This morning I stumbled upon this story of a student at UMass who is not succumbing to the collegiate norms. In a nutshell, Brian Marquis is bringing forth litigation against eight academic professionals because he believes his earned grade, an A-, was instead changed to a C based the results of a grading curve in one of his classes.
After reading the article, I felt that disgusting twist in my stomach that always resonates when speaking of the real world applications of college. Normally this is reserved for the professors whose beliefs deviate from the norm and their only way of being heard is to scream louder than anyone else in the room. Metaphorically speaking, I am referring to Ward Churchill.
Back to the story at hand, I feel that there is a growing discontent with rules of college compared to the rules of the real world. There is no reason that this man should be restrained from an earned grade because the TA thought his grade looked unfair in comparison to the rest in the class. This is absurd.
Another thing that bothers me here is the lack of forward thinking on the University's part when Mr. Marquis initially brought the issue to their attention. With an ounce of critical thinking they should have deduced that the TA had incorrectly graded the student, and this could have been resolved without incident. Instead, they chose to alienate a student and attempt to intimidate him into submission, some may be able to construe from the written responses to his initial pleas.
The bottom line here is that the collegiate systems need a wake up call to inform them that they are providing a service and that students are going to hold them accountable just like what happens in the real world.
