question

Okay, I know some of you who read this teach. So here's a question for you:

You have several students in a basic-level, non-majors college class. They are all failing. You have a suspicion - but no hard evidence beyond that you saw them talking and writing fast at the start of class - that they collaborated on a homework that was supposed to be non-collaborative.

Do you bust their heinies for cheating, or do you just figure that they're failing anyway and it will all come out in the wash? And that it's not worth the pain or psychic energy of going through the effort?

A few years ago I would have been on it like white on rice, but now - I'm getting old and I'm tired and I'm inclined to think that if they plan on cheating their way through life, I'd rather they hit bottom in a situation where it really mattered.

I'm so sick of this class right now. I had five people just up and walk out after the quiz even though they KNEW we were going to have class afterwards. This happens regularly this time of the semester and I'm telling myself it's not that **I'm** boring (although I probably am), it's that they're overloaded and have midterms in other classes and they're tired and they don't want to be there any more.

The thing that frustrates me is - I work hard to try to make the information relevant and interesting. And you know? I find a lot of the stuff - a lot of the detail on bacteria and how they impact the human race and the environment - deeply fascinating. But I'm quickly learning that what is deeply interesting to me is apparently deeply boring to 80%-85% of the populace.

And that makes me sad, because I still have deep inside me the sad geeky schoolgirl who ate lunch alone most days because she wasn't popular and no one shared her interests.

I also had my "BMOC" guy almost make me go off on him today. I was handing out a research-based homework assignment and I reminded them that it was "own words," they they would get zero credit if they just printed out a website and handed it to me. And he very loudly said "Damn!" when I said that, I guess to jokingly signify that that was what he had been planning on doing.

And you know? Maybe I am just old and tired and sad and getting bitter but I just didn't find it funny. I went to some effort to pre-select topics that would be (a) easily researchible and (b) interesting. And it also reminds me that he's someone who figures on getting by on charm and good looks, and I admit some bitterness on that front, as I am neither charming nor good-looking, so I have to get by on hard work and intelligence, and believe me, it looks a whole lot EASIER to get by on charm and good looks...

I know my face betrayed what I was feeling when he said that but to hell with being the poker faced prof. I'm still processing the crap happening to my friends - and other crap happening to other people - and I have a costly car-repair bill waiting for me when they finally FINISH working on my car. And I have poison ivy and my asthma is acting up and a whole constellation of other things that I convince myself I could ignore if I were a stronger person, and so I have the added guilt going for me there.

And you know? It's hard to walk into the classroom every day and see reinforcement of how strange you are compared to 90% of the human population - how out of touch I am, how I geek out in ways that most people find incomprehensible. On good days I rejoice in it and take pleasure in the idea that I'm unique, but on bad days I just feel like a purple rhinoceros or something. Like I stick out like a sore thumb and nothing I could ever do would make me fit in.