Hammer nails non-traditional student stereotype
Mark Edgcomb
IV Leader Staff
Spring semester 2006 at IVCC is off to a festive start.
Here is a Hammer Point: next time the school welcomes back students with a bunch
of balloons in the lobby, please consider setting up a booth and giving darts
out so we can pop them.
This would be more fun and entertaining. Since I am concerned
about the college’s budget and since the money has already been spent on the hot
air to expand the balloons, why not start the semester with a bang?
Perhaps it would warm up the building enough to allow the
reopening of the courtyard. We students miss our shortcut when heading for the
next class after getting a cup of tasty coffee — which none of us would dare
bring into the classroom for fear of being placed on that secret listing of
subversive individuals.
Being a non-traditional student (or traditional) can be a
little intimidating. Walking into the classroom and experiencing your professor
who will teach and guide you for the next sixteen weeks is most of the time an
uneventful moment. On the first day of class, the professor hands out their
syllabi (some are calling it a contract), goes over it quickly then one heads
home and starts working on the homework. Good news: if a student completes
homework, it is difficult to fail a course.
Students fit into two general stereotypes: traditional, 17-22
years of age and non-traditional, over 25. There are other signs I might just be
a non-traditional student: one is I always wheel my wheeled book bag into a
classroom looking for the always-open front row of molded plastic chairs that
are older than traditional students.
Indeed, when I am shopping for a new-wheeled book bag the
most important concern I have is the total gross vehicle weight it is designed
to handle.
You might be a traditional student if you wear your PJs on
campus and if you expect to catch up on your sleep in that professor’s class
that bores you.
You are definitely a traditional student if you spot one of
your parents in one of the front row chairs.
You are a non-traditional student if you realize that if you
had listened to your parent when you were a traditional student the first time
you would not be sitting in class next to your friends’ kids.
Unquestionably, no mistake you are a non-traditional if you
find yourself enjoying homework more than your own kids.
I have a confession; I missed doing homework over the
semester break. No, I am not ill or demented (maybe manic). My reason for this
statement is without homework and essays to write I viewed a superfluous amount
of television and Internet.
Cruising through the channels and the Internet, I found Pat
Robertson telling the world that his “God” gave Israeli Prime Minster Ariel
Sharon a divine punishment of a substantial stroke because of his withdrawing
from the Gaza Strip.
On the World Wide Web, I found the opposite in a person
preaching the “Flying Spaghetti Monster” as one of the controlling forces in the
universe.
My point is the college has put together the “IVCC Diversity
Team.” A survey was given to “know what people thought ‘diversity’ refers to and
how they themselves are diverse.”
Questioning diversity on campus is good; likewise, we should
be honest and instead of one “God,” maybe we all have our own beliefs, whatever
that might be.
Education is my newest faith... I hope a good liberal
education will enlighten and uncover the meaning of it all. Maybe I will start
may own non-traditional religion and explain how one gets to heaven. First, one
has to die, and then you are on your own, but if you bequeath me some money, I
will gladly jump up and down and sing. However, it might be better if you just
keep practicing your chosen faith and leave your body to the IVCC anatomy lab
and your estate to the IVCC Scholarship Foundation guaranteeing your name will
live on for years into the future.
Here is a riddle, how does a professor get into a locked
classroom? Give up? By calling 9-1-1, which equals seven (thanks to Math 0907)
which rhymes with heaven; therefore, this must be a sign from the Great Flying
Spaghetti Monster that those who cannot get into the classroom might have
followed the wrong calling in life.
Alternatively, perhaps like all diverse Homo sapiens (thanks
Professor Nett) the professor was just experiencing a dire day.
As for me, I have statistics to compute, which might make for an ominous
semester.