Satire.

I managed to make it almost all the way through the university without taking the required writing course. My high school Advanced Placement work really should have gotten me out of such a basic skills class, but eventually I just gave in and did it so I could graduate. This is how I ended up in Freshman Writing 101 the first semester of my senior year.

It was 8am on the first day of the semester and, with the exception of summer school, the first college class ever for most of the students. The essay was on childhood obesity. I finished my essay first and was the first to volunteer when the professor asked someone to stand up and read for the class.

I got an A for my well-written, logical argument for eliminating childhood obesity. As a bonus, I also traumatized an entire class full of fresh-out-of-high-school students who had never read A Modest Proposal with my cold and emotionless delivery. The next person to volunteer was the other senior in the class.

We had written our essays at the same time with zero discussion beforehand, and had obviously come to the same conclusion at the same time: You can propose whatever you like, no matter how preposterous, and get an A as long as your paper was well-thought-out and well-written. I like to think the freshman learned a valuable lesson that day, but I never got to find out because none of them would talk to me the rest of the semester.