Everything in this video is true. And hilarious.

Today, two students walked into my room. The people at the front desk had given them a card key that opens my door. So, I’m sitting here, slowly getting ready for a quick shower before bed (that is to say, I’m in shorts and a bathrobe), and all of a sudden two young Asian gentlemen walk into my room.

So, I turn around. I ask them what they are doing here. They look confused and terrified (probably because I’m in a bathrobe and in their room). I tell them that I am in this room until tomorrow, so I send them back to the front desk to get a new key.

I cannot believe this place. They’ve literally forgotten that I’m here. I have no way to get food yet. I have to be buzzed in and out of the building. And now they are booking other people in the room I’m living in. And they asked me if I was staying here or living with some relatives until the first day of work? So, technically, I could have unloaded my belongings here, gone to my relatives in Brampton, and come home on Tuesday to find that people had been rummaging through my stuff (because I doubt a couple of kids could resist looking into the tote that I have with a Wii/DS/PSP and a whole pile of video games, and with an LCD TV nearby, why not have a little fun?

This school is a mess. A trainwreck. I’ve heard the stereotype that co-ops from our school can be pretentious and act like they’re the hottest thing since sliced bread. That isn’t how I’m trying to come across. I’m asking for a little respect and decency. Had I gone to sleep, those two kids (who I might be TEACHING next week) would have walked in on me in my boxers without a blanket (because it is hot in these rooms).

After that, I might as well quit my job (or abandon the profession entirely) and prepare for some sort of sexual harassment/indecency charge.

Oh, also, my keycard has expired again. I need to go down to the front desk to have it renewed. If this becomes a daily occurrence, I will be most displeased.

In my opinion, a stream of comments on a blog should typically come to a halt as a result of their own momentum. I have never liked the policy of “cutting off” the right to comment on any post, and this is why I do not close commenting here.

Now, granted, I do respect the alternative. Sometimes - as it has been said - a discussion is merely going in circles, and it has become a matter of two people (or groups, as the case may be) putting forth two separate alternatives to some sort of problem or issue, neither of which can be certified to be any better or more grounded in fact than the other. Or, perhaps, compelling arguments can be made for both sides regardless of whether these arguments are tied to the reality of the situation.

In these scenarios, I do understand that it may be appropriate to acknowledge that an impasse has been reached and no further discussion is worthy of merit. I respect that. I also respect the right of a blog owner to then create a summative comment restating both opinions and acknowledging the impasse.

However, I think it is slightly unfair to put forth new information or arguments when creating a concluding comment. So it was in the Strange ELPE Decision

Had the final comment been simply the latter half of what currently exists, I would not have had a problem with it. However, the material in bold (below) is making further arguments for one side, and then closing the comments is preventing response from the other:

Binks

I think this has reached the end of its usefulness, so I’m going to sum up.

**For writing it; I think that at least if the test is done earlier, it’s one less thing to worry about when other exams come up (even if it’s marked later - they can sit in a box). Arts uses AL as its “home base” for frosh week; I imagine other faculties have similar situations; we also do services tours - so the frosh are out and about getting landmarks and touring special places on campus. So long as ample “hooplaw” is made about the locations for ELPE writing, it doesn’t seem like it’d be that difficult to pull off.

They could also run ELPE writing at any other time during the term (it’s not like people can cheat by “knowing the answers” for the ELPE). I disagree that it must be done in December.

Since Stream 4 is being phased out, that looks like a real red herring to me. It’s a point that is already irrelevant, or will be so soon.**

However, our basic points have been thus: Math and Eng have more people who fail ELPE than Arts does Arts students need English to even consider passing a course; Math and Eng could probably scrape by

I don’t think we’re disagreeing at all with either of these points - where we disagree is in the relative importance of these situations. I think our positions on all of this is pretty clear.

Thanks for your input, but this is clearly an impasse; we’ll have to agree to disagree here.

To that end, I am going to respond to the additional comments made.

