You're going to MAKE us type?!?!

Today I officially become a monster to my students. Today I inform them that they will be required to type all papers for my classes and that said papers must follow a specific format. Come on everyone... you know it... 1" margins 12 pt font double-spaced first line indented. Its the way millions of college students type papers every day. Millions of other high school students as well as I'm sure 3rd graders at this point. Its amazing to be how much resistance I have been getting from my students when I encourage them to type.

I know, I know, not all of them have computers at home but that's a lame excuse. There's nothing that says they can't write their papers by hand at home and then type the papers when they get to school. Our library opens at 7:00 am most days when I get here. It stays open in the afternoon until at least 5:00 most days while I have debate practice. There's a network printer here too! I also reserve class time in the computer labs.

I think we've been too lenient on the typing issue for a long time. I think the number of students without a computer at home is actually very low. In an informal poll of my students, less than 10% are sans-PC. Several of my students already type their papers so I know it won't be too much trouble but there will be some resistance.

My fear is that next year some of these kids will be in a college history class and they'll hand in an hand-written paper with torn edges from where they ripped it out of a notebook and the professor will look at them and ask, "who was your history teacher in high school?"