It is what it is...sort of.

I feel we should all experience having a student drop out under ambiguous circumstances. I received an e-mail from a student this past Wednesday. I wrote her originally inquiring about her absences and lack of participation. She responded back stating she was dropping out of college in order to save up money for future ventures versus taking classes which did not “progress her education and moral preparation”. Now, there are many ambiguous terms and the e-mail as a whole was impersonal but professional, quite contrary to myself and the class I try to encourage which is more personal than professional. But regardless, it sent me into a tail spin for one day. It occurred a week after I assigned Guts, (and I thank everyone who chimed in their voice on that decision.)Literally. I was overtly depressed over this. Common sense and reason escaped me and I could only focus on the lack of educational progression and moral progression.

Then, sometime that evening common sense and reason decided to have a reunion with me after talking to several people. After examining the student’s attendance and actually reading the e-mail, I realized, with the help of a few faculty members, that there is no way I could be souly responsible for this decision of hers, in fact I now consider a great act of hubris to feel that on only four class periods together I could push any student to this life altering decision. The reasons she gave me were ambiguous at best. While I do agree that the progression of a student’s education is an important factor, she attended a whole four class periods. Am I expected to restore faith in the entire academic community in four class periods or is it even conceivably possible to fail it in four class periods? Even then, why the whole of college versus just my class? If it was the instructors fault for her dropping out, it was a group effort then. As for moral preparation…I simply don’t know what she means. I told this to Dr. Weaver, and she hit on what I feel is the best explanation and that is that this reasoning may be just what she is telling herself to further justify it. It's a decisionWhether her reasons are her own, forced, or initiated, I simply don’t know, but I simply can’t reasonably take everything as a personal commentary

But it doesn’t erase the effect to an extent. I don’t take it personally nor as a comment on me as a teacher. I take it for what it is. I thoroughly believe that the key hallmark to any great writer is that they are sympathetic to people’s motivation, life movements, moral reasoning (please, don’t begin to comment on that one), and personality. They understand character in short. This is one student who I don’t think I will understand.