Community College: The Finest America has to Offer.

I've got friends who write blogs. I've even got a few family members. I never really got into that whole thing, writing just wasn't really something I was interested in. Well that's about to change. After a semester and a half in Community College I feel it is my duty to inform that rest of the world of the horrors that take place in these hallowed halls. I'm also incredibly bitter towards this subject so take that with a grain of salt as you navigate your way through the following piece of brilliantly written literature.

Hold on kids class is about to begin.




Community College is like a relationship. (Side note taking relationship advice from me is like taking financial advice from Bernie Madoff). Coming from a big school I was pretty excited to get a change of pace into a smaller atmosphere with smaller class sizes and more attention towards students, like most relationships community college started off pretty well. Here's the best way I can describe this before I continue, basically it's pretty similar to how you start to date someone and everything is going great. You're having fun enjoying the other person's company and life is going well. Then after a while things are still alright but you realized that Susan (fake name) isn't all that exciting anymore, but she's still a nice girl so it last a little longer. Three weeks later and you realize Susan's insane and the whole thing spirals to all hell. Basically that's how my adventures have transpired so far.

I'm going to break this down into three categories so you can see what I'm talking about because I'm aware that if anyone reads this they probably haven't had the honor to attend so a prestigious establishment.



THE STUDENTS:

There's a couple types of students at CC. The first is the overbearing adult who dropped out of high school but makes it their business to answer every question in class to impress the teacher who's probably young enough to be their kid. These fine folks generally range from the age of 45-60 and are seen everywhere. They're like a rash. I'm serious. Take the fine lady who sits next to me in Biology. She is 53 years old and has a name that I never cared to ask. She always is the first one to try and answer a question and does that thing like a six year old when they have to go to the bathroom ("Oh, oh me! Me! I know!). Let me be quite frank with you there's nothing more annoying than an obnoxious elderly person in class. Furthermore ma'am in Biology class if you're reading this, if you'd put as much effort into school when Nixon was in office as you do now, you may actually have achieved some of your dreams. Stop trying to live through your kids and get a real job. I'd also like to point out that if one more adult tells me that Richard Nixon wasn't wrong, I'm going to go apeshit. The only guy guiltier than Nixon is OJ. Seriously, I apologize that you voted for the man. Hopefully you got the next one right but please stop telling me, because quite frankly it appears you haven't bathed in three days and I'm trying to pay attention.

The second type of student is the adult who did graduate high school or college but for some reason is taking classes again and only God knows why. These people are a complete mystery to me. I don't get it. Maybe they beat their kids or maybe they just have no friends but for whatever reason taking 15 hours of school a week at the age of 107 sounds like a good idea to them. These populous people usually keep to themselves unless it's just you and them in the halls, then they'll attempt to strike up a conversation. This reminds me if someone at CC every starts a conversation with the words "You know when I was young..." run. Run, run, run, run, run, run. I'm not kidding. Drop the class and never go back. Not only will you end up hearing a 12 minute story about how (insert high school) was better in the 1970's when you could smoke in school and the girls were easy, but you'll walk away praying to yourself that you don't end up like that guy when you're 80. Also if you happen to not be able to run or you're just slow (because they WILL chase after you) at the end of the story they'll always ask, "Ya know what I'm talking about?" No, I don't know what you're talking about because I didn't go to high school during the Revolutionary War and never got the chance to have tea with Robert E Lee, but thanks for that vividly detailed story and the 12 minutes of my life I'll never get back.

Finally, for the student section there's the teenage or mid twenties student who just appears to have no general idea of where they're going in life or what they're doing. These kids come into class and it's impossible to tell whether they're high or their though process really goes something like this. I don't really know why these kids bother to show up. They sit in class do nothing and get terrible grades. They might as well just take $1,500 and burn it. That's really not even an exaggeration. Although if you followed carefully you'll see that eventually student type #3 becomes student type #1 and this whole damned process starts over.




Unfortunately, I need a nap before work but next time I'll break you in on the wonderful faculty that is known as TEACHERS at Meramec.