Granite

Your alternatives ignore already stated information.

If the ELPE is written earlier and left to stagnate, it serves no added benefit. Students will not be able to get enrolled in the Fall terms Writing Clinic (which has limited spaces) which means that writing it before December has no added benefit regardless.

If the ELPE is written in different locations across campus, then the ELPP and the Writing Clinic will have to stretch their budget to thin to get people to proctor at all of these various locations, resulting in an administrative and financial nightmare.

If the ELPE is written at any other time during the term, it does not remove a collision with some sort of assignment or project for some group of people. The fact of the matter is, students are preoccupied with readings, essays, projects, presentations, and weekly assignments all throughout the term. Furthermore, class schedules are so varied that scheduling ELPE sessions would be next to impossible. Frosh Week and the Final Exam period are the only feasible times because the potential for conflict is minimal.

As you say, there is no way to “know the answers” or “cheat” for the ELPE. Similarly, there is no possible way to study for it. So, why not have it during December for some? It does not require any additional preparation that would interfere with Final Examination studying. Furthermore, the people writing the ELPE in December are likely to have the easiest time with the test.

Stream 4 likely had more of an impact in the past than it does currently. This is true. It has become an irrelevant point (or will be soon).

As said before, the current system for the administration of the ELPE offers the least amount of conflict possible and allows the entire program to operate as smoothly as possible with minimal negative impact on students.

Now that I have countered the new information that you put forward, I’m going to leave it at that. I haven’t really presented a new argument. This is mostly just applying elements of the ELPP that were brought up in previous comments. If you feel the need to provide some sort of rebuttle, feel free to do so in my comments.

Regardless of whether anyone reads this, I feel much better having been able to have said my piece rather than being cut off from making any further comment.

EDITORS NOTE: (8:41pm) Since posting this, two of my three comments have been approved. The Automoblogging comment exists in limbo still.

So, over the months (or years), there have been a lot of my comments that - for one reason or another - just don’t make it into Binks’ blog. Until now, I haven’t said anything because I didn’t want to make a big deal about it. But over the past week or so, I’ve seen about three comments get “lost” in the shuffle, and it is starting to seem like I am just being censored on a regular basis.

I’m going to link to the posts here and include the text from the unapproved comments. You tell me if it seems that bad. Perhaps someone can explain to me why they did not make it through the moderation filter.

Freedom of Speech = Giving Fox News An Interview

Comment #3:

All very true.

But I cannot see how trying to steal the reporter’s microphone will cast them in a favourable light either when they are on the 6:00 news. That clip wont even need to be edited. (I’m talking about the guy at 2:07).

I think the only guy who did something sensible was the guy who said “Stop the torture, stop the war.” I mean, as you said, if you don’t say anything that can be twisted, they’ll edit you out completely. I would rather say something productive and have it edited out then say something offencive and have it looped for the next 48 hours on Fox News recaps of the day’s headlines.

Strange ELPE Decision

Comment #4: (before Andrew’s final comment)

Yeah. They have been slowly moving it forward so that everyone has to take it.

In Andrew’s year, if you had a certain percentage in your Grade 12 English in high school, you did not have to write the ELPE. But then, there was all this concern about how effectively high schools teach the fundamentals (remember how we had to do all that grammar stuff in Sinko’s Gr. 12 English, and we made a big stink about it - they actually should be teaching more of that, and they’re instead teaching Moss-ian literary analysis).

So, they changed it so that high school credits don’t count.

And, up until last year, if you had a transfer credit from another university that counted as the ELPE equivalent course (one of six ENGL courses at 100 or 200), you didn’t have to write the ELPE either. But even that has changed because they feel they can no longer determine how much other universities are teaching students.

So, now they have migrated to everything being done in house. And now everyone does the ELPE.

They are changing things to suit Andrew’s argument for the importance of the ELPE. However, in the past, they have been unable to do so. So, they are now moving to a more suitable system.

