Conference quark::human_relations-v1

    No, I think you are being a responsible consumer.
    
    I think we need to expect to receive what we paid for.  If you have a
    copy of the course description and your description varies a great deal
    you shouldn't have any difficulty!
    
    Go for it Meigs!

    The least they can do, if they don't give you a refund, is to rewrite
    the course description!
    
    That way at least nobody else will fall in the hole.
    
    -Jody
    

>
>Do you think I'm being a grouch?  Meigs
>
>
      Yes,
      You get as much out of a training as you put into it... As an adult you
      should prepare yourseld for the training by reading (the library) book
      that you mentioned.
      You then grab the teacher and ask questions.
      I would consider your request for money back after the second or third
      lesson... Not at the end of the meal.
      Rgds,
      Stephen

Re: .3

>> You get as much out of a training as you put into it... As an adult you
>> should prepare yourseld for the training by reading (the library) book
>> that you mentioned.

I disagree.  Remember; the student was a beginner, and this was billed as
a beginner's class.  "Beginner" implies that one does not even have any
IDEA what a fruitful line of inquiry or library research would be.  That's
the purpose of the class.

It's interesting tying this in with the college thread... Eugene may
correct me, but I believe that in China if a student doesn't learn
something it is the TEACHER who is considered to have failed.  In the U.S.
the attitude is completely the opposite; if the student doesn't learn,
it's the STUDENT'S fault regardless of how much of a bozo the teacher
may have been....

[ I had some classes in college where I learned things DESPITE the best
  efforts of my professors.... ]

>> I would consider your request for money back after the second or third
>> lesson... Not at the end of the meal.

The problem with the meal analogy is that after one or two bites of
steak you KNOW that the rest of the steak will be pretty much the
same.  With a class that seems to be going nowhere, you sit through
it hoping that eventually the teacher will say something that "clicks"
and ties together all the random thoughts that the teacher has been
spewing out until then.  Often, this never happens, but you don't KNOW
it won't happen until the course is over.  Then you sit there, totally
befuddled, saying "Is that IT??!!".

To the basenoter:  I don't know about the school system where you 
took your course, but in Worcester the adult-education system hands
out evaluation forms and encourages feedback on how teachers are
doing.  (Of course, the teacher I had for ballroom dancing this past
semester was an absolute gem and I couldn't fill the sheet with enough
praise for her 8-) ).  Even if your school system didn't hand out
evluation forms, you might consider extracting your basenote, tidying
it up a bit (summarize your specific complaints at the TOP, then go
into anecdotal details) and sending it in to the adult-education office.
At least in Worcester, they take complaints seriously...

--jim

    Meigs,
    
    Having taught community college myself, my response is that you
    had a terrible teacher and you should complain to the authorities.
    
    Bonnie

The problem with "adult ed" courses at community colleges is that you get
pot luck at instructors.  They are usually people in the community who
claim to have at least a passing familiarity with the subject at hand.
Many know the subject very well, but don't have the skills or "mind-set"
necessary to teach a successful course.  Rarely, you'll find someone who
both knows the topic and is skilled at teaching it.

I think what you found, Meigs, was someone who was an artist herself, who
was asked to teach a course and thought she could do so by telepathy, not
taking the time to do the job right.  You should file a complaint and ask
for a refund.

				Steve

    If you are a beginner what you need is a class that is going to help
    you and is for beginners only.  Instead of going to adult ed courses
    try School of the Worcester Art Museam. The classes have a good
    repuation and it does not cost any more (well maybe just a little but
    it is worth it!). If you want I have a brochure that I will send you,
    just send me your mail stop.
    
    
    Happy painting!
    
    
    Lynne

Thanks for all your comments. I am going to request a
tuition refund.

A friend told me this weekend about a night school class, held
for credit, where the teacher was outrageous. The teacher
simply did not show for about 1/3 of the classes and, when
he was there, the students could not make sense of
what the teacher said. (The students started suspecting the
teacher did not actually know the subject.)

Halfway thru the semester, the teacher failed to show up again,
and the class went -- en masse -- to the night school office to
request their money back and the class be cancelled.

My friend never heard if the students got their money back,
but the teacher was not rehired.           Meigs

p.s. -1  Thanks for mentioning them. I'm going to work on my own
         for a bit, but will look at the Art Museum School if I
         decide to take another class.

    Education is a business just like most things.  If you didn't receive
    what you paid for, complain to proper authorities.
    
    But, keep in mind, some of the best teacher don't explain but rather
    show.  If she did neither, then it seems it was left to you rely
    on whatever you already knew.  Not what you paid for.
    
    It seems to me that it takes both, a good and willing instructor
    and a willing and interested student to make a successful learning
    experience.

Meigs................

