Photo Credit: Daily Orange, Joey Baker
Professor Laurence Thomas is known at Syracuse for his crazy antics, constant swearing, and his black/Jewish heritage. Oh, and he also teaches Philosophy.
A lot of you should remember that hullabaloo that occurred when Professor Thomas attacked Nancy Cantor’s diversity policies through his personal website.
This time, Professor Thomas is combatting texting in class. As reported by Gizmodo.com, as well as a few other sites Professor Thomas had “walked out on his class of nearly 400 students last week when he caught a couple of students fiddling with their phones instead of paying attention to him. It wasn’t the first time Thomas has cut a class short because a student broke his no-texting rule. To Thomas, texting saps the class of its intellectual energy.
“My job is to engage the class, to give them stuff to think about,” he said. “They need to respect that,” said Thomas.
I personally don’t think texting in class is a big deal. If you are occasionally answering a few texts quietly and respectfully, then there is no need for a professor to make a huge scene. However, if you’re constantly texting and your ringtone is set to blast, then I’ve got a problem.
But, I guess take that with a grain of salt… All my friends hate me when I’m on my phone and they are trying to talk to me.
Either way, I think its ridiculous how some professors react to students. It seems that are acting up in hopes of a publicity stunt rather than providing an education…Yawn outside!
