One does not simply walk into the office to collect work at
the end of term.
If it is at all possible the students become all the more
demanding at the end of term. These are usually the students who have spent all
year not handing in their work. To be fair to them this does show some sort of
commendable behaviour. Any student who can go a whole year ignoring the
continuing looks of death, the slow stroking of bolt cutters whenever a
lecturer asks where their work is or the extraordinary amount of sadistic
sarcasm dripping down the office walls, has some real determination of
character, or they’re just really fucking stupid. I place my money on the
second one. These students seem to slither their way out of the woodwork at the
end of the year when they realise they are about to go out into the world without
a qualification, and as it turns out a qualification is essential to their
working lives. The student population seems to double like a parasitic swarm as
student after student shamefully make their way into the office. A lot of time
you didn’t even realise these students existed. They stumble in showing about
as much spatial awareness as they have academic and you spend a good few
minutes thinking ‘who the fuck are you?’ as they whittle on about how much work
they have left to do. I like to give them names based on where I think they are
going to end up in life, so at least I have some sort of reference in my head. For
example in the last week I have encountered; Bin lid, JK (Jeremy Kyle) and
dead. The last one is more of a hopeful dream than a reflection on their
abilities. Unfortunately the education system has changed and you are no longer
allowed to throw out an insult scattered with swear words and kick them out the
door. You are supposed to help all students achieve. Quite frankly this
disgusts me. Lecturers end up doing more work than the students as we attempt
to wrap them up in a soft little cloud so tightly that it could strangle a care
bear. However apparently this is not a concept universally accepted by the
higher ups so we are forced to bow down to Ofsted and make sure every student
passes.
Whilst this concept is most irritating (I’m not overly
enamoured by the concept of rainbow based murder), it is nothing in comparison
to the attitudes of the students around this time. The universe suddenly jolts
to find a new centre of gravity and revolve only around this one spot. A
typical conversation goes as such:
“Have you marked my work yet?” Notice no “hello”, no “please”.
“What work?” I know exactly what work bin lid means but I
like the cause a little bit of frustration considering the jealousy of their
blood pressure over mine.
“You know that one we had to do that table for” proving that
they have no idea what the assignment is called, what it’s for and clearly they
have not learnt a thing.
“When did you hand it in?” Blood pressure beginning to rise
again.
“Yesterday” Assignment hand in cut off time is 3pm. It’s 9am
the next day. I believe the expectation here is that at 3pm the previous day I
would have rushed down to the reception and grabbed the assignment whether it
had been tracked in or not. Perhaps a lord of the rings worthy battle would
have ensued with the reception staff. I of course would have ran straight back
to my desk and marked the work, or perhaps if I was still teaching or doing any
other work I would have taken it home, because this is what I live for. I live
to mark the work of students who apparently have no concept of time or space,
lack the ability to construct a polite sentence and contribute to my never
ending reliance on my homicidal imagination.
“Oh yesterday well bin lid I thought I would use your
measurement of time which seems to be completely different to everyone else’s
but according to you completely acceptable. So lets see; this assignment is 3
months late, I’ll drop you an email in September” Blank face.
“It’ll be marked when I get round to marking it” blank face.
“Leave”.
Bin lids assignment is sat on my in tray at the top of the
pile. It instantly makes its way to the bottom of the pile. It’s these little
tricks in life that bring a smile to my face.
