Scrutiny

Tuesday was final exam day for the 2nd years, and it was a long day.

Mr. S and I had decided to combine classes and judgment in order to give a more balanced assessment of the students. One by one the students had to come into the cavernous meeting room, sit down across from us at the oversized table in an uncomfortable chair, and try to speak for 3 minutes or so about some random topic.

I'd been uncharacteristically industrious and drafted 18 possible topics for my students to speak on, ranging from the more basic "what are your plans for the future?" to questions requiring a little more nuance, such as: "why is corruption so rampant in China and how can it be prevented?" Mr. S was less so, he prepared three topics, the first two moderately difficult and the last one more general "do you like to travel? Describe some travel experiences yadda yadda." About 70% of his students spoke on that topic. By the end I was ready to poke the next student who began speaking about travel in the eye with my pen.

Mr. S allowed his students to choose their topic, I selected the topics for my students when they sat down and only gave them one minute to prepare. Mr. S's students were better-polished because of it, but I was satisfied more or less with my students' performance. There were some delightfully schadenfreude(sp)-ian moments, tho, like when a student who'd been absent from my class since September walked in to take the final as if nothing were amiss. I told him to speak about this topic: "why branding is so important for global companies." We'd covered it in class. He looked at me doe-eyed and said "what does this mean, branding." I said "we talked about it in class, now either speak or get out."

Well, really I was a little kinder. But the douchebag still failed.

Each examination required about 5 minutes or so, the first minute for them to prepare and make notes, three for them to speak, and the last minute for follow up questions and getting the next student situated. 5 minutes each. We have about 150 students. You do the math and then ask yourself why I slept in this morning.

If your answer is because I'm lazy and I don't have to go into work today, give yourself a gold star. In fact, I don't have to go into work for quite some time. Ah, the joys of university life.