I'd write the most woke paper you've ever read and see how he responds. Make up a ton of personal *****

murphyag said:

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aggie93 said:

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combat wombat said:

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I would seriously ask how this assignment is relevant to the subject matter of the class he signed up for. Furthermore, his opinions on this article are completely irrelevant to his grade in the class. So, basically, he's been assigned an English grammar and composition paper.

He could just blow sunshine up the prof's butt, too. Complete tongue-in-cheek opinion piece. Satire, if you will. Just not so over the top that the prof realizes what it is.

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It's apparently graded by some 3rd Party site that uses an algorithm. No clue how that works.

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WTH?!? Why?

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There are now online tools that schools can use that check for plagerism. Gotta 7th grader whose papers are automatically checked by such a website. It returns a score of how likely you copied text from other articles in its database. That 'score' might be what is being mentioned here, without knowing more.

It isn't like when I was in school pre-internet and could copy word for word paragraphs from books in the library. Now they got websites with algorithms that will catch you if you try that!

OldArmy71 said:

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I taught college English and also high school Dual Credit and AP English.

Like you, I am mystified by the assignment, since it has nothing to do with US History before 1900.


The professor is not an idiot. He/she knows that the parents of many of his students voted for Trump.


I know that those who are suggesting using ChatGPT are not serious, but just to say it, do not do that. It would be cheating/plagiarism, and would result in very negative consequences. It would also torpedo any future attempt to dispute the ultimate grade on the paper.

If I were your son, I would carefully isolate several claims that the article makes with which your student disagrees and then disprove them, preferably with factual evidence from cited sources.

In addition, assuming that your son took AP English Language or a college rhetoric class, he should be able to point out instances in the essay of hyperbole, name calling, red herring, etc. In other words, your son could analyze the rhetorical devices used by the author of the Atlantic essay and show that the essay is not based in logic or reason.

The article is behind a pay wall which prevents me from saying much more.

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Talking more with my son it sounds like it won't count for much, this is just the prof screwing with kids on his way out the door at the end of the Semester. It's a really poorly written article. Going to have him basically take your advice and not get overly controversial and try to keep it to facts.

After the Semester I told him to report the Prof. If he loses his A I told him he can also expect his Dad to be making some phone calls and raising hell. I may do that anyway.

Does this prof have tenure?

If not... he/she sounds like the perfect candidate for what the TX legislature is looking to address this session.

"Fight over tenure has Texas professors fearing loss of academic freedom, job security"

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/education/2023/04/13/fight-over-tenure-has-texas-professors-fearing-loss-of-academic-freedom-job-security/

FincAg said:

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This shouldn't be hard for an A student. Write the paper, use the other books and material from the semester to highlight similarities and differences to pre 1900 American History calling out the plight of actual slavery and reconstruction.

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Yep. Critique the (white) author as minimizing the plight of Jim Crow era blacks in order to score contemporary partisan political points.

History profs were mostly liberal or apolitical when I was in school, but I never saw any assignments this blatantly inappropriate for the course material.

So, depending on how scrappy your son is, he might consider going to the head of the department at the end of the semester to complain about the proff issuing a political litmus test assignment.

In the meantime, you can do a little research here: https://www.thefire.org/

Is this the son that I know? I'm going to message an instructor over there if so.

I've been in the workforce for 20 years & I'd never accept a work assignment I don't want to do. Your kid should tell the authority to shove it, like we do in the real world.

Shouldn't have sent him to a lib school

Don't recall the exact topic, but I had a somewhat similar experience in my criminology class to satisfy the social science class requirement circa ~05 or 06. Being an Ag major that was my only experience with idiotic profs.

hoosier-daddy said:

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I've been in the workforce for 20 years & I'd never accept a work assignment I don't want to do. Your kid should tell the authority to shove it, like we do in the real world.

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I will assume you are NOT active duty military.

Subjecting your opinion to the chain of command is actually a useful real life lesson to take with you. Give them what they want and relent for the sake of your transcript. Take the lesson that everything you've learned is only useful to a point - you cannot rely upon it and be ready to learn on your own when the opportunity presents itself. Finally, you owe nothing to a system that demands this out of you. Nothing at all.

How about make the focus of the paper on the role news organizations have played in shaping the opinion of the electorate. Compare and contrast modern day bias with that before 1900.

Have him turn it into a methodology paper about how history should in his opinion be done. How should a historian 100 years in the future view the article? For example there were people that believed Trump would bring back Jim Crow laws. Objectively he didn't so 100 years from now, knowing how things turned out, a historian might have trouble understanding the Trump opposition. A paper like this despite clearly being wrong in its predictions gives insight into a segment of society that would have fallen through the cracks in the future etc..

Trajan88 said:

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Does this prof have tenure?

If not... he/she sounds like the perfect candidate for what the TX legislature is looking to address this session.

