Statement of Teaching Philosophy, Part 2
Mar. 10th, 2022 08:30 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rynlingMy grandfather died when I was in my sophomore year of college. I didn’t have much contact with that side of the family since moving to Atlanta, so this didn’t affect me emotionally, but it was really important to my father that I go with him to my grandfather’s funeral. This involved a lot of travel and travel expenses, and decisions had to be made quickly.
This happened right before fall break, so I emailed all of my professors to ask for midterm deadline extensions. I was a “shows up to every class, always does the reading, gets perfect scores on every assignment” sort of nerd, and I was as polite and apologetic as I could possibly have been at nineteen years old.
Regardless, every single one of those five professors told me that I was not allowed to miss class, and that I couldn’t extend my deadlines by even a single day without severe penalties.
I was on a ton of scholarships, and I was applying to even more scholarships to be able to study abroad in Japan, so I freaked out. If I didn’t have positive rec letters and a perfect GPA, I’d be fucked. The way I saw it at the time, I didn’t have room to negotiate.
So I told my dad that I couldn’t go to my grandfather’s funeral, and he’s never forgiven me. I was never close to that side of the family, but most of them never forgave me either. Like, the only thing they know about me is that I didn’t go to my grandfather’s funeral because I decided that midterms were more important.
And to be fair. That family is a bunch of bigoted religious zealots, and my father is a weak and cowardly person who never learned how to behave like an adult. If I didn’t alienate myself from them because of this, it would have been something else. Any contact with them was contingent on me trying very hard not to be gay, and there’s no way that could have lasted for much longer. The funeral would have been a disaster for me, and it’s probably for the best that I didn’t go.
Still, this doesn’t negate the emotional upheaval I experienced at the time, nor does it negate the irony of the professors not returning the graded midterms until almost the end of the semester. Why demand that these papers be turned in on time if they were going to take forever to grade them anyway?
Now that I’m a professor, I understand that grading is a shitty and thankless task, and that some students will walk all over you if you let them. Still, if you can make someone’s life easier by giving them a deadline extension, why not just do it? Especially if you’re not going to grade their work immediately (which I most definitely am not).
I mean honestly. Even if a student is balls-out lying about a death in the family so that they can take a break from school, what’s the harm in giving them a chance to rest before they start the assignment? If nothing else, it’s infinitely preferable that they take their time and turn in good work than me having to read an insane Adderall paper emailed along with an unintelligible cover letter at 3am. Not that I don’t appreciate those papers as the absurdist comedies they are, but they’re a bitch to grade.
This happened right before fall break, so I emailed all of my professors to ask for midterm deadline extensions. I was a “shows up to every class, always does the reading, gets perfect scores on every assignment” sort of nerd, and I was as polite and apologetic as I could possibly have been at nineteen years old.
Regardless, every single one of those five professors told me that I was not allowed to miss class, and that I couldn’t extend my deadlines by even a single day without severe penalties.
I was on a ton of scholarships, and I was applying to even more scholarships to be able to study abroad in Japan, so I freaked out. If I didn’t have positive rec letters and a perfect GPA, I’d be fucked. The way I saw it at the time, I didn’t have room to negotiate.
So I told my dad that I couldn’t go to my grandfather’s funeral, and he’s never forgiven me. I was never close to that side of the family, but most of them never forgave me either. Like, the only thing they know about me is that I didn’t go to my grandfather’s funeral because I decided that midterms were more important.
And to be fair. That family is a bunch of bigoted religious zealots, and my father is a weak and cowardly person who never learned how to behave like an adult. If I didn’t alienate myself from them because of this, it would have been something else. Any contact with them was contingent on me trying very hard not to be gay, and there’s no way that could have lasted for much longer. The funeral would have been a disaster for me, and it’s probably for the best that I didn’t go.
Still, this doesn’t negate the emotional upheaval I experienced at the time, nor does it negate the irony of the professors not returning the graded midterms until almost the end of the semester. Why demand that these papers be turned in on time if they were going to take forever to grade them anyway?
Now that I’m a professor, I understand that grading is a shitty and thankless task, and that some students will walk all over you if you let them. Still, if you can make someone’s life easier by giving them a deadline extension, why not just do it? Especially if you’re not going to grade their work immediately (which I most definitely am not).
I mean honestly. Even if a student is balls-out lying about a death in the family so that they can take a break from school, what’s the harm in giving them a chance to rest before they start the assignment? If nothing else, it’s infinitely preferable that they take their time and turn in good work than me having to read an insane Adderall paper emailed along with an unintelligible cover letter at 3am. Not that I don’t appreciate those papers as the absurdist comedies they are, but they’re a bitch to grade.
no subject
Date: 2022-03-11 06:30 pm (UTC)(I didn't even realize I could ask for extensions. I overslept an exam once and showed up at the end of it in a flying panic and the TA just patted my shoulder, told me it was all right, and took me back to the department office to sit the exam right then. She was, and remained, my favorite TA, but not just for that.)