Day 56 of Governor Newsom’s “Blueprint for a Safer Economy”

Thursday. 10/22/20

7:45 a.m.–8:15 - Up and I go downstairs to take the dog out. She’s still asleep and won’t wake up so I rub her tummy several times.  We go outside and I notice she pooped on the patio.  She goes potty and I clean up the dog poo. Back inside and pieces of chicken for her while I make my coffee for me.

8:30-10:30 – Day 4 of my 8-week accelerated class. Week One down.

Today, the same problem student, again, requests a Zoom meeting.  I reply, “Sure.  What’s on your mind?” He says that he is disputing two questions on the video quiz that he just completed.  So, as you can see, dear readers, there is no need for Zoom. I inform the student, that so far, most of the students received a perfect score on the video quiz and none are disputing any of the questions.  However (sigh), I’m happy to take a look at his quiz. “Which questions are you disputing?” I don’t hear from him again.

I take a paper attendance and send an email blast to those students who were absent.  Then, I officially drop several students who have not been in class all week.  I send an email blast to the students congratulating them on completing the first week of our 8-week accelerated class – only 7 more weeks to go.  One student responds, “You’re so sweet!”  The rest of the students could care less about my email blast.

10:30-11:00 – I eat a TJ pkg of trail mix and drink my coffee.

11:00 – 12:00 - I’ve assigned a Netflix video for my afternoon class, but after the “Fed-Ex Fiasco” I prepare an alternative assignment in case some of my students don’t have Netflix.  The second documentary is called A____ and is available on PBS, free for the students.  Unfortunately, I need to create a video quiz for the alternative video so I get started on that.

12:00-12:30-L. airdrops the lecture I recorded into Canvas.  When she’s done, I make a spinach salad for lunch and read a Money Diary.

12:30-1:30 – Shower. Covid-19 uniform.

1:30-2:30 – Return to work and prepare the Discussion Boards for Specialty Class No. 2 and this evening’s core class.

2:30-6:00 – Class begins.  There is a 2-hour lecture, followed by today’s documentary. At 4:30, the students start watching R_____ on Netflix.  Three students respond that they don’t have Netflix so I email them the link to the alternate video and explain that I will email them the video quiz at 5:30, with instructions that they can complete the quiz for homework next Thursday.

-One student angrily responds that the video is 2 hours long and he is just now starting to watch it and this is going to interfere with picking up his son from day care. Uh, I don’t care.

I respond that at no time did I ever instruct him to watch a 2-hour documentary, 30 minutes before class ends.  We’re in the 10th week of the semester and throughout the entire semester, I have informed the students that class is over at 5:30, regardless of whether we watch the video in its entirety.  The video quizzes that I design are created to accompany the content of the video that we have watched, usually the first 30 minutes.

The same student sends me email after email, in short bursts, complaining that he is not going to have time to complete the video quiz.  By the time I respond, he is sending yet another email, and we are stepping on each other in the email thread.  Students do NOT seem to understand that emails are NOT TEXTS. His emails are fragments, really, like “How am I supposed to complete the video quiz on time?”  or “I have to leave.  What am I going to do?” Every time I respond and explain, he sends yet another fragment – “This isn’t fair. I can’t finish the video.”  “I don’t want a 0 on the video quiz” as if he’s not bothering to read any of my replies.

Finally, I start sending the same email over and over again: “Please see my previous email wherein I state that you are only responsible for the first 30 minutes of the video. Also, please note that the video quiz will be emailed to you at 5:30 and due next Thursday for homework.” Every time he sends an email, no matter what the content, I respond with the above, repeatedly, until I’ve sent 6 emails with the exact same message.

After all this, which extends over a 20-minute period, the student says, “Watching A_______ now.  This is a great movie.  I’m going to finish it over the weekend.”  I exit out of his email correspondence in disgust.

-Yet another student emails me and says she doesn’t have Netflix.  I email her the link to the alternate documentary, but then she responds that her sister has provided her Netflix password.  I respond, “Glad to hear it.  You’ll really enjoy R__________.” The student responds, complaining that now she doesn’t know what to do and is tired of being confused in this class. ??? What?

