Students rarely surprise me and when I had an email from Shara from last semester asking when I would be in office hours I immediately assumed it would be a last-ditch effort to whine her way out of the FA (Failure due to Absence) that she received in my 101.
When she arrived I was quite cordial, etc., and she launched into her story of what all was going on with her last semester: new freshman, kicked off the dorm list due to space constraints so had to apt. it at the last minute, too shy to approach instructors to talk about course issues, two big health problems for which she knew she should have brought absence excuses, and finally, not having realized she had so many absences.
I kept waiting for the, "So is there any way you can change my FA?" but it never came. She finally said she just wanted to let me know that she had learned a big lesson and that she understood she needed to stay in better contact with instructors from now on as well as paying more attention to the syllabus and policies. She just didn't want me to think she either didn't like the class or was consistently irresponsible and wanted to explain that she understood.
I appreciated her visit, not because it matters to me much what I think of students. In fact my in-class opinion of Shara was quite positive; when present, she participated willingly and always knew what we were doing and where we were, which is pretty much all I ask for. I suppose her visit did improve my overall perspective on her but mostly it made me dare to hope that perhaps not all students are lame and irresponsible after all. Or at least not after they see certain consequences.
Guarded optimism, but optimism all the same :)
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