"Fight over tenure has Texas professors fearing loss of academic freedom, job security"

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/education/2023/04/13/fight-over-tenure-has-texas-professors-fearing-loss-of-academic-freedom-job-security/

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He sent me their profile and it's exactly what you would think, I'll just leave it at that.

aggie93 said:

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It's an American History Class prior to 1900. He's got a mid/high A in the class and a 4.0 overall so his grades are very important to him. Then out of the blue the Prof gives an assignment to "annotate and give opinions about". It's an Atlantic Article from 2016 after Trump's election but prior to him taking office essentially saying how Trump was going to roll back all the progress and hope of the Obama Presidency and comes just short of saying that Jim Crow is coming back. The first sentence is "The accomplishments of the first black president will be erased by a man who rose to power on the slander that Barack Obama was not born in America." and it goes downhill from there.

I am furious seeing profs give students stuff like this at the end of the Semester clearly designed to find out their political leanings on a subjectively graded paper. It puts my conservative son in a position where he can either write a paper as he truly believes or try to come up with something they want to hear. Apparently it will be graded by a 3rd Party website that uses an algorithm. My son is thinking of writing the Dean because it has no relevance to the course.

The article just rambles incoherently. I swear A&M really doesn't want any more of my donations again.

Welcome to the Second Redemption

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Had several of these off the wall assignments in grad school. Have himwrite a narrative to compare and contrast the articles conclusions to American to American beliefs before 1900 or something along those lines. The idea is to challenge/compare current beliefs to our historical ancestors.

If I were writing a response to that article, I would focus very little on Trump and mostly on the falsehood the article is based on regarding the Obama Administration being a resounding success that moved America forward. There are MANY examples of failed policy to prove that.

I would also point out that it wasn't Donald Trump who first brought into question Obama's country of origin, it was Hillary Clinton in the 2008 campaign.

I would also bring up that it was Obama's team that spied on the Trump campaign during the 2016 election.

Have him write 2 papers, submit the leftist one first, wait for his grade to come out then submit the real one that isn't full of ****

Easy A. Write what the professor wants.

College is a good time to learn that the world is not an echo chamber.

Let your kid fight his own battle.

A great reason to have your kids get credit for these types of classes before they get to college.

TX_COWDOC said:

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This is nothing new. Tell him to crush a couple of bud lights and write the paper from a leftist viewpoint. Sticking to your beliefs in this type of environment is likely a self- limiting exercise.

Alternatively, tell him to pen the assignment like the red-blooded alpha male you've raised him to be and dgaf the drop in grade points.

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It's always better to be alpha.

He should stand up for his beliefs and write honestly. With grades that high he should easily be able to challenge a leftist prof, and at least get it on the record. It won't hurt him in the long run

Ghost of Andrew Eaton said:

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Let your kid fight his own battle.

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He asked for Dad's advice.

History profs. Yeesh

aggie93 said:

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Ghost of Andrew Eaton said:

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Let your kid fight his own battle.

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He asked for Dad's advice.

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That's the advice.

I had a leftist English professor when I was at A&M who gave us an assignment to write a pro or con paper on nuclear power. After researching it, I determined that the pros outweighed the cons and wrote a pro paper. I didn't think she would agree with it but wrote it anyway. She gave an A.

Had another leftist professor at A&M who assigned a paper on pay inequality between men and women. At the time I thought it was due to sexism, however after researching it, I discovered that there were legitimate reasons for the disparity. I didn't think he'd like it but wrote it anyway. He gave me an A.

If he defends his position well he should get a good grade and, if he doesn't, he should be on firm ground to challenge the grade. I also agree with others that it appears your son is in a position grade wise where he can afford to FAFO. Why compromise his integrity?

Make a mockery of this dumb ass professors ideas and opinions by writing the most over the top woke **** anyone has ever seen.

In ten years, A&M will resemble Missouri and freaking Austin.

not another dime

No mention of who the Prof is?

Compare/contrast the partisan presidential journalism of 2016 to that of pre-1900. Get an A slamming the media that gave us BHO and tore down Trump.
https://www.presidentprofiles.com/General-Information/A-History-of-the-Presidency-Presidents-and-the-press.html

B-1 83 said:

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He should have a good time spewing out each and every leftist talking point in his paper knowing he's just playing the prof for an "A". That is a good life exercise in itself

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Both my children do this daily at Tarleton and A&M Kingsville

Your son knows what the prof. Wants just write the bull**** paper and move on.

Tarleton??????

A&M Kingsville I can halfway believe (not that I'm doubting you, just the pool they are known to draw from).

JohnLA762 said:

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Sounds like he has a big enough cushion in the class to teach him about staying true to his beliefs…

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There is no such thing as a big enough cushion. If you irritate the prof he can give you a B if your grade is is 89.9. If you irritate the prof he can likely tweak a couple of grades just enough that you end up with an 89.9

What a bunch of snowflakes on this thread! What good is learning history if you can't take the lessons learned from the past and apply them to today? And don't we want to see some critical thinking in schools? I know I do!

If the prof tries to use it as a means of calling people out for their political beliefs, report his/her ass. Just write a good paper and learn from the experience.