I knew my writing students were using AI. Their confessions led to a powerful teaching moment (The Guardian, 5/10/26)

[highplainsdem]

8. I'm so sorry you ran into teachers that bad, but I'm glad you found local writers teaching classes

that taught you much more.

I don't think I got As on my stories from that professor because he was wooing me - I rarely saw him, and he was already quite old, and from what I learned later, very happily married - but I think that was the same semester I ran into harassment from a poli sci professor (that was my major) who told me I deserved a C but he'd give me an A because he "liked" me. He then asked me out. He was about 60, and married, had once been the dept chair. I turned him down, then waited to see what he'd do with that grade. He apparently thought twice about trying to give me a C for turning him down, which was a wise decision. The dean had approved my taking 24 hours of classes that semester, mostly poli sci and history with a lot of reading, and I'd worked hard to get good grades. (Otoh, I wasn't going to argue getting a B for a fiction-writing course where I'd cut most of the classes. Though I had told the professor I couldn't stand seeing the students he thought were worst just torn to shreds.)

Anyway, those female students who seemed to be teacher's pets at the time might've been running into all sorts of nasty harassment when other students weren't around. Shame on those professors for favoring ANY students, though. It's terrible that you encountered that even once. Three times is nightmarish.

Aspiring writers deserve encouragement whenever possible.

That MIT prof is brilliant.