What he said.
April 11, 2011
Matt Yglesias on student writing and the Internet:
The thing that you have to do if you’re in college is start doing the work. Follow writers you like on Twitter and use it to interact with them. Write your own blog, and even though it probably won’t have many readers take it seriously and write it like it’s intended to be read by total strangers. If you do internships, try to do them at places that hire young people for writing jobs (i.e., not the New Yorker). Think about what would be a good place for a first job, not a place where you’d dream of ending your career. If you do a post critiquing something someone you respect wrote (me, for example) then send an email and explain yourself—you might get noticed. If you get ignored, don’t get discouraged—you might suck, but the guy you wrote to just might have been busy that afternoon.
I’m going to add that writing faculty should be encouraging these activities, and that writing faculty should be taking part in them as well. Obviously.
The crying student
October 17, 2009
I get one – at least one – every semester. It’s usually a woman, but men cry, too. (Tracy Budd, who sent into my office the most lachrymose individual I’ve ever had the pleasure, knows exactly what I’m talking about.) Usually it’s someone who’s well indoctrinated into the educational system, enough anyway to regard my pronouncements as not only authoritative but somehow bearing on her or his respective worth or character, has been receiving therefore high marks throughout high school, and has been performing well below level of the typical Rutgers student. And yes, the typical Rutgers student is, while often obnoxious and possessing of a stunning sense of self-entitlement, actually capable of a very high degree of critical intelligence and expression.
They show up in my office mid-semester or a little before because I’ve been giving them poor grades, and they’re trying and trying, but they’re still not getting the grades that would validate them as worthy individuals. And it’s not like I don’t know who they are: usually have been trying to get them into my office so we can figure out what they can do to improve, but this type of student is eager to please and therefore somewhat intimidated by the idea of speaking one-on-one with the person who dispenses knowledge and judgment. But finally they muster up the courage, they come to my office during office hours, and the combination of the humiliation of the poor grades, the habitus of respect for educators and higher education, and the shock of finding themselves in a chair in my office engaged in a conversation with their tormentor reduces them to tears.
