I want to vent. My best friend of more than a decade considered switching out of his course.
Somehow, this professor has students who graduated in his class. In my opinion, these students have a bright future ahead of them because they adapted. But that's not the point. The point is that this professor is intentionally trying to
If he actually TRIED teaching properly by being empathic or caring enough to not grade several students 0/80 but by giving a stern warning at first or a reasoning on why he wants them to specifically stick to this method of solving yet also respects his students enough that they can try another method that isn't HIS and not giving them an outright 0/80 score, OR not sticking to one rigid process of solving a problem from a boarding exam book, OR can't even be bothered to encourage a student to try new ways of solving a problem, OR all of it combined, then and only then would I RESPECT him and say that I was wrong, I was truly wrong and will apologize.
"Pano naging engineer Yung nag graduate sa failure teacher. If failure methods Yung ginamit or he gaved them. May nag graduate dahil sakanya and is now a licensed engineer so XX u cannot say he is a failure because he isn't"
"Just like the other students in the past and is now a licensed engineer in his the failure teachers teachings"
"So yes I just don't think we get his methods I guess.."
"Pero may nag graduate sakanya so we are overreacting"
Forgive me if I'm wrong, but what is this reasoning? Just because someone graduated from him, its because its not from the sweat and tears of the student but because of this professor's teachings? Because these students adapted to his rigidity and passed due to it?
Even if they have the title or the feeling of worldly wisdom, if he can't teach, he can't teach. If he can have accomplishments in other things but can not teach, then isn't he still a failure as a teacher?
Like how a man can be excellent at work, but abusive to his wife and kids at home. it doesn't change the fact that he's a terrible father, and in this case, a professor that's terrible at teaching.
Lord, forgive me for being overly idealistic about how I see mathematics.
But if he defends that it's to teach "how it is done in a board exam for the highest scores," that, in itself, is limiting how mathematics should be. In my viewpoint of respected mathematicians, again, is not just a matter of scores of a predefined, not always only this standard always seen equation that's used to solve a problem. It's how to use an equation that leads to the correct answer and can be used for any other question that also answers it because in the first place, that's how people in history found inconsistencies to a theorem or mathematical equation.
Geniuses and students of academia not only made great contributions to mathematics just by following standardized rules and fundamentals but by testing said rules, because they questioned it. Because they thought differently. Because they allowed themselves to think differently and not be constrained by a teacher who can only rigidly teach from a boarding exam book!
I humbly ask here, the professors and teachers, in this subreddit of their perspectives.
Please help me understand the reasoning on why a professor wouldn't, with such achievements and great titles, wouldn't spare a few minutes to give a much needed and very reasonable explanation on why my best friend and his classmates had been directly given a 0/80 of a score for only not using the methods the professor taught them. How can a zero out of eighty even be remotely possible for more than just a few students?
From someone who desperately wishes for answers, B.