In this essay, “Other Voices, Other Rooms”, Professor Gerald Graff offers that education at a university could be exciting and rewarding for students. However, it applies to those who have developed the skills at summarizing, weighing arguments and synthesizing conflicting points. Unfortunately, not all students possess these skills and as they start getting confused they will care more about appeasing the professor in order to obtain good grades. In return, they will give their professors whatever they want even though it seems contradictory to their beliefs (339). Graff believes that not all college students possess the skills necessary to be successful and that professors are only making the issue worse by teaching in a vacuum. According to Graff, “No self-respecting educator would deliberately design a system guaranteed to keep students dependent on the whim of the individual instructor (338). That is the case in some classes; Graff has noticed that students are choosing to bypass the experience of learning and will agree with their professors. They will tell them what they want to hear, rather than challenge their point of view. The author goes on to provide different examples to help support his theory; he uses several various methods to include: personal anecdotes, academic references, and analogies. These support his thesis and help drive the point across regrettably none of the examples are supported by facts.
Of three methods employed, two of the three examples resounded sharply and were well supported and helped the reader understand the point of what Graff was making. The third example, he does not provide enough evidence or studies to support his claims. In his first example, he uses a personal anecdote of when he attended college, which added value to his essay; he helps the reader to relate to the topic of discussion. Gerald reflects back on a