During the recent finals, I encountered the most blatant and uninspired attempt at cheating that I have ever seen. What annoyed me the most was that it was so sloppy, so obvious, that it clearly revealed the cheaters thought I was an idiot and also that they could not care less about my course. The icing on the cake was that one of the cheaters was my own graduate student, paid as a research assistant.
When it comes to cheating during in-class exams, I take reasonable measures to prevent it. I make sure the students sit far apart, no unallowed materials around them, and I will pay attention to those who uncharacteristically fidget, stare into the thin air forever, look like they are playing with their cell phones etc. But, I don't go overboard policing the students. I think this is distracting and disrespectful to the hard working ones, and some days (OK, most days) they are the only ones that make teaching worthwhile.
However, when it comes to take-home exams and projects, it's a bit tougher to spot cheating, but I usually only assign these to graduate students. I guess I am still under a romantic impression that people go to graduate school to learn and better themselves, not to slip and slither through the cracks with minimal effort. When we talk about projects, it's usually OK for people to consult with each other, but unless the projects are explicitly group ones, each person must do their own work and turn in their own report.
This time, there was a project due on the day of the final (in-class exam). I collected the projects before the exam started, and as the students worked, I flipped through the reports. There, staring me in the face, were two absolutely identical reports, down to figure captions corrected by hand. Exactly the same plots, exactly the same parameters chosen (parameters were to be chosen so that a certain property was fixed, which left a pretty wide range of variability).
I also discovered a third, conspicuously similar to the previous two reports, but slightly different and clean.
I had the students stay after the exam and confronted them: the third student actually did the project and the first two used his code and created identical reports (you'd think they could have tweaked the parameters a little but no; absolutely zero effort had to be expended).
One of those who copied was my own student, supported as an RA. I generally expect my own resarch students to shine and be among the best ones in the graduate classes I teach. I am probably even stricter to them than to other students. I have been thinking about letting this particular student go for quite a while now, because the has been inexplicably negligent of his duties (misses individual and group meetings, ignores my emails); in the past, I sent him multiple notices with concerns about his behavior and performance, accompanied with instructions and requests for improvement (or else). With cheating so blatantly on top of everything, this guy showed without a doubt that he couldn't care less about the class and had no respect for me whatsoever. This cheating sealed the deal on his RA termination. Regarding his class standing, upon inspecting the university guidelines and consultation with colleagues, I gave him a zero on the project and then graded accordingly.
The question to ponder is how do you punish a cheater in your class? Does your university have guidelines? Would you act differently if the cheater were your own research student?
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Monday, December 27, 2010
PG-14
Warning: this is a personal post with TMI. Flee while you can. If you decide to continue reading, be prepared to send only good vibrations my way.
So here goes. I am 14 weeks pregnant (hence the title) with Baby No 3. So far everything looks good, we had the 1st trimester screen and everything came back normal. While the baby is doing great, the mom -- not so much. I have been vomiting incessantly since week 4 and have lost 20 pounds already, which I would have ordinarily welcomed if only it hadn't happened over such a short period of time. For what it's worth, if you ever envision losing 20 lbs over 2-3 months, I can tell you from experience that it requires you to eat virtually nothing.
The constant nausea and vomiting, combined with extremely high workload I have had this semester, have been the reasons for the scarcity of posts. It has been really hard for me to make myself do anything but the absolutely necessary work. My wonderful husband has taken over all my household chores (for which I love him more than ever!!!) so I can spend the little time I have at home prostrated on the sofa, trying to give my digestive tract a chance to process something before the inevitable vomiting. I honestly cannot say if it's worse when I eat or when I don't. I am now officially afraid of all foods as nearly every food item has made me barf at one point or another. I am down to eating only toast (buttered toast being an occasional success).
When I was pregnant with my first son, I had nausea in weeks 8-14 but no vomiting. With my second, it was much worse, with the nausea and vomiting during weeks 6 through 16; luckily, at that time I could take Zofran, a magic pill that would completely stop the nausea. This time around, it has been much much worse and nothing is helping. Zofran has been completely useless and my doctor basically says I need to take it easy and wait it out, which is ironic because I am much busier than ever before and really need to be functional. Whenever I feel sorry for myself, which I am ashamed to admit is often, I keep wondering what the women do who are as sick as I am but have to be on their feet all day or work in the fields... In many ways I am very, very lucky, and very, very spoiled.
