Thursday, June 08, 2006

Phew and Oh S**t Part Two

Yesterday I saw many a stressed academic.

One cried and sobbed at me about her immense amount of marking.

A usually sweet and fluffy academic got stroppy with me when I told her that I couldn't have her marks ready for an internal board with the time frame she was giving me.

Another academic was not happy at me stating the industrial action was 'resolved' in an email requesting marks and insisted that it is 'suspended'. Yeah you're right but I need your marks god damn it - so don't give me no shit!

Today the academics were better but I nearly cried when I found 11 cases of cheating in coursework on my desk this morning... Fortunately my boss intervened and its now only 4 cases...

But I wasn't alone in my mood swings - my fellow colleages were one minute silent and beavering, the next laughing about receiving marks on scrappy bits of paper or cigarette packets and then stressing...

Oh the joy that is Higher Education.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I thought the marking was being done despite the strike but the results not submitted, to avoid exactly this?

ginquinn said...

Nope - some academics also refused to do any marking because in principle if a student discovered that their work had been marked they had the right to request their mark - or so I hear. Some have been 'secretly' marking and some have not...