Newspapers / Fayetteville State University Student … / Nov. 1, 1995, edition 1 / Page 14
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Broncos' Voice Homccoming 1995 Teach Me Instructors of Fayetteville State University: Are you using your de gree to facilitate academic excellence or to undermine and intimidate stu dents? Is your degree the only mea sure of intelligence? For centuries, critics, scholars, and great philosophers have argued with great curiosity and passion: “What makes one an intelligent being?,, I believe a number of professors at Fayetteville State University have been plagued by the same complex ques tion. With no other answer, they re solve, “Yes, my degree makes me in telligent. It sets me way above my stu dents not only as a scholar, but also as a human being, and therefore, it gives me not only the power, but also the right to a) be condescending, b) be an intimidator or c) question the students’ abilities based on ethnicity or gender.,, This dangerous berating and belit tling of students must stop! No more should students’ ears ring with dull ing, condescending, and insecure state ments such as “I have my degree, you need to get yours,,, or “I already have what you are trying to get,,, or “It’s my way or no way.,. It is this type of superficial mentality that imposes aca demic terror and intimidation upon stu dents, and these two qualities are not conducive to the learning process. A professor who is so arrogant as to believe that he or she has nothing to learn, or to gain, from the student is the biggest of all demigods. Learning is a continuous and cumulative pro cess. Professors who are unwilling and unable to admit that they too are im perfect creatures, capable of making mistakes, are loaded guns; their tar- by Tonia Y. Clare-Jones Are you using your degree to facilitate academic ex cellence or to undermine and intimidate students? gets are submissive students and in tellectually passive students. Fayetteville State University is comprised of some African American instructors who bring centuries of power lessness with them into the class, and al though they may rep resent and embody a knowledgeable people, are they guilty of using their degrees to be ___ condesending to students? Are they us ing their de grees to ex act loyalty and submis- s i V e n e s s from stu- dents based upon insults and intimi dation? Ultimately, is the classroom governed by a dictatorship or do stu dents have the right to be heard, to petition, to challenge, to demand that they be treated with respect regardless of gender or race. Fayetteville State University is also comprised of some white' instructors who seem to be here merely for a pay check. Instructors who have no regard for the academic welfare of students are dangerous seeds. These seeds bring forth a fruit of disguised igno rance. These instructors also bring biased baggage to a historically black university and dump it on the laps of their students. Not only do they seem not to care about the scholastic devel opment of the student body as a whole, but also, they have the annoying habit of patronizing us academically and intellectually. Their patronizing us keeps them from having to deal with us on a sincere and sagacious level. They give us superficial information that they feel is pertinent and re duce us to mimicking robots who are asked to remember answers merely to pass tests. The college experience, the true college experi- ence, should not begin and end with rote memorization. Tests based only upon rote memorization do not test in- telligence or learnig capa bilities. All they prove is the slothful ness of the professor and show a bla tant disregard for the student’s ability to learn on an elevated, erudite level. I would ask any professor who assigns an excessive workload just to show au thority or one who constantly criticizes and ridicules a student, “What are you trying to prove?,. Those of us who are academically and intellectually alive are not amused, intimidated, or im pressed by these tactics. Are you try ing to prove that because you have a degree and we don’t, that we should be unquestioningly receptive and ap preciative of any academic instruction you give us, regardless of its rel evance? If your academic instruction is demeaning, condescending, insult ing, and just plain stupid, you haven’t proven anything except that you are using your degree to assert power and to intimidate students into intellectual silence. Your degree in this light be comes nothing more than a tarnished, dusty trophy. I am in no way dismissing the in structors’ knowledge of his or her given field, but does the instructor pos sess wisdom—the ability to use this knowledge in a positive and intellec tual capacity and to convey it to his or her students in a substantive and aca demically credible manner? This qualification is the true test of a “degreed,, person, not some plaque on the wall that one refers to when it is convenient to do so. I have cited the vices of many of the professors at F.S.U., but I would be remiss if I didn’t include the charges