Definitely complain and try for a refund.  You didn't get your money's worth at
all.  Whoever hired that teacher for the course should know what happened so 
she doesn't get to come back.  Eighty dollars is alot of $$$.  I paid that for
six weeks of quality instruction. Never mind what you probably invested in 
tubes, brushes and paper to get started.

You didn't mention where you live but I can personally recommend the DeCordova 
Museum for watercolor classes having taken several there. The staff is very
professional and I did learn alot.  Watercolor is a very demanding medium.  
A teacher can demonstrate certain techniques such as the wet in wet technique, 
dry brush strokes etc. but you really learn so much from just painting, painting 
and more painting and remembering your errors. You didn't get any demonstrations
of technique or anything.

My teacher would have a still life set up for us each time in place when we got
there and would demonstrate some new technique each class. She would then leave 
us on our own for an hour or so to do the still life just circulating around 
offering comments or suggestions. Then we would put all our painting up 
and critique each other.  Everyone develops their own style and it was so inter-
esting to see how each person handled the subject from different angles.  And
we got homework.....just like kids........It was so enjoyable.

Just learning about color is complete course in itself.  One thing that I 
learned is that once you start adding more than two colors to each other the 
color the resulting starts getting muddy. There's so much to it.  I hope you
don't get discouaged and stop painting.  I tried the adult school route once
at night and although he was better than what you described I would definitely
go the museum way.

Happy painting.

Anita

Anita,

Thanks for info on De Cordova. I will take another watercolor
class and I'll get their schedule as well as the one mentioned
earlier. 

>Whoever hired that teacher for the course should know what happened so 
>she doesn't get to come back.

Well, they might hit me. She is a full-time high school teacher
and well thought of there. (She told us so. :) ) She is certainly pleasant,
but teaching is not ... uh ... a native gift with her.

>My teacher would have a still life set up for us each time in place when we got
>there and would demonstrate some new technique each class.

That's great. In our class, the teacher encouraged everyone to
paint from pictures, which I found odd. I've taken four or five
other art classes over the past 20 years, and have never painted
from pictures. (One of the students was painting a 10 X 14
watercolor from a dark, fuzzy 3 X 5 inch photograph. She was
really discouraged and I thought a large chunk of the problem was
the photograph.)

A few years ago, when I wanted to sign up for an acting class, I
checked out a bundle of course descriptions. It seemed acting
could be a great "cover" for egos who really don't know how, so I
was careful to find someone who looked legit.  I ended up in
A. Miller's course at the Harvard Center for Lifelong Learning
(in Cambridge, Mass.).  She has been a professional actress for
25 years and was Great!!!  It cost $2XX -- I forget exactly, but
I didn't mind a penny of it because she was terrific. (I have her
address should anyone be interested in acting.)

    So??? Did you ever hear about the refund? Are they going to pay
    you back? Did you hear if any of your classmates complained?
    
    Interested to know,
    
    Bonnie

I sent them a letter on June 12th and will call them the
third week of July if they have not yet responded. As this
is a school, it seemed best to allow time for stuff to
sit around. 

>  Did you hear if any of your classmates complained?
    
I don't know for sure but I doubt it. A few of them had
taken a drawing class from the teacher before and were quite 
fond of her.  Some of the students said they were there to 
"get out of the house" so they probably didn't care much or
perhaps at all. Hmmm ... if she is the only art teacher they've
every had, they may think this is how it is done!

Of course, I could go off the cliff and bring this to small
claims court. But I have a vague memory of hearing that
one can't sue a school over education issues. (A student tried
to sue the U. of Connecticut a few years ago for reimbursement
of tuition and other expenses. She claimed several courses the
U required her to take were worthless. The judge threw the
case out because the law prohibits one from sueing a school 
for such a cause in Connecticut. Which is too bad. Where is
Judge John Sirrica (sp?) when we *really* need him.)

Maybe I will drag it to court.  I've had some great teachers
and a teaching slot should not be filled by such a non-teacher.

 Meigs (who is still feeling grouchy)

	Hi,

	This is a battle that can be won...but you have to keep
	one thing in mind:  schools are bureaucracies, and you
	must conduct your campaign through their chain of
	command.

	I successfully received a full refund on a computer course
	I took at a junior college once.  The instructor was
	competent, but not informed about the school's computer
	configuration.  So, all his examples and assignments
	failed to work.   The school's computer lab was staffed by
	kids working on their projects....they had no time to
	actually maintain the communications link to the
	mainframe we needed to use.

	And so on..

	I went to the instructor....got a shrug.  To the department
	head: "So sorry...nothing I can do", was the answer.

	My letter to the president of the college with a journal of
	my contacts and experiences produced a 100% refund !

	Persevere !

	Steve H

Steve H,

-1  Thanks for your encouraging words. I admire (and am copying)
your determination.

