Berea the difficult

After my class in Biology last Friday, a student came running after me to hand over a paper (drenched with tears?) that I recognized as an essay to my question, "What do you make of the Third Quarter?" I did not know at once how to react. I thought that perhaps, the best thing to do at that time is to approach her and tell her that the Third Quarter had been very demanding academically, but that her performace proved wanting... But there's more to the paper that brought me to a state of reflective silence. The question I gave came back to me. What do I make of the Third Quarter?

I thought the Third Quarter has been quite a tough one academically. I thought that it was one super quarter that ushered in a host of academic activities like the concert... and the other concerts. I thought that it was one difficult quarter that was made even more difficult by the topics that should've needed continuity but was denied with one given the series of breaks that figured as holidays or rehearsals. Comparative Anatomy needed continuity. Inorganic Chemistry's logic is sequential. Deny both the momentum that each needed to push the facts across and you get gaps in learning.

To my mind, such is the state of the Third Quarter. But there's not much that can be undone now. But having thus described the Third Quarter as one difficult quarter, I also thought that my students are not left without munition to help themselves out of the bind. A difficult task is made easy by summoning extra effort to stave off unnecessary academic distress.

So what do I make of the Third Quarter?

The Third quarter is one moment in time when we learn our lessons the hard way. If in failing we learn to hope for triumph then let failing be so. If in failing we learn to pick up the pieces of a squandered opportunity and learn to move forward, then let failing be so.

But while at this, let it be known that I still hold on to the quote from Plato I gave during that lecture on Friday, "The greatness of a teacher is best measured by the quality of his students."

My hope is that, like the oyster, you be able to make this academic irritant into an academic pearl. An academic pearl that will become the mark of quality students that you are. Then I can sit back with the thought that I have reaped from your struggle, my own struggle for that fruition of an earthly crown - the opportunity to touch as many lives as my own life can.