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keri
2010-01-17 08:14 pm UTC (link)

Dear lord, it's like that kid has never considered what professors have to deal with on a regular basis. It's like he's never considered that rules like "10% off the grade when caught texting" might have been put in place for his benefit. (And I seriously doubt that the grade deduction is for a first-time or mild offense.)

Also, I like how Raw W-something commented somewhere around a third of the way down the page that texting isn't distracting for other students unless they have ADD. I mean, what?! I dunno, but I always found it was super easy to be distracted by someone doing something unusual during a lecture, even when I was fully engaged with the class. Texting or websurfing ranked up there.

My favorite was this one girl who I had several classes with over a few different semesters and who would break out a water bottle in the middle of class and one of those packets of flavor/vitamin powder. She'd proceed to pour the powder into the bottle, then shake it for a good minute or two. It was so loud and obnoxious and I inevitably missed parts of the professor's lecture because of it. I was so happy when I walked by said prof's office one time and overheard the girl getting scolded about her behaviour ♥

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beccastareyes
2010-01-17 08:25 pm UTC (link)

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dez_chan
2010-01-17 08:43 pm UTC (link)

I hate HATE to use the "what the fuck are you going to do out in the real world, you special fucking snowflake" but seriously! What's gonna happen in an office or workplace environment when they're at a meeting or something and they bust out the fucking phone to text? Then they'll probably run home and cry that they're so working below their potential, man! They should've taken that internship at Elitest Fuckwads LTD., they'd appreciate his genius and innovation and they wouldn't have to pay attention to shit they don't want to! And they can have ice cream for breakfast!

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keri
2010-01-17 08:46 pm UTC (link)

Don't worry! He's already responded to that in this post or comments or somewhere. He claims that there's a difference between an office and a school environment, and he wouldn't dare use his cellphone to text in a meeting at work!

Because, of course, there's nothing at all similar to the two things, and the main reasons against texting at work are totally different from those against texting in class.

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	dez_chan 2010-01-17 08:48 pm UTC (link)
	It's my experience that people who are entitled assholes in college are the same entitled assholes in the workplace, but YMMV. These are also the same people that I long to take drinking in a rough part of town so as to witness a beatdown. (Reply to this)(Parent)

zyna_kat
2010-01-17 10:59 pm UTC (link)

Heh. Oddly enough, at my office, he'd be the only one not texting or taking calls during meetings. It goes on constantly. Sometimes we have people attending one meeting in person, and listening into a conference call of another meeting.

It used to bother me a lot, but most of us have gotten used to it, unless the person is being really obnoxious about it.

So, if this dude can multi-task paying attention to the professor and texting, he's learning an important business skill!

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	frequentmouse 2010-01-19 09:34 pm UTC (link)
	Or as the demotivation has it, "Meetings: because all of us together are stupider than any of us separately." Since my husband got a Blackberry he uses required large-group meetings to answer email, do remote checks on his servers, and work through the easier bits of his help-desk queue. It at least gets something useful done (Reply to this)(Parent)

	sheep 2010-01-17 09:12 pm UTC (link)
	Our university lecturer never threatened to lower your grade, he just threatened to take your mobile and phone the speaking clock in China, and then leave it on for the duration of the lecture. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	keri 2010-01-17 09:22 pm UTC (link)
	That is a beautiful threat. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	wankaholic 2010-01-17 10:20 pm UTC (link)
	Ours always said that if he caught you texting in class, or if your phone went off, he'd answer the text/answer your phone. :x (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	harrylovesron 2010-01-17 10:38 pm UTC (link)
	One of mine said that, too. He followed through on one occasion. XD I can't remember it very well, though. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

wankismyfandom
2010-01-18 12:39 am UTC (link)

Once in my university Spanish class, somebody's cell phone went off, and the prof breezed by her desk, swooped up the phone, and answered it with a stream of rapid-fire Spanish, explaining that [student] was in class and unavailable, but that the caller could try back in an hour. We could all hear the person on the other end going "What? WHAT? Who are you? Where's [student]?"

After that people turned off their cell phones quite religiously upon crossing the classroom threshold.

