<p>I don’t think it’s just accents. I think it’s a thought process that involves a translation step. Eventually people learn to think in English. </p>
<p>I see the same problem in industry. Often people for whom English is a second language resort to using sentences with too many pronouns. I always stop people and ask what you mean by “this” or “can you be more specific”. With my own people, I work with them to be clear and precise, to start a stream of consciousness from the beginning, not skipping any steps, not using any pronouns. This is a solvable problem if people put in minimal effort. </p>
<p>@ClassicRockerDad - Thanks for highlighting this better. I was implicitly including that understanding meant not being able to translate words and sentences into meaningful information, which is what understanding is. However, you point out, quite correctly, that the process that is at the center of the issue is translation. </p>
<p>I worked at global firms for the majority of my career and there were only two people whose accents I found overpowering: a French/Vietnamese speaker, and an American with a strong southern accent. </p>
<p>If I’m paying a quarter of a million dollars for college for my child, I am entitled to expect that they will be taught by someone who can be understood well enough to have learning take place. </p>
<p>@romanigypsyeyes - Not sure how I am being rude. Just because you have been around accents does not mean others are overblowing not being around accents. I think it is more rude to deduce others are overblowing it than me pointing out you cannot and should not make that deduction.</p>
<p>I have no interest in defending the practice of hiring professors or TAs who communicate poorly. Sometimes a better instructor is available, and sometimes one is not. It’s an imperfect system.</p>
<p>OTOH, it is naive for parents and students to assume that the university experience they think they deserve is the same experience the university is selling. It is especially naive to think that a large university exists for the express purpose of educating undergraduates. Yes, this is what the marketing campaigns want you to believe, but it’s no more real than the belief that drinking Coke will surround you with really cool friends.</p>
<p>I don’t know if I agree with the “I’m paying; therefore, I should get what I want” argument.</p>
<p>I mean, I see/hear it all the time (I pay big bucks for this school, so I should . . . not have to live in the dorm, be able to skip the prerequisites, avoid the teacher I don’t like (or who has an accent), be allowed to park wherever I want, not have to pay overload).</p>
<p>You can vote with your dollars to go elsewhere if not happy. If “everybody” does that, then the university changes. If few do, maybe it’s not the serious issue you thought.</p>
<p>We lost an excellent faculty member this year because “students” complained about his accent. Well, freshmen complained. The upper division students in the major loved him, but there are far fewer reviews from them as the survey courses are much bigger. The upperclassmen learned how to work with the accent. I’ll admit, the guy was hard to understand at times, even though he spoke English all day every day. He was also great at repeating himself when asked or trying again with different words that would be less affected by his accent. I’m very sad to see him go. </p>
<p>@WasatchWriter stated, “OTOH, it is naive for parents and students to assume that the university experience they think they deserve is the same experience the university is selling.”</p>
<p>I do not buy the argument that purchase expectations are naive. Naive is expecting whiskey from a bottle of wine. It is something entirely to be sold whiskey that has been presented as wine. I definitely agree with buyer beware, but being aware does not immune one from something not seen in a larger purchase. </p>
<p>Naive is going in with blinders on; what we are talking about here is a very researched purchase that gives an unexpected surprise. I find that a very different situation.</p>
<p>@ordinarylives stated, “I don’t know if I agree with the “I’m paying; therefore, I should get what I want” argument.”</p>
<p>I am going to make a very safe guess you do not practice this in your own life when you are paying the bill. Unless, of course, you go to the grocery store and do not mind paying for a cartoon of eggs and having a couple plums in the cartoon too. Maybe you are happy paying for a car with five seats, yet it only has four seat belts, making it less useful. But, I doubt you do any of that. Therefore, it follows when paying $60K for something, there is a certain expectation one gets what one pays for, not less or different. </p>
