Posted by Krystyna Hunt in
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I really enjoy writing editorials. Basically an editorial is well-written opinionating. It needs some basis in reality and being able to make sense on something to which readers can relate, but other than that it is merely an opinion, and who can question that? Someone can question me, and my opinions, but not their validity. So far I have been able to vent on group work and relay the positive benefits of liberal arts electives - against the opinion of some other teachers and students.
What is perplexing about writing for The Sheridan Sun, is the constant, total non-reaction from the targetted readership. Group work is universally hated throughout the college, with many people, both instructors and students having few positive experiences with it, and yet, not a single letter to the editor. Not one person stopped me and said, “boy, you really got it right with that editorial.” Or even wrong. I would have loved to have had it wrong if it meant knowing somebody read it. The same with the electives article. Apparently in other years the Dean of Liberal Arts always wrote a letter to the editor when someone criticized being forced to take liberal arts electives, but here I wrote some good reasons for them, and no letter came to congratulate me for it.
Anyway, my comfortable feeling of hope that things would be more mature this time round came crashing down this month. I had mentioned Melanie as being my co-editorial writer. I had my suspicions about her last year when she volunteered for the 4-person group to create a presentation on the history of travel writing, and I volunteered to join the the group, making us two, and she promptly told me she decided to leave the group and join another group with her friend, Tanya, leaving me the only one in the group. Her visible discomfort with me, and the eagerness with which she sought another group to join was a bit disorienting, but then everything was disorienting last year. Later on Joanne and friends joined, and we did do the presentation of the group.
Now that she and I were a team writing editorials, she seemed much friendlier and more willing to tolerate my company. At the Video Production class, since we were all sitting together, all of us agreed that we would be a group. That was nicely settled.
The following week I came late into class, Dinah and Melanie were sitting together but a couple of guys were sitting with them. Since these table desks only have 4 spots I had to sit somewhere else. Before I came in, everyone had signed their names to a sheet stating who was going to be together on which team. After the class disbanded, Prof Cynthia brought the list to me, because I had not seen it to sign on, and I noticed, with a loud gasp, that Dinah and Melanie had signed up with the 2 guys who were at the table. They were still around so I went over and asked what happened because last week we decided we would be on the same team. Dinah and Melanie just shrugged their shoulders and said they didn’t remember such an agreement. Okay…okay….disorienting…..but okay. I was put on the only team who only had 3 members. These were people I had never met before and so had no idea what it would be like working with them.
I was also with Dina and Melanie, the 3 of us again, in the Law and Ethics class. Frequently we were asked to work on a problem in class as a team, which we proceeded to do. I admit I had to lean over to hear Dinah and Melanie a lot, because they had a tendency to talk to each other and noticed me only when I was straining to lean over and struggle to get my opinions in, but I was trying not to be paranoid and suspect I was being rejected.
At the second class Prof Andy gave us an assignment to find a crime or court reporter to interview about his or her professional experiences. I worked over the weekend researching a list of potential reporters, showed up Monday morning and discovered that Dinah and Melanie were already in class ahead of me, and had chosen the reporter. I thought they were a bit hasty not waiting for me to show up with my list before they decided, but I thought, hey, I’ve been complaining that everybody was slacking off last year leaving me with all the work, I shouldn’t complain that these people were ahead of me. At least it showed initiative on their part and that couldn’t be bad. Melanie then suggested that I design the presentation, which I could do at the next meeting of the group. Two days later I showed up to work on the presentation and Melanie told me she had already done it. So far I had contributed nothing to this group work.
Then Melanie corners me and wants to know how and when did I presume I was part of a group with her and Dinah. My jaw dropped! I sat at the same table with them, I worked on the same problems with them as a group, why would I not presume I was part of their group for an out-of-class assignment? Oh no, Melanie told me, I shouldn’t have presumed, I should have asked them if they wanted me to be in their group first. Well, what group should I have been in? All the people sitting at the table desks were the groups who worked with their groups. We were asked to become groups of 2 or 3. We were 3, I sat at their table, why wouldn’t I think I was part of their group???
Melanie was adamant and quite snarky about it. Uh-uh. I should have asked permission to join, I shouldn’t presume to be part of their group. I think Dinah was embarrassed by this but she and Melanie were now BFF’s and she sided with Melanie. My stomach sank. I flashed back to high school. I was being told I was not wanted in the group, and that I had to ask permission to join. Oh God, I remember that feeling. I remember the rejection. I remember the mean girls exclusion ploy. My impression of being accepted as an equal were shattered and for a time I had those awful reject, outsider, misfit, weirdo feelings again. I was now expected to say “please”, “pretty, pretty please” to join a group?
I fired off an email to Prof Andy telling him what happened and telling him that from now on I was going to do all the out-of-class assignments by my myself. I was not going to be part of any group. He concurred that was probably the best strategy. I did not sit with Dinah and Melanie again.
I must say I felt a little tremor of glee inside me when I heard that Melanie’s last editorial was rejected for publication because it was written so poorly. Two can play the emotional immaturity game and it’s to learn all over again in college.