I respond, “There is no need for confusion. If you HAVE Netflix, watch R________. If you do NOT have Netflix, watch A____________. That is all you have to do.”

The same student responds, complaining that it is already 4:45 and the video is 2 hours long. Same thing for her, too.  I respond that at no time did I ever instruct her to watch a 2-hour documentary 30 minutes before class ends.  We’re in the 10th week of the semester and throughout the entire semester, I have informed the students that class is over at 5:30, regardless of whether we watch the video in its entirety.  The video quizzes that I design are created to accompany the content of the video that we have watched, usually the first 30 minutes. She responds that she is watching A_________.  Why is she watching A, when her sister gave her the password for Netflix and the movie R_______ is assigned?

In all seriousness, it might be time for me to hang it up.  I’ve been doing this for TWENTY years and I’m tired of all the bullshit.

The Fed-Ex student [remember him?] emails stating that, “I don’t have Netflix and I’m just sitting here, twiddling my thumbs and doing nothing. This isn’t fair.”  I respond that I wish he would have told me earlier that he was doing nothing because I have an alternative assignment for him.  I send the link for the PBS video to him and explain that I will send the video quiz at 5:30.  He can turn it in for homework next Thursday.

He explodes.  In a tirade, via email, he berates me for refusing to understand his situation and failing to make my course content accessible to all students.  He screams that it is not fair that he is assigned HOMEWORK when the rest of the students have the opportunity to complete their quiz during class time.  Now, he will have to use his personal time to complete the video quiz.  Readers should note that most students finish a 10-question, multiple-choice, video quiz in 10 minutes.  Additionally, he is only responsible for watching the first 30 minutes of the video and it is 5:00 p.m. The class ends at 5:30.

I make the only point that I can in the midst of this screaming, continuous outburst: “My course content is accessible to all students.  In the event it is not, I provide access or an alternate assignment.”

He continues screaming that I should have posted the alternate assignments on Canvas from the outset and it is not HIS responsibility to notify me if he can’t access the content.

Finally, I email, “I can understand your frustration.  In light of your unique circumstances, please cease watching the documentary.  I posted a “10” in the R_________ video quiz column in the online gradebook.”

Readers, please note that this student has the highest score in the class.  With the extra credit he has completed previously, he currently has a 101%.

Ten minutes after class ends, the student emails me stating that he hopes I don’t view him as lazy and  trying to get out of work. He says he will continue striving to be a good student.

Fuck. you.  I don’t bother responding.  In fact, I don’t think I will ever respond to this student again.

I want to quit.

6:00-6:30 – I take the dog for a walk and try to clear my head.

7:00-10:00 – The last class of the day starts.  A few hours prior, I scanned an Extra Credit assignment to a student with my edits and comments.  It was one of the worst essays I’ve ever read – in fact, it wasn’t an essay. It appeared that the student had taken loose notes on her lap top and then turned that in as an essay, without addressing the question.  I gave the student a 2 out of 20. There was no topic sentence, paragraphs, or concluding sentence – just a few typed sentence fragments on the page – and I made several comments and edits.

7:10 – The student emails me in broken English and says: “That was bad and I the low score. You shouldn’t have done that (j/k).” Or what?  I’ve actually never had a student threaten me like that, although the English was so bad, maybe the student meant to say, “I wish you wouldn’t have done that.” ??? Who knows.

This class rolls along, like usual, with no questions or commentary other than my lone male student who checks in with me, every Thursday, around 8:30, just to chat, which I don’t mind AT ALL.  I catch up on my blog.

9:00 - L. and R. are making a pasta dinner from Trader Joe’s The College Cook Book and I exit the office to see how it’s going.  They’ll be finished at 10:00.

10:05 – Class ends and the pasta dish is done so I serve myself and head upstairs.  I ask L. to shut everything down after R. goes home.  I really, really need to get a work out in, but I’m running on 2 hours sleep so I eat dinner, do my night time routine, and forego working out.  I’m in bed by 11:00.