Students

Next week my students have their last exam of the semester before the Final Exam. Our Applied Calculus I course at UVA is brilliantly structured so that the first two exams are before the Withdrawal Deadline, after which they are stuck in the class for the rest of the semester! So now they're stuck taking the hardest of the three exams, and there's no way out of it. Muahahahahaha...

I am having more and more people come to office hours lately. It's almost like they're just finding out I can talk to them outside of class! Some students find this out right from the beginning of the course, and they never let go. Others are shy, and couldn't possibly imagine taking any of my precious time outside of class. Both of these traits can be detrimental--the first because it means they're not thinking for themselves, and the second because it means they're not getting help.

On the other hand, my honest assessment is that there's basically no correlation between how often a student comes to office hours and how well they do in the class. Some students don't come to office hours because they don't need to, others don't come even though they should. Some students come to office hours because they're really motivated and want to get an A or an A+, while others come to office hours because they're really not getting it.

But the main thing I realized this week is that I'm actually getting personally attached. It happened when some students ask me whether I'd be teaching Applied Calculus II next semester, so they could sign up for my section. I had to say I honestly don't know. And then it hit me. I actually would like to see these students again. I kind of like teaching them.

It was so easy back when the department sent out the class request list to write down that I just wanted to teach the same course again--that way I don't have to write new lecture notes, I don't have to work so hard to develop a course curriculum, and I can focus on my research. But now I'm realizing, oh snap, I actually do care about something more than my own goals; I actually care about my students.

Since the department has yet to assign grad students to teaching sections, I technically don't know yet whether or not I might actually get to see some of my students next semester; but the reality is, I probably won't. It's weird just being a grad student and teaching. You go into it feeling like it's mostly just a job--like I was telling one of my students the other day, we all do it to pay the bills. What I didn't count on exactly was that it might actually mean more to me than that. I guess I didn't factor that into my equation.

And I thought I was good at math.