Passing?

I'm not in school anymore but I am a teacher and that usually means maximum drama because, let's face it, kids are funny.

Especially college kids who think they're smarter than the average professor.

Like last week when I had a conversation with a girl who is concurrently enrolled in high school and my college class.

Which is usually the sign of an above average student

Usually but not always.

And definitely not this girl. As evidenced when she approached me and told me that she needed that she have this form that needed to be signed saying she was passing my class so she would be continued to be eligible for high school activities.

And actually she was supposed to turn them in every week and had just forgotten but never fear she had enough for the rest of the semester so if I would just go ahead and sign them in advance and I wouldn't have to worry about it anymore.

To be honest, I hadn't been worried...largely because I hadn't known about the existence of the form until that exact moment.

Her brilliant plan, though, did worry me.

"I can't sign a whole semester's worth of forms in advance," I told her. "I can't see the future; I've no idea if you'll be passing six weeks from now."

Judging by the look on her face, this might be the most confusing thing anyone had ever said to her.

"I just have to have the form signed," she said in a slow, careful voice,

"I just have to tell the truth on it," I said.

And she stared me like she honestly couldn't figure out what my problem was.

Since I am a teacher, I decided to use this as an educational moment.

"Look," I told her, "if I sign that I'm saying that you're passing the class.  What if you stop coming? What if you're not passing? I can't sign a form that says you're passing six weeks from today's date when I have no idea what your situation will be then."

And she just kept staring at me like I'm the one who wasn't making any sense.

"I just have to have a form that says I'm passing." She explained one more time.

"But you're not even passing NOW," I told her.

And she stormed away in a fury.

I still can't figure out if I should be insulted that she thinks I'm dumb enough to fall for this or if I should be horrified that she honestly can't see the flaw in her plan.

This post is part of a weekly blog hop called Finish The Sentence Friday. For other school related posts, please click below:

Happy Fall Y'all

This week’s Theme Thursday topic is Fall.  And to me, Fall means one thing: back to school.

Since moving to Oklahoma, I’ve worked a lot (too many!) different jobs. But the one thing that has always been consistent is teaching; even when I was working other jobs, I stayed involved in teaching. This year I’m teaching at two different colleges and I love it.

And when you’re a teacher, fall is always awesome.  Everything’s new—new classes, new plans, new students— it’s exciting.

The things that would send me right over the edge in the middle of the year can make me laugh in the fall.

Like a student I like to call Purple Hair No Pen.

Please understand that I have no problem with the fact that this girl’s hair is Easter Egg purple.  My own hair has definite purple overtones after the unfortunate My-Hairdresser-Doesn’t-Know-What-Color-Red-Is incident. But, a week and a half after she first dyed it, her neck, shoulders, and hands are also still bright purple.

Which makes me question her basic intelligence and, honestly, her overall cleanliness.  I mean, unless she was actually trying to turn herself into a muppet, she clearly used no protective gear AT ALL while dying her hair. And wouldn’t regular showering tone it down a little after a week and a half?

Still, my problem with her is not her hair color.  It’s the fact that she keeps coming to a writing class without anything to write with.

Our first conversation about it went a little like this:

 

Girl "Can I use your pen? I don’t have one.”

 Me: "This is a WRITING class."

 Girl "Well, I wasn't here last time--I didn't know we'd need one."

 Me (to no one in particular): “This conversation is going terribly.”

 Girl "Soooo, can I have a pen?"

 Me: "I only brought the one I'm using.  You need to come prepared."

 

This, by the way, was a lie.  But this is a COLLEGE class, I don't hand out supplies willy-nilly.

 

It was supposed to be a lesson for her…but I can’t ascertain if it actually taught her anything because the next two class periods she still didn’t have anything to write with.  And then she took our last quiz with a brown calligraphy scrapbooking marker.

I guess I should be glad she actually had a writing utensil but she kind of ruined her little victory by handing me the quiz and asking “Wait—do I need to put my name on it?”

How this girl got IN college is a mystery for the ages.

If this were the middle of the year, I would need all my self-restraint not to punch this girl in the face.  But it’s Fall, so I laugh.

I thought all teachers felt the same way but that theory was tested yesterday when I found out that I, apparently, have mutant strength.

Here’s what happened: After my first class, as I was tidying up so the DEPARTMENT CHAIR could teach in that room, I reached over to raise the projector screen and I ripped it right off the wall.

And by ripped off the wall, I don't mean the screen ripped.  I mean that the brackets holding the screen in the wall came off, a huge chunk of plaster came down, and the whole thing essentially fell on the ground.

There is now no screen in the room and there is an ENORMOUS hole in the wall.

I, of course, started cracking up. “Wow,” I said. “I’m like a SUPER HERO. Who knew?”

“Wow,” the department chair said.  “I needed that screen for my class.”

Which pretty much put the kibosh on taking a picture of it for my blog because she wasn’t laughing AT ALL.

And I can’t even report how her class went because I was like “Oh, that’s unfortunate…so sorry.”  Then ran for it.

Not because I was still laughing (though I was) but because I had another class and it’s fall and I’m a dedicated teacher who refuses to let my students down by being even the slightest bit late.

I’m not going to lie, the fear that she might suggest we switch classrooms for the hour so she could have a room with a projector screen might have played in a tiny bit.

In the middle of the year, I’d be freaking out, thinking “Hope this doesn’t affect my class load next semester…but not now…so Happy Fall, y’all!

 

For other Theme Thursday posts, click the link below

 

 

For other Theme Thursday posts, click the link below