What are they teaching my kids???

[fyffer]

So, I've shared this on facebook, but I figured I'd check for sensibilities in the Pub as well.

I've just about had it with the notes coming to me via email from my childrens' schools.
I will continue to add items here, as they undoubtedly will continue to flow to my inbox, but this last one was just absurd.

My daughter is in 8th grade, and next year will be entering the high school (the same one that I went to, by the way). They are holding a scheduling/information night at the HS, and this note came to my email today in a word document, and concluded with the following:

Administrators and Department Chairs will be available to answer questions. Park in the main parking lot, enter in the main entrance and the Auditorium is straight ahead. Feel free to bring your perspective 9th graders. We’ll see you there!

Love the superfluous capitalization and malapropism. And this is where my community is going to educate my daughter. <sigh>
Am I overreacting? Or is my ire well-founded?

[emmline]

Most likely the note was typed by an secretary or assistant who does not have good editing skills.

Yes. There should be a checkpoint at which all documents leaving a business or school should be approved by someone with a known capacity to spell and punctuate correctly. I think that fewer people can nowadays than could 20-30 years ago, and it doesn't necessary occur to the hiring parties to screen for this.

[Nanohedron]

Am I overreacting? Or is my ire well-founded?

While on the one hand we're talking about an educational environment here, on the other hand you simply received an office missive from a humble clerk to the parent, and one not necessarily indicative of the state of the curriculum. Nevertheless one's eyebrow rises.

Can you, or anyone, tell me what a "perspective 9th grader" could possibly be? I have somewhat less problem with "Department Chairs", but only just. The capitalisation notifies me, by its Significant Aspect, that I probably won't be accosted by Harry Potteresque speaking furniture. Dunno how anyone else'll see that one way or the other, though...

[dwest]

Maybe they want her to come ready to express her views?

[gonzo914]

It is not only communications coming from schools and businesses. The level of writing has declined in much of the written media. I see errors regularly in print -- local paper, CNN, Slate, and MSNBC all come to mind -- that would have cost someone a letter grade when I was grading copy editing students fifteen years ago. There's more of an emphasis on writing sparkly, cute headlines and using the layout software than on fact-checking and having a command of the written language.

[s1m0n]

Most likely the note was typed by an secretary or assistant who does not have good editing skills.

Yes. There should be a checkpoint at which all documents leaving a business or school should be approved by someone with a known capacity to spell and punctuate correctly. I think that fewer people can nowadays than could 20-30 years ago, and it doesn't necessary occur to the hiring parties to screen for this.

Don't look now, but people your (present) age thought the same 20-30 years ago, and in every decade before then, too. You are looking at the generation gap, not the collapse of western civilization.

[Nanohedron]

Don't look now, but people your (present) age thought the same 20-30 years ago, and in every decade before then, too. You are looking at the generation gap, not the collapse of western civilization.

Bollocks. Plenty on either side of this "gap" you posit couldn't spell back then, either.

[MTGuru]

You are looking at the generation gap, not the collapse of western civilization.

Could be both.

[Doug_Tipple]

I went shopping for groceries today. Passing through the produce isles, I noticed that the zucchini looked good, so I bought some. I thought to myself at the time that "zucchini" would make a good word for a spelling bee. Who would have guessed that there were two "c's" in zucchini? All you can do is hope for a good memory for detail, which was never my strong suit.

[s1m0n]

Don't look now, but people your (present) age thought the same 20-30 years ago, and in every decade before then, too. You are looking at the generation gap, not the collapse of western civilization.

Bollocks. Plenty on either side of this "gap" you posit couldn't spell back then, either.

That's my point. This is a gap of perception.

[Nanohedron]

Don't look now, but people your (present) age thought the same 20-30 years ago, and in every decade before then, too. You are looking at the generation gap, not the collapse of western civilization.

Bollocks. Plenty on either side of this "gap" you posit couldn't spell back then, either.

That's my point. This is a gap of perception.

Your point is ill-founded and the gap of perception is yours. For all you know, the clerk who composed the letter was eighty years old. When your needlessly divisive generational arrogance and presumption gives way to reason, let me know.

[dwest]

The loss of print journalism will lead to the collapse of western civilization. This man or his clone will be running the show.

[MTGuru]

Who would have guessed that there were two "c's" in zucchini?

Of course, in Italian double consonants like "cc" are actually pronounced: zook kini. So they don't really have that problem. I always thought it funny that in Italy they tend not to spell words when asked. They just pronounce carefully.

Q: "How do you spell appoggiatura?"
A: "Ap podge jia TOO ra!"

[missy]

It is not only communications coming from schools and businesses. The level of writing has declined in much of the written media. I see errors regularly in print -- local paper, CNN, Slate, and MSNBC all come to mind -- that would have cost someone a letter grade when I was grading copy editing students fifteen years ago. There's more of an emphasis on writing sparkly, cute headlines and using the layout software than on fact-checking and having a command of the written language.

I completely agree with this. I've stopped reading our local paper. The writing is about on level with what my children did in fourth grade. And in the online version - they never come back and update the stories.

[mutepointe]

I took a semester of German in college. If I remember correctly, that languages capitalizes all nouns and ruined me completely on this matter. I can see why those particular words were capitalized.

In a school setting, those words are proper nouns. The Auditorium is just as important as Paris, France or Texas, take your pick. You try not capitalizing "Administrators" or "Department Chairs" and see how long you remain in their good graces. Improper grammer, probably. Proper suck-up-ed-ness, you betcha.