A personal journal about teaching the Bible and ancient Near Eastern history/theology/religion/archaeology to university students in New Orleans, and whatever else happens to be on my mind.
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Monday, April 18, 2005
Personal Responsibility Plus Some Guilty Feelings
A student just stopped by my office who said that she is a graduating senior who took a Theology class with me back in 2002. She failed that class, she said, and the Registrar's office told her to talk to me to see if she could turn in a research paper or some other project to get the grade raised from an F to a D. Then her family could see her march in graduation in a couple of weeks. She said that the grade she received in my class was all that was keeping her from fulfilling her family's dream of seeing her walk across the stage to get her diploma. I was shocked that the Registrar's office would suggest something like this as an option, and told her that I could not do that and she would have to take her Theology course in the summer. This sort of thing happens to me more every year here at Xavier. It's hard to maintain standards sometimes without feeling like a heartless bastard.
Call me a heartless bastard, but this senior should have known that an F wasn't going to fly for a REQUIRED course. Xavier will play people, and she should have taken care of meeting her Theology requirements much sooner than 3 weeks before graduation.
ReplyDeleteAssuming that the student, as you report the incident, is telling the truth, what astounds me is that the institution does not have clear rules to cover this situation! Surely either (a) it is institutional policy that students (perhaps in clearly defined circumstances) can do such catch up work OR (b) it is clearly not allowed by the rules. Either way the individual teacher should not be put in the position of deciding!
ReplyDeleteTim's right, but I suspect this sort of thing goes on all too often, especially at small private schools. Xavier does have many "policy gaps," situations where there are no clear rules. Kinda like Thunderdome!
ReplyDeleteSeems like it was a clear cut situation to me, the only issue here is the Registrar's office! Firstly I ask the student for a specific name then approach that person directly to avoid a future re-occurance. Guilt can be a hard one, but at the end of the day the professor made no such promises and the only person who should fel guilt is the mis-informant.
ReplyDeleteSteve Holm