My Personal Student from Hell (Or so I Thought?)

I don’t know about y’all, but after reading Parker Palmer’s The Courage to Teach, specifically the chapter that talks about the student from hell, I had a specific student come to mind. See, but my own personal student from hell does not fit any universal archetype, they are not a stereotypical disengaged or outright disruptive student. No, no, no, it is never that simple for me. In fact, in many ways, my student is a puzzling, paradoxical conglomeration from hell. Or so I thought.

Let me give you some context. I’ve had issues with this student from the first few weeks of class. Leading up to interpersonal week, this student had increasingly begun to use their phone in class – but at least had the courtesy to attempt to hide it from me. On the first day of interpersonal week, they outright began texting and using Snapchat on their phone for the entire first half of the class, which was a lecture-based discussion. Following this lecture, I had my students engage in an activity that required them to get up and walk around the classroom – in which this student promptly got up out of their seat and walked right out of class. Let me tell you, I was crushed. I could not stop thinking about what had happened for days. I was frustrated, confused, and even personally hurt by my student’s decision to outwardly use their phone for the entire first half of class and then decide to ditch the last half of it. Is it me?! Am I that boring?! Are my classes that excruciating to be in?!

I didn’t know how to respond. Right after that class, I decided to send my student an email to let them know that phone use is prohibited in class and since they also left during the middle of class without notice, I would be counting them absent. To which my student responded, “That’s fine.”

YIKES.

It was during Impromptu Presentation week that things took a turn. On the day that my personal student from hell had to present, they came up to me and told me “I’ll take the zero.” They had decided to simply opt out of presenting their impromptu speech! At this point, I had accepted this student as my own personal student from hell, disengaged and did not care.

After the week of impromptu presentations, I announced that students who received a 70 or lower on their presentation could visit me during my office hours to present again for a higher grade. Immediately after that class ended, my personal student from hell approached me to ask if this opportunity applied to them. I said yes (technically a zero is lower than a 70, after all). The following class day, they showed up to my office hours, presented, and I was able to speak with them a little more. We had a conversation about Advocacy in Action and their group’s progress so far, and though the conversation was brief, it was friendly. I was surprised. Clearly, this student cared enough about their grade to come to my office hours and present in front of me and my peers. Had I misjudged them?

Reading Palmer’s passage about the student from hell re-conceptualized everything for me. Palmer stated, "Students are marginalized people in our society. The silence that we face in the classroom is the silence that has always been adopted by people on the margin – people who have reason to fear those in power and have learned that there is a safety in not speaking.” (p. 45) I have no way of knowing what my personal student from hell is going through, I have no way of knowing what their educational background is, or what personal difficulties they may carry. I don’t know if I can break their silence, or their perceived disengagement, but I do know that I can try. I can try to employ critical pedagogy in my classroom and teach with my authentic identity and integrity. Through this, I can only hope that I can make a difference in my student’s life.

As I reflected on this reading in Palmer’s The Courage to Teach, I see what he meant by the idea of teaching being heartbreaking. You can give yourself fully to the cause and you still may not see any results. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t keep trekking on.

#eyeswideopen