Instructor Defends His Unorthodox Methods : Moorpark College: Richard Wimmer, who was forced to resign his part-time position, says, ‘I think what I do works.’

Moorpark College English teacher Richard Wimmer says his life seems to be imitating art these days.

The part-time instructor, who has taught at Moorpark for five years, recently submitted his resignation after three students and three parents complained that his unorthodox teaching methods are lax and his assignment topics too risque, he said.

But Wimmer, 54, compares his situation to that of the teacher in the movie “Dead Poets Society”--beloved by most of his students but ousted by a stuffy administration for his unusual approach to teaching.

Among other things, the complaints were triggered by essay assignments that asked students to describe themselves taking a shower or to discuss a dialogue with their mothers about sex, Wimmer said.

Wimmer’s students at the two-year college also complained about the lack of grades and the brevity of the critiques written on the 10 papers they are asked to write during the semester.

In a memo, administrators criticized Wimmer’s class as lacking structure, organization and purpose, and said he came to class unprepared, did not follow his course outline and sometimes dismissed the three-hour classes early, Wimmer said.

But Wimmer said an administrator who visited his class four years ago “wrote a glowing report and a glowing recommendation for a full-time job.”

After students’ complaints, the first of which was in the 1987-88 school year, “the same lesson I taught in 1986 that received a glowing report was viewed again by administrators, and their response was, ‘No instruction is going on,’ ” Wimmer said.

This month, Wimmer said, he received a letter from administrators notifying him that his services would be terminated after the fall semester. He said he was given the option to resign, which he chose so that he would not have the blight of being fired on his record when he looks for a new job.

Alicia Long, dean of general and transfer education, said Wimmer has submitted his resignation, effective Feb. 1, but that she could not comment on his situation because it is a confidential personnel matter.

Wimmer, who will continue teaching his three composition classes through January, acknowledged that his teaching methods might be unorthodox.

During class, students sit with him in a circle, not facing him at the blackboard. Students are called upon to “write about one another and talk about issues that are very personal in their lives,” said Wimmer, adding that writing assignments emphasize narration and argumentation.

For example, the assignment asking students to describe themselves taking a shower was intended as a description exercise to help students learn to write about tactile experiences, Wimmer said. It was followed by an assignment asking students to write about eating a pizza, he said.

Very few of the papers he received on the shower topic “were ever sensual or salacious,” Wimmer said. Students always have the choice of choosing an alternate topic if they were offended, he said.

Wimmer said he spends most of the class time talking about the art of writing rather than the mechanics, such as spelling and punctuation, although exercises are done in those areas as well.

“Students are just totally bored and turned off with the kind of beating-your-head-and-regurgitating-the-information kind of material,” Wimmer said. But he added: “I think what I do works. I think I’m a damn good teacher, a very good teacher. I’ve had whole classes sign letters saying, ‘He’s the best teacher we ever had.’ I know something’s working.”

Brian Conroy, who took Wimmer’s course in 1988 and is now a student at Pierce College, said it changed his life and spurred his plans to earn a bachelor’s degree from UC Santa Barbara.

“I was very surprised with the format and structure of the course,” Conroy, 40, a laboratory manager, said. “It was very interactive rather than being a lecture kind of format. . . . I wrote more papers for that course than for any I’ve had. I really enjoyed it. I think it was the most educational experience I’ve ever had.”

Conroy said he did not find the shower topic provocative. “I don’t find anything risque about taking a shower,” he said. “I do it every day.”

Sondra Hozinsky, 30, said she took the course on the recommendation of another student.

“You aren’t sitting in the classroom staring at the instructor for three hours,” Hozinsky said. “I’ve already recommended him to other students.”

Hozinsky said Wimmer has occasionally dismissed the class early, perhaps half an hour or so, but that he usually gives the students shorter breaks and meets with some students after class to discuss individual papers.

Wimmer said the six complaints are the only ones he is aware of from about 600 students that he has taught in five years at Moorpark. He said he dismissed parents’ complaints because they are not in his class.

Some of Wimmer’s current and former students have written letters to administrators on his behalf and are circulating a petition expressing support for the teacher.

Conroy and Hozinsky were among one of two groups of students who have held impromptu meetings with administrators in the past two weeks in support of Wimmer.

Hozinsky said students hope to meet with administrators to present the petition and letters after the Christmas break.

“We’re not going to let it rest,” Hozinsky said.

Wimmer, a 15-year teaching veteran and an author, received attention in 1989 for his novel “Irish Wine,” which holds the unofficial world record for rejections--162 times over 27 years--for a work of fiction that was eventually published. Shortly after its publication, the book was lauded in a New York Times review.

Wimmer also has published a nonfiction book about baseball and co-written a screenplay that was produced for television.

Wimmer said he considers himself primarily a writer, but loves teaching and believes he has a talent for it.

“I’d like to continue it, and I’d like to continue it at Moorpark,” he said.

For now, however, he’s looking for another job.

“If this could be resolved to my satisfaction, I’d like to stay at Moorpark,” Wimmer said. But the only way he would stay, he said, is if officials “take me back on my terms. . . . Really listen to the students and you’ll see this kind of thing is working.”