Klaus Solko, co-executive editor 

Kindergarten kids are taught to raise their hands. Literal kindergarteners—that is how easy it is. Now I recognize that every professor runs their class differently, but my problem comes when people completely disregard the way that a professor runs a class. If you aren’t in a class that is based in open dialogue, don’t take it upon yourself to try and open it. 

I for one recognize that if my professor is teaching a 300 level course I shouldn’t be interrupting the lecture. Because, get this, some classes are hard, and hearing someone yap through them isn’t helping anyone learn. 

Honestly, I find it so crazy that people do actually interrupt professors during lectures. I have to think they believe they know more about the topic or that their insight is so profound it couldn’t possibly be restrained in a raised hand until the professor gets a chance to call on them. 

Hilariously, these same people are typically way off topic with whatever they are sharing. But god forbid they ever ask a clarifying question. It is always either a personal anecdote or a correction to something that isn’t relevant. 

Seriously, I’ve been in a class where we were talking about Nietzsche, and the professor offhandedly mentioned how ethics change over time and referenced Greek gods for a second. Of course, this class had one of those people who can’t shut up, and they started going on about Greek gods. In this class, we never once got through a lecture on time because this person wouldn’t be quiet. 

While I do truly hate these people in class, it is even more crazy to me that professors never do anything about it. I guess I get it a little bit. Professors are often scrambling for participation, and while someone interrupting them is annoying, it is also participation. 

However, what I feel professors are failing to realize is, someone acting like that discourages other students from participating. Especially because I have yet to have a person like this in a class that doesn’t also interrupt other students. 

Like seriously, why is it that when I am in a class I raise my hand, and I get called on, and I get half way through making a point just to get interrupted by another student who definitely doesn’t know more than me because they don’t even know what I was going to say. It has to take such an unimaginable amount of self-importance for these people to exist. 

I’ve also had someone bring up to me that professors might not call out students because we are all adults. To which I say, “Yes, we are adults, and if a fellow adult doesn’t know how to act, they should get called out.” There are plenty of times in adult life when people need to be reminded of expectations, and a classroom 100% should be one of those places. 

I’m not even saying that professors should be stopping class to call a person out, though I do think that would be very satisfying. But asking someone to stay after class and saying to them then, “Hey, could you not interrupt me and your fellow students?”

The craziest part of this is that I’ve seen this behavior happen with a guest speaker. Someone who is an expert on the topic comes to teach a class, and of course, there is someone who has been alive for a quarter of the time, and they think they know more. 

Part of me almost wishes I had half the amount of superiority complex these people have. Maybe then, when they talk over me, I could tell them to shut up instead of just looking really pissed off while I wait for the professor to tell me to continue.