This lovely essay was written last semester by my student, Basil Rana. Basil is taking a huge course load right now, and I know he is struggling to manage all of his responsibilities. If you have any words of encouragement for him, please share! — Professor Jennifer Hurley Attaining perfect…

So much of what we call education is small minded. Even something seemingly large, such as a student learning outcome, reduces a layered, individual human experience to a standardized bullet point. …

It’s the night before the department meeting, and I can’t sleep. Something about being in a space with other teachers makes me deeply uncomfortable, a feeling I am ashamed to admit. In my fantasy life, I am a team player, well liked, maybe even admired. …

The sociology professor was on Zoom presenting research about how students felt taking classes during COVID. The results of the research: Students were depressed, anxious, and totally overwhelmed by their workloads. One professor raised his tiny Zoom hand. “I don’t get it,” he said. “I always assign a ton of…

I have probably said this too, at one time, though now I am ashamed to admit it. The educational system conditions us to think that students must keep pace — -and that as good teachers, it is our role to must ensure that they keep pace. But you know what…

Is School Anti-Learning? More and more, I am coming to believe that school is a place that is, sadly, antithetical to learning. It is a place where students pretend to learn in exchange for a grade that certifies that they “learned,” and are thus qualified to move on in the…

Like many teachers, I have spent countless hours trying to devise a perfect grading system, one that is equal parts fair and rigorous, that will reward students for hard work and punish certain behaviors that I saw as detrimental to my students’ progress. For twenty years I worked on this…