Filipinos rebutted a multi-awarded broadcast journalist who suggested passers of the University of the Philippines College Application (UPCA) 2022 to choose “terror” professors in their studies.
GMA journalist Jessica Soho was asked to give helpful tips to “iskos” and “iskas” as they prepare to embark on another chapter in their lives.
This is because the state university released the results of UPCA for the academic year 2022–2023 last Tuesday.
UP has suspended administering the UP College Admissions Test (UPCAT) for two years now due to the “immense logistical challenge” of administering the exam in a COVID-19 pandemic.
Aspiring students are instead assessed based on their high school performance.
UP said it had evaluated over 100,000 college applications.
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Soho, who graduated from UP Diliman with a mass communications degree, reminded incoming “iskolars ng bayan” that studying at UP is a “privilege” that should not be wasted.
“Even if your professors don’t check the attendance, show up. Listen good because you have the best teachers in the world,” she said in an interview.
“Choose the terror ones, you’ll learn the most from them, believe me. And if you survive them, you will survive anything,” Soho added.
A quote card of this remark circulated online, prompting some Filipinos to respond to Soho’s suggestion for the incoming college students.
“From experience, I learned the least from terror profs. We all learn differently and when professors are engaging and encouraging, I enjoy the learning space and participate more. If you survive a terror prof, you pass, but you don’t really remember much from the course,” a Twitter user wrote.
“Meron kaming terror prof dati at tinawag niya akong ‘unsafe nurse.’ Tumatak yun sa isip ko (until now), and I never practiced the profession after graduation. If you survived a terror prof, congratulations. If you didn’t, mahigpit na yakap. Our failures will not define us :),” another online user claimed.
A different Filipino wrote that terror professors are “overrated.”
“They don’t inspire growth. It’s the ones who are very open to mentorship ang the best,” she said.
Another Twitter user claimed to drop out due to a “terror teacher who bullied students arbitrarily.”
“Learned nothing from her and was so traumatized from that experience I dropped out. There should be no room for megalomaniac bullies in the teaching profession,” she said.
A different Twitter user claiming to be a corporate educator said that “adults learn best when they are motivated.”
“I highly doubt that students get motivated by fear. In my experience as a corporate educator, learners excel when the environment is free from stressors,” he wrote.
Terror teachers are educators who are considered “strict and nerve-wracking.”
An education blog said that terror teachers are known for giving their “students a hard time during classes” and for dangling failing marks to scare them.
It added that most of these terror educators “are short-tempered and unapproachable.”
“They assign requirements that consume a ridiculous amount of time and energy from a student. They are notorious for distributing overly detailed and difficult exams,” the blog post claimed.