<p>It is NOT an overblown problem when a TA in recitations sessions cannot understand or answer questions clearly to the point that he is not even understandable. Yes, I’ve had a couple replaced who were that bad, but not easy to do. THe courses are often high risk, weed out science, math, STEM courses any ways, where some may need every bit of assistance possible. And they put these TAs often in the lower level courses. When one is further along, more mature, not a teenager anymore, it’s easier to be more assertive and insist on the TA addressing questions and issues. I don’t tolerate an instant if I can’t understand what the teacher is saying and will call him out directly on it, but teens, new at college won’t. If I’m the one asking the questions, that TA or profe had danged well better be able to make himself understandable to me or I wiil take it right to the chair, and insist on a meeting and will ask some questions in the presence of the chair with the non English speaking or otherwise not understandable (foreign language may not be the only impediment) with the teacher answering him on tape. </p>
<p>I agree that there should be some give. I spent a goodly part of my life with a mother who speaks broken English. She lives with me now and is nearly 90 years old. So, I feel like I give a lot , in making an effort to understand. But if it’s no go, and it’s a course being provided by a school or any institution, they had better make it right. I’ve gotten rid of nurse aides for my MIL who are not understandable. Made people, places get someone who is comprehensible to me, and family when they cannot speak clearly, loudly, correctly enough so that we can understand. I speak perfectly good english and my ears are just fine, so if there is an issue that the person cannot make himself clear to me, then it’s on THEM, not me. It has to be worth MY time and very unpleasant effort to make it happen when there is someone that bad, so it’s not like it’s a freebie to me when this happens and it’s rare that I have to go that far, but, yes, absolutely I will and have when I cannot understand important directions and discussions. I’ve had my kid’s life depend upon being able to understand what some medical person is saying I’ve had not only a grade, but comprehension of some essential academic foundation at risk when someone is not understandable, so, yes, you had better believe I will make a stink if that line is crossed.</p>
<p>Of course I would not make those purchases. I would, however, take myself to another store that sold what I wanted. And that is what I am suggesting. If you feel what you are paying for a college entitles you to a specific delivery system (in this case, no foreign teachers with thick accents) then you should shop until you find the product you want for the money you are willing to spend. Ford dealers don’t start selling Scions because a customer walks in with cash and demands one. That dealer will send you down New Car Row to the Toyota shop. </p>
<p>I had a TA once who (I presume) spoke English fluently, but mumbled incomprehensibly. I am not exaggerating when I say that no one in the class could understand anything he said, even when he was responding to a direct question. He wrote everything on the board, and we survived by copying it all down.</p>
<p>The problem was that I didn’t do anything about it. I didn’t confront him about the problem, and I didn’t complain to anyone else, either. I was a freshman ( which seems to be true of many of the victims of this kind of problem), and I just wasn’t ready to make waves about something like that. I was impressed by the story above of the older freshman who didn’t put up with it. I think this is the only way this problem will ever be solved–students need to refuse to accept wholly inadequate teaching.</p>
<p>I note, in passing, that every time this issue comes up, there are people who just can’t seem to believe that it ever really happens that there is a teacher who can’t be understood. I don’t get this.</p>
<p>Fwiw, I’m not saying that there are no profs/TAs who have this issue. Far from it- I do think there are some that are nearly impossible to understand.</p>
<p>OTOH, I do think the problem is overblown. Some students will make it seem like NONE of their profs are intelligible because they won’t put in the slightest effort. </p>
<p>I had a GSI last semester that got great reviews from us but terrible reviews from the undergrads. We could all understand her no problem (she was Chinese and just about everyone in my class was white) but yes, she had an accent, and they claimed they couldn’t understand her. We’re not any different than the undergrads so why could we all understand her but they couldn’t? THIS is what I’m talking about- not profs that people pretty much universally agree are not understandable. </p>
<p>Romani, there may be a difference between a seminar and a lecture in terms of being able to understand a teacher. A person may be understandable in more conversational speech, but not so much when standing in front of a group. This is why, if there are complaints, a person with authority needs to visit the actual class that is generating the complaints.</p>
<p>If there’s a bright side, it does force the students to really pay attention.</p>
<p>It’s not just limited to STEM subjects. I had a finance prof from China, head of the department, who could barely speak understandable English. I still remember him every time I perCHASE something with my Rican Press Credee Car. I found it hard to believe they couldn’t find an American qualified to teach finance. I was also confused by my Iranian econ professor. Why was someone from a third world country teaching us economics? At least his English was adequate.</p>
<p>"We’re not any different than the undergrads so why could we all understand her but they couldn’t? "</p>
