By Ellie Conklin
FAIRFIELD, CT – “Good time management” and “full understanding of the medium” are two requirements for students’ midterm presentations in Dr. Sonya Gupta’s English class, but she has yet to master these skills herself. According to her students, Gupta wastes an extraordinary amount of class time attempting to conquer Youtube’s irritating autoplay feature. “Without fail, Dr. Gupta will continue her lecture in the last few seconds of the video and then get surprised when the next video in the queue starts to play,” sophomore Dan Jacoby explains.
Gupta, 59, often employs visual examples to help her students better understand the concepts and theories she is teaching, but it seems as if she never quite accomplishes her goal. “I never remember what the video is about,” junior Kayleigh Carlson tells us, “I only remember how she complains for the following three minutes about technology.” Gupta, who received her PhD from Yale University, will often resort to muttering under her breath and clicking every button on the screen once the next video plays.
“She always ends up clicking the ‘play next’ button instead of the ‘pause,’ and the whole cycle just starts all over again,” Jacoby tells us.
Several students, including Jacoby, have volunteered their time to teach Gupta how to use Youtube, but she does not want to listen. Jacoby is infuriated: “And she gives me a C because I don’t follow her instructions in my paper. Oh, how the tables have turned.”
Stagnation 