient with me until I get over the
impulse to respond to
everything which I've found interesting.

Just want you to know that I've hnad wonderful experiences with college
professors (and now
that I'm older, some of my best friends are RETIRED professors!)

When I graduated from college I had no intention of taking those "mickey
mouse" courses which
California required (I thought) in order to get a teacher's credential.  But
after a couple of years
I suddenly decided dI was wrong to avoid teaching and started attending San
Francisco State part time.  (I was working at KQED at the time)  What I
found was that I enjoyed the required courses I took.  I was astonished.
One professor actually taught in a portable iron lung.  The first day he
remained silent until we were all seated then informed us that we would soon
forget that he
was immobile.  He was right.

I ended up getting my MA at Texas Western in El Paso (a branch of the
University of Texas)
The professors there were stimulating, encouraging, helpful and
interesting.  No complaints.  Just
very grateful and fond memories.

But I must also add, in connection with my adventures with Mark Twain, I've
had some
curious experiences with "experts."   I have to remind myself that they are
merely human and
not infallible.  This was a surprise to me.

I don't think I was among those who were scared of academics, but just
wanted to
reassure you that many of us recognize you all as fully human.

Regards, Arianne


On Mon, Mar 24, 2008 at 4:48 PM, Gregg Camfield <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:

> All,
>
> I'm intrigued by how many postings over "the flap"--or perhaps
> "flapdoodle"--suggest that (1) the forum is mostly "academics" (2) the
> academy is "politically correct" (i.e. left-leaning,) and (3) college
> professors are elitists who have no time for naive questions.  As a college
> professor, I'm dismayed (not at all offended!) by the implications of these
> opinions.  These opinions suggest that certain negative feelings about
> college professors and the roles of higher education are wide-spread.  Have
> we, by failing to serve the public, earned these opinions? I hope not.  At
> any rate, I'd like to challenge them.
>
> 1) I have always enjoyed the forum because so many of the postings are NOT
> from my university-employed colleagues.  We get to provoke one another at
> conferences and in print in our spare time; here we get to see a range of
> ideas from another audience, one that is neither an audience with similar
> training and responsibilities nor one that is responding to us in our
> classrooms.