The Jailhouse Rocks

Ah, another ritual of academia. This batch of woe strikes fear into the hearts of grizzened professors and neophyte instructors alike. Like Poe's raven, they come a-tapping incessantly, and are a blight on the faculty consciousness until the next crisis can hopefully blot them from everybody's short-term memories. They affect how an entire class is developed and taught. They can change career paths.

A irate president, you ask? Some new-fangled pedography (teaching method)? Robots? No. Something far more frightening.

Student evaluations. (OK, I dramatized it a little, but these puppies do tend make professors and instructors (me the latter) a little wacky.)

To explain: every semester, all WNCC students are given a blank evaluation form and asked to rate various aspects of their classes, ranging from how the course met their educational needs to material organization to the amount of respect the students received from the teacher. There is also an opportunity for them to provide written comments about the course. All forms are supposed to be anonymous, except for the occasional student who signs them. A signature doesn't hurt the student because faculty don't get their copies of the evaluation forms until long after the semester has ended and final grades have been turned in.

When we do get the forms back, we can (a) objectively evaluate the feedback and incorporate the constructive criticism into the next semester's classes, or (b) ignore it and vindictively double the workload for the next batch of hapless grunts that stupidly register for our classes. Since I teach murderers, rapists, and child molesters, taking option (b) is not bright, so I'm thinking of changing a few things for the next semester.

The best part of the evaluations are, no argument, the written comments. Inmates as a rule have no fear to get in my face and tell me when I'm screwing up, and I deeply appreciate it when they do because I got to work with these guys to get the learning they need. If I'm creating barriers with pointless yakking and/or crappy class material, then nobody is getting nothing done.

Nevertheless, the comments mean a lot to me because these guys are either writing with a fully developed bullshit dictionary or they actually mean what they're saying. Either way, they're making an effort to be part of the system and not be outside of it.

These are all of the comments that mention me specifically and, again, they are anonymous:

- "Mr. Moore was 'And Is' one of the best teachers I've ever had the opportunity of knowing and I appreciate his willingness to come here and teach."

- "Mr. Moore has taught me in a way I can understand. In my opinion, he is doing a great job."

- "The instructor Mr. Moore has done an excellent job in helping me understand computer operations."

- "Mr. Moore is very on-time with his teachings, and very helpful when in need. He's not an evil teacher. The man has a halo over his head."

You'd be tempted to label that last one as pure bullshit, but I can guess who wrote it because that's the way he talked in class. He wrote straight from the heart.

And people wonder why I teach in a prison.