with those doe eyes.
You are late.
There isn't a deadline.
There WAS a deadline.
Did you read the syllabus?
Did you get my reminder?
It was in an email.
I said it in class.
No exceptions, I said.
I remember.
Why do you think you're the exception?
You're the most dull of all dullards,
You're the most dull of all dullards,
yet you want the most leeway.
You think that this close call
has taught you a lesson,
and now I can accept this late project?
has taught you a lesson,
and now I can accept this late project?
Nice try. No, the lesson will be learned
with the F.
I guarantee you this lesson will last longer.
No, you can't do something else instead.
This was the thing.
We spent weeks on it.
It's all we talked about.
I called it the alpha and omega of all projects.
Remember?
You could have turned it in any time
over the past 3 days.
Many people did that. So afraid
were they that time might come a-croppin'.
Not you. You waited until 4 hours past the deadline,
and then the shit you gave me looked like
it had been stored on the floor of your car
for a week or two.
Late. Doesn't exist. Zeroes in its eyeballs.
And now I must take my leave.
And now I must take my leave.
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ReplyDeleteDick Tingle is a better man than I (and I am currently paying the price in more overdue grading -- some my fault, some the students', all part of an interrelated pile of toppled dominoes -- than I can keep up with).
ReplyDeleteI am also more like CC on this one. My deadlines are not this rigid. If they were, it would not only go against my personality to some degree, it would get me in trouble with my hierarchy.
ReplyDeleteIt was only 4 hours late?
ReplyDeleteThis semester long project had to be turned in in person at my office this week. We're not in class this week, and I told all students I was holding free office time Monday 8-4, Tuesday 8-4, and then Wednesday from noon-6.
ReplyDeleteALL of my students except for 2 came on Monday or Tuesday, turned work in (a 10 minute long process because there are 12 different elements to the project, and we mark up a checklist), and picked up their readings for the final.
On the last day, right at noon, one student came in, turned the stuff in. 6 pm Wednesday was the drop dead deadline. It had been talked about all semester. It's on the syllabus, and in any number of correspondences made to students about the project for 12 weeks.
At 6, the last student hadn't appeared. I went to dinner, took my wife over to a friend's place to pick up some Christmas candy, and then on a hunch I drove past my office at just before 10 pm. I checked my office, under my door, in case the last student had been there. He hadn't.
As I opened the door to the parking lot, at a few minutes past 10 pm, my straggling student was there, sweating, pushing a misshapen mass of papers into my hands.
No, I didn't accept it.
As I opened the door to the parking lot, at a few minutes past 10 pm, my straggling student was there, sweating, pushing a misshapen mass of papers into my hands.
ReplyDeleteHow dare you, sir! Have you no heart?
That paper was under your door at 5:59:59 pm on the dot. The student in question, having suddenly remember a vital comma and/or semicolon, had retrieved it using a straightened out coathanger, corrected the aforementioned egregious (albeit slight) error and had then been in the process of putting it back under your door. Then, out of nowhere, a stray dog/cat/squirrel in desperate need of medical attention appeared. What was he to do?
(It goes on, but you get the gist...)
My new favorite response (that I'm too scared to use) paraphrases Jay-Z: If you're havin' problems I feel bad for you son, but I got 99 problems and your's ain't one.
Dick, you re-assure me! I have the same policy and every time I have a "special" student. I don't feel badly anymore.
ReplyDeleteAh, Sawyer. Good the know the student services people are just as suspect of these excuses. Sometimes I wonder if the people over there aren't just playing the role of Mom and Pop Bail-my-screwed-#$%-out.
Merely,
ReplyDeleteLooks like your question was answered. Are you happy, not?
This is going to be my new manifesto.
ReplyDelete