'Tis the Season....for assignments

Six weeks have flown by in my course work and we have hit what would be termed mid-terms in the US.   And true to that thought come the first of the assignments.  All of the reading and discussing and listening gets to be synthesized and regurgitated back in the form of essays and oral presentations.  I am to write an academic paper the British way.  Which means thoroughly scrutinizing the literature and research and applying it to the theories and discussing it in very full detail usually in answer to a posed question.

 We had one of our professors warn us about the grading system in the UK.   Especially those of us coming from systems that 90-100 is an A, 80-89 B, 70-79 C, 60-69 D and anything below a 60 is failing.  We were told that high marks are 65-69 and marks with distinction are over 70. High 70's are rare and almost no one gets an 80 or higher.  Passing, so getting out of here with a MA degree, is anything over 50.  However if you want to get into a PhD program classes better be scored over 65 and your dissertation over 70 (or visa versa).  Whatever marks the convener gives is not the final mark.  All of your work including the dissertation will be sent to an outside source to be graded and given a final mark.  Also deadlines are out of the professor's hands.  If you miss the deadline you will be docked 10% of your grade for each day it is late- no excuses.  The university controls this and they rarely make exceptions.  It has to be something extreme and it must go through an appeals process.   Bottom line, work hard, turn it in on time and pray for a score I would never in my life would have thought I would be happy to see.  

On a similar but unrelated note, I now understand how my students could spend an entire year in my classroom and not know the names of their classmates or who was actually in the class....you are forgive.  

Unrelated to school.... I am impressed with Britain's honoring of veterans and the fallen war heroes.  In the US we call it Veterans Day, here it is remembrance day.  The official day is the same: November 11.  They honor it the Sunday before, so today.  For those who don't know why Nov 11 it is because it was the signal of the end of WWI 11/11 at 11 am.  People wear poppies in honor of Flanders's field.  They have commemoration ceremonies and everyone at 11 am stops and has two minutes of silence for respect for all who have fought to maintain their freedoms.  Which means that at church today at 11:00 am we all stood for two minutes in silence.  If you are not familiar with the poem or the story behind Flanders's field and the poppies that is your homework assignment.  Then as you contemplate the freedoms that you enjoy remember that freedom is never free.  It has been paid for in lives.  I stood proudly today with allies remembering all that has been sacrificed.  Because of them I can be here studying. We need to raise our title of liberty and give thanks to our God for our freedoms, and remember the lives of those who have bravely fought to defend them.  

Now go do your homework and I will go do mine. ;)



Here are some random things in my world.