Teachers and the First Amendment

[Rageaholic]

I think students should have the same rights as adults. I hate when adults think kids shouldn't have any rights at all and just shut them out. With that said, aren't a lot of these just common courtesy? People don't take kindly to bombastic assholes spouting political rhetoric anywhere so why would the classroom be any different?

[fireheart17]

Stoners writing "Why we should legalize Marijuana"

I could actually see that being done with some decent research into the long-term and short-term effects of marijuana, as well as research into places that have already legalized marijuana for medical use and what the effects are in relation to drug-related crime or similar.

But then again....it IS coming from a stoner.

I can see some of the hot-button topics being argued through a paper as long as they have research to back it up-that is, VERIFIED research. Using the fraudulent study linking MMR vaccines with autism would get someone a fat zero.

[AdminAssistant]

In the theatre class I teach, the students are required to see two productions and then write a critical essay about each. We give them a fairly strict guideline to follow in terms of structre (so they don't spend the entire paper on a plot summary). I would never force my students to say that they liked a play that they hated. As it is, I have to stop them from writing glowing reviews in a strange effort to suck up to me. However, regardless of if they liked or hated a production, they must be able to articulate why they felt that way and they must be specific. They can't say, "That actor sucked." Why did he suck? Give me examples of him/her sucking.

I always give a speech on the first day saying that a discussion of theatre will eventually involve politics and religion. That's just the way of it. I have never told someone "We won't discuss that" on the grounds of it being controversial. I have changed topics when it's irrelevant. I mean, if we're talking about RENT, then we'll certainly talk about the AIDS crisis and gay rights and homelessness and all those other things. We don't need to talk about abortion or the death penalty or anything that's not relevant to the topic.

[firecat88]

This all reminds me somewhat of the professor who taught my Intro to Creative Fiction Writing class a couple years ago. He had a rather *large* list of rules:

• No sci-fi
• No fantasy
• No romance
• No violence
• No cursing
• First-person was tantamount to blasphemy
• We had to hand-count the number of words in each piece we wrote because he didn't trust the computer to count them
• Story segments couldn't be longer or shorter than what was stated on the assignment sheet, which could sometimes be as few as 1,000 words maximum
• In each segment, we *had* to find someway to incorporate all 5 senses and somehow make all the details fit the length requirements.

And then there were these two books that we absolutely had to buy. Each book, he read all of a chapter out of and spent the entire time ripping one (a first-person Western-type story) to shreds and praising the other (a third-person crime drama-type story). I didn't buy the books quick enough for his liking because I couldn't get to a bookstore on time, so he dinged me for it.

I was really excited for the class at the beginning, and ended up hating it. I got a D in the class, and exactly zero shits were given about it.

[jackfaire]

But then again....it IS coming from a stoner.

He said he would preapprove a paper on the topic if the person could present an original thesis and not the same arguments he had seen a million times.

[AdminAssistant]

This all reminds me somewhat of the professor who taught my Intro to Creative Fiction Writing class a couple years ago. He had a rather *large* list of rules:

Many Creative Writing-style classes do that. Rules force creativity, which is why some of the best works of literature come from oppression. Especially maximum word limits, because learning to be concise is so important.

I didn't buy the books quick enough for his liking because I couldn't get to a bookstore on time, so he dinged me for it.

Every college class has textbook requirements, so....

[firecat88]

Every college class has textbook requirements, so....

The difference is that textbooks actually get used more than once. These, out of the entire semester-long class, we cracked open exactly one time for each book, read a paragraph or two, and had to hear him rant about how first-person stories are horrible and that we should never read or write them, after which we never touched 'em again.

As to oppression and rules fueling creativity, yes and no. It didn't spark my creativity for the assignments. However, I did get a ton of writing done outside of class. Short stories, roleplays, character biographies for both, poems, anything where I didn't have to play by his rules.

[Seifer]

I think the free speech extend only until it disrupts the classroom. And same for the teacher- their rights are only to enforce an orderly classroom. If I come home and post on my facebook "Mrs. Dithers is a big fat bitch!" and e-mail it to the whole school faculty, they can hate me all they want but have no right to punish me for it (and they deserve punishment of their own if they do).

It's between me and my parents, because it happened at home. If I use the computer lab at the school, it's different, because it happened on school property and time.

And yet if Mrs. Dithers posts on her facebook, "Jimmy Smitts is a tool and I can't stand the sight of him!", she gets fired.

Why is it okay (and doesn't "disrupt the classroom") if the students trash talk the teacher, yet it's a huge offense if the teacher says something negative on their own personal page?

You don't bitch about people you work with on social media sites, it's just that simple. The teacher has to work with the students each day, and the students have to work with him/her. It's best not to purposely ruffle feathers just to prove a point.