My apologies to the squeamish readers for all the oversharing, but this whole pukey situation has been really debilitating in the last few months. It colored everything I did [e.g. I asked not to be the PI on a couple of collaborative grants as I know I don't have it in me to herd the cats (a.k.a collaborators) right now, and likely won't in the next month or so]. Grading all my finals and having gone through several of my graduating student theses and dissertations count as my crowning achievements for the month of December, as they required all of my significantly depleted energy.
But here comes the question for my esteemed readership: if this pregnancy goes well, I will be a tenured female faculty in a physical sciences field with 3 kids. That is rare enough to be quite revealing. It's not an issue right now as no one IRL knows and I am not showing and likely won't be for a little while longer, but I am not sure what to do about sharing some of the follow-up information (e.g. when the baby actually arrives).
There are a couple of relatively primitive things I can try, such as (a) remove personal posts after 2-3 days, which would allow those who have me on their readers to pick up the post but not a random browser who happens to stumble upon my blog and connects the dots from old posts. This assumes that there are no people who already know me IRL among the regular readers. (b) I can have the people who really want to follow some of the baby developments send me an email and I will have select posts accessible to these subscribed readers only.
I don't want to start a separate baby blog because being a mom is just one part of what I am, and this ain't my first rodeo so I don't expect to write about the baby stuff too often, but would like the option to write about it on occasion.
So, any ideas on how (if it's at all possible) to share some pregnancy/baby info with interested readers while minimizing the chances of my pseudonymity being blown? (And no, saying "Then don't write about it on the internet, duh" does not actually count as a good faith suggestion.)
So here goes. I am 14 weeks pregnant (hence the title) with Baby No 3. So far everything looks good, we had the 1st trimester screen and everything came back normal. While the baby is doing great, the mom -- not so much. I have been vomiting incessantly since week 4 and have lost 20 pounds already, which I would have ordinarily welcomed if only it hadn't happened over such a short period of time. For what it's worth, if you ever envision losing 20 lbs over 2-3 months, I can tell you from experience that it requires you to eat virtually nothing.
The constant nausea and vomiting, combined with extremely high workload I have had this semester, have been the reasons for the scarcity of posts. It has been really hard for me to make myself do anything but the absolutely necessary work. My wonderful husband has taken over all my household chores (for which I love him more than ever!!!) so I can spend the little time I have at home prostrated on the sofa, trying to give my digestive tract a chance to process something before the inevitable vomiting. I honestly cannot say if it's worse when I eat or when I don't. I am now officially afraid of all foods as nearly every food item has made me barf at one point or another. I am down to eating only toast (buttered toast being an occasional success).
When I was pregnant with my first son, I had nausea in weeks 8-14 but no vomiting. With my second, it was much worse, with the nausea and vomiting during weeks 6 through 16; luckily, at that time I could take Zofran, a magic pill that would completely stop the nausea. This time around, it has been much much worse and nothing is helping. Zofran has been completely useless and my doctor basically says I need to take it easy and wait it out, which is ironic because I am much busier than ever before and really need to be functional. Whenever I feel sorry for myself, which I am ashamed to admit is often, I keep wondering what the women do who are as sick as I am but have to be on their feet all day or work in the fields... In many ways I am very, very lucky, and very, very spoiled.
My apologies to the squeamish readers for all the oversharing, but this whole pukey situation has been really debilitating in the last few months. It colored everything I did [e.g. I asked not to be the PI on a couple of collaborative grants as I know I don't have it in me to herd the cats (a.k.a collaborators) right now, and likely won't in the next month or so]. Grading all my finals and having gone through several of my graduating student theses and dissertations count as my crowning achievements for the month of December, as they required all of my significantly depleted energy.
But here comes the question for my esteemed readership: if this pregnancy goes well, I will be a tenured female faculty in a physical sciences field with 3 kids. That is rare enough to be quite revealing. It's not an issue right now as no one IRL knows and I am not showing and likely won't be for a little while longer, but I am not sure what to do about sharing some of the follow-up information (e.g. when the baby actually arrives).
There are a couple of relatively primitive things I can try, such as (a) remove personal posts after 2-3 days, which would allow those who have me on their readers to pick up the post but not a random browser who happens to stumble upon my blog and connects the dots from old posts. This assumes that there are no people who already know me IRL among the regular readers. (b) I can have the people who really want to follow some of the baby developments send me an email and I will have select posts accessible to these subscribed readers only.
