I met with my co-instructor the other day in the lunchroom. Three days before, we had a pow-wow about some group presentations which we graded together from the top to the bottom, but ran out of time. I had allowed her to determine the rest of the grades. When I found out that everyone in the class had gotten an A or a B, I must have winced (I have a terrible poker face). Moreover, when my co-instructor says: "Well, these are second semester seniors, now is not the time to weed them out, we just need to graduate them" and "It's OK, they aren't going to graduate school anyway, so it doesn't matter", I must have really frowned.
But I couldn't keep my mouth shut when she said; "Next time's crowd are really good and they are going to want some rigor" I said, "Not if they have two more years of really easy classes (in your department)."
UGH-> I could have kicked myself as soon as I said it.
It was clear that the point was poorly taken, as she became very defensive and the rest of the convo deteriorated quickly.
Later she dropped by my office. We both apologized profusely and expressed how upset the convo had made us both. Now all is right with the world again, but I still have to figure out A) How to broaden my view of education, or B) How to keep my mouth shut and face neutral. Knowing myself, A will be much easier that B. And A will be very hard!
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