(aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2545 by Angharad Copyright© 2015 Angharad
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I eventually got over my funk regarding the illegal killing of raptors—they’re all protected, though it still pained me that humans could see them as anything other than glorious aerobats, as most of them are. Sadly, most men are interested in money to a much greater degree than enjoying beauty. Many only see it as something to possess or despoil. That red deer on Exmoor, the Emperor or whatever he was called, with huge antlers, some twat had to kill just because he could. People like that should be destroyed too, they demean humanity by despoiling all they touch. It’s not as if he did so with his bare hands. He hired a gillie to find the stag and shot him with a high powered rifle. Anyone could have done that, even the dickless wonder who did it. I despised him and all of his ilk.
Seems like there are a growing number of total shits in this world. A colleague who crashed her car on Christmas Eve and was dealing with insurance companies trying to get her claim settled, related how a cold caller—one of these ambulance chaser types, coincidentally called her and she thought it was her insurance company. It transpired her car had been bashed a year before and he was trying to get her to claim for injuries she didn’t receive. She refused to play ball saying it would be telling lies and immoral. He didn’t seem to care and pestered her for several days.
I was as horrified as she had been; it just isn’t cricket to screw money out of others simply because you can. We both felt morally superior for a few seconds, until it began to rain and then it was more a question of trying to stay dry than worry about each other’s philosophy. I think I’ll stick to dormice, they neither cheat nor lie, but then they’re only awake six months of the year.
“One of your students has complained to the dean about you,” Delia told me. “She claimed you told her if she didn’t put her tablet away you’d make her eat it in front of the whole year.”
“Nah, just her class.”
“You’re so merciful.”
“Just call me Atilla,” I joked.
“She didn’t think it was funny. In fact she thought it was decidedly un-funny.”
“She’ll get over it.”
“What if she doesn’t?”
“Oh c’mon, Delia. I told her to write notes not jump off Beachy Head.”
“What if she can’t make notes?”
“She shouldn’t be here, or she should have told us if she had some difficulty.”
“She might be too embarrassed.”
I hadn’t thought of that. Did I overreact? “They’re not schoolkids any more, they’re young adults. If they can’t hack it, what are they doing here? If they have problems, we explain at the beginning of their course, they should come and tell us—we’ll help them.”
“I take it you didn’t have any problems, Professor.”
“If I did I dealt with them myself.”
“Which might have been what she was doing.”
“Get her name from Daddy’s secretary, then make her an appointment to come and see me.”
“The dean wants to see you.”
“What now?”
“I think so.”
“When you call Pippa, tell her I’m on my way over.”
I assumed it was because of this girl. Perhaps I’d been a bit hard on her but we are supposed to exercise a degree of stringency. We’re offering these kids a degree if they’re prepared to work for three years. The problem is, these kids are so spoiled, the first time they have to wipe their own bums, they complain. How are they going to grow up if they meet no challenges except avoiding date rape and pregnancy?
It was with a heavy heart that I trudged over to Tom’s office. “Hi, Pippa,” I said entering her office.
“You’d better go straight in,” she said. It wasn’t a good omen.
I knocked and entered when he called from inside. He was alone, so I anticipated I could talk my way out of this.
“Ye ken why I asked ye tae come?”
“I presume it was because I told a student to stop recording me.”
“Partly.”
“Oh?”
“Also thae fact that ye humiliated her in front of a full cohort of her fellows.”
“I told her to make notes instead.”
“I ken well whit ye said, she recorded it.”
“After I told her to stop.”
“Ye telt her if she couldnae make notes she shouldnae be there.”
I blushed. “Sorry, but it rankled me. If she’d asked me beforehand, I’d have let her on the proviso she didn’t share with anyone else.”
“She said she wis too nervous to ask ye—thae superstar professor.”
“What?” I gasped.
“Yer status, ye’re an aristocrat’s wife, a PhD, a successful film maker and author. This nineteen year old kid has never been away from home before and ye, thae big superstar just pissed all over her.”