I don't want to start a separate baby blog because being a mom is just one part of what I am, and this ain't my first rodeo so I don't expect to write about the baby stuff too often, but would like the option to write about it on occasion.
So, any ideas on how (if it's at all possible) to share some pregnancy/baby info with interested readers while minimizing the chances of my pseudonymity being blown? (And no, saying "Then don't write about it on the internet, duh" does not actually count as a good faith suggestion.)
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Answers to Hermitage's Wimminz in Academia Panel Questions
Here's my 2 cents on the questions Hermitage chose for her Women sans Babies panel. Sorry I'm a bit tardy, it's the end of the semester...
1. How do you command the attention, and respect, of men in academic settings (e.g. classroom, conferences, faculty meetings)?
I am going to assume here that the question means "I am technically very competent but do not feel I command adequate respect. How do I remedy that?" You have to take cues from the guys. Even as young students, when guys think they know the answer to a question they just blurt it out (I sometimes wish they wouldn't). This extends into their professional years. You have to get over the fear of being wrong and simply speak up. The fear does eventually go away. A good exercise is to give yourself the following task: you have to come up with one nontrivial question for each talk you hear at a conference. And then go ahead and ask it. Pretty soon you will be one of the most feared and revered members of any audience!
I am in one of the fields with the most dramatic underrepresentation of women, so the rules of the game are entirely masculine. One of the important differences between men and women (on average, of course) is that women often feel they need external validation, someone to pat them on the back and say "good job" when they are feeling down. I used to be quite unhappy because these were not forthcoming as often as my ego needed them, so I thought I was no good. That was not true -- while everyone likes praise, I have found that external affirmation is much less important for an average guy's sense of self-worth than a woman's so men simply don't volutneer praise easily. So recalibrate: I have learned not to expect pats on the back and to simply rely on what I think is best. And pats on the back do come, but infrequently and indirectly and quite unexpectedly. Sort of like hugs between manly men.
Moreover, use all the nonverbal tricks in the book to communicate that you have gravitas. Wear heels if you need to feel taller, wear clothes that make you feel strong and confident (anything in black makes me feel awesome), stand up tall and speak loudly, make eye contact. If you happen to be tall and/or have a strong voice, be grateful and use these qualities!
2. How should women dealing with a two-body problem handle assumptions that their career is secondary to their partner’s?
If stupid questions like these are asked in an inconsequential context (e.g. a random person chatting you up at a party) try to be matter-of-fact and set them straight ("Actually, my significant other is flexible in career choice and will follow me to my chosen position"). The person will usually be embarrassed enough even if you don't go on to tear them a new one for assuming that your gender automatically makes you inferior in ambition or employability.
But, if it's the issue of hunting for jobs, make sure everyone who is important (e.g. all your letter writers and close senior colleagues) know exactly how serious your career plans are. There must be no ambiguity there.
3. What would you like to see from tenure-track and not-yet-tenure-track menfolk? How can they pitch in?
When we complain of sexist treatment, shut up and listen with an open mind. Don't be on the defensive -- most of us actually don't hate men, quite the contrary. We are just exhausted.
Try to view us as you would your male colleagues and competitors. Try to be honest to yourself about how often, unwillingly, you may think "She got this because she is a woman" out of pure jealousy. If you catch yourself thinking that a woman is not deserving, ask yourself if you would think the same of a guy with the same record. I am a woman and I have caught myself valuing a paper less when I found out that the main author was a woman -- it was quite a sobering experience. So try to be honest about your biases and work to counteract them.
Speak up for your female lab mates and colleagues. Try to learn what career building is like for us, but really keep an open mind, and you will see a path akin to death by a thousand paper cuts. Listen and be empathetic. And then help us fight by putting in good words for us wherever you can. Workplaces that are friendly to women are friendly to all people who strive to have a balance between professional and personal lives.
4. How do you deal with insinuations that you were only chosen for a position/award/etc because of affirmative action?
As in 2: stupid and/or malicious questions are best deflected with matter-of-fact calmness. "My record is very strong, so I have no doubt I would be selected even if I was a guy." I think everyone deserves the benefit of a good deflection and a chance to blush and change topic; if they don't take it, i.e. if the person keeps at it, by all means bite their head off. Call them out for being a jealous insecure schmuck.
