It's All Academic

 I think most of us know that there are two meanings of the word "academic" and I for one do not believe that the virtually opposite definitions are just beautifully coincidental. One meaning is anything related to education and scholarship. The second meaning, one that most only discover through education and scholarship, is anything that is not of practical relevance, usefulness, or interest. You've heard the saying, "It's all academic." It's something you say when any further action will be useless, disinteresting, and irrelevant. That's meaning #2 and we all know that "number two" has a dual meaning as well. Bearing that in mind, I will begin this post by saying that my M. Ed. efforts have taken a sudden turn from #1 to #2.

Let me hit you with another well known saying - and sayings tend to become better known in proportion to their truthfulness - You get what you pay for. I chose the University of the People because it had a Master of Education program and because it was cheap. Not free although they claim to be tuition free. I don't give a rip whether you call it "tuition" or "a modest stipend for the professor," I am concerned only with how much this education will cost me. "Free" tends to catch the eye more than the word "affordable" which also appears on this page. I guess they got me there! 

I have recently found out a few things about my current Master of Education studies, as well as the institution through which they are being conducted, the University of the People, that are screaming definition number two and are illustrating saying #2 because if you ask me, they stink like number two. I will let you in on those things and what I think they signify. Please tell me if you think I am jumping to conclusions.

I started my studies officially in April of 2022 while still living in Gongju, Korea. I was accepted into the U. of the People on the strength of my Canadian BA that I am currently being told is only the equivalent of three years of study toward an American 4-year BA. Translations and equivalencies... a frustrating and unfair part of academia that sometimes subverts definition #1 in favour of #2. I have also been informed by a Maryland university that my credits from the U. of the People are not yet acceptable or transferable to that college because while the U. of the People IS accredited by the DEAC (Distance Education Accreditation Dept.), which is recognized by the US Department of Education (USDE) and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA), it is not, as yet, recognized by the WSCUC (Western States Commission for Senior College and University). Wait, wouldn't that be WSCSCU? Abbreviations, initialisms, and acronyms... one of the most common ways to disguise #2 as #1. 

I will get to the shafting I believe I am receiving that has to do with my final two courses in my master's, but first an illustration of the above. I contacted my academic advisor (chuckle chuckle... academic is right) Sampada about the BS I am going to relate and she focused on one part of my correspondence: my use of the "U. of the People" instead of what she called the "acronym UoPeople." I am going through an educational crisis that could end my studies that have cost me a several thousand dollars and hundreds of hours and she is lecturing me (erroneously) on how to abbreviate the name of the institute?!?! The following is what I felt the need to send her:

As a friendly reminder, kindly note that "UoPeople" is not an acronym. One of my pet peeves is people who throw around acronyms like LINC (Language Instruction for Newcomers to Canada) and initialisms/abbreviations like PBLA (Portfolio Based Language Assessment) especially when speaking to people who do not know what they mean. It is a pretension of professionalism that I try to avoid since it leads to highly UNprofessional confusion. In many cases it is just an affectation used to impress. 

"UoPeople" is neither an acronym or an initialism. I'd refer to it as an awkward abbreviation. What I did is abbreviated "University" in the accepted "U." form and then wrote the rest of the title in full. In my opinion, it is a form of the university title that is less prone to confusion. However, I think we would both know from context and experience what is being referred to even if one of us would type UoP, U.P., UoftheP, or some other short forms, so let's not be pedantic. 

The focus of my B.A. was English literature. I had more than my share of professors who analyzed every detail of my syntax, grammar, and writing structure to the point of excessiveness, but they did it correctly. It made my writing better. One part of my predominantly positive experience at the UoPeople that has been difficult for me to deal with is the weekly criticisms of my written work done by fellow students, many of whom do not speak English as their primary language, that have included incorrect corrections which cost me grade points. There is so little recourse that I have taken to skipping the peer correction portions of my classes. It has hurt my CGPA, (an initialism, not an acronym) but saved my sanity. 

See? I have far too much free time. I need to get back to my studies. :-)

So in future, let's not be concerned about each other's writing, grammar, spelling, etc. I think it would be preferable to concentrate on giving program advice relevant to my academic experience at the university. 