I called the school last Friday and they told me they had never
received the letter and had no record of it. 

The woman I spoke to also sounded quite indignant when I told her
why I wanted a refund and stated "Mrs. So-n-so is a *certified 
teacher* {italics hers}."   Wow! A certified teacher! Take my
breath away. (Damn! I forgot to tell her I was certified too!)

But I earned a medal for being polite but firm ... well, sorta.
I rewrote the letter with more detail and sent it to a real human
being. I will call the real human being this Friday and see how
things stand. 

And I've decided: If they say No, I'm going to small claims court.

Just doing my bit to improve American 
education (and get my $80 back    :)

"We have no record of receiving the letter" is one reason why certified
mail was invented 8-)  Seriously; although it'll cost you a few pennies
more, I'd suggest that you send it certified; that way, if they claim
to have "lost" it you can refresh their memory...

As for "certified teacher"; yes, they expect you to fall down and beg
for mercy from the Educational Establishment God.  Funny thing is,
it doesn't work the other way.  My sister is a certified teacher, but
that doesn't seem to make a difference when arguing with HER kids'
teachers........

[to tie this in with another thread in another notesfile... seems like
New Jersey has a bill in process to require licensing of software engineers.
Naturally, the engineers are fighting it tooth and nail... I say let it
pass.  That way, we can just say, "But that code was written by a *certified
software engineer*!  It can't POSSIBLY have any bugs in it!" 8-) ]

    
    most certificates are a lot of worthless dross; they prove zip...

    People can lose certified letters too.  In this case all it would do
    is prove to the sender that the letter was indeed received and lost.
    Certifying helps nobody.
    
    ed 

   Well, there's always the method of showing up in person.


   							Terza

    Of course sending something certified helps.  They then cannot
    claim "We never got it", and must admit "We lost it."  This puts
    you one up in your dealings, since you can hint at multiple
    incompetences by extrapolation.  Also, since *someone* has to
    sign for it, you've got a name (or at least an illegible -- but
    perhaps recognizable -- signature) of someone to trace it through.
    
    					Ann B.
    
    P.S.  I have to file non-tax forms with the IRS for a non-profit
    organization.  The previous treasurer warned me to *always* send
    my returns certified mail, and that this was the best advice he
    had ever gotten from his predecessor.  I've done it, and had to
    sent photocopies of my return receipt to get them to stop whining
    about non-receipt.

    To go a bit further, if your certified copies keep gettng 'lost' go to
    the school dean and make an issue of staff's incompetance... that and
    the threat of a law suit should motivate some action out of them. 
    Don't quote me on this, but I seem to recall a similar situation in
    California where the mail was repeatedly 'lost' and when the person
    trying to handle things went down face to face they demanded a days
    wages for the time they had to take off work to handle it.  If I recall
    it right what whould have been an $75.0 refund because the person was
    dissatisfied with the class (along with several other students who
    testified later but hadn't taken things into court) turned into an
    ultimate $6000.00 for lost wages, duress, and other problems resulting
    from the person trying to get the money and having problems contacting 
    and having the problem recognized by the school.
    
    This happened some time ago and I can't recall all the details, I
    remember that the first paragraph talked about the class advertisment
    and that the student didn't receive what was advertised, they had
    problems with using certified mail to handle the situation as the
    letter kept getting lost, and finally had to take time off frm work to
    get things handled.  
    
    I couldn't tell you the actually outcome but if memory serves me right,
    the article was written as if the student was going to win the case.
    
    Skip

Forward motion.

As I said a few notes back, they told me last Friday they
had no record of the letter and I should resend it. So I did,
with a few more details added. The very next day, I got their
letter saying the refund was denied. We had crossed in the mail.
(The signature on their letter was made by an ink-stamp;
the letter appears to be written by the person who was so
indignant over my refund request.)

So I'll wait a week for another reply, then call them, and
if a "no" pops up, I will speak to Mr. InkStamp.

Their letter does state "I have shared your letter with <teacher's 
name> who is also a member of our regular day staff. I can say that 
this is the first concern I have regarding her instructions."

My work phone rang twice this week after 5:30, and after I stated 
my name, the caller hung up with a thump. Gosh, maybe someone wants to 
complain about the quality of students these days!

Meigs

Anyone have any more pointers to the California story?

    re .4,
    
    Well, Jim, if we are talking about the traditional Chinese society,
    say, 150 years ago, the worst sin a teacher could commit was called
    "waste his students' precious time of learning" (not an exact
    translation).  It was a moral principle (not legal, after all who is to
    decide who is and isn't a good teacher) of probably the highest order.
    
    With that, the teachers were considered authority figures who
    regularly spanked their pupils, so they would work harder, ya see.
    