Then there are situations in which your gender may have really played a positive role. My recommendation is to say "Thanks!" and really be grateful for the break. The fact is, these breaks are so few and far between that you should not be ashamed or guilty that one happened to fall in your lap. Among a group of equally meritorious, people will take any advantage to get ahead -- pedigree, network, charm. If for once your gender gets you ahead, great!
1. How do you command the attention, and respect, of men in academic settings (e.g. classroom, conferences, faculty meetings)?
I am going to assume here that the question means "I am technically very competent but do not feel I command adequate respect. How do I remedy that?" You have to take cues from the guys. Even as young students, when guys think they know the answer to a question they just blurt it out (I sometimes wish they wouldn't). This extends into their professional years. You have to get over the fear of being wrong and simply speak up. The fear does eventually go away. A good exercise is to give yourself the following task: you have to come up with one nontrivial question for each talk you hear at a conference. And then go ahead and ask it. Pretty soon you will be one of the most feared and revered members of any audience!
I am in one of the fields with the most dramatic underrepresentation of women, so the rules of the game are entirely masculine. One of the important differences between men and women (on average, of course) is that women often feel they need external validation, someone to pat them on the back and say "good job" when they are feeling down. I used to be quite unhappy because these were not forthcoming as often as my ego needed them, so I thought I was no good. That was not true -- while everyone likes praise, I have found that external affirmation is much less important for an average guy's sense of self-worth than a woman's so men simply don't volutneer praise easily. So recalibrate: I have learned not to expect pats on the back and to simply rely on what I think is best. And pats on the back do come, but infrequently and indirectly and quite unexpectedly. Sort of like hugs between manly men.
Moreover, use all the nonverbal tricks in the book to communicate that you have gravitas. Wear heels if you need to feel taller, wear clothes that make you feel strong and confident (anything in black makes me feel awesome), stand up tall and speak loudly, make eye contact. If you happen to be tall and/or have a strong voice, be grateful and use these qualities!
2. How should women dealing with a two-body problem handle assumptions that their career is secondary to their partner’s?
If stupid questions like these are asked in an inconsequential context (e.g. a random person chatting you up at a party) try to be matter-of-fact and set them straight ("Actually, my significant other is flexible in career choice and will follow me to my chosen position"). The person will usually be embarrassed enough even if you don't go on to tear them a new one for assuming that your gender automatically makes you inferior in ambition or employability.
But, if it's the issue of hunting for jobs, make sure everyone who is important (e.g. all your letter writers and close senior colleagues) know exactly how serious your career plans are. There must be no ambiguity there.
3. What would you like to see from tenure-track and not-yet-tenure-track menfolk? How can they pitch in?
When we complain of sexist treatment, shut up and listen with an open mind. Don't be on the defensive -- most of us actually don't hate men, quite the contrary. We are just exhausted.
Try to view us as you would your male colleagues and competitors. Try to be honest to yourself about how often, unwillingly, you may think "She got this because she is a woman" out of pure jealousy. If you catch yourself thinking that a woman is not deserving, ask yourself if you would think the same of a guy with the same record. I am a woman and I have caught myself valuing a paper less when I found out that the main author was a woman -- it was quite a sobering experience. So try to be honest about your biases and work to counteract them.
Speak up for your female lab mates and colleagues. Try to learn what career building is like for us, but really keep an open mind, and you will see a path akin to death by a thousand paper cuts. Listen and be empathetic. And then help us fight by putting in good words for us wherever you can. Workplaces that are friendly to women are friendly to all people who strive to have a balance between professional and personal lives.
4. How do you deal with insinuations that you were only chosen for a position/award/etc because of affirmative action?
As in 2: stupid and/or malicious questions are best deflected with matter-of-fact calmness. "My record is very strong, so I have no doubt I would be selected even if I was a guy." I think everyone deserves the benefit of a good deflection and a chance to blush and change topic; if they don't take it, i.e. if the person keeps at it, by all means bite their head off. Call them out for being a jealous insecure schmuck.
Then there are situations in which your gender may have really played a positive role. My recommendation is to say "Thanks!" and really be grateful for the break. The fact is, these breaks are so few and far between that you should not be ashamed or guilty that one happened to fall in your lap. Among a group of equally meritorious, people will take any advantage to get ahead -- pedigree, network, charm. If for once your gender gets you ahead, great!
