I've been passionate about English and literature ever since I was little. I loved the creative freedom of writing as well as its organizational process. It was this amalgamation of indefinite possibilities coupled with concrete rules. It was only when high school and college came that I really began losing my enthusiasm towards academic writing.
For a long time, I chalked it up to being the bland topics that left little room for creativity or "echo chamber" professors who wanted regurgitations of their lectures and/or beliefs, but as my first year of college winds down to an end. Though, after having completed my first year of college, I think I've figured out what the main underlying issue is. While the aforementioned reasons are certainly contributing factors, the main issue lies with the bittersweet, but ultimately toxic nature of rubrics and length requirements.
Rubrics are a teacher's bread and butter. They're neatly organized gems that help explain to students requirements and expectations. They're meant to help guide students towards the ever desirable A+. From my experience, this guidance, while often successful, comes at a cost.
Rubrics are comprised of two main components: topic-related requirements and length requirements. I don't usually have a problem with the former, because writing topics are typically meant to be open-ended or argumentative. Usually, stimulate creative thinking. The latter, however, is extremely problematic.
I'd wager that more times than not, students view word and/or page requirements as length maximums. If an assignment calls for "at least two pages," most students will take it to mean that they only have to write two pages. While the logic of it isn't false, the mentality of most certainly is!
Instead of writing out a complete thought or a thorough thesis, so many people, myself included, often opt to abruptly finish papers instead of cleanly coming to a conclusion. Not only can this negatively impact grades, it subconsciously causes us to write lackadaisically. This shortcutting is harmful to our writing and communicating abilities when habituated.
Length requirements also cause students to add unnecessary or irrelevant "fluff" to their papers in order to reach the required count. In most cases, these additions detract from the overall enjoyability and/or quality of the paper. Understandably, a lot of people have an issue with short papers. They appear insipid or lacking depth, but appearances can be misleading. The ability to be thorough, yet concise is greatly undervalued, especially in a society that values time as much we do!
There will always be some students who are disinterested in English classes, and will always do the bare minimum, but there will also always be others who can create succinctly crafted essays. It may be nervewracking at first to be so laissez-faire with students, but the freedom and responsibility students are given because of it promotes critical thinking. Since students would be just as likely to receive a good great with a two-page paper as they would a seven-page paper, they would be more likely to actually plan out and elaborate on everything they want to discuss.
The only thing teachers would have to do in return is remind and emphasize the significance of pertinence.
This article is specifically meant to go out to any and all teachers or teachers-to-be: please consider not enforcing word or page requirements to your students. I know it can be an onerous task to read through
You want to read passionate, or at the very least, well-developed essays, because not only do you know they have the capability of doing so, but you know that pushing them and challenging them in little ways like this are beneficial to their overall education. They have so much room to grow as students and writers but can only do so if allotted the space to do so.
