Serious

I have a student who wrote a terrific paper. I actually have several who did a great job, but I'm going to focus on one particular student here.

The student worked hard. I was worried initially, because this student was repeating the course, but this student WANTED to work. I'd get lots of emails from the student to clarify an understanding of issues related to the topic of the paper. Upon the student's request, I sat down and went through one of the papers that he picked to use as a resource. It was a tough paper. I even wrote 2-3 sentences to model how to explain things for the student. The student used my words. (We discussed it. It's okay. We joked that not all professors will write papers for students... ) If a student wants to make an effort, I will sit with them and support their learning. I wouldn't have written things for the student if the student hadn't also been making an effort.

The student worked hard from the beginning of the course, kept up with the schedule and was really open to learning*.

Anyway, from the "final draft" to the final paper, the student added in MORE information! The student didn't do just a correction of the existing paper, but thought about what might be missing and added NEW, NOVEL information. You have no idea how exciting this is to a researcher type! I am so thrilled I could cry. Reading this student's paper was a beautiful way to start my day!




*This is in contrast to the student who was so closed to criticism, it was ridiculous. I get that she was working hard, but she wasn't doing very good work. I was trying to get her to think about things to make her life easier and her work better, but she wouldn't take anything from me. She HATED it when I made suggestions. Note to self: You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink.