T-Ball academics going mainstream sounds silly but it is very serious. It comes from Walter Willams piece at The Daily Signal and exposes how American University has hired a professor to teach other professors on how to grade students.
The University believes student “labor” (on writing) should be measured rather than skill or ability.
Employers pay for results
Think about that for just a minute. The reward does not go to actual learning. It does not go to demonstrated proficiency in the area of study. No, it goes to “labor”. That is time expended regardless of the result. How hard did you try? This is college “T-Ball”.
Employers receiving college graduates who spend a lot of time not getting things done are not what they want.
The professor that American University hired to teach that nonsense is Asao B. Inoue. He is a professor at the University of Washington in Tacoma in interdisciplinary arts and sciences. He is also the director of the university’s writing center.
Racist objectives or functional literacy?
Inoue believes that a person’s writing ability should not be assessed, in order to promote “anti-racist” objectives. He taught American University’s faculty members that their previous practices of grading writing promoted white language supremacy. Inoue thinks that students should be graded on the effort they put into a project.
The idea to bring such a professor to American University was probably the result of deep thinking. Undoubtedly, deep thinking done by the university’s diversity and campus life officials. Inoue’s views are not simply extreme. They are hostile to the academic mission of most universities. They are entirely antithetical to the pay for results approach of the world at large.
Forgiving and ignoring a students’ writing ability affects black students most. White students’ speaking and writing would be judged against the King’s English. The King’s English is standard, correct English grammar.
Generative theory of language
Noam Chomsky formulated the generative theory of language. According to his theory, the most basic form of language is a set of rules of syntax universal for all humans. It underlies the grammar of all human languages. We analyze and interpret our environment with words. The words form sentences in a structured language. That’s what allows us to effectively communicate thought and reason.
Conclusion
Not holding students accountable for proper grammar does a disservice. It disproportionately harms students who overall show poor writing abilities. When these students graduate from college, they are not going to receive evaluations based on Inoue’s standards. They will receive judgment according to their objective abilities. It follows that when they fail to meet those objective standards, the standards themselves will be labeled as racist. T-Ball academics going mainstream is a sad fact of life these days.