The other night, Joey and I were walking to our favorite neighborhood brewpub for dinner. I saw what looked like a twenty dollar bill on the ground and I swear to God, my first thought was, "That can't actually be a twenty." I'm not sure I would have actually kept walking if I were alone but Joey did not even hesitate - he pointed at the money, said, "whoa!", and picked up what turned out to be TWO twenties. Honestly, I still couldn't quite believe they were just lying there, like maybe they were counterfeit, or someone had planted them and was just waiting to see what we would do. I had to explain the joke to Joey (who is a computer engineer) and he just said, "Well, good thing I'm not an economist, isn't it?" Amen to that...
By now, you may have heard about the biology professor at Louisiana State (Baton Rouge) who was removed from teaching an intro course where "more than 90 percent of the students... were failing or had dropped the class." The majority of the comments on the Inside Higher Ed story about it are supportive of the professor, particularly given that it seems like the administration did not even talk to her about the situation before acting. I tend to fall in the "there's got to be more to the story so I'll reserve judgment" camp but the story definitely struck a nerve with me, partly because I recently spent 30 minutes "debating" with a student about whether the last midterm was "too hard" and the whole conversation was super-frustrating. To give some background: I give three midterms and a cumulative final, plus have clicker points and Aplia assignments that make up about 20% of the final grade. I do not curve individual exams but will cu...
At least your choice was better than that facing two economists in the other classic joke when they find something else on the sidewalk: http://www.tinyrevolution.com/mt/archives/000466.html (Warning! Somewhat crude. Not for everyone's "taste.")
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