At Highlands University in the \u00e2\u20ac\u02dc80s, a secretary I used to know circulated a sheet that contained clever descriptions of the college hierarchy.<\/p>\n
It started with the dean, who was \u00e2\u20ac\u0153able to leap tall buildings at a single bound\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and was \u00e2\u20ac\u0153more powerful than a locomotive.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
The department head could leap Quonset huts and sometimes win a tug-of-war with a switch engine.<\/p>\n
The full professor left scuff marks trying to leap over a chair. The lowly instructor would trip over his own shoes.<\/p>\n
The events and descriptions are probably inaccurate and based on memories. I hope some Highlands secretary, with access to the correct version, will forward it to the Optic.<\/p>\n
The descriptions came to mind during a meeting last week in which several members of the emeritus faculty group discussed what they plan to talk about during a homecoming week panel discussion at 10 a.m. Thursday at the new Student Center.<\/p>\n
One of the panelists, former Highlands professor of education Lupita Gonzales, talked informally about protocols when she was a student in the \u00e2\u20ac\u02dc60s: Coeds wore dresses, not slacks, cutoffs or shorts. There was to be no overt P.D.A.<\/p>\n
What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s P.D.A.? It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not the erstwhile Personal Digital Assistant, a cell-phone-like device that allowed people to take notes and even listen to voice or music. That P.D.A. vanished as cell phones grew. P.D.A., in the eyes of then-Dean of Women Ann Nanninga, meant \u00e2\u20ac\u0153public display of affection.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
So, there was to be no overt or excessive kissie-face or huggie-bear in Kennedy Lounge, where couples congregated.<\/p>\n
What impressed me even more in that era, as a student was the amount of power held by professors. The law simply was that students were to dress and comport themselves respectably while enrolled at Highlands.<\/p>\n
New freshmen needed to wear a purple-and-white beanie on campus. That item of apparel entitled upper-classpersons to demand that we lowly freshman sing the Highlands fight song: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Cowboys, the best in the west land; Cowboys for you we stand . . .\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
We climbed Hermit\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Peak, and we painted the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153H\u00e2\u20ac\u009d on the hill on the east side of town, where a professor, Caskey Settle, awaited with a kettle of soup.<\/p>\n
We were expected to thrive on school spirit, which meant attending games and sitting together, purple-and-white chapeaux on our pates. The rule was that we wear the beanies until the Cowboys won their first football game. We lost the first game, whereupon L. Rush Hughes, a Highlands official, got on the P.A. at Perkins Stadium and said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Freshmen, hold on to your beanies.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
We didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t win a football game for several weeks but got to shed them with our first victory, our homecoming against The Sisters of Mercy Tech.<\/p>\n
We were a different group 50 years ago, and I assume almost all of us understood that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the professor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s word is law.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d About two decades after my years as a student, I was amazed to discover how much things had changed.<\/p>\n
Two decades earlier, if you missed a final exam, that was it, tough. You received an F.<\/p>\n
But during my time as a faculty member, it seems, there were myriad safety nets for students. One office on campus typed students\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 hand-written papers. Did they also correct spelling and punctuation?<\/p>\n
In the earlier years, every prospective graduate needed to pass what was called the English Usage Examination. It didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t matter what one\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s GPA was before taking the test. I believe we English majors had an advantage, the test containing grammar terms like \u00e2\u20ac\u0153gerund\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153appositive.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
Of course, for those who failed the exam, there was always next quarter to try it again. I suspect the mere pressure of taking an exam may have caused some to fail it.<\/p>\n
We lived through the era of the mimeograph. Once, in a scenario that might have inspired a scene in the movie \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Animal House,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d someone went through outside trashcans to recover the stencils used to prepare a multi-page final exam. The students apparently \u00e2\u20ac\u0153read\u00e2\u20ac\u009d the typing on the translucent sheets, giving them access to the exam questions.<\/p>\n
But that theft was discovered early the next morning, prompting our history teacher to require what many thought was a grueling written final exam. None of those completion, multiple-choice or true-false items. The professor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s word was law.<\/p>\n
And on a personal note, a letter I once wrote to the editor displeased one of my profs with whom I was currently signed up for eight credit hours. Soon, the professor threatened to turn all my current credits to Fs, unless I wrote and had printed, a letter of apology.<\/p>\n
Apology for what? Doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t matter. The professor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s word was law.<\/p>\n
And finally, an incredibly perceptive professor who apparently was able to distinguish term papers written by Hispanics, from those written by non-Hispanics, issued five hours of F to a senior in her major field. Why? Because \u00e2\u20ac\u0153no Hispanic can write that well,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d the professor said.<\/p>\n
Now what if I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d defied my professor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s insistence by refusing to write an apology, lest he assign the eight hours of failing grades? Or what would have happened if the other (Hispanic) student had gone up the chain of command to protest her five hours of F? I have no doubt that would have caused more difficulty. The first instinct among chairpersons and deans is to back up the faculty member. I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t believe either of us would have won our case.<\/p>\n
It is true that many students believe their work merits a grade higher than that awarded. My first year of teaching featured visits from a number of my students who said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I showed this paper to another professor in your department, and he\/she thinks I should have gotten a higher grade.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
One thing that never happened in my 28 years of teaching at Highlands was for parents to question any grade their Hijito or Hijita received.<\/p>\n
Apparently it happens a lot in public schools. Let\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s hope it remains there.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
At Highlands University in the \u00e2\u20ac\u02dc80s, a secretary I used to know circulated a sheet that contained clever descriptions of the college hierarchy. It started with the dean, who was \u00e2\u20ac\u0153able to leap tall buildings at a single bound\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and was \u00e2\u20ac\u0153more powerful than a locomotive.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d The department head could leap Quonset huts and sometimes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1137"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1137"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1138,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1137\/revisions\/1138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}