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Accolade Magnet
I am on a university committee that, among other things, selects recipients of certain named awards reserved for physical sciences faculty of different career stages. It's a nice chance to peek into other people's CV's, especially those of successful people from different disciplines, who have had different career trajectories.
What caught my attention is one particular person whom I know well. Let's call this person Accolade Magnet (AM). AM has been nominated for every award you can think of by their department and several professional societies, and is universally adored. The letters of reference all but refer to AM as the second coming and there is no doubt in people's minds that the sun shines straight out of AM's ass (making AM clearly an even more appropriate moniker).
What aggravates me is that I know this person well and I have never been dazzled by their techical brilliance or originality. However, AM is the nicest and most pleasant person you are ever likely to meet (on the outside of course). Always upbeat, with a megawatt smile as though you just made their day just by showing up, perpetually supportive of students even when they act as procrastinating asshats, just being an annoyingly calm, collected, friendly person. I, personally, want nothing more than to punch that fake smile off AM's face. AM is also quite a control freak and everything moves according to AM's schedule -- always unavailable, always the one whose responses and actions are awaited, always the one having to have the last word. But it's all with a blindingly brilliant toothpaste-commercial smile.
But, I digress. Back to the awards...
On the same day, I heard a fairly young faculty (who also happened to be nominated in one of the categories for the university award) got elected as a fellow of a very selective professional society that I would never guess this person even belonged to (i.e. their field of specialization is not a natural clue that they belong to this society at all). Then I wondered if another collaborator of mine, a deserving faculty (DF) and a much more obvious member of the same professional society, was ever nominated for the rank of fellow, and I exchanged a few emails with a common senior collaborator. The senior collaborator said yes, DF was nominated twice and was rejected both times. The election of this other person out of the blue will not make DF happy...
Which got me and the senior collaborator talking (actually, emailing) about awards. Apparently, being excellent means squat. You have to be in the mindset of wanting awards, seeking them out, doing the legwork for nomination, getting people to nominate you, getting people to write letters for you. Once you start getting awards, they keep rolling in. There are people who fly quite high largely on hype. You have to be interested and quite proactive in playing this game, and the game apparently gives back. Waiting to be nominated for anything, based on, say, your excellent scientific output (e.g. lots of highly cited papers) is apparently naive. No one thinks of you (because they are presumably busy thinking about themselves). Unless you are as fucken nauseatingly lovable as AM. Then apparently everyone bends over backward to do stuff for you.
I suppose this is another piece of information towards disillusionment with academia. Politics, not surprisingly, is everything yet again...
What caught my attention is one particular person whom I know well. Let's call this person Accolade Magnet (AM). AM has been nominated for every award you can think of by their department and several professional societies, and is universally adored. The letters of reference all but refer to AM as the second coming and there is no doubt in people's minds that the sun shines straight out of AM's ass (making AM clearly an even more appropriate moniker).
What aggravates me is that I know this person well and I have never been dazzled by their techical brilliance or originality. However, AM is the nicest and most pleasant person you are ever likely to meet (on the outside of course). Always upbeat, with a megawatt smile as though you just made their day just by showing up, perpetually supportive of students even when they act as procrastinating asshats, just being an annoyingly calm, collected, friendly person. I, personally, want nothing more than to punch that fake smile off AM's face. AM is also quite a control freak and everything moves according to AM's schedule -- always unavailable, always the one whose responses and actions are awaited, always the one having to have the last word. But it's all with a blindingly brilliant toothpaste-commercial smile.
But, I digress. Back to the awards...
On the same day, I heard a fairly young faculty (who also happened to be nominated in one of the categories for the university award) got elected as a fellow of a very selective professional society that I would never guess this person even belonged to (i.e. their field of specialization is not a natural clue that they belong to this society at all). Then I wondered if another collaborator of mine, a deserving faculty (DF) and a much more obvious member of the same professional society, was ever nominated for the rank of fellow, and I exchanged a few emails with a common senior collaborator. The senior collaborator said yes, DF was nominated twice and was rejected both times. The election of this other person out of the blue will not make DF happy...
Which got me and the senior collaborator talking (actually, emailing) about awards. Apparently, being excellent means squat. You have to be in the mindset of wanting awards, seeking them out, doing the legwork for nomination, getting people to nominate you, getting people to write letters for you. Once you start getting awards, they keep rolling in. There are people who fly quite high largely on hype. You have to be interested and quite proactive in playing this game, and the game apparently gives back. Waiting to be nominated for anything, based on, say, your excellent scientific output (e.g. lots of highly cited papers) is apparently naive. No one thinks of you (because they are presumably busy thinking about themselves). Unless you are as fucken nauseatingly lovable as AM. Then apparently everyone bends over backward to do stuff for you.
