Invisible Rules


It seems that in todays fast pace world that the average person has two career options when it comes to being successful. Either getting a job and working your way up or going to college for certifications and degrees. Just getting a job first has its advantages, such as getting payed while you learn on the job. Another would be having set rules that are supposed to be enforced for all workers. Even though not all people have the same set of rules, there are still rules. College on the other hand definitely has many gray areas. Teachers tend to have their own individual sets of rules and systems for the different classes that they teach. Workers and students also have rules and expectations that they expect their employers and teachers to follow.

A lot of teachers and bosses don’t feel any responsibility towards these expectations. Workers have much less say in any type of rules unless they are part of a union. Students on the other hand should have more say in the way classes are conducted. After all, they are the customers and are paying for classes that are meant to prepare them for the skilled jobs they are working towards. I have heard the saying “the customer is always right” many times. In the case of teachers, this rule has got thrown out or flushed somewhere along the way. This doesn’t mean that teachers must conform to each student’s demands but that expectations of the class as a whole should be met. The expectations I am speaking of are what I feel most students expect when enrolling for a class.

In speech class I was told that speakers must not assume what an audience knows about their subject and must explain everything in detail. A lot of teachers just assume that students know everything about a class. Even when certain material wasn’t covered or even in that class’s book. If students knew everything before a class started then there would be no need for teachers. Another necessary expectation that teachers should be required to meet is that grades and feedback should be given in a timely fashion. Teachers that give little to no feedback or wait until the end of the semester are giving students anxiety about their unknown progress or lack of progress.


Not all teachers ignore these expectations. Most of the time it’s the students that don’t do what’s required of them. The difference is that students are paying to be in class and are penalized for not doing so. Just because many work places have misplaced standards doesn’t mean that students should have to be shuffled through college like an outdated assembly line. Rules and standards for student’s expectations shouldn’t be the unwritten invisible rules that they have ended up as. Instead they should be an overwhelming necessity.