Pretty easy--even with Annabelle

I was not looking forward to dealing with Annabelle again today, as we're getting down to the wire on her final research project, and indeed, I had a bit of a hard time, as usual, getting her to focus on one thing at a time--and on what's most important. Right now, the main thing is that she is just responding personally to her sources--"I found this interesting"--but has no argument with which to frame her use of the information she found. She was unaware that she didn't have a thesis, even though we've talked about it before, and even though we had hammered out what her thesis could be. She was mostly worried about whether she was using enough sources--and I have to say, pedagogically I have a problem with an assignment that requires a student at that level to use ten sources, as the problem is likely to be exactly what Annabelle is experiencing: overwhelmed with information, no clear sense of what to do with it other than regurgitate it. But ah well. Fortunately, Annabelle will be in tomorrow to work with another tutor--someone new to her this time, and someone with more infinite patience and gentleness than I can summon, though I've managed to summon more than I would have been able to even last semester, never mind in semesters before that.

I then met with a student who admitted up front that he has a contentious relationship with the professor of his class--and knowing who his professor is, I'm not surprised (P&B knowledge)--so he wanted me to read and evaluate his essay. It was generally good, but his argument needed to be brought to the surface and clarified, along with transitions. He also had some real train-wrecks of sentences, which were odd to encounter in what was otherwise very clear and controlled use of language. I read it over, made suggestions--and then he asked me what grade I'd give it. I said, "I refuse to answer that question." I told him that without the changes, any grade I'd give the essay would be significantly lower than the grade it would earn if he makes the changes--and that if he makes the changes, it would be a very strong paper. But I talked to him about what a student can do about the fact that grading writing is subjective. If the professor is willing to work with the student, then the student's job is to find out what criteria are important to that particular professor and comply with them to the best of his or her ability. In cases--such as this one--in which the professor is not willing to engage in that process, the option is "grit your teeth, do your best, take your grade, move on." And I reminded him he actually has learned something, even in this unpleasant circumstance: how to deal with this particular kind of difficulty in a professor, and a little more about writing, as well as about the topic of his essay.

The final student was a drop-in, an Honors student, who simply wanted help with an APA references page. He had the citations correctly on separate pieces of paper, but he hadn't saved them in any way that would allow him to copy and paste what he already had into his essay document--but he didn't want to re-do his research. I told him those were his only options: duplicate the research (and take advantage of the citation tools in the databases, which would give him the ability to cut and paste) or type things in. He managed to find four of his five sources and use the citation tools, but--as sometimes mysteriously happens--the fifth source would not reveal itself. But by that time, he was ready to type in that one last source. Along the way, he got more comfortable with how to do the formatting (and I learned a little more about using Google Docs, which sort of works but not as well or easily as Word). He was skipping the class for which he had written the essay in order to do the work--but as an Honors student, he probably had an absence to burn, and as long as he could submit the essay on time was no doubt making relatively intelligent use of his time (though coming in earlier would have been smarter).

And I had no fourth appointment today, so I've been noodling around with email and whatever else: nothing of significance. In a few minutes, when my stint is officially complete, I will head home. Paul and I were going to meet for dinner tonight, but we've managed to shift that to next week: a much better option for him, as he will be out from under the weight of final grading. Originally it seemed I wouldn't have any good opportunities next week, at least not before he has to head back up to Massachusetts, but at least one if not two of my appointments shifted to an earlier slot, thereby opening things up to a reasonable "dinner a deux" option.

So, home early today, and back here on Thursday for my second-to-last day, at least this semester. I was wrong in my post yesterday: Monday, which is the last day the Center is open this semester is also the last day of the semester. I kept getting confused about that--but, duh, even that's awfully late, as graduation is next Wednesday. The timing is pretty nuts: one day to turn grades around before commencement? But if any student fails a class required for his or her degree, I guess the Registrar's office simply will say, "Sorry: we know you went through the ceremony and everything, but in fact you don't have your degree yet; you still need to fulfill X requirement." I don't imagine there will be a lot of those cases, but seems like creating potential SNAFUs that could pretty easily be avoided. My hunch is that the ceremony was scheduled when it was around the availability of the Nassau Coliseum, not for any logical academic reason--and that's the way things go around here: technical expediencies trump intellectual logic. I could go on about that at length ... but why? I do my stint Monday, and Wednesday, I will be laughing at Eddie Izzard in the company of a very good friend while the ceremony goes on and on.

And none of that is now. Now, I go home. I'll post again--good lord willin' and all that--on Thursday.