Following a devastating final in ENG 221,
many English and Comparative Literature majors were left wondering why they ever became English and Comparative Literature majorsin the first place. The class, which had been fairly tame up until that point, suddenly took a turn for the worse when Professor Harvard decided to genuinely test students' knowledge regarding the material that they had been reading during the semester.
Several English and Comparative Literature majors walked into the room with the expectation that enough big words and fancy phrases would enable them to pass the final effortlessly and without firing a single neuron. However, these hopes were dashed upon receiving the final itself, as instead of the comfortable, easy-to-bullshit questions like "Identify the Romantic qualities present within Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poetry" that they were expecting, these students received questions that asked them to identify extremely specific pieces of information like "the person who Christian encounters upon his arrival at the Delectable Mountains in Pilgrim's Progress" that no person with a life outside of the class could ever possibly remember.
Students were appalled to find that not only were these questions about stupidly specific pieces of knowledge only found within the readings, but also that they were required to convey this knowledge in short answer form. This arbitrary and sadistic decision put the entire class at a disadvantage, as students were forced to write answers that they had absolutely 0 percent confidence in, as opposed to 25 percent.
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Many students called the test "merciless" and "virtually impossible". When asked why he thought students should know "the approximate of stanzas within 'Abasalom and Achitophel'", Professor Harvard believed that it was crucial for students to "really understand the nitty gritty aspects of British Literature." Professor Havard's rating on RateMyProfessors, which was a 4.8 before the final, has dropped to a 2.6 as of today.
Immediately following the final, students in the class GroupMe began to circulate a petition which advocates for the class being renamed to "Memorizing British Literature". Whether or not this petition will be looked at by tenured members of the English department still remains to be seen, though it is highly unlikely that this will happen.
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