<p>Because you have a lot more practice communicating with her in particular. Because you have more years of experience communicating with people who share her first language. Because what you speak with her about is not something radically new to you.</p>
<p>There is a fair amount of research on this topic in the second-language teaching community. For fun reading on the use of random undergraduates as pronunciation judges, read just about anything published in the past 20+ years by Tracey Derwing and Murray Munro.</p>
<p>Accent modification is long, hard work. It does not happen overnight. That means that each student has to determine his/her own limits for dealing with a communication issue, and get help at his/her own end. If students cannot understand their instructors, they need to speak with their advisors, and find out what that particular college/university has to offer as a work-around: tutoring, a different section, etc. </p>
<p>Part of the problem here is that there is a widespread cultural expectation about the way universities are and how they should behave. It’s my experience that until they see it close up, most Americans think like this:</p>
<p>The essential purpose of a university is to educate undergraduates
People earn graduate degrees, but the process is mysterious and has little bearing on undergraduates
The basic job of everyone called a professor is to teach
Everyone teaching at a university is a full-time professor
Scholarly research means scientific research
Research just sort of happens; new technologies and medicines just sort of appear
Students go to graduate school with the express purpose of becoming better teachers</p>
<p>None of this is true. It’s what we want to believe, and unfortunately the media is complicit. Think of all those sympathetic professors in tweed jackets. When was the last time TV showed you a 22-year-old grad student teaching English composition to a bunch of 25-year-old commuters?</p>
<p>No one spends a lot of time educating the public about the reality. So parents and students make assumptions about what their university experience will be like. And sometimes they are disappointed.</p>
<p>It’s like a crazy open secret. No one can really claim to be surprised, because the information is available at a glance. At the same time, it is NOT a part of the national conversation about education. We should ask ourselves, Why is it big news when a kindergarten cancels a show, but it’s NOT big news when a bunch of college students flunk a test because they can’t understand their professor? Why do we know more about college basketball than we do about college classrooms?</p>
<p>@ordinarylives - That you treat the college decision (an expensive purchase), so cavalierly is interesting. Not sure what to make of that. The point of me using the grocery store and car is they illustrate even with small purchases the logic of purchase expectations hold.</p>
<p>College is not a simple get up and move proposition; it is a serious, well-thought-out decision that really is the defining life decision for many - it is often the first important decision a young person makes. And, there are specific expectations there about how and what one will learn, as there should be. </p>
<p>Additionally, the producer is the ultimate responsible party in any transaction, if the product does not meet customer expectations, especially in actual delivery of services. The delivery of services here is information, and it is up to the information producer to make it right. </p>
<p>I agree with you if a student is not a good fit, they should transfer. Anyway, transferring indicates a systemic issue. </p>
<p>However, in this case, the student is the good fit, but the professor is not. Therefore, the onus is on the information deliverer (college) to address the issue, not the purchaser (student) of the education.</p>
<p>I suspect that accents are less of an issue when the listener already has a fair to good grasp of the subject matter, such as would be expected of a graduate student or upper-level undergrad, or an undergrad in an intro class who already learned a good bit of the material in an AP or IB class. </p>
<p>Some schools do seem to require that grad students pass a spoken English exam that is separate from TOEFL and enroll in remedial classes if necessary before being permitted to teach. </p>
<p>^^ I have had a couple teachers who English was a second language, but they were understandable to us. Interesting point, as that was in grad school, so the class did have a grasp of the info already. I could see that might be an issue for undergrads, for whom this might be an intro class. </p>
<p>Then there was the who they were issue - these profs were tops of their fields in the world and darn it if we were going to miss that opportunity. But, that is the key - those profs had decades of teaching and knew how to speak English more than well enough. I gather the situation we are discussing here is totally different. </p>
<p>My cynicism suggests that the reason we hear this complaint most often from freshmen is that the department knows which teachers can’t communicate well, and they fob them off on freshmen in intro classes–and in particular intro classes that aren’t aimed at departmental majors.</p>