[coreyp_1]

I didn't go into my entire syllabus, but it is sufficient to note that I did drop the lowest grade, and I only failed a few students out of hundreds, and that is a reflection of their work, not mine.

Yes, it is sad that people of my "kind" "exist as professor." I helped students start a business. I started a makerspace for them so they could explore the world of 3d printing, arduinos, etc. I guided them build projects that were worthy of showing off on their resume (which resulted in some getting jobs). I was proud of the cool things that they did, and I worked with those who had difficulty. I was just so horrible!

Actually, my students quite liked me, and I was often forgiving if a student came and talked to me... after all, that's part of their learning process. Either the student cared or they didn't. I made it clear from the beginning that I cared about them, even when I had a class of 165 in the middle of Covid.

Do you actually understand what a diploma represents? It is a certification of knowledge (binary in nature... you either have one or you don't, so it is by definition a very coarse measure). A grade (or GPA) is a one-dimensional measurement of that certification. That is what your tuition is paying for. It is paying for someone who is qualified to teach you something and then evaluate you on the standard to which everyone else from that institution is also held. It is also a ranking against their peers (which is a reason that I had no patience for cheaters, which I found some every semester). As an aside, this is why a course transferred from one institution to another will often not be included in the GPA of the later institution, because it is not the same standard.

In education, you need both structure as well as innovation. I taught both. You seem stuck on the "rule follower" and "rule breaker" mentality, but that is completely orthogonal to what I am saying. I taught mastery. Whether you follow or don't follow the rules (however you define "rules") you must still master your craft, and the university exists to certify that mastery. That is the point of the university. Certification of mastery.

If you don't want certification, then don't go to a university. You aren't required to get a degree. You can learn everything that you need to from books and other places. But if you want certification of your knowledge, then you have to actually go through the steps that verifies your knowledge and ability, as determined by other people from a variety of backgrounds who have each had their knowledge and ability certified by even more people from a variety.... you get the idea. That is what a university is.

Consider the similarity with the martial arts world. You can buy a black belt online, but do you have mastery? Someone would ask how you got it. Who considered you worthy of posessing the black belt? You might say "it doesn't matter... I can fight and win!" You might be right. But the black belt isn't about fighting. It's about self-discipline, philosophy, experience, and yes, mastery, as learned from and evaluated by someone else who has an applicable certification.

I have a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Notre Dame, an R1 research university, as conferred by a panel of experts from a variety of universities (meaning faculty from other universities, not just Notre Dame itself) based on my academic achievement in the field of Computer Science, peer-reviewed conference and journal publications in the field of Computer Science, as well as my creation of a peer-reviewed, published, and publicly-defended dissertation over graph grammars (blending formal language grammars and graph theory). That is my certification. Every grade that I gave derived its credibility from that certification, and was my communication to the world of my assessment of the mastery of that student to the expectations of the university, me, and their relation to their peer group (you've heard of a grade curve, right?). That's the way it works.

You are not requrired to take part in it, but just don't treat it like sour grapes (from Aesop's Fables, it might be an obscure reference).