Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Pushy African

A student who missed two Mid Term tests held TWO weeks ago, despite the dates of the tests being announced in advance and then reminded over and over again, insists that I allow him to take the tests now. The said student as well as his classmates were also told that if they were absent from either tests there would be NO taking the tests at a later date.

This student (he's African, by the way) has been harassing me for the past two days to allow him to take the test when he discovered that both missed tests amounted to 50% of the final grade (also something that I made clear to the class in the first week of class). He rarely comes to class and most probably wasn't aware of the marks breakdown which I explicitly explained in class --- ha, what a surprise!

His excuse for missing both Mid Term tests? He had to visit a friend in the Kajang Prison (can't help wondering what was going on that he just HAD TO visit his pal in prison on the day of the test...hmmm... someone suggested to me that perhaps it wasn't a friend he was visiting in prison but rather, he himself was locked up!).  He also told me that he was in hospital on the day of the test and produced a receipt from a hospital dated January 9 for a test that was held on January 19 --- hmmm... it seems like he has a problem comprehending numbers now....! The education system in the country which he comes from (Republic of Guinea) can't really be that bad, can it (I mean, to the extent of producing people who don't know the difference between January 9 and January 19 --- that's a difference of 10 DAYS!!!)?


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