“I’m sorry if that’s how she experienced it.”
“Tell her not me, if she hasnae left already.”
“I asked Delia to call her to come and see me to discuss things.”
“I’m disappointed, Cathy. I never expected ye, of all people, tae dae this tae anyone.” I felt about two inches tall and near to tears myself.
“Perhaps, you’d better accept my resignation, forthwith. I’ll do you a letter later.”
“Gang tae run away again are we?”
“No, doing the decent thing. I made a mistake, I’m now facing up to it and taking appropriate action.”
“Sae ye both lose?”
“What else can I do?”
“Whit d’ye think?”
“I don’t know.”
“Sae if ye resign, that maks it all better does it?”
“No, but I’ll be seen to have taken appropriate action.”
“By wha?”
“By everyone.”
“Including all the other students wha’er paying nine thoosand a year tae hear ye blether.”
“What d’you mean?”
“Whit aboot a’ thae others? They came because ye seduced them.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Daddy.”
“I’m no being ridiculous, I’m tellin’ ye thae truth. They a’ think they can study yer vermin an’ become rich an’ famous, like ye did.”
“Who in their right mind would believe that? This isn’t reality television, this is a university—they come to study, I come to facilitate that learning. It isn’t a finishing school, we don’t wipe noses and bums, this is the real world. If they don’t work, they don’t stay. If that’s cost them. Too bad, at least they’ll have learned one thing.”
“Sae wha stole yer lollipop?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Are ye gang tae tell me whit’s thae real problem?”
I felt a tear run down my face, “I can’t cope any more. I’m resigning before it kills me.” I went to turn to leave but he beat me to the door.
“Sit doon,” he pointed to an easy chair. “Pippa, twa coffees, please.” He sat next to me. “Noo, tell me a’ aboot it...”
Comments
My Eleven Year Old Granddaughter
... does not know how to write cursive (longhand). Her schools in Arlington, Texas don't teach it. My handwriting is terrible basically because I lack dexterity. I am not able to draw a straight line; even when using a straight edge. I think back to the early 1950's. If you wrote poorly, and I don't mean content wise, your grades suffered. There was a specific block on the report card, and there was fallout all over the place. My drawings in Biology were downgraded because of my poor printing. I'm still not able to write well, especially after my bout of three major surgeries in 6 days six years ago. The anesthesia did bad things to me. The trouble is, I barely know how to operate a computer, much less a tablet. I would really be lost in class today.
I hope Cathy will understand that learning comes differently to different people. Our minds don't operate the same. What works great for some, Cathy, e.g. may not work well for others. Learning how to learn can be very difficult
Portia
No doubt
Tom will talk Cathy out of resigning, But is that really a wise move on his part ? Seems to me over the last few months Cathy's workload at the university just keeps on getting larger, Cathy being Cathy find its difficult to say no and the extra work just keeps coming ...Sooner or later she will have to call a halt, Maybe that time is now!
As we all know, For the Camerons money is not a problem, So leaving the unversity will make no difference to her and her family Cathys health however could be a problem if she carries on working at this rate, At the very least she needs a break to chill out and enjoy life a little and reflect on what she really wants out of life...
Kirri
Makes me wonder. Even
Makes me wonder. Even pictures from a mobile would prolly sell well, given Cathy's celebrity status. Recordings, videos? Someone might want to support themselves in such a way.
Not to mention that there might be more sinister motives.
A cleverly cut video could be used to "prove" how someone with Cathy's background is corrupting young minds.
Aside from any number of toes Cathy has stepped on, intentionally and unintenionally, the press never forgets and someone might just want to make a name for themselves.
Hand-writing?
What do I know? I couldn't read or write but to spell my name at fifteen. My writing is still appalling and illegible to others. At college I had to type EVERY assignment and the clatter of my 'tripe-writer' late into the night used to send my flatmates into a frenzy of protest. I still type everything that might have to be read by others, failing that I write in block capitals.
