Why do my students hate me?

It's hard not to think that after a day of grading research papers. The grammar...the grammmmmmmmmmmmmar. The approximately 40-50 10-page papers I read each semester (and yes, I actually READ them) invariably fall into the same ratio: 10% are good, maybe another 20% or so don't make me upset, and the rest...sheesh.

So if there are any college-age students reading this, a few tips when you hand in your paper...

*Read your paper out loud, to yourself, before you hand it in. Do your instructor that favor, OK?

*Papers get Googled now, don't try to buy them.

*I hate this sentence: "In order to analyze [ostensible topic of paper], it is first necessary to summarize [entire work]." NO, IT'S NOT NECESSARY! You think we don't recognize filler when we see it? I swear, sometimes I think oatmeal and sawdust are going to fall out of the pages.

*For the last. fucking. time. The apostrophe is used to indicate possession. Possession. POSSESSION! I tell my students this every semester, and they still do it. One semester while I was a TA I remember correcting one paper discussing "The Brother's Karamazov"; this told me that not only couldn't that student be bothered with correct grammar, s/he analyzed a novel without bothering TO LOOK AT THE COVER OF THE BOOK.

Deep breath. Calm blue ocean. OK.