Last semester, I went head to head against the establishment at Monroe Community College. Christine Schwartzott (the head cheese at VAPA) came in after the petition was made aware to her. She lambasted me publicly in front of the entire class, in an attempt to scare any of the students that backed me into submission.
Schwartzott made false and misleading accusations about me, so as to discredit me, and distract the class from the real issues (as stated below). When I tried to correct her lies, and defend myself, Schwartzott threatened to have security remove me from the college if I uttered another word.
After I took my test for the class at the Students With Disabilities Center, Fred Burger and Nancy Mallory ignored me and refused to instruct me. I contracted the shingles the next week, and was too ill to make the next class. Between these two situations, it fostered the rumor that I was tossed from the class. This scared the rest of the students, just like N. Mallory, F. Burger, and C. Schwartzott had planned.
I fought my grade of a C - to the bitter end. At MCC there is a 'Good Ol' Boys' system, much like what you see in the redneck parts of the country, and in government. I knew I was in for some backlash, yet the fact that all they could come up with was the fact that I took some pictures of some college attention *ores, (which they all verbally agreed to be photographed) and posted them on my photography site, was comical.
I was not aware at the time that I needed to have written permission (verbal permission does not hold up in court) to do such a thing. That is why I went to college, to learn my craft. I made a mistake, and I made things right. I took the photos off the site as soon as I realized that it was an issue. Dick Ryther, (a head honcho at the college, and one of the few people I respect there) shook my hand, and the issue was dead over two months ago.
Fast forward to this week; I was walking down the hall from a class, when I felt drawn to read the MCC Doctrine (it is a media propaganda tool to promote the college, it rarely contains anything news worthy). My name was on the first line of the front page. As I read this malicious dribble equivalent to a National Enquirer story about Osama Bin Laden hiding out in Rochester, while working as a janitor at MCC, I felt the need to tell the whole story as to why the college even printed this garbage.
Lori Moses, is not a descendant of Moses, Jesus, or John the Baptist; she is one of C. Schwartzott's longtime buddies. Lori had this Psychophant (Noun: One who attempts to curry favor by flattering influencial people, but does so to a psychotic degree. From the Greek word sykophantES slander, and the English word psychosis) - Wendy VanDellon write this front page article bashing me to no end.
I just wanted the world to know the real, hidden reason behind this. If she wanted to do an article of merit, why not write about the greed and corruption at the college. For instance, whenever the measly minimum wage goes up, MCC cuts jobs for its students, cuts the hours of those students that they did not lay off, and cuts educational services - LIKE THE MAC LAB.
Yet, the big wigs like Flynn and his bambinos get a fat raise every year, at the expense of the students. They are the same ones with the power to cut funding in departments, while also voting themselves a raise. There is money in the budget to have Red Hot Chili Peppers concert (at $160,000) at the college, but no money to keep out MAC labs running on weekends, or help upgrade the video production equipment).
VanDellon has neither the talent, nor the guts to write of such issues. This was her big chance to suck up to the yuck yucks at MCC. Well, pat yourself on the back, you liberated woman, you! Your circulation is 3,000; mine is eight million hits per day! How do you like them apples!?!
&below is the real reason why the college paper is bashing me&
(link deleted - see below)
Some of the issues with the Video Production & Editing class taught by Fred Burger and Nancy Mallory are as follows:
We were shown a video as an example (titled Kung Fu Fighting) for our Feet & Faces project. This video showed various shot formats (long shots, with view of full body, etc.) that were later found (the day of shooting, and entire week later) to be shots that we would be marked off for, if we used them on our project.
How can a professor (s) get away with showing a visual example of a project that does not meet the requirements of what is expected of said project? All of the storyboards, with shot sequences, and list of shots (that may have contained long shots, extreme long shots; I.E. Shots that were not deemed acceptable) were viewed by either Nancy, or Fred (possibly both of them) the day the Kung Fu Fighting video was shown, without being told that students would have points taken off their grade for such shots.
If it was not for the questions from students the day of shooting, many of said students would not have known this fact. Most students assumed that these shots were acceptable to use, so long as the required shots were woven into the project. The excuse given (the day of shooting) was this was not a perfect example of what we were looking for. Then why show it?!!!?!!!? If not to confuse us, no other explanation comes to mind.
Once this revelation came to light, it created total chaos for many of the groups. Some of the ideas that groups created, from the previous week, hinged on these shots in order to tell their story. This caused groups to frantically scramble (the very day of shooting, no less) to either re-write their storyboards, or scrap their idea entirely. The fact that any professor can then stand up in class and say that they explained this previously to a class full of students shaking their heads and looking at each other in disbelief is beyond disheartening.
There seems to be a deliberate pattern of mis-information, and lack of consistency as it pertains to our expectations in this class. This lack of consistency may be due in part to the fact that we have two people teaching the class. When the issues are raised in class, it seems as if they dance around the subject, and try to deny the fact that their story was different from a previous lecture.
The fact that our class is a lecture/lab all in one day puts us at a dis-advantage when our professors decide to throw such curve balls at us. It would be bad enough to only have 24 hrs in order for a group to adjust to such circumstances (like many of the other students with a different schedule must be facing). For those of us that go from lecture, straight to lab, it can be an impossible feat.
When questions arose about the format of the tests, we were told that they would consist of: Multiple choice, true/false, fill in the blank, etc. Not only was that not the case, when it came to the part of the test where we had to name the shots in each picture, the print quality of the pictures were so bad in some cases, that it was nearly impossible to decipher them. If that was not bad enough, the time (or lack their of) that we had to complete the test left many students scrambling to complete it.
On November 2, we were split up into teams with people we may have never worked with before. We were given approximately 45 minutes to shoot footage, edit the footage, and hand it in. More than one group had experienced technical issues that were beyond the scope of what a layman could fix. Many of us lost 10-20 minutes of our overall time, due to equipment issues. It is not fair that groups may have been marked off for issues beyond their control.
This is supposed to be an entry level' class. Many VC02 students are required to pass this class as a mandatory requirement. The format of the class seems geared towards emulating the stress induced environment of a station such as ESPN. That would be fine, if this was a Masters Degree class.
When you teach a person how to swim you should not toss them in the Atlantic Ocean before they learn the doggy paddle'. Those that are drowning in our class feel cast off at sea. There are people that have prior experience with skills needed for this class. For them, this is a challenge that they can adjust to (possibly).
As far as the rest of the populous, we have little or no background in this skill set. We are not allowed the time outside of class/lab to attain a level of confidence that only comes with repetition.
The fact that individuals are graded as their group performs is ridiculous, to say the least. If fate puts you in a group that puts rearranging their sock drawer above working towards the project goal (s), it does not matter how much that person tries, they get the same grade as the slacker (s) get. Once again, if this were a Masters Degree level class, this socialistic approach towards learning might be appropriate. Let the individual decide if they want to take this career path.
This petition is also addressing the wish of each student that has signed it to a grade grievance for COM 150. With such a unanimously unified group of individuals sharing the same feelings towards this class, it is our belief that a class action' grade review is needed.
To ensure this, we would ask that those who signed this petition be left un-named, until after final grades are issued.
Pete
Spencerport, New York
U.S.A.
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