Too late now to learn joined up script.
Seems like Cathy needs to find a way to
de-stress.
... and perhaps Tom has pushed her too far, too fast.
It was called ...
... double writing when I was at junior school. No idea why. Now I physically can't write by hand. I can do a decent job of printing if I take my time but my right hand doesn't work properly because of a high spinal injury (cycling and a cat are involved). I do a lot with my left hand but writing isn't one of them - screwdrivers and spanners are, pens and scalpels are not.
I was going to learn to touch type but I'm afraid it's a quite fast two finger operation for me. I have no idea how I'd manage if I were back at night school taking copious notes. Even in 1990 when it happened there were no portable devices but it did get me out of taking minutes at work meetings which was great.
Cathy is in the wrong but a 19 year old isn't a child and should be able to stand up for herself. At that age I was working away from home, living in digs and going to night school almost independent of my father.
Robi
Making Goat Cheese ...
Well she could stay home, milk goats and make cheese? Or not...
G
I call my handwriting chicken scratch
Seriously because not long after I first learned how to write out of the big block letters I broke both wrists so had to relearn how to write n hold a pencil. To this day I can do cursive if I concentrate otherwise it's a mix of non cursive and cursive handwriting.. And even then it's a mix of capital letters an lowercase letters. Don't even get me started on spelling and proper sentence structure or grammar or punctuation.
I Had To Use A Tape Recorder In College
because I couldn't write fast enough to keep up in class. Even doing that, I got lost because the professor was speaking in a heavy German accent. Even when I asked for help, she refused. Her attitude was that if she helped one, she had to help others, so she didn't help anyone. Cathy is burned out and she took it out on her students, One thing she might have also considered, the girl might be dyslexic and unable to write clearly. I think she is definitely due to take a break before she has a mental breakdown.
Taught how to learn
But has Cathy learned how to teach? She has got so far on the essential passion to inspire her audience, and a magnificent instinct to entertain spontaneously as well. Am I missing her education training somewhere back in the story?
Sad to say I had the fire to learn ground out to an ember early on, after years of exam-passing method and scribbling class notes faster than I could neatly achieve. It often seemed to be olympic pen training rather than soaking up knowledge.
"Reach for the sun."
The fine art of eating crow
I've forced myself to stand in front of a hundred people and apologise. We all make mistakes. Maybe a bit of help from Shekina or that God she does not believe in?
Even if Cathy does stop teaching and stay at home, doing so right in the middle of the year leaves Tom in the lurch and a right horrible one at that. I hate to see Cathy in this position. So apologising to the student will build character, she can finish out the year, and take a sabbatical.
Or, perhaps our author is a bit worn out to night and something less painful will come to mind later.
I sure love this story Angharad. It does not get any better than this.
Gwen
It's totally...
It's totally inappropriate for a professor to ridicule/belittle a student in the way it appears Cathy did this student.
To make matters worse, If her university is anything like the ones over here. There's every possibility that the student had approval to record the lecture in advance due to some physical disability that precluding standard note taking. (My older daughter has a similar dispensation - her rheumatoid arthritis is severe enough that she literally cannot spend an entire lecture period taking notes with pen/pencil on paper. By half way through (if she can get that far) the pain in her joints is such that she can no longer hold the pen/pencil. (The school made accommodations for her disability.) Were it such a case, Cathy should have been "notified" that the student had received such a dispensation.
(For what it's worth, at my daughter's previous school, there were "businesses" that paid for student's notes and/or recordings of lectures and RE-Sold them to students... Without any guarantees as to quality... Though they did allow recipients to rate the quality of the notes and such... And, even without those "businesses" many students would record lectures (audio only) so they could review them with their notes at a later date.)
I guess things are very different over there - if students don't record lectures.
Cathy IS to quick to "resign" (& run away)... If recording lectures is so uncommon over there, I might wonder if said provost might have instigated the recording as a way to get at Cathy before she got to him... (Suspicious minds here.)
Annette