Paul -- I read this and laughed out loud; with you, not against you! There are sentences where you relate what you did in class (like no syllabus) and I found myself yelling at the screen "No! No! Abort! Don't do that! They'll die!" But that just means you absolutely pegged the modern university teaching experience. I hope UMW gives you the opportunity to get back on the horse.
Paul Cymrot, if you offered this class to the community at large, I would sign up immediately. It sounds like you developed exactly the kind of class those students needed, but aren't old enough to know it yet. In the eyes of my husband and me, you are not a 1.3, you are a 4.5!
I should let you know that I am one of his former students (unfortunately), and this article is entirely slanderous and made to make us sound inadequate and ungrateful. I was initially very excited for the class as Paul seemed like a very passionate professor and the course sounded interesting to me. He is extremely belittling as a professor and I find this article to be proof of how prone he is to belittling his students in order to appoint himself as righteous. Incredibly disappointing to see this article on my feed, but not at all surprising given my experience with him
One of the students here. I will keep things cordial and professional, but it is incredibly relieving to know that Professor Cymrot was honest about himself and his way of teaching—in that he was unable to handle a class of less than 10 students. Assignments were convoluted and the environment was not welcoming. I do not appreciate being lied to or about, so this is also extremely disappointing to see, as it slanders myself and my classmates (of which helped me survive this class, as I would not have been able to succeed without them). I also do not appreciate our anonymous class feedback being used in this article, as that information (though not specified by name) is meant for the instructor and Head of the Department. I sincerely hope that if Mr. Cymrot is chosen to teach another class, that he learns from the errors of his previous teachings and takes student feedback into serious account rather than fuel for his article writing fire.
This comment proves one of Mr. Cymrot’s points, which is that he sensed students saw him as an adversary rather than as a guide. Everybody was on edge, it seems. But at least in retrospect, Mr. Cymrot is trying to take that apart and look at it in this article. Maybe someday this commenter will be able to acknowledge that the instructor had good intentions and subject matter expertise, and that he was trying to give his students more than just a box checked en route to graduation. It would also be a good life lesson for the commenter to recognize that Mr. Cymrot did no harm by writing about what he personally experienced, without publicly naming or shaming anyone.
You're certainly welcome to weigh in on this essay or anything else in The Advance, but you'll need to identify yourself with your real name to post comments.
Very interesting. Retired bio prof here. Without having tried it many people think teaching is easy. They are wrong… teaching poorly is easy. Trying to provide students with excellent learning opportunities (as you did) is very hard.
Like Julia Lang, I would take this class in a heartbeat if you offered it for the community. But then I love reading, love books - and I'm old. "Old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read." (Francis Bacon, 1624).
College teaching sure isn't like it used to be. I talked to enough university folks in the past 10 years to stay away from teaching there. I remember attending a UMW first-year parent seminar back in 2005 at which I first heard the term: 'helicopter parenting'.
Gave me flashbacks to being high school faculty and hearing that we had to monitor the Guidance vault because parents were volunteering in the department, filling teacher requests for copying worksheets.
Every so often, staff would find one of them in the vault, caught red-handed with confidential info in another student's file. They wanted to know the course load, GPA of a challenger to their own child's chance of being named valedictorian. It's cut-throat out there.
Parents would set up an appointment with Guidance to argue that the B wasn't good enough. So the teacher was called in by an admin, just as is happening now at the college level, and told to change it to an A to get the parent off their back and quell the student's anxiety, due to ' but they always get an A'.
Some faculty jumped to another school or system. Others retired because they saw the writing on the wall: the pressure to change a grade wasn't worth spending a few more years in the profession they had loved in the early years.
Grade inflation is just a given in today's universities. Some top-tier schools are implementing aggressive counter-measures. Faculty at Harvard University voted to cap the number of A grades at 20% (plus four additional A's in smaller classes) starting in the 2027 academic year to restore meaning to academic excellence.
During my grad school year at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University, way long ago, I was part of a cohort participating in coursework divided into two sections: CBI/Competency-Based Instruction v. traditionally-trained early childhood/special educators. We were told we 'could' get a 'B' in the class, but why should the department allow that level, when they could get all of us to 'A' competency.
Most students did well, but there was the backup of re-taking a different version of the content module until we were at 100% accuracy. The prediction was that we'd stay in the profession longer if we were trained right.
It ended up being true. The research team didn't assess our level of happiness, satisfaction, and sense of purpose in a profession that, when practiced properly, makes a difference.
I absolutely loved your article in this morning’s FXBG Advance! What a frustrating, eye-opening experience that must have been. Thank you so much for sharing it.
