Thursday, October 26, 2006

things that make me uneasy

I now have to talk to my advisor (let's call him professor W) about a lot of topics, particularly a potential problem I may encounter with another professor (let's call him professor C). Professor C is the only teacher is my school who teaches a social psychology class. I think I'm required to take a social psychology class before I can graduate anywhere. The problem is that the way professor C teaches this class is he expects people to do a research report in a single class period, with no warning about what it's going to be on and no way to do any part of it at any other time. I can't possibly pass this way. I thought this was a settled matter, but my parents are saying that I can get accommodations for this. The only thing I can ever get because of my documentation is double time, I still don't think that would be enough time to do research and right the whole thing. The only way I'd even have a shot is if I was told at least a day in advance. I seriously doubt any teacher would give me that kind of "special treatment". I think it's even less likely that professor C would. Fist of all he wouldn't even give students a break when they couldn't get access to any computers. (My boyfriend took this class.) He kept saying things like "excuse making is what crazy people do." (I still don't know what that means.) Professor C also has demonstrated, in another class I had with him, that his attitude toward people with "special needs" is less then enlightened. He still refers to autistic savants as "idiot savants". He then insists "that's not real intelligence". (You’d have to be caught in a major time warp to be a psychology professor and not know that there are multiple intelligences and that autistic savants, by definition, are extremely high in one area and lacking in most others).
Anyway, my parents now want me to bring all this up with my advisor, possibly leaving out the last part, I not sure if it would be helpful. Since professor W is a cognitive psychology professor, it might help him "see where I'm coming from", but I don't know.

In general I'm usually uneasy about asking for any accommodations. It usually gets the other students mad at me. Frankly it's not fair. It's not fair that anyone should have take a timed test or timed in class assignment. I can't even remember if I'm also supposed to talk about career options with professor W as well. That conversation is even more awkward because it highlights my problems even more.

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

I'l never understand people

Surprisingly enough, my sociology textbook actually said, "There would be enough food to feed 10 billion people if everyone adopted a vegetarian diet." I was expecting that this either would not be mentioned in class, or would be met with nothing but disbelief. Instead my teacher actually did bring this up and he said "I don't know about you guys but I'm not willing to give up meat." The rest of the class agreed.