From: ST102315 at brownvm.brown.edu (Jake)
Subject: Re: Professors as tech support
Date: 8 Jun 1996
Message-ID: <4pc017$rp0@cocoa.brown.edu>
newsgroups: alt.sysadmin.recovery

In article <4paou7$90t@tribune.concentric.net>, Indica at cris.com (Leigh Metcalf) said:

This brings up wonderful images for me. Imagine if teaching calculus, say, were done tech-support style. I can just hear the whiny freshman saying to the poor underpaid and overworked professor on the other end of the phone:

"...But I just want to calculate the area under the curve! Why does it have to be so _complicated_?"

What do you mean, you haven't heard this? And 'but my computer can do it in half the time! Why do I have to do it by hand?'

True enough. That was what I liked about the image: the personalities are very similar, the situation is similar in many ways, but also quite different in others. Maybe a longer dialogue would be helpful to show what I mean.

*RING RING*

Me: "Calculus consulting, can I help you?"

Student: "Hi, I have this curve, and I want to find the area under it, but it's not working!"

Me: "What happens when you try?"

Student: "It's just not working!"

Me: <sigh> "OK, let's start from the beginning. What happens when you try to integrate the curve?"

Student: "Integrate? I don't know. Integrate?"

Me: "Have you read the textbook, sir?"

Student: "No. All I want to do is find the area under the curve!"

Me: "The information on how to do that should be in your textbook. Why don't you try reading it and call me back if you still can't figure it out."

Student: "But I lost my textbook!"

Me: <groan> "OK, well, you should really try and get another copy; there's only so much I can do over the phone. But I'll see what I can do. What's the equation of your curve?"

Student: "What's an equation?"

Me: "Well, in this case, it's a symbolic representation of the curve, usually using a cartesian system with x representing the distance along the horizontal axis and y the distance along the vertical. Sir, have you taken algebra?"

Student: "Algebra? No. What's that?"

Me: "Well I'm sorry, sir, but you really can't use calculus unless you already have algebra."

Student: "But all I want to do is [etc.]"

-jwgh (who actually taught a high school calculus class for a few months)

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"These people where not only cheering, they were throwing flowers and hats.
The hats were made of stone, but the thought was there."
           (Terry Pratchett, Eric)

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