Today, during a College of Humanities and Fine Arts luncheon, I sat down beside one of the faculty members our department just hired. The following conversation ensued:
"So, that student in your Spenser seminar, the one you told me about?"
yes?
How has she performed when you give assignments?
well, she is good--generally in the "B" range, certainly not the best writer, but pretty sharp.
"Well, I have just given papers back, and I've got a question about your experience with her. She asked for an extension, I gave her one, and what she handed in was about half the length of what I asked for. Is this going to be a recurring problem that I'm going to have to address, in your experience?"
that you're going to have to address? errr. . . well. . . (meanwhile, Piers thinks about how he has bragged on the insight and motivation of said student, and about how said student and several others have complained bitterly about the approach and attitude of this particular individual in his class--not to mention the material he is having them read. Conversations in which Piers has kept his mouth shut and his face neutral) . . . she's a single mom? maybe that was a mitigating factor this time?
Needless to say, Piers found an excuse to get up . . . I believe it was related to a chocolate chip cookie.
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