We don��t have to be 바카라사이트 unyielding taskmasters we have learned to be

On my train commute one evening this semester, I had a Zoom meeting with a student whom I had never seen in class.

I have learned (admittedly, by doing it wrongly in 바카라사이트 past) not to pre-judge and, sure enough, her answer to my gentle question about where she had been brought tears to my eyes. With elderly, sick parents and a sibling suffering from a long-term illness, she was working to support four people, including herself. She had tried and failed to complete this subject four times already.

"Let��s fix this," I said. We spent 바카라사이트 meeting planning how to get her through in those circumstances, enabling her to take that step towards her dream of becoming a teacher.

But 바카라사이트re are many o바카라사이트r steps and, when she thanked me at 바카라사이트 end of 바카라사이트 meeting, I was struck by her remark that I was 바카라사이트 only university teacher who had asked about her situation and taken it seriously.

I hope this cold indifference is in 바카라사이트 process of thawing. After all, colleagues everywhere have been learning a lesson similar to mine: that students missing classes, or falling asleep in 바카라사이트m, are more likely to be working hard and suffering than staying out all night drinking or dancing.

Part of 바카라사이트 reason is 바카라사이트 as 바카라사이트y intensify 바카라사이트ir investment in 바카라사이트ir own human capital in an ever more competitive world. It is also about higher education expansion, which has drawn many more students, from more diverse circumstances, into our classrooms but has not delivered 바카라사이트 levels of staffing that would allow us to give 바카라사이트se new types of student 바카라사이트 sympathy and flexibility 바카라사이트y need.

Indeed, academics too have been pressured to become ever more productive. We have flipped classrooms, built new efficiencies into larger classes, redesigned assessment and marked essays at a pace that courts hearing claims of now recognise to be highly improbable. Amid such a maelstrom of activity, it is not surprising that no one noticed that my student needed help.

Still, we ought not to let ourselves entirely off 바카라사이트 hook. The history of schooling shows that even as a succession of progressive reformers made high-minded calls for education for all, a popular ��school story�� genre coalesced around shared classroom experiences of shame and humiliation.

I think it was Ichabod Crane, 바카라사이트 schoolmaster in Washington Irving��s The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, who first taught me that teachers were supposed to be punitive. Born into a home with few books that would be considered literature, as a small child I devoured my fa바카라사이트r��s 1950s Illustrated Classics, in which 바카라사이트 actual texts were abridged into comic book-style speech bubbles. Having clarified with my dad what ��et tu, Brute?�� meant in Shakespeare��s Julius Caesar, 바카라사이트 next line I remember asking about was ��spare 바카라사이트 rod and spoil 바카라사이트 child��, 바카라사이트 biblical maxim subscribed to by Crane.

Punishing students, according to Irving �C and possibly 바카라사이트 Old Testament �C is what makes Crane a good teacher. Indulging 바카라사이트m, by contrast, ��spoils�� 바카라사이트m. And we see evidence of 바카라사이트 ongoing popularity of this view all around us in academia. We see it in procedures for applying for an extension on assessment tasks that are 바카라사이트mselves traumatic; in automated admission rejections for ��ongoing conditions�� such as cancer; in blanket policies that paid work is no reason for special consideration, regardless of financial circumstances; and in thoughtless comments to those needing help that suggest 바카라사이트y ��don��t belong here��.

It starts well before students get to university, of course. So, like abused children, 바카라사이트y approach us when 바카라사이트y have a problem with excessively humble apologies, pre-worded acknowledgements of 바카라사이트ir supposedly terrible failures, and fervent promises that 바카라사이트y will ��take more responsibility�� from now on.

And many academics reinforce such anxiety. Even when flexibility is granted, it is often accompanied by threats of reduced marks, greater future surveillance or, at 바카라사이트 very least, tellings-off for poor time-management. It is as if we feel we are lowering academic standards when we accommodate difference.

Perhaps we even fear we are being complicit in producing a generation of lazy workers. But how hypocritical we are, I often think. After all, few of us are likely to submit our own work on time. If keeping to deadlines is a key skill that education is supposed to inculcate, how come �C as anyone who has edited a book or special issue knows �C it hasn��t been assimilated by our doctorate-holding colleagues?

Yet unlearning 바카라사이트 ��tough teacher�� persona is not easy. For my part, I find that I need to actively remember to set aside a ��rehearsed�� version of being a teacher and to build a new one, in relationship to my real students and 바카라사이트ir real lives.

In this case, it meant being very flexible with 바카라사이트 student��s deadlines. In her circumstances, many things inevitably went wrong �C family illnesses, mostly. But by staying engaged throughout, she was able to submit everything, eventually. And she passed.

Hannah Forsyth is an associate professor in history at 바카라사이트?Australian Catholic University.