University Students is Clever

DISCLAIMER – THIS DOES NOT APPLY TO UNIVERSITY STUDENTS WITH SOME KIND OF LEARNING DIFFICULTY. YOU HAVE A LEGITIMATE REASON.

Yes, those with keen eyes will have noticed the grammatical inaccuracy of the title. And yes, it is intentional. I know this may seem nerdy but one thing I was looking forward to about University was getting away from people who speak in a way that would cause Microsoft Word to put a line under almost everything they say. People who say things like “I seen this” or “I done this”, drive me INSANE! And I do correct them, to the point where people are very irritated by me, but I don’t care. Everyone has their “pet peeves”, this is mine, it may seem unimportant to some – and it is in comparison to other things – but it’s a big deal to me. So yes, I was looking forward to getting away from these people.

Cut to a couple of weeks into Semester 1, doing some group work and we decide to take it in turns to type – seemed only fair. So, one of the members of my group sat down to type up the work, we all brainstorm the report and get it done fairly quickly. It gets posted and when I get my copy of it I can’t believe it. The amount of spelling mistakes, the incorrect grammar, the pathetic excuse for sentence structure – it was ridiculous! It barely made any sense. But I kept my mouth shut because I barely knew these people. Every time we did this work (and I didn’t type) it was horrific. These people had no learning difficulties and they were clever enough (obviously, they got into University) but this was appalling. And I know I sound like a snob but seriously, it’s spelling and grammar we get taught this in school for years! These people also made statements like “I’m horrible at spelling”. SO WHAT?! I was horrible at it for years but I practised and now I’m not as bad. If you know you are bad at something THAT YOU NEED why wouldn’t you work at it?! I wouldn’t be as bothered but these reports were going to be graded! A percentage of our module grade was resting on these reports and I was ashamed to have my student number associated with them.

First semester was over and I was happy to find out that I wouldn’t be doing any group work in the second semester. Second semester, going pretty well all the way through, no group work, happy, happy. Psychology Research Methods report lecture. Going through it, all fine, same as last semester until near the end when one of the slides said this:

“Spelling and Grammar

l  “Whether” (as in “whether or not”), NOT “weather”

l  “Their” means belonging to

l  “They’re” means “They are”

l  “There” as in “over there”

l  “Where” is a place, “were” as in “they were” “

That is word-for-word what the slide said. I think it is a joke that a University lecturer has to make these things clear. I understand maybe 3^rd year pupils at Secondary School making these mistakes but First Year at University – come on!

Maybe I’m just being a bitchy snob, maybe I’m just arrogant but I, personally, think that this stuff should be common knowledge. And I am in no way claiming to be perfect, I make mistakes – of course I do – but I try to not repeat them. In fact, it is very likely that there is a mistake or two in this post but I know the difference between “your” and “you’re”, I know that “their” states possession, “there” states location” and “they’re” is a contraction of “they” and “are” – I know it because I was taught it and I paid attention. I’m not blaming teachers, which I know a lot of people do, I’m blaming students who don’t pay attention. 

Thoughts?