There must be something in the water at all these American universities.
A professor in California -- I’ll let you have a moment to be shocked -- is handing out extra credit to students who adhere to his own personal brand of liberal non-logic by asking them to write letters whining about how they have to pay for taking his class.
Seriously. He's literally getting paid to tell students that they should demand that they not have to pay him.
So you know we aren't making this up, from Campus Reform:
A California State University, Channel Islands professor asked students to endorse part of Bernie Sanders’ platform for extra credit by asking their state legislators for tuition-free college.
“In a 1 to 2-page business letter, write your assembly member and/or state senator as to how the high fees and tuition of the California State University impacts you, and your family, not only financially but also psychologically and in other ways,” description of the assignment obtained by Campus Reform instructs.
“Also include why you believe free tuition would better impact your education.”
Barajas added that if a student’s letter “fails to conform to the above instructions, zero points will be awarded.”
In other words, writing a letter explaining why people – including adult students – should be held responsible for their own personal and financial choices will result in exactly zero points. Kind of like the amount of sense this all makes.
Campus Reform adds, “In one of his blog posts, Barajas argues that student loans are a new form of financial slavery and urges his elected officials to reinstate a 2008 budget cut that apparently reduced the cost of CSU’s annual tuition.”
Interestingly, Transparent California, a website that lists the salaries of California State University faculty and staff, reports Barajas received roughly $147,500 in salary and benefits in 2014, the most recent year available. He got about $147,000 the year before that (and based on these stats, we can reasonably assume he’s also been paid over the last year and a half).
There’s no word yet on whether Barajas has selflessly handed over any part of his considerable earnings, paid for through the tuition and fees extorted from powerless young scholars, to help all those poor college grads pay off their loans.