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harrylovesron, 2010-01-18 01:03 am UTC

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finchbird, 2010-01-18 02:57 am UTC

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honorh, 2010-01-18 10:37 am UTC

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sizer, 2010-01-18 11:42 am UTC

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jaythenerdkid, 2010-01-18 05:56 pm UTC

	mary_mac 2010-01-18 02:40 pm UTC (link)
	One of ours did that. Usually very grouchily, but once he got A's granny, who'd learned to only phone her after 6 just in time for her to start having MA classes that started at 6, and proceeded to conduct some of the most outrageous flirting any of us had ever heard. I miss that class. It was fun. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	plazmah 2010-01-17 11:54 pm UTC (link)
	That reminds me of a girl who sat near me in my freshman physics class; the class was right before lunch and she'd always bust out either a tuna sandwich or an orange, both of which are smells I (nor many of my friends) cannot stand. It was horribly distracting. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	harrylovesron 2010-01-18 01:06 am UTC (link)
	Oh man, people eating in class was one of my big pet peeves, too- both because of the smell and because of noisy chewers. There was a guy in one of my classes who always sat next to me, often brought a snack and chewed with his mouth open. DDD: (Mouth-open chewing is one of those nails-on-a-chalkboard sounds to me, I cannot STAND it.) (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	hallidae 2010-01-18 01:19 am UTC (link)
	This was the one good thing about studio classes I was in: in the ones that actually allowed food, everybody was eating, so it wasn't just one person distracting everyone. The only time it was really bad was if someone broke out something like curry, or something that had onions in it. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

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sequinedlizard, 2010-01-18 02:13 am UTC

varethane
2010-01-18 09:51 pm UTC (link)

:C I ate a lot in class last fall semester, due to a ridiculous schedule-- every Wednesday I would have class in one campus from 8:30 am to 12:30 pm (I'm in a fine arts program so studio classes are four hours long), then from 1:30 to 5:30 at a campus all the way across town (so lunch was picking something up en route and eating it in class), and then AGAIN from 6:00 to 10:00pm... back at the first campus, entailing another trip across town. Twelve hours of almost solid class, and I couldn't eat during the breaks or I'd be late to the next class.

...I tried to do the eating unobtrusively, at least? D:

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twinno
2010-01-18 02:15 am UTC (link)

As an undergrad I was chronically in classes with a girl my other cohorts had unfortunately deemed "Pizza Face," because she'd always bring food to class and she was a very, very sloppy eater.

Most of my grad school profs, though, gave the students carte blanche on food, since those classes always coincided with dinnertime and were usually very, very long. I still felt bad when I walked in with Taco Bell, though.

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	lyssa 2010-01-19 03:51 am UTC (link)
	I had a professor that brought in food for us all to share since we'd voted to move the class to 6-9. He even made the university pay for it. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	silrana 2010-01-18 05:00 am UTC (link)
	I'm feeling really old now. When I was in college, you thought you had a really relaxed professor if they let you bring in a soft drink can. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	monty 2010-01-18 12:13 am UTC (link)
	Dear lord, it's like that kid has never considered what professors have to deal with on a regular basis. That kid has never considered what anyone who is not him thinks, wants, feels, or has to deal with. (Reply to this)(Parent)

abharding
2010-01-18 03:17 am UTC (link)

So if someone has a disorder it is their fault if they are distracted by the sound of someone texting in class? I don't look for things/sounds to distract me. They just do. I never had to deal with that particular distraction, but that is because of when I went to school.

That said, there are times when someone is going to need have their phone on - even in a class. My sister likes to tell a story of one class she in where one of the other students was a guy whose wife was nine months pregnant - so he was pretty much on stand by. But he put the phone on vibrate - so if his called he could leave with as little fuss as possible.

But something like that? It is the exception. And in the person can talk with the professor to let him/her know what is going on.

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digigirl132
2010-01-18 12:23 pm UTC (link)

Yeah, there's always exceptions. In one of my classes there was a guy who had a 24-hour call job, and he could lose his job (and his ability to pay for college) if he didn't answer his phone. Another was the primary caretaker for two children with severe disabilities, and he had to keep his on just in case the daycare needed to contact him.

But that's the thing: they had damn good reasons to keep their phones on. Ten bucks says that the guy posting all of this just wants to talk to his buddies.

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	caffeine_fairy 2010-01-18 08:30 pm UTC (link)
	To quote him directly; As for “WHY” I text: I have a social life. Can't be much of one if you have to be on call every moment of theday. If people were that keen to talk to you, they'd call back. (Reply to this)(Parent)

drmoppet
2010-01-18 03:53 pm UTC (link)

In my experience, students who need to have their phones on for family, job, or other important reasons (like being on call for firefighting/EMS) tend to be the ones who let me know in advance, put the thing on vibrate, and don't use it unless they actually get that call.

(Which is why I tell students "If you need to have your phone on because something important for you could happen, please just put it on vibrate and step out if it goes off. However, if 'something important' is 'I can't go 50 minutes without texting,' please consider a 12-step program.")

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