Near death experience

My final exam ended this morning. Now that it is over, I get to spend a couple of days grading. Before the fun begins, I thought I would share the following story.

I've been teaching one section of a course with about 1000 students. There are several instructors for this one course, and we all assign (nearly) the same homework assignments and give common exams. To make the course work with all that common grading, you need a leader -- the course coordinator -- and a lot of team players.

Last Tuesday, the course coordinator found me in a public place.

"Are you going to be in your office later today?" he asked.

"Yes," I said, "pretty much all day."

"Good, because I'd like to come by. I want to talk to you about [the course]."

I looked at him curiously. "Do you want to discuss the evaluation you did for me?" A little over a week before he sat in on my class to observe and critique my teaching.

"No, that's not it."

"Well then, do you want to discuss next semester? Because there are a few things I think we should change in the homework and exam rotation."

"No, that's not it either. We'll talk about it in your office."

So. The director of the course wants to talk to me about something that can't be discussed at all in public, about the course I am currently teaching.

Sounds like another reprimand to me. With sweating palms, I racked my brain. What had I done wrong this time? Was I too harsh on my grading of my assigned common exam problem? Were my review sessions too lenient? Did a disgruntled student end up in an administrator's office? What had gone into my emails recently?

I waited in my office with a paper to read open on my desk, but I could only focus on the impending visit.

We interrupt this post for a philosophical discussion. Here is a question that has been on my mind recently: What is the evolutionary explanation for mortification? The fight-or-flight response to stress I understand. If you are facing a tiger in the jungle, you need to fight it or run away to preserve the species. But what about embarrassment? You wish that tiger were right here right now and it would eat you and you wouldn't have to suffer the humiliation any further. What does that do to the gene pool? Is it a sort of self selection of those members who should not be allowed to reproduce? I'd like some theories here.

Anyway, the course administrator arrived within about five minutes, and closed the door gently behind him.

"This is top secret," he began. "I have in my hands a copy of the final, and I'd like you to proof read it for me."

Have you ever dropped a spoonful of ice cream onto a hot stove? That's what happened inside my head. My fears instantly melted into a giant ball of goo inside my brain. The private meeting wasn't to reprimand me, but to discuss the top secret final exam! That's why he couldn't say anything about it in public.

I readily agreed, and spent the first 15 minutes of my proofreading time trying to clean melted ice cream out of my brain. You wouldn't know it, but relief really can get in the way of normal human functioning. Especially if the relief is the thick and gooey kind.

Thank goodness that tiger wasn't around after all.