Maybe, but those examples seem to suggest that the kids weren't looking for metaphors, and couldn't let context take form from the abstract. My wife took a writing course at our local CC just a year or so after immigrating from China. She was by far the best writer in the class. It was like her peers were elementary school students.
Your wife is married to a white Ph.D scientist with a wikipedia page. She is, as the MAGAts like to say, a "global elite." Sure, she may not have been married to you at the time but it's not like you ordered her up out of the back of a magazine. I took some courses at a couple community colleges. I had the tallest degree in the room. "local community college" is not and should not be a wellspring of intellectual excellence.