against the students. I charge you with apathy. I challenge you, the student body, to insist vocally upon the right to be heard, to petition, to challenge unfair treatment at the hands of pro fessors. You have the right not to be intimidated and not to be forced into some invisible, silent role to pacify the instructor in order to pass the course. Shutting up and selling out your ideas just because they don’t coincide with the instructors’ opinions will ulti mately lead to you selling your-self short of a credible, competitive and substantive education. Many of us have been silenced and forced to be invisible for centuries. At a univer sity, of all places, we should assert our intellectual and academic rights. We must fight mind-forging manacles and loosen ourselves from fettered, oppres sive, and tyrannical spirits that present themselves in the form of “Professor.,, Students, I implore you. Rise! de mand to be taught—not patronized, see Teach, page 17 Resurrection by Eric McQueen We have laid in this grave of op pression and ignorance for a long sea son, but now we’ve been called to rise. For too long we like fools have re turned to our own folly. The Black community is in a shambles, as a re sult of our own actions. We have al lowed ourselves to be mislead by a system that seeks our destruction. Ho micide is on the rampage through our community. Teenage pregnancy, drug abuse, incarceration, crime, unemploy ment, poverty and broken homes are all prominent portions of our commu nity. Our foolishness is laid out on tele vision, radio, newspapers and maga zines for the whole world to see. The shame that is attached to the Black community drives some Blacks to reject themselves. We begin to in tegrate with things that are foreign. This denial of self has led to cosmetic surgery, altered hair color, colored contacts, and altered behavior to as similate characteristics that are mag nified by hypocrisy. The abun dance of ishness in our commu nity has us in a mental grave, where we have lay stagnant for centuries. Due to the condition of our state. Minister Louis Farrakhan called for one million Black men to rise up from their hellish state and set the commu nity in order. The One Million Man March that took place October 16, 1995 in Washington D.C. was a return to self. It’s time for us to end this mockery of self and abandon this sys tem that has put us on a course for self- destruction. October 16, 1995 was a Holy Day of Atonement that signified an elevation to the one who created us, not the ones who made us. On that Holy Day, the Black man and Black woman were asked to repent of the rejection of themselves and who they were created to be. In honor of this day, all people of color were asked not to go to work, not to spend money and not to send their children to school. All disputes should have been settled, the time has come to end all division among the family and community. Prayer and fasting are in order to cure us of being such a hard-hearted, stiff- see Resurrection, page 17 Rites of Passage by Vadrin Colvin In response to Stephanie Taylor’s editorial, “But At What Cost?,, ('Bron cos’ Voice. October Issue), I do not belong to a Black Greek-Lettered Or ganization, but I seem to get a differ ent understanding of the purpose of the so-called “hazing,, tactics that they hav6 been accused of using. By no means are the —- techniques meant to be malicious in nature. In my opinion, it’s the exact oppo site. The act of pledging a fra ternity or sorority has been equaled to that of the biblical rite of passage that Moses endured, braving the heat of the desert after exile from Egypt. The pro cess also reflects the turmoil and suf fering of Blacks in the history of our stay in America. The “blood, sweat, and tears,, spilled by our ancestors in the creation of this couiitry is charac terized in form during the pledging process. Like “The Dozens,,, a game The act of pledging a Eter nity or sorority has been equaled to that ofthe bibli- calrite ofpassage... traditionally played by Black children, pledging initiates and prepares one for the racism and oppression awaiting them in White America. Rigorously training the pledgee for induction into an organization that has subsequently proven to be more effi cient in providing service for the larger community on the whole than any of its white counterparts is a welcomfe procedure for some. The number of weeks it takes to pledge a student as a “Black,, Greek in no way compares to the life-time of abuse that Black Ameri- cans have suf fered at the hands of white supremacy. Never would I condone serious bodily harm, injury, or death to any of my brothers or sisters. However, I believe Ms. Tay lor misses the point of pledging by concentrating on the “negative,, of a “positive,, thing. We must always keep in mind that hardship and strife must be endured for any and all ranking po sitions we earn in life.
Fayetteville State University Student Newspaper
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Nov. 1, 1995, edition 1
14
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