Also, as Andrew said, most Arts students are from Ontario. They have the appropriate background in English. Any students not from Ontario are surely aware of the volume of reading that goes along with Arts courses, and would be prepared for it. Any International students admitted to the Arts Faculty (and I imagine they are few and far between) will have taken their English entrance tests that will have provided the University of Waterloo with a brief overview of the student’s understanding of English. They do not get admitted unless their TOEFL scores show that they understand English at the minimum levels it would take to survive at the university level.

The small percentage (and I mean really small) of Arts students who get into that faculty who do not understand English in the slightest are the most minimal losses that the ELPP allows. The ELPP is by no means perfect, but they have minimized “losses” - so to speak - campus wide when it comes to understanding of the language.

As one final point, a lot of Math/Engineers go on co-op in the Winter of their first year (or used to, Stream 4 is being phased out). So, they need to have their writing skills solid before their first work term (i.e., their first work report) because they wont have time to go to a writing clinic after writing the ELPE in December if they start work in January.

The Beginning of Automoblogging

Comment #4: (before Andrew’s final comment)

Is the objective of those presentations to get kids to say “Police officers are nice people” or to get the kids to say, “Drugs are bad” (I remember a drug presentation at St. Als) and “Drinking and driving is stupid” (this presentation happened at St. Mikes, I believe). But yeah. I have never been under the impression that the message of those presentations was “Police officers are cool and nice.” There has always been another message that is much more important. Just because they treat kids with some measure of civility during these presentations does not mean that that was the point.

I think having police seem entirely friendly might work against them as well. I remember one time I caught a guy shoplifting at Zellers, and a cop came in. And I had to be present in the room as stuff happened. I think shoplifters and other criminals might be more defiant of police officers (once caught) if they remembered that Officer So-and-so gave them high-fives when he came to their school.

And I don’t know that “increasing respect for the law and will to cooperate with the police” will increase their safety. You are not a criminal. You are not likely to commit any crimes. Whether a police officer waves to you or not is not going to change your mentality towards crime. Similarly, people who would be willing to commit crimes are not going to change their mind because a cop waved at them. Drug addicts will still be drug addicts. Pedophiles will still be pedophiles. Murderers will still be murderers. A wave is not going to change their outlook. In fact, I doubt these people would be the type to solicit a greeting from a cop anyway.

Also,

0:46 - Binks: “That’s why people hate police officers.”

If you don’t hate police officers, what are you basing that on? I think police officers are good people and I respect the job that they do. I’m not going to judge them negatively because they don’t wave to me.

I mean, I understand that all three of these comments have some sort of criticism toward the original topic. But you cannot just walk out into the world and say things with no basis, and I found that there were several false generalizations and incorrect assumptions about how things function that needed some sort of clarification, or at least another viewpoint expressed. I do not think that such actions are cruel. I do not think that such actions are malicious in any way.

I’ve been criticized for comments I’ve made before, and I dealt with them accordingly. I did not censor the person with critical comments. I find the treatment that I am receiving to be unfair, and I no longer feel that I should stand for it.

I think I am slated to have a bad week.

I go to the bathroom. No soap. Gross. Okay. Back to my room. I have a sink/vanity with soap in there. Everything should be fine once I get through the door.

Huh. My keycard doesn’t work. I’m locked out of my room. Glad I decided I would return to my room to shave instead of going directly in the shower, otherwise I’d be marching up to the front desk in a towel. The front desk of a high school. Can you imagine walking into the office at St. Mikes in a towel? No imagine you are the teacher and not the student. Not a good way to start.

Oh, and then I googled my name and institution. Turns out Imprint used something I said in one of their environmental polls (I wonder if it was done because the editor recognized my name, in part). The thing is, they have me under the engineering part of the poll.

My comments look largely out of place. I am no engineer, and not an expert in engineering related things. But just the fact that my comments ended up under engineering makes me wonder how much they fudged their sampling when they did this poll. Good grief…