    * * *
    
    I don't know about the exact circumstance surrounding this case, but I
    agree with .3 in principle.  It is probably just me, but I didn't get 
    much schooling and was self taught by and large when I was in China.  
    So naturally, I fit right in with the free wheeling American college 
    campus.  Even there I kept my habit of "self-education", and skipped
    about half of the lectures.  I just read and read, and went to talk
    to the prof.  At first they were pretty annoyed and had an attitude
    of "if you don't come to the lectures, I ain't gonna repeat it just
    for your benefit", but soon they came around because they realized
    that I was really interested in the stuff.  And our topics would
    usually drift slightly away from the course material.  I took those
    as a peer to peer discussion.  If there is one thing I ever learned
    it is that there aren't really any uninterested prof., but only
    uninterested students.  Most of those fellows were dying to tell
    someone what they do.

    Needless to say, when I went to Illinois and was assigned to teach
    freshman calculus, I tried to model my class on my college 
    experience.  I told them that I didn't mind them showing up late
    or leaving early or not showing up at all or eating breakfast 
    in class or reading newspapers in class as long as they didn't disturb
    other people.  I told them that the stuff they wanted
    to learn was all in the book, and if they had questions, they
    could ask me in the class or grab me whenever they could find me
    and I would be glad to help them.  Well, that was a disaster.  
    Many of these people couldn't care less about what was in the book,
    and all they wanted to do was passing the "damn course" and didn't even
    realize that they had to make an effort just to pass the class.

    * * *

    Anyway, Joyce was prophetic in her 1038.61 note.  I am going back to
    school to get my math Ph.D at College Park, Maryland.  So I will probably
    be teaching freshman calculus again.  I don't know my plan for the
    class yet, but those of you parents who plan to send your kids 
    to Maryland for high education have thus been warned.

    My last day at Digital is 8/23.

    Eugene
                                              

    Go to the first night of the next class, then quietly slam the teacher
    to all the other students. "This lady was USELESS last time, I'm just
    here to see if she's figured out that teachers should teach instead of
    just jerk off for two months." It's a valuable service to the other
    prospective students, and the teacher may change her ways if she finds
    herself with a tiny class.

    Re: .24
    
    Hoyt, do you know a good lawyer to defend Meigs on slander charges
    if she takes your advice?
    
    				Steve

    Re .-1
    
    You can only be convicted of slander if what you say is not the truth.
    The truth is always a cast iron defence to slander charges.
    
    Dave

    You'd have a hard time proving the "truth" of .24.
    
    		Steve

    This is why I laugh at the concept of "free speech." It used to be HUAC
    and the blacklist and jail. Then it was ostracism for being politically
    incorrect. Then it was professionally uncool. Now you have assets, so
    don't say a word lest you lose them.
    
    But you're exactly right, Steve. Meigs, do NOT follow my advice, unless
    you are judgement proof (zero net worth and negligible income).

    I take it back. Free speech is wonderful. I frequently state my opinion
    of the President and the Congress and so on, and I've never been
    arrested or sent to a mental institution. Too easily I forget. I *do*
    appreciate the Bill of Rights.
    
    Meigs, how about going to the first class and discussing your
    complaints with the teacher? If you use the right combination of
    firmness and charm, and luck out, then the teacher might throw in a
    free semester of teaching, doing it RIGHT this time. THEN make a point
    of writing more letters, this time praising her.

    
    I don't think it's a good idea to bad mouth anyone unless it's very
    dangerous to another's health.  By doing the former, you shade one's
    objectivity to form an honest opinion of the slandered.  And it
    also degrades the slanderor somewhat in my opinion, unless she was
    asked by another student for a honest opinion.
    
    The ripped-off student should approach the instructor either in
    person or through an anonymous letter, as many students have the
    opportunity to evaluate the course at the end, and explain her issues
    or problems with the course!
    
    A instructor with integrity would at least give the student the
    chance to retake the course, fee free.  The student should ask
    questions at any time she felt confused or just plain had something
    to ask.  That's learning!
                                                  

The argument never achieved resolution; it just petered out.

I called the school about six times, trying to reach the 
person who runs the place.  He's a busy fellow; I never connected. (The 
folks answering the phone had no idea why I was calling, so there was
no "I'm not here" going on.  Just tight schedules everywhere.)

After a few months, I decided to get their attention by
file a claim in small claims court.  However, if you want
to file a claim against a town, city, or other governmental unit,
you must file it within 30 or 60 days, depending on local law.
I was waaaay beyond the 60 day period.

In sum, the only action I took was to write two letters (described 
earlier) and make phone calls to a non-available person. 

I dropped it. The best thing to come out of the class was this note. I 
found all the ideas and stories posted in here quite interesting. 
Thanks, all, for your input.  Meigs