COMMUNITY COLLEGE PART II - THE FACULTY

Community College is fascinating on a lot of levels. You see things you thought you'd never see in life, like a guy hanging from a tree in the middle of campus playing a flute and you meet people that you wonder how survival of the fittest hasn't already killed them.

The first thing I wondered when I stepped on campus was what the teachers would be like. I'd heard horrors stories about certain programs and um good things....actually, no the only good thing I'd heard about it was that the art program was great. My first semester teachers defined awful and I'm pretty sure my history teacher was a descendent of Hitler because he was WAY too excited to talk about the Holocaust. One of my classmates had to remind him that "six million people died during that you sick fuck." However, I digress. I'm going to focus on the teachers I have this semester. To start however, I'd like to remind you that unless you're in the art department 99.9% of the teachers are going to suck worse than this guy. It's just a fact. The faculty at Community College all have a different job at a real college/university and to be quite honest they don't really care about anything at CC but making a few extra dollars. (I also realize that I'm making rash generalization and sound completely jaded but for the sake of this blog role with me ok.)

Take for instance my algebra teacher. I'm in a late start class and the first thing this guys tells the class is "sorry if you don't like this class but I was told 48 hours ago that I was teaching this and haven't had time to prepare." Is this a joke? To quote my friend Brandon a ham sandwich could've taught me math better. Not only this but the class is in the farthest building on campus, basically the reject building and it's on the second floor in a classroom that MAYBE seats 20 kids and that's if three of them are anorexic. To top it off this guy is easily the creepiest person I've ever met. He's the Michael Devlin of teaching, the odds of the girl who sits in the front row filing sexual assault charges before the semester is over is currently 87%. I mean I guess since I'm a guy I can put up with him but I really feel like I should be calling in MSNBC and Chris Hanson to handle my math class.

The creepy teachers don't really bother me (because basically they're all creepy), it's the teachers who literally have no idea what state they're in that really get me. This would be my Biology teacher. The lady actually does work at a legitimate university and even has written the book and lab book we work with in class. Upon hearing this I thought that this may be a decent class, I mean she wrote the book so she should know the answers to the question.

So we're in lab class on Monday and if you received a text message along the lines of "FUCK THIS SCHOOL" on Monday you're about to find out why. We're performing a lab on bacteria which is about as fun as watching grass grow and there's a question in the lab book that nobody can understand. I mean nobody, I even asked the 53 year old lady at the next table who knows everything. She didn't know. So I'm thinking my teacher wrote this book I'll ask her. I proceed to explain to her that the question doesn't make any sense and ask her what she's looking for in the answer. I received the answer of "I don't know." Excuse me? You don't know....HOW THE FUCK DO YOU NOT KNOW, YOU WROTE THE DAMN BOOK? As I calmly and collectively reminded her of this she told me to google the question when I got home. Um, you're joking? Please, for the love of God tell me you're joking ma'am. I had to watch Michael Devlin eye rape an innocent girl for the last hour in algebra and you're telling me you don't know the answer to a question in A BOOK YOU WROTE. At this point I proceeded to walk out of class and cancelled school activities for the rest of the day. Ladies and gentlemen, Community College!



Again, I'm taking a nap before work today and will get the third and final part of this done tomorrow at some point. I hope.

However, before I go I'd like to share a story that happened to me in algebra. We're sitting in class playing "math baseball" which is the gayest thing you'll ever do, FYI. Basically we're all given a problem and supposed to solve it on our own is the gist of this. So the kid sitting next to me and I finish and we're talking and I look down the row and there's this heavy set kid who looks really confused. As Professor Devlin looks up and says "is everyone finished?", this heavy set kid stands up and shouts in the middle of class, "WHAT THE HELL ARE WE EVEN LOOKING FOR IN THIS PROBLEM?". Needless to say everyone including P. Devlin is stunned and the kid next to me is laughing so hard he's crying. So of course now I'm laughing and the kid who can't do 2x + 4 = 20 now feels like the world's biggest douche. Anyway, Michael excuses classes ten minutes early and I'm not clear if he molested the heavy set kid or not but he didn't come back next class.


