In a fit of pique, I actually made the following statement to one of my underperforming classes today.
“While I know that there are a few of you that have made a concerted effort to succeed this semester, most of you have not. When I gave you the opportunity to make up some of your score on the second exam, you did a half-assed job and your scores reflected that. When I gave you a take-home portion for the third exam*, where you had your text and your notes as reference, you did a half-assed job, and your scores reflected that. Yet when I inform you of your current standing and mention that it is substandard, you bitch and complain about it. What would you like me to do? Take your fucking test for you and blow smoke up your ass by telling you how well you did?”
Afterward, I couldn’t believe that I'd said it, but this class has been against anything at all resembling work and thought all semester. This class has my very special snowflakes Foolish Freddie the Football Player and Amazingly Arrogant Autumn. This section has scored significantly lower than my other sections of the same course this semester. In fact, this section has scored significantly lower than any other section of this course I have ever taught.
I just thank the Force that I don’t have any evaluations this semester.
* - The syllabus stated that all exams were in-class exams.
At least you know that they didn't cheat on the take home exam. You should celebrate their honesty. Cupcakes for everybody!
ReplyDeleteI went through a similar situation a few weeks ago. The main problem with the class is that there was a disconnect between the expectations of the class and the expectations of the professor. I thought they should read the material, synthesize information, and write coherent papers that reflect their mastery of the material. The class thought they should jerk off and get an A.
ReplyDeleteAfter a particularly bad night, I drowned my sorrows in vodka and spent the rest of the week deciding how to revamp the class.
The next week I rolled in, fell on the sword, and took the blame for the class not meeting my expectations. I then let them decide what objective measures of assessment they wanted used for the remainder of the course. (Papers, you see, allowed me to discriminate against the men in the class. Nevermind that the highest grade on a paper that week was earned by a man.)
Nope, from here on out it was going to be quizzes. The little cherubs, now protected from my biases, would do great now, huh? Not so much. Oddly, the students still suck. I even let them take notes from the reading material to use during the quizzes, but they still screw them up. Instead of failing papers, they now fail quizzes. But since everything is objective AND I let them use notes they prepared, it's much harder for them to blame me.
You see, I do get evaluated for every class in every semester. I have to make them understand that their failing is not my fault. It will be interesting to see how many fail the course; several are still on track. I suspect that, like Alice Fenton, I will take some pleasure when some fail. Not because I'm hateful, but because students who refuse to try or to learn SHOULD fail.