closing out the semester

Turned in my grades today!! Yay!!

As always, a horrible sprint for the finish line, but I got 'em in. And I mailed out all the rec letters. Whew.

And immediately, I felt so much better, so much happier.

Though I was actually surprised at the range of grades in my "good" class -- they were a great group of students, I really enjoyed our discussions, and I fully expected to have a pretty high average grade. But some of them slacked off on turning in their weekly response papers or other assignments, and it really hurt their grade. I always warn them about that. Then, there were the 3 or 4 people who just didn't turn in their final paper, and didn't take the exam -- no email, no explanation, nothing. 2 of these were really good students, too. I'd have given them incompletes if they'd gotten in touch, explained the situation, asked for an incomplete. But they didn't, and so I had to give them Fs. (Of course, 95% of undergraduate incompletes turn to Fs in a year anyway, because they don't follow through. But it seems nicer to give them the chance if they want it.)

Remember Mr Text Messaging? Over the rest of the term he supposedly had a car accident which totalled his vehicle, hindering his ability to get to campus; his girlfriend's son had to have surgery; and his grandmother was sick. No, really. Really. The last time I spoke with him he was asking for an extension on the final paper -- I gave him the same one-week grace period I allow all my students (with a set penalty for lateness). He emailed me to ask if he could email it to me. I said yes. He never turned it in. He did well on the final (B or B-) but he had missed a bunch of earlier assignments. He got an F. Not even close to a D-. I triple checked everything, because he's just the sort of guy to try to file a grievance just because he thinks the world owes him extra favors. Oh, and the last time I saw him he also managed to be vaguely insulting to me, by implying that he thought I was a TA. Oh please. I'm so sick of this guy. I just hope he doesn't try to come and complain about his grade.