Staff Box by Kiese Laymon

Oberlin classroom -- Invasion of the cats with swole heads

Teachers at Oberlin need to shut the fuck up sometimes . . . learn to teach . . . learn to learn.

Before coming to Oberlin, i attended two other colleges. One, a small really white liberal arts school in Mississippi, ranked 84 in the US News and World Report. The other, an urban historically black University, wasn't even ranked. Differences? Yeah, less packaged perks, more warmth, more black folk in the institution or around the institution, worse retention rates, less wealth (disguised and actual), more economic struggle (actual, not disguised). But the primary difference was that the teachers seemed to care and were remarkably better at the craft of educating and learning.

It can be easily said that the price one pays for going to a selective institution of higher learning, other than damn near 30 G's, is to be a student taught by completely inept professors. It reasons that at selective institutions of higher learning, a higher premium is placed on publishing and attending conferences. This, coupled with tenure and the profit motive of many under-paid professors can lead to a preach-filled, teach less classroom. Too many professors at Oberlin use our allotted 50, 90, or 160 minutes as cum sessions for their overly stimulated intellectual egos.

I swear, it's like professors think they're Richard Pryor's intellectual equivalent and we students are supposed to be the giddy, on-the-edge-of-our-seat audience who paid all this money to hear she/he gab. But while Pryor fed the hungry crowd some wild ass, from the heart, complex jokes that they really wanted to hear, they force feed us some ol' dry plotted intellectual bullshit. Many talk and talk and gesticulate and laugh at their own jokes, and talk and talk and maybe ask questions to which they already have the "right" answer, then with 5 or 6 minutes left in class say, "any questions comments, anything."

Here's a question. When you gonna shut the fuck up and give a shit about disengaged students in front and around you? These students might have mounds of questions or comments that could teach you and their classmates something of substance. No, i'm not asking you to be that skinny white grrl from Dangerous Minds. But something different needs to be done.

I feel sorry for you swolehead intellectual preachers. Naw, really i feel sorry for your sleeping congregation because 30 G's is too much to pay to listen to a bunch of mostly white swolehead intellectuals talk about their research. Do you think you're engaging? Do you care? Most of you have more lived and intellectual experience than students and invariably there are many ideas students can learn from you. And there's no doubt that students should work equally hard at learning and teaching you and themselves. But how many of you attempt to mesh your horrid and beautiful lived experience, your intellectual experience, your vulnerability, your academic discipline, and your humanity with us? And i really think it can be done from Neuroscience to Contemporary Literary Jargon to Black Feminist Thought. (It's done in Black Feminist Thought, but that's another essay).

Many students see the teacher as the indomitable pointy point of a packed pyramid, a perfectly shaped pyramid within which more time is spent making sure one says something that sounds smart as opposed to something that might actually help students and teachers learn … and like fucking drones, when speaking in class, we mock the dominant paradigm (nice teacher word) of teacher-tortury/student-submission and instead of asking questions of ourselves or others in the classroom, we make compact teacher-like statements usually directed, phycially and rhetorcally, to the teacher in the hope of a head nod, an "exactly" an "uh huh" or any form of intellectual validation. But students don't grade students, right? Students aren't the ones giving the evaluations that count in mystical real world, right? And there's always teacher evaluations to get even, right? I guess that's pretty right, but it sucks to perpetually mask yourself just to get the teacher off.

This is the witty solution part of the essay directed to teachers: Everyone loves to talk and not enough people listen. Those with enough money pay shrinks to listen. Those without, align themselves with people who listen and think they're cool. With this said, it makes sense then for teachers to compensate students for listening to them. So, why not come to class with some money or grape Kool-aid or Vienna sausages or hummus or something. Then pass that shit out after and before 12+ minutes of diatribe.

Or - If all you're gonna do is stand and talk at the class, why not prepare your selfish soliloquy before class, write that shit down, and give it to the students to study and analyze at their leisure. Believe me, your presence ain't all that. Stay your intellectual ass at home and let us formulate our own ideas about your written ideas and the other assigned class texts. Oral or written evaluations are requested.

Or - come to class and try to educate, facilitate and learn with us. Then tell your teacher friends around the country that some students want teachers to shut the fuck up and listen sometimes. And tell them that at first, it'll seem weird and forced. It's gonna take some time cuz the dominant paradigm (nice teacher word again) of teacher-tortury/student-submission has been in place for many years and students, at first, will not be accustomed to teachers not talking as much or teachers posing questions and acting as if they really want to know what the student thinks. Don't just teach to be understood or to persuade. Teach to understand and learn.

This is the witty solution part of the essay directed to students: I really think that whether it's heeded or not, students know that we should be trying harder and attempting to be better than we are. What if we tried as hard to learn and teach as we tried to be cool and acceptable to whatever group? What if trying hard to learn and teach was cool and acceptable? What if trying hard was cool and acceptable? It's sad and maybe it shouldn't be this way, but so much of our future's learning, teaching and loving depends on us and college professors. We don't expect humanity or "i dunno shitness" from most of them, but it's got to be there and showing us their humanity might help us out a great deal.

In a relatively short time, we're all gonna be dead. And in a relatively shorter time, we're gonna be out of this school. Why not utilize all our human choices and student privilege. Let's not look back and be all bitter, thinking "we sho' shoulda done such and such." What are we scared of? Interrupt the silly swoleheads when they start yapping for . . . . say over 10 minutes if you want to. Answer what the swolehead wants to hear only if it's really what you think. Don't answer all reluctantly like you're scared to get the shit wrong, either. Remember, swoleheads are like us, and really don't know that much, and if they were secure with what they knew, they wouldn't have to talk so fucking much. Oh yeah, and know that all professors ain't swoleheads. And know that my head must be pretty swole to write all this and think you care. The power in the classroom has got to be equalized if full education is ever to happen. We have gotta take the lead in reconfigurating the academy and the classroom.

You know what? I wish i wouldn't even have written this shit. Next week, i gotta ask one of these swoleheads for a grad school recommendation. I really wish i wouldn't have written this shit. Damn!