Hell Week

And so, we’ve come to the most awaited time of the semester. Hell season has arrived, everyone. Care for another cup of coffee?

The funny thing about hell week is that students are very much submerged in thoughts of passing each final exam and completing term papers required of them, clearly clueless about their professors’ share of hell week dilemma. Now this I didn't know about until I became an instructor.

Hell week has a much intensified effect on teachers. It entails sleepless nights of checking and re-checking exams, analyzing essays, finding out strengths and weaknesses of each term paper submitted, reassessing grades to be given, justifying in our brains why student A is worthy of a flat 1 and why student B should be warranted a DRP. I am meticulous about this stuff because after all, the final grade is the same figure printed out on each student’s transcript of records (which will be checked by their future employers, assuming of course that they want to be employed). And although I trust Microsoft excel, I check every row and see for myself that while student C did well in Essays and Class Participation, his Midterms and Finals took an epic nosedive and therefore by the power vested by mathematical formulas on the column that indicates Final Grade, he couldn’t earn anything higher than 2.0. After affixing my signature on each class card bearing the student’s final grade, I have to staple it myself to their thoroughly checked test papers.

Right this very minute, I am officially awake for 27 hours. As I helplessly stare at piles of yellow and white papers to check, I can’t help but smile at my own blunder. I could have settled for a really easy objective type of exam with answer keys and all, but I went for essays and term papers instead. And since I brought it upon myself, I couldn’t ask anybody to help me out. As one of my co-faculty puts it, “Maaga ka nga nagpa-exam, essay naman. So, pano ba yan? Good luck nalang, ha.”

Hay naku. Kung di rin naman ba ako isa’t kalahating tanga. And I almost spilled coffee onto these yellow papers. This is not good. I’ll give in for a nap and some recharging of whatever remains of my so-called brain.