Thanks, Yo

So, She Who Shall Remain Nameless drops by my office ever so casually to tell me that, you know that class you'll be teaching next semester? Well, those were her kids, and gosh darn it, she just couldn't bring herself to fail any of them. Even though there were a few in there who probably deserved it. Well, it's pretty much split down the room, actually. Half are pretty good, and half are pretty bad. So, you'll be getting a mixed bag next semester, {chuckle}, but you can always email her if you have questions about them.

Thanks, yo.

Never mind already that the class will take place in the dreaded "dinner hour", where they're thinking about nothing but lunch anyway and whether I'll let them out early to stuff their gourds with what passes for meals here. Now it's going to be populated with half a set of losers who have been encouraged to continue their loser ways because another teacher confirmed and coddled that behavior. They're going to have a false set of expectations that I'll have to dash now, thanks very much, which of course will be chalked up to me being the bad bitch of a teacher, and why couldn't we just have Ms. Blondey McNumbnuts again? She was so nice, never made you work hard, you could hand things in whenever you wanted to and even though you knew you'd failed the class, by golly, she just didn't have the heart to do it to you. Not like this current devil's minion, Prof Lucifer McHatesalot, who must have simmering coals in place of a beating human heart.

Nevermind also that this is the same person I ended up beating out for this job, who moved herself out of the office she was supposed to share with me (which was OK, because it was already awk-ward!), and who I ended up having to hold a meeting with about the progress/point of the project we were all on. At this same meeting, she told me with more than a little snark in her voice, "Do you expect me to teach any differently, just because these students are supposed to be different?" I bit back my initial response, which was something along the lines of "Um...yes", followed by a soapbox rant on how you probably needed to adjust the way you taught no matter what class you were teaching to meet the learning needs of the students, followed up with a commentary on why she likely didn't get the job. But instead, I just gave some basic info about the kinds of academic challenges this demographic tended to have, along with a general warning to be alert to the fact that they may have extra difficulty, and forewarned is forearmed, blah blah. Which she followed that with "Well, they're not expecting us to grade any differently, are they? I mean, they're not expecting us to be more lenient with them just because they may struggle?"

The answer, of course, was no, and I wouldn't have signed on for the job if it included that. But I'll just let the irony of her snarky meeting comments marinate deliciously side by side with what she ended up doing to me for next semester.

Class is in session, bitches. Oh, and to my "colleague"? Santa is totally leaving lumps in your stocking. I hope they're the brown, smelly kind.

-- DV