I hope you agree. 

I received a reply that ignored my advice and continued to refer to UoPeople as an acronym and it was purposefully overused. I will henceforth use only "U. of the People" and never "UoPeople" to refer to the institute with which I am currently, and precariously, attached. 

You may consider all of this academic... because it totally IS. But I have grown sick of this sort of number two. I have reached the limits of what Faulkner would call the "baseless hoping that is the diet of weaklings." I am mad as hell and I'm not going to take it any more. This is the start of me fighting back. 

The acronym LINC and the initialism PBLA were chosen for a reason. They are two of 100 such misleading and confusing short forms that were bandied about by self-congratulatory academics at weekly meetings in the Calgary Centre for Newcomers where I used to work. They cherished all of their secret code words and Pavlovially honoured and protected them as loyally as Sampada with "UoPeople." They sprinkled these abbreviations generously into their meeting lectures to assure the higher ups of their worthiness and irreplaceability and to assure the newbies that if they don't understand, it's because they are UNworthy and replaceable. The entire room was full of people who fancied themselves teachers and who were loathe to explain things or TEACH things. Is this what we consider to be academia?

Anyhow, I digress. Is my university accredited? The short answer is no. It is not regionally accredited and unbeknownst as well as unbecarenst to me, regional accreditation is widely considered superior to national accreditation in the US. It is more prestigious. Well la de da, who gives a fuck, I wanted my M.Ed. for international or possibly Canadian teaching purposes. 

However, now I know that often when the word "accredited" is used, it only means regionally accredited. For example Canadian universities recognize transfer credits from similar courses from accredited American universities. So I could go to the U of T, UBC, McMaster, SFU, Queen's, UVIC, or major unis like that in Canada and just grab two more credits and claim my master's, riiiiiggghhhht?Well, I am now learning that like the answer to almost all questions in our lives of manufactured complexity, the answer is, "It depends..." Maybe, like the Maryland university that refused my U of the People credits, Canadian universities will only accept REGIONALLY accredited university credits. 

Who the hell looks deeply into this? I mean honestly, before I signed up for the U of the People should I have called every university and college in Canada at which I thought I might at some point want to use my master's for teaching and/or studying and asked whether credits from the U of the People would be recognized? What about the ones around the world? And that answer can change. The U of the People is currently a candidate for regional accreditation. I think I know one of the ways they might be going about trying to attain it and it has to do with me and my fellow M. Ed. students being forced into performing studies and writing them up as our theses rather than choosing topics about which we are more passionate. In almost every class I took the professors gave us readings from the internet, JSTOR, LIRN, e-book central, Gale, ACM, or other such cherished abbreviations with which to complicate our educational vernacular but we were also tasked with providing our own outside sources in everything we wrote. In almost every class I noticed some of the websites I had used in my writing being assigned as required reading in subsequent weeks. It probably happened other times without my notice and it definitely happened to other students. This is not plagiarism and with the profs not getting full salaries, who can blame them, right? My baseless hopes were that only our sources, not our writing, would be used for the benefit of the university.

I have no evidence and I am not suggesting that this is happening, but what if the reason we are all being forced to write professional pedagogical studies on classes (something exactly none of my fellow students have expressed an interest let alone a preference in) is so that the university can combine our studies and theses into a macro-study that can be published by the university as a means toward qualification for the more prestigious regional accreditation? That's how this academic number two works, isn't it? If you answered no, stick with me.

 I have to tell you that part of the 11th course, aside from conducting your research on a class of students, is compiling a comprehensive list of articles, documents, and works that you have cited or referenced in your writing throughout the previous 10 courses. They want at least two for each week of study. The courses are 8 weeks each. Along with weekly correspondence and peer evaluation between fellow students and the prof, we are expected to do one discussion post, one formal writing assignment, and one portfolio writing assignment. We don't always have all three but usually do. That amounts to almost 240 written assignments by the end of the 10th course. Each are 2-3 pages and each must have several sources. I have some with more than 10 works cited. 

