Wow! Junior Who Clearly Hasn’t Done Readings Still Manages to Be Condescending in Seminar

Early Wednesday morning in the 10:30 am Urban Studies seminar ‘Affordable Housing in a Global City,' Brandon Schifrin accomplished a feat like no other. During a conversation on chapter four of the textbook focusing on affordable housing in Latin America, classmate Jenna Espinoza made an insightful comment about the ‘Juntos Nos Levantamos’ Housing project in Buenos Aires, Argentina. 

Without having read the chapter at hand, and before Espinoza could finish her sentence, Schifrin’s hand left the game of Flappy Bird he was playing under the table and shot up into the air. “I’m pretty sure it's 'juntos nos levantamos,' not 'levántamos',” he said making direct eye contact with Espinoza. “I think that’s the way they would say it… In Argentina.” The room fell silent in wonder; Schifrin managed to be condescending without having read a single page of the assigned text and having no context for the conversation at hand.

“At first, I was a little upset that the only response he had to my comment was correcting my pronunciation of a word in a language I never claimed to know," said Espinoza outside of the classroom. "Yet when I realized that not only had he not read the homework, but additionally had not listened to a single thing I said, and STILL managed to find fault in my pronunciation… I was like 'Damn!' I’m impressed.”

After a moment of silence to process what had happened, the whole class including the professor and TA stood up in a standing ovation to celebrate Schifrin’s creativity in making others feel less than.

When asked to comment on the situation, Schifrin said he was, “just happy he could teach the class something today.”