<p>I've got a major problem with my professor for English Literature.</p>
<p>I thought I'd really like the course when I signed up for it. The material looked interesting enough and the professor struck me as really nice, if not a little too personal and sweet.</p>
<p>However my illusion of the ideal English Literature course has gone up in smoke. I was unaware of the major problems in the course until someone else in my class spoke to me before class. She said that she noticed the professor didn't like me very much. I was slightly surprised but I had had that nagging feeling for a couple days, and I replied so. What she said next was a bit surprising: Apparently, she noticed the professor's dislike of the both of us, and we agreed that we didn't like the professor that much. It's not a case of a professor feeling generally superior to her students, though. I observed her a little more closely, and noticed that there's someone else that she seems particularly fond of.</p>
<p>The first assignment, which was a short paper on our opinions on a short story, which I handed in received a mediocre grade. According to her comment, she merely disagreed with my opinion that "I found the selection to abuse a highly cliche story plot."</p>
<p>Her behavior also irks me to no end. One of the first things she said in class worried me a bit: She basically said that she expected us to meet her expectations in this singsong voice that set warning lights screaming through my head. I thought she was like my Intermediate Algebra professor (tough and strict but a very fair and effective professor) and glossed over it, but I realized that I should have listened to the warnings.</p>
<p>Someone in the class dropped out after the first or second class, and the professor made a comment like, "Oh, _____ isn't here. What's wrong, he couldn't take it?"</p>
<p>There was a group of four people who seemed to be close friends, and the professor split them up because "it wasn't fair for the people who weren't their friends."</p>
<p>She gave me a bad grade on an assignment because (please do not think about this too hard because I don't want anyone's head exploding from confusion) of how I handed in one of my papers: I finished just by the end of class and asked for a place to print it, she said with her usual sarcasm, "Well you know you could always go across the street to the library, if you're quick you just might be able to make it..." I remembered the tutoring center upstairs and went there to print out my paper. As to why exactly I got a bad grade, she didn't say. Maybe it was because I didn't cross the street with Macbot and print it in the library?</p>
<p>There were 16 people in our class the last time I checked, and she liked to split the class into groups of 4. However last class she split them into groups of 3 - guess who she left out? Me. And she said "Oh look, <my name="" here=""> doesn't have a group. Does anyone want to help her out?" (I was literally burning with embarrassment but I don't cry or anything, I become homicidal.)</my></p>
<p>It's not just a problem of conflicting personalities too. She has a really awful habit of going off on tangents, we can be talking about the author one minute and the next she'll say something like "Oh, and speaking of this, it just reminded me of this one time..." She can spend about 15-25 minutes giving us a short lecture about some vague assignment, our next short story to read, and the weather, then she'll spend the rest of class talking about her favorite magazines and that one time something happened a few years ago. Her beliefs bleed into how she teaches. We don't learn how to write, we don't learn how to analyze literature, all we learn are her (irrational and illogical) beliefs. There are no open class discussions where we talk about our questions and opinions about what we've just read - we're supposed to simply sit and listen to the professor's opinions, and agree with them.</p>
<p>For all you tl;dr people: My professor is rude, condescending, pulls far-fetched assignments out of thin air, shows blatant favoritism towards some and outright snobbishness towards others, and grades people on how much she likes them and whether or not she agrees with your beliefs.</p>
<p>I really want to withdraw from the course, because I've got a nagging little premonition that's telling me "She's going to drag you through hell and back if you stay in this course! She hates your guts and isn't afraid to show it because she's got control over you!" I think I'm doing fairly well in this course, but I don't know how long it's going to last. I saw her give some other guy a bad grade with the comment "I don't agree with you" and sadly with these courses where everything that is the professor's word reigns supreme, that is a perfectly good reason.</p>