If I make a "portfolio" of the most important sources from the most important writing assignments, we'd be looking at conservatively over 700 sources I have used. Part of the 11th course is to write up that list and they provide us with a template we must adhere to. In the beginning (2022 and 2023) we were forced to use the online portfolio program called Evernote. Like most of my fellow students I found Evernote to be unnecessarily complicated, tedious, and completely superfluous, but we were forced to make entries, take screenshots of them, then submit them for grades. Also like most of my fellow students, I have kept all of my writing in an organized file and it includes well over 1000 sources recorded in perfect APA citation. They are also recorded in the program I use that makes the APA perfect called Perrla. I don't need a "portfolio" but the school has hopped on this pedagogical bandwagon, this fleeting fad, this flavour of the day in education - port fucking folios. 

Can you tell how much I like this process? I hated using it for my studies (as did all of my fellow students) and I hated using it in the classes I taught (as did all of the students). It's just a giant waste of time. When I was doing the PBLA classes at the Calgary Centre for Newcomers, trying to organize each student's binder and trying to organize each lesson, handout, exercise, assessment, quiz, etc. into the appropriate heading, sub-heading and sub-sub-heading with uniformity that would pass the auspices of the governing bodies constant watchful eyes, the only thing uniform was frustration for everyone and time we could be learning to speak English completely wasted. At the Calgary CFN it was useful for the bosses, however, in making sure teachers were teaching what was wanted and not teaching what wasn't. For the U. of the People, it's just a more organized and convenient printout of academic sources their students find and they use for their own purposes. But BOTH try to soft soap the teachers/students into believing it is all for our own good. Well fuck 'em. I am reminded of Korean banks forcing customers to use their bankbooks. After 100 transactions without updating the bankbook, your account will be frozen. It was even worse in China. They assure us it is for our "convenience" but it's just so they can keep track of our money. In Korea I got into the habit of starting new accounts after 99 transactions and making a grand display of throwing my pristinely unused bankbook in the garbage before taking home my new bankbook that would be thrown into the same garbage 99 transactions later. I am VERY tempted to tell the U of the People to take their fucking portfolio and flush it down the toilet because it stinks like number two.

Before Sampada became my academic advisor I had Renuka. About half way through my 10 courses I asked her to make sure I took all the electives and mandatory classes I needed and to give me an idea of what was acceptable for thesis topics. I gave her a description of some of the things that had interested me most in the courses to that point and how I would like to formulate a thesis from them. It was basically how to use Paulo Freiere's tactics for teaching adult literacy to oppressed Brazilians and employ them in the area of adult ESL for today's politically oppressed learners. I would still like to do that and I have a list of reading and research I have already done in preparation. I was never given an answer by Renuka. In fact the last email I received from her was an introduction saying, "Hi, my name is Renuka and I will be your new academic advisor."

I think I had Renuka to get me through the good 10 courses and now I have Sampada whose job it is to bully me into finishing this thing up. I recently asked her if I really had to find a class and do a study on that class. I am finding it difficult to get work in Canada, U.S., Taiwan, and other places as described in my previous post. Her response was that I could have worked out other methods like surveying teachers or using archives. But it was my fault for dropping the course without getting in touch with my professor.

The reality is I sent an email to the professor via U. of the People email which is the only means of correspondence with her I had been offered. I waited until the night before the course dropping deadline and received no response from the professor. So I guess I was expected to stay in the class having absolutely no idea of what the course would entail other than the tedium of the portfolio and conducting some sort of process that I was NOT interested in which would ultimately become the basis of a thesis I did not want to write. 

I chose to drop the course and am currently on leave of absence   NUMBER TWO. 

Evidently there is a maximum number of leaves of absence a student can apply for and take. After that I don't know what happens. From early indications of the help I will receive from Sampada, or lack thereof, I think I may find out.

There may yet be a way to make Gatorade out of this pile of gators but if not it is still another piece of extraordinarily bad luck in an extraordinarily bad luck career. 

The one saving grace is that it IS entertaining to write/complain about, don't you reckon?