I am a longtime community member. I teach and live in the path of Matthew and woke up to a crunching sound as a tree crashed through the roof of my kitchen. My family and I are all safe but we have extensive damage to the house and no power and no contact yet with authorities.My briefcase full of schoolwork was at the foot of my bed and I had bitched for 2 days about it and the students who created it, making life unpleasant for everyone around!
A nice recalibration of the relativity of misery. When we sort out our problems here, repairing wood and glass, chain sawing a 60 year-old tree into slices, I will turn my sights on my job again, and I hope I will hang on to the recently gained perspective.
For others in the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida affected, good luck.
- anonymous
I have former colleagues in Charleston and Flagler. Everyone safe but a scary night for them I know.
ReplyDeleteI am very sorry for your serious problems, even as I am glad you weren't raiding the refrigerator at the time of the treefall.
ReplyDeleteI am also contemplating saying I'm sorry you hadn't left your briefcase in the kitchen, and/or suggesting you claim that you had, but I'm not sure I could muster the finesse as my previous attempts at lightening a dark situation were not always well done. So I won't do that.
What amazes me is the capacity of the human spirit to rise triumphantly to a situation precipitated by events beyond its control. Having lived through Sandy's wrath in 2012, I recall the determination of my neighborhood to bounce back, and how for a time, everything but doing that seemed inconsequential by comparison. The ability to focus on a (mostly) tractable problem was also, oddly, a relief from the tilting at windmills that my job had become.
And, when school opened again, my colleagues and I were able to not sweat the small stuff. For a time.
If the papers supposedly got lost or destroyed, the students would have provided another copy, that's all. In fact, if anybody's paper was late, late penalties wouldn't have applied as long as they too provided papers to "replace" those that never existed.
DeleteHad the professor lied about what happened to the initial batch, he wouldn't have been able to check whose paper really was or was not there. I mean, he would have been able to do it, but how would he have explained that to the students he caught?
In fact, because the whole class would have resubmitted the papers, that would have amounted to an extension for everybody, so if any students did somehow get penalized for their late papers, they would have been able to complain that the extension was not granted to them as well. Alternatively, some might have claimed that they had submitted a copy at the right time but simply don't have another, which may be careless but is no reason to get penalized, since it's the professor, not them, who lost their precious unique copy.
This assumes the "schoolwork" was typed, produced on a computer, and the bits still exist somewhere. It's equally likely to be handwritten work, tests, quizzes,... things that cannot simply be replaced with "another copy".
DeleteYou'll note that I specifically disavowed suggesting that the papers be destroyed as a way of avoiding the unpleasant task of grading them. But since we are taking this up in earnest, had the papers in fact been destroyed I'd suggest these resolutions:
Delete1) Forget about the assignment and reweight calculating the final grade without it. This would of course depend on its weight and/or whether other high-stakes assignments depended on it, e.g., if it were a low-stakes draft of a scaffolded "term paper". Students have already benefitted from the mere act of doing the assignment, which is rather the point.
2) Give the whole class the opportunity to produce a replacement by whatever means. Some may submit an exact copy (if available) while others may revise or even submit de novo. So be it.
"Fair" is not always obtainable in its ideal. Sometimes luck favors the unprepared; as Richard Thompson sings, "good things happen to bad people." Those who are worried that, due to some Act of God, someone didn't receive a late penalty they'd justly deserved can find proactive schadenfreude in the idea that the "reward" will only reinforce subsequent attempts at lateness and escalating penalties.
Wouldn't it be easier to just give everybody the maximum possible grade for those papers, such as 100% or A+ or the maximum number of points? Everybody would be happy, especially if that kind of grade is rarely ever assigned to anybody or an individual student is never able to get it.
DeleteEveryone probably would be happy in the short term. This is why grade inflation is so tempting, and why evaluation systems that privilege students' short term happiness and/or "success" tend to lead to grade inflation.
DeleteIn the longer term, people who might not be happy include anyone who is affected by the student's failure to master the material (and, in this particular case, the student's possible lack of knowledge that (s)he has failed to master the material). That could include future professors, classmates, employers, clients/patients/students, and, of course, the student hirself, who may encounter difficulty in later classes.
There's a reason we don't simply issue babies (or 21-year-olds) college diplomas, because current statistics show that those in possession of a college diploma do much better economically than those who don't. If you change the circumstances which lead to someone getting a grade, or a credential, you also change the signifance and effects of that grade/credential.
That would likely be seen as "less fair" by many or most students, particularly those who stand to gain from other students performing less well. It's basically saying that someone who put little-to-no effort into the assignment gets the same "reward" as one who busted their hump. If the points value is low enough, it could be argued that it won't affect the ranking enough to matter, but I try to avoid such arguments unless they can be teaching moments.
DeleteOnce again, I should refresh the page before commenting, to avoid rehashing what's already been better said. On the other hand, Cassandra and I have touched on some different aspects. I particularly appreciate the point about illusion of competency exceeding reality, and consequences thereof. So it seems one should avoid that.
DeleteWell said.
ReplyDeleteGlad you and your family made it through, and best wishes on getting through the tree removal/house repair process as quickly and painlessly as possible (which will still probably mean a long slog).
ReplyDeleteAs you and OPH remark, this sort of event can, indeed, provide perspective, and can bring out the best in colleagues and (yes, even) students. Best wishes for this turning out to be an occasion when everyone can work together for a while, and perhaps be reminded how good that can feel. Goodness knows we could all use that about now (it's raining -- gently -- where I am, which means I've been able to catch up with the news. I wish I'd read (more) student papers instead).
My house cannot be lived in until extensive repairs have been made but I realize how lucky I am. My college is closed for a few more days and my colleagues have all offered room and board, meals, clothes, etc. We are an acrimonious group but everyone's kindness will be long remembered.
ReplyDeleteYou are rich far beyond mere possessions to have such colleagues.
DeleteInterestingly, I recall recently reading how doing someone a favor makes you more favorably disposed towards them. Times like these result in many people doing favors for each other, and the good will spreads accordingly. The acrimony may later return, but seldom to its previous level, and the underlying sense of good faith and shared mission is hard to extinguish.
While they're all in such a giving mood, one of your colleagues would perhaps be willing to grade those papers. I mean, you're going to be seriously preoccupied with claims adjusters and contractors and whatnot, right? It's for the students, after all.
"Precious, unique copy." Really Monica? Anonymous' house was wrecked and you're worrying about "precious unique cop[ies]." After my house burned down, taking students' papers with it, I had everybody reprint their most recent papers and bring in their previous papers so I could reconstruct grades. I got thru the semester okay, and so did the students, but I felt I was operating at maybe 70% between crying jags and anxiety jags. On that awful day that the fire came through, two people died and the rest of us were waiting on a backed-up road hoping the wind did not shift. Perhaps you should re-read Anonymous' post about priorities and obsess less about "precious, unique copy" (but I guess that is your modus operandi).
ReplyDeleteI never said that the copy really was precious or a priority.
DeleteWhat I said is that the student would have lied about having submitted the only copy of a paper that in reality he had not even written.
Had the paper really existed, it would have been unique in the sense of being the only one. Precious or a priority, probably not, but it depends from whose point of view. Maybe only for the student, but if it was so important for him, he would have written it for real instead of telling such a bold lie.
Dana Collette is a management professor at Vancouver Island University located in Nanaimo, British Columbia.
ReplyDelete