Schaefer Shares

Research is a necessary topic in almost every single college class. Because of this, it ends up becoming very redundant. But, I have a few professors that I thoroughly enjoy because of the passion they exude when lecturing their classes. Those professors are typically involved in publishing a lot of their research. I know that it is a requirement for some, but not all of them talk about it as much as others. I think that those are the professors who stand out to me the most over the last three years I have spent on this campus.

Now the downside to professors like that is that sometimes they expect the same out of their students. Just because this specific concept is something that they find completely interesting, does not mean that the students also do. Plus, the majority of us definitely don’t find the actual research as exhilarating as some of them do. Yes, I do find it interesting to learn new things. No, I don’t have the will power to sit and read a thirty page article about one specific concept.

I think that a middle ground should always try to be reached between students and professors when it comes to research. Some professors have way too high of standards. It is genuinely difficult to find 10 sources for a research paper. Especially when they can’t all be journal articles. The papers that I only have to have 3-5 sources for are much stronger than one with ten, because it is so challenging to find ways to integrate each into one paper.

The other problem is the some professors seem to think that our library resources are a godsend. The truth is… it isn’t. Most of the full length articles can’t even be read electronically. And most of us aren’t going to mess around with it for more than five minutes to try to figure it out. We live in a time where most of us have little patience, and when it comes to not finding what we want fast enough, there’s no hope. And it gets worse with the students that are younger than us, they are even more impatient, so good luck with that.