Alright children, it's crunch time and class is winding down. It's time to hit the hardcore stuff, the stuff that's gonna be on the final exam.

The final part of the blog here we're going to do a bit differently. For starters I'm just going to label it SCHOOL and instead of complete thoughts as in the previous two parts I'm going to combine a bunch of random thoughts into paragraphs. If you like it great, if you don't well eat shit.

Without further hesitation, I present you SCHOOL:

Ok to start I'd like to talk about the quad, it's basically a grove of trees that's about as big as your home garden. In this grove however is where majority of the students meet with one another to talk about creepy things like Pokemon cards and World of War Craft. What I'd really like to hit on are the kids who play musical instruments in the "quad". For starters, to the kid who thinks he's Jason Mraz, for the love of God you're not. Seriously, you're about as much like Jason Mraz as I am Ghandi. You can't sing and you play the guitar about as well as a blind monkey. Also please, please, please FOR THE LOVE OF GOD learn another song than "The Remedy". I know it's tough because Jason Mraz is a fruit anyway, but if I walk by one more time and you're nine octaves too high on the second verse I'm seriously going to bitch slap you with that guitar. You've been warned. While I'm on this topic, to the girl who sits next to him and plays the tambourine, in no part of "The Remedy" is there a fucking tambourine. Actually, I'm going to fill you in on this little fact, in no part of any good song is there a tambourine. Do you know why, because it's a stupid instrument that requires little musical talent and is more grating to listen to than nails on a chalkboard. Learn a new instrument or just spare us all the trouble.

After we make our way through the quad, we find ourselves outside of Clark Hall. You may ask yourself who Clark is and don't bother because no one fucking knows. I've asked every person in Clark Hall and no one has a single clue as to who this douche is. Anyway, CH is where admissions at Meramec is housed which is also home to the most incompetent and inept people on the Earth. If you don't believe me ask anyone who attends this school and the admissions/financial aid faculty are awful. Let's start with admissions. As I'm attempting to send my transcripts to Kansas, the lady informs me that I don't I don't have the address for KU on my paper. As I politely remind her that I do, she informs me that the address on the application is for University of Kansas in Lawrence, KS. Um, no shit ma'am, that's where I want these transcripts sent. So the mummy behind the counter looks at it again and tells me that that's my home address. Of course, how could I forget that I lived in the admission office at KU, silly me. As old Frankenstein turns back to her computer I inconspicuously exit the room and make a few I hate the elderly comments just loud enough that Cleopatra at the next desk shoots me a look. Back off raiders of the lost ark.

I'm not even going to discuss the cashiers office because I'm pretty sure they've issued a restraining order against me.



I apologize that section three was a bit shorter than one and two. Just how I roll. Before, I put a wrap on this edition of "Why Community College Sucks Worse than my Future In-Laws." I'd like to end with a small story.

So I'm walking back to my car and I pass by two creeps wearing shirts that say "Professional Vag Inspector" and "I <3 Teachers With Cans." Really, you're a "Professor Vagina Inspector" sir, because you're 50 pounds passed obese, have acne I could play connect that dots with and haven't gotten a new haircut since '92. For the guy who likes "Teachers With Cans", really bro, really? I mean who doesn't like hot teachers? What, happens when you have a class with a hot teacher, didn't think that one through did you dipshit?

One more thing I'd like to mention before I leave. Who's hires these teachers? While in algebra today, I found out that Professor Devlin before working here was a middle school teacher. I mean, it makes perfect since that the guy who looks and acts like the most notorious child molester since Michael Jackson worked at a middle school, but we're hiring middle school teachers? Was Wildwood campus out of people to lend? Furthermore I'd like to add that somewhere there's a middle school with a large group of twelve year olds that are severely emotionally disturbed. I feel like the teaching requirements for this school are "Must be 25 years old and have a pulse." For crying out loud at least make an attempt here.


Anyway, I hope to keep this an ongoing thing. Here's to hoping my life remains remotely interesting.


Until next time,


Your friend and mine,

-ben