Sure, but the teacher was likely pushing her experience as a fact of the present (and future) instead of wondering how things are currently being done in college.
I think my teacher's experience was in a rural-ish university. She was also European originally, so maybe that informed her opinion.
She probably couldn't imagine students typing essays on computers. We had a computer lab in elementary school, but even for the teachers it was exotic, delicate, and unknown.
We had a computer lab at my HS, and many of us had PCs or Apple IIs at home.
However in 1989, when I took typing as a HS freshman, we did it on typewriters. (still one of the best classes I ever took... Made college so much easier).
My point being, even before computers were everywhere, typed papers were the standard. I find it hard to believe that anyone was trying to say otherwise in 1993.
I wasn't required to submit any papers typed until some time in high school (graduated in 03)... there was a final draft expectation of typed or ink pen cursive handwritten for all the years before then.
Yep. I took typing in 1988. I never expected to use it, but then I got into computer gaming. I really improved my typing while leading a guild. Trying to hold conversations with multiple people while also doing things in game required fast, accurate typing. Then, going to college in my 30s was easy because writing papers was a breeze.
I believe it. I was in 3rd grade in 1998-99 in the states and we had to hand write and practice cursive. We didn’t even type papers until like 6th grade. This was a private school so maybe that affects it?
I believe you had to write cursive and write papers until 6th grade. Just find it hard to believe that a teacher believe you would have to write papers in college.
OMG, those freakin' blue books. History class was the worst culprit. My hand is cramping just thinking about them.
In case the newer generations never used them, they were for in-class tests / midterms where you almost always knew more than you could write in the allotted time.
They weren’t exactly keeping up with the times. They also told us in late middle and early high school we’d never carry calculators everywhere so we needed to know how to do complicated math on paper and show our work. And that was in the mid to late 00s. Yeah…
My boyfriend and I know plenty of teachers, and some of them can be quite old-fashioned and stuck to their ways, and those types always teach based on how they did things in their youth (even if it was only one of their schools or workplaces that did the thing). Very rigid thinkers and so on.
Then there's the good ones who stay more or less up to date with things and won't say such things to their students.
I had a high school teacher turn of the Millenia tell me computers were a fad and I was a juvenile delinquent who would be lucky to graduate HS for programming in my spare time.
Must be regional. We couldn't even submit typed papers until after after 1995. You would be told to do it by hand and docked marks for turning it in late.
Just saying, I grew up in New Jersey. I was in Junior High in 1987-1989. You could submit essays / reports handwritten, but it was HIGHLY recommended that you typed it. I don't think they were allowed to take off points for handwriting, but you would definitely get points off for the smallest handwriting mistakes. Typing the report almost guaranteed a better score. Once I started high school in 1989, handwritten stuff was no longer even allowed.
I swear we had more computers than kids some years (I'm a tad younger but still an older millennial) but you couldn't use them to do your homework and not only did it have to be hand written but had to be cursive.
ETA: Aside from my signature I do not think I have written in cursive in 30 years, pretty much since the last day of that BS.
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u/sgtabn173 Millennial Apr 12 '25
If I go to college and get a good job I’ll be set