I suppose this is another piece of information towards disillusionment with academia. Politics, not surprisingly, is everything yet again...
Thursday, December 2, 2010
Haggling, with Orange Juice
This past Monday, I brought a graded midterm back to my undergraduate class. There are about 60 students in it. I had them look at the exam, we went over the problems in detail, and then I collected the exams. A few students didn't show up,
so I have been expecting to see them during the week.
One kid emailed me on Tuesday about wanting to come look at his exam, but apparently could not do it before my office hours today (Thursday). As I showed up for work this morning, he was already waiting in front of my office. We sat down, and I started going through the pile, looking for his paper, he said something about bringing me something and put a bottle of orange juice on my desk. I was quite surprised; I thanked him but declines and said he didn't need to bring presents to his teachers.
Still going through the pile, I asked him "Have you looked at your exam before?" and he said "No." I asked because I thought I had seen him in class on Monday, which would mean that he had already looked at his exam, but there are a sufficient number of students that I could not be sure. So I figured I had misremembered and that he's indeed here to look at his paper for the first time.
I found his exam, he started flipping through it, acted surprised at his middling score and asked what the average score was (which I told the students on Monday, so he would have known it if he'd been in class on Monday). And then he starts asking very specifically for extra points here and there, and he says "but you said you had given partial credit for this and that." I realized he had indeed been in the class on Monday, and saw that his exam had been marked up, with correct answers written in a red pen by him during the Monday class (he wrote the exam in pencil, and the exam was graded with a blue marker).
So the kid came in, prepared to haggle for points, armed with fucken orange juice to bribe me, and acting as though he hadn't seen the exam before. My blood pressure went through the roof. I gave him some of the points he asked for, but told him that he should be ashamed of himself for pretending he'd never seen the exam before when I had explicitly asked him about it. He acted all innocent and wondered why I was so angry and I said it's because he was trying to pull wool over my eyes and I most certainly didn't appreciate it.
I am sure I should have hidden my anger better, but I find it really hard to act all Yoda-like when someone's trying to make an ass out of me. Stuff like this makes me hate teaching... I am sure he now thinks I am the Wicked Witch, but maybe next time he will think twice before trying to pull off similar trickery on another teacher.
so I have been expecting to see them during the week.
One kid emailed me on Tuesday about wanting to come look at his exam, but apparently could not do it before my office hours today (Thursday). As I showed up for work this morning, he was already waiting in front of my office. We sat down, and I started going through the pile, looking for his paper, he said something about bringing me something and put a bottle of orange juice on my desk. I was quite surprised; I thanked him but declines and said he didn't need to bring presents to his teachers.
Still going through the pile, I asked him "Have you looked at your exam before?" and he said "No." I asked because I thought I had seen him in class on Monday, which would mean that he had already looked at his exam, but there are a sufficient number of students that I could not be sure. So I figured I had misremembered and that he's indeed here to look at his paper for the first time.
I found his exam, he started flipping through it, acted surprised at his middling score and asked what the average score was (which I told the students on Monday, so he would have known it if he'd been in class on Monday). And then he starts asking very specifically for extra points here and there, and he says "but you said you had given partial credit for this and that." I realized he had indeed been in the class on Monday, and saw that his exam had been marked up, with correct answers written in a red pen by him during the Monday class (he wrote the exam in pencil, and the exam was graded with a blue marker).
So the kid came in, prepared to haggle for points, armed with fucken orange juice to bribe me, and acting as though he hadn't seen the exam before. My blood pressure went through the roof. I gave him some of the points he asked for, but told him that he should be ashamed of himself for pretending he'd never seen the exam before when I had explicitly asked him about it. He acted all innocent and wondered why I was so angry and I said it's because he was trying to pull wool over my eyes and I most certainly didn't appreciate it.
I am sure I should have hidden my anger better, but I find it really hard to act all Yoda-like when someone's trying to make an ass out of me. Stuff like this makes me hate teaching... I am sure he now thinks I am the Wicked Witch, but maybe next time he will think twice before trying to pull off similar trickery on another teacher.
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