Paul -- I read this and laughed out loud; with you, not against you! There are sentences where you relate what you did in class (like no syllabus) and I found myself yelling at the screen "No! No! Abort! Don't do that! They'll die!" But that just means you absolutely pegged the modern university teaching experience. I hope UMW gives you the opportunity to get back on the horse.
Paul Cymrot, if you offered this class to the community at large, I would sign up immediately. It sounds like you developed exactly the kind of class those students needed, but aren't old enough to know it yet. In the eyes of my husband and me, you are not a 1.3, you are a 4.5!
I should let you know that I am one of his former students (unfortunately), and this article is entirely slanderous and made to make us sound inadequate and ungrateful. I was initially very excited for the class as Paul seemed like a very passionate professor and the course sounded interesting to me. He is extremely belittling as a professor and I find this article to be proof of how prone he is to belittling his students in order to appoint himself as righteous. Incredibly disappointing to see this article on my feed, but not at all surprising given my experience with him
My real name is attached to this account, thank you
Thanks for clarifying, Cat.
One of the students here. I will keep things cordial and professional, but it is incredibly relieving to know that Professor Cymrot was honest about himself and his way of teaching—in that he was unable to handle a class of less than 10 students. Assignments were convoluted and the environment was not welcoming. I do not appreciate being lied to or about, so this is also extremely disappointing to see, as it slanders myself and my classmates (of which helped me survive this class, as I would not have been able to succeed without them). I also do not appreciate our anonymous class feedback being used in this article, as that information (though not specified by name) is meant for the instructor and Head of the Department. I sincerely hope that if Mr. Cymrot is chosen to teach another class, that he learns from the errors of his previous teachings and takes student feedback into serious account rather than fuel for his article writing fire.
This comment proves one of Mr. Cymrot’s points, which is that he sensed students saw him as an adversary rather than as a guide. Everybody was on edge, it seems. But at least in retrospect, Mr. Cymrot is trying to take that apart and look at it in this article. Maybe someday this commenter will be able to acknowledge that the instructor had good intentions and subject matter expertise, and that he was trying to give his students more than just a box checked en route to graduation. It would also be a good life lesson for the commenter to recognize that Mr. Cymrot did no harm by writing about what he personally experienced, without publicly naming or shaming anyone.
You're certainly welcome to weigh in on this essay or anything else in The Advance, but you'll need to identify yourself with your real name to post comments.
The name attached to this account is, in fact, my real name, thank you.
Thanks for clarifying.
I’d welcome a counterpoint article from the student’s perspective.
Very interesting. Retired bio prof here. Without having tried it many people think teaching is easy. They are wrong… teaching poorly is easy. Trying to provide students with excellent learning opportunities (as you did) is very hard.
Like Julia Lang, I would take this class in a heartbeat if you offered it for the community. But then I love reading, love books - and I'm old. "Old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read." (Francis Bacon, 1624).
College teaching sure isn't like it used to be. I talked to enough university folks in the past 10 years to stay away from teaching there. I remember attending a UMW first-year parent seminar back in 2005 at which I first heard the term: 'helicopter parenting'.
Gave me flashbacks to being high school faculty and hearing that we had to monitor the Guidance vault because parents were volunteering in the department, filling teacher requests for copying worksheets.
Every so often, staff would find one of them in the vault, caught red-handed with confidential info in another student's file. They wanted to know the course load, GPA of a challenger to their own child's chance of being named valedictorian. It's cut-throat out there.
Parents would set up an appointment with Guidance to argue that the B wasn't good enough. So the teacher was called in by an admin, just as is happening now at the college level, and told to change it to an A to get the parent off their back and quell the student's anxiety, due to ' but they always get an A'.
Some faculty jumped to another school or system. Others retired because they saw the writing on the wall: the pressure to change a grade wasn't worth spending a few more years in the profession they had loved in the early years.
Grade inflation is just a given in today's universities. Some top-tier schools are implementing aggressive counter-measures. Faculty at Harvard University voted to cap the number of A grades at 20% (plus four additional A's in smaller classes) starting in the 2027 academic year to restore meaning to academic excellence.
During my grad school year at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University, way long ago, I was part of a cohort participating in coursework divided into two sections: CBI/Competency-Based Instruction v. traditionally-trained early childhood/special educators. We were told we 'could' get a 'B' in the class, but why should the department allow that level, when they could get all of us to 'A' competency.
Most students did well, but there was the backup of re-taking a different version of the content module until we were at 100% accuracy. The prediction was that we'd stay in the profession longer if we were trained right.
It ended up being true. The research team didn't assess our level of happiness, satisfaction, and sense of purpose in a profession that, when practiced properly, makes a difference.
Paul,
I absolutely loved your article in this morning’s FXBG Advance! What a frustrating, eye-opening experience that must have been. Thank you so much for sharing it.
Wow! Thanks for sharing.
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