One of my more engaging students came to class tipsy. Well, not tipsy... blind fucking drunk, really. He always sits in the front row and today was no exception.
He began my lecture by asking me irrelevant questions, loudly and with much guffawing. In particular, how enlightened was I and could I provide him with enlightening information? I responded somewhat coolly, and thankfully he calmed down before I was forced to escort him out of the room.
He passed out in the middle of the lecture. At the end of class I announced a pop quiz; he did not regain consciousness. He slept through the quiz, slept through the turning in of the quiz, and slept through the student exodus (120 students) at the end of the turning in of the quiz. I put my hand on his shoulder and asked him if he was okay. He lifted his head and said, "yes," then put his head back down and went back to sleep.
As far as I know, he stayed in the lecture hall for the next class that meets there, and perhaps the one after that too. He just called me, still drunk, to ask if I had found his notebook.
Thursday, May 04, 2006
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11 comments:
Wow. I'm too flabbergasted to think of anything witty to say, so just wow.
An astonishing anecdote all around, but it's the notebook phone call that will haunt me.
Amazing.
There was a rash of such occurances at our U a few semesters ago, so they instituted a "Call Campus Safety" policy.
I bet his hangover was (will be?) EPIC.
We had a student have a cocktail party (oh, did I mention it was at 10:00 am) and orgy in one of the halls earlier in the semester. This is not all though; this was apparently part of a nervous breakdown. We had to come from our classes to ask said student to get dressed and stop screaming. When she began to get even stranger, well, that's when we called the nice men in white coats.
I had a student do something similar when I was a TA, way back when. I had told a worried class that the only ways in which they could fail our short-essay (Intro to Lit) final was 1) cheat, 2) don't show up, 3) or show up drunk. (I meant that if they studied and did their best, they'd at least make a D.) So one little sorority chick showed up for said final completely hammered, smelling of Jack Daniels and giggling like a fourth-grader. The other students caught on before I did and were trying to subtly get my attention: "Psst...Miss K...pssst..." When Drunk Girl finally turned in her exam and left with a lurch, the class burst into laughter! It was hilarious in the end.
Her essay looked like someone had dipped a chicken's feet in ink and let it run across the page. She failed the final! I guess she wanted to test how serious I was when I said students would fail the exam if they showed up drunk. Her final grade: D.
Oh oh oh! My turn!
When I was a TA, I ran a telescope observing lab at an observatory about a half mile up a dark, windy road. Two women showed up on the last night of the semester after the rest of the students had left, and they were completely drunk. The scary part of the story is that they *drove* themselves up the hill -- I have no idea how they managed to make it safely to the top.
Anyway, I let them do the lab -- they had to look through three telescopes and sketch the objects they saw. Two of the telescopes are in one building, one is in another building, and there is a big, open field between the two buildings. However, important to the story is to note that there is forest surrounding the observatory on all sides maybe about 30 - 40 yards away in every direction.
After finishing in the one building, I suggested we go into the other to look through the other telescope. Then I noticed that one of the women had left on her own. I asked her friend where she was and she said she didn't know. We walked outside, and there in the middle of the open field, she was squatting with her dress hiked up to her chest relieving herself of some of the alcohol she had previously ingested. To be perfectly honest, the only thought going through my head was why didn't she find a place a little more private than the middle of an open field?
Baruch Grazer is quite right, the notebook phone call is amazing, but I've had this sort of phone call too in this sort of situation. What I haven't had is a _good_ student doing this. Very wild.
Before they stiffened the entrance requirements where I teach, I'd have the back rows of the lecture hall entirely populated students on drugs. Agitated crackheads and sleepy potheads.
That was still more fun than the intelligent design freaks I get now!
Man, these stories are priceless! Just what I needed to make me laugh on a day full of bad, bad, bad essays. Thanks, AP & company!
At least he wasn't playing a drinking game like me an my mates once did. (Drink whenever the prof identifies the colour of chalk by touch. Drink whenever the prof muddles example numbering convention e.g. example 2 -> example d. etc.)
Something rather unrelated: How did your grad student's brownbag work out?
please
teachers
I need help
what does good teaching consist of essay?
:)
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