Complaints about freshman English

I know freshman English is a broad topic.  There has got to be a wide variety of incoming freshmen, from those who have little skill with writing to those who are currently reporters, novelists and essayists.  I have read that one of the first ideas of what an educated person should aim to be was the model of a speaker.  In the pre-microphone days, a speaker who could be heard over a crowd and who could speak without notes and give a meaningful, rousing statement was a person (male, probably) who mattered.  That was actually in the days when writing was a technical skill that was mastered by only a few, maybe like engine or tv repair today.

It is still a technical skill but is now considered one that close to everyone can master.  As noted for me in the memorable book "Style: An Anti-Textbook" by Richard A. Lanham, reading is basically a type of input into our brains and arithmetic, the third of the famous 3 R's, is usually presented as a chore of calculation to be completed by the learner, but writing is an art.  It is a delivery from the person's mind to the outside.

Even 20 years or more ago, many colleges and universities (and I am sure, high schools and others) focused on writing as a personal creation tool that any student could use to explain mastery of content and ideas.  Such a student could also write a statement of personal feelings, questions, criticisms and reactions to issues in a way that revealed something of the sort of person the writer was.  That focus is often called 'writing across the curriculum' or something similar.

Thus, freshman English is often considered a doorway through which the competent writer can enter into many different studies. 

The problem is that in today's world, we often combine speaking and writing into a presentation.  Modern presentations are often given beside a large screen onto which the presenter can project whatever is relevant.  Therefore, all the trick and tools of Hollywood, Bollywood, sound tracks, timing, fade-outs and other transitions can and often are used in a presentation.  So, today it does matter if a person can write 500 words on the state of the country, but being able to tweet 140 characters, embed a video on a web page or post to a blog are also matters of everyday power literacy.  Let's move on!