Having taught college writing for a number of years in the past, I find it a great pleasure to be back in the classroom—as a student.
Instead of being the motivator, I get to be motivated.
Instead of drawing students out on the first day of class, I get to be drawn out of my own tight little shell of self-consciousness.
Going back to school at the age of seventy-one was scary. I am at least forty years older than all the other students in the class.
I gave myself plenty of extra time to get to school, which was a good thing because I couldn’t find the classroom. Tompkins Cortland Community College (TC-3) is in one large building, essentially “a rectangle” as everyone I asked for directions told me, but I still wandered aimlessly up and down the halls.
When I finally got to the classroom door, the room was dark. A few young men were sitting around a rectangular arrangement of tables, talking about girls.
I decided to wait outside.
Then a few young women entered, so I joined them. The room was still dark and not likely to change until the teacher arrived. I remembered those times in my own days as a teacher, coming into a dark room full of students and turning on the lights.
Why don’t students turn on the lights in a classroom?
No one wants to show that much enthusiasm, to be considered some kind of nerd. The first student to enter could turn on the lights if he or she so desired, but after that, it’s verboten.
Or it could just have been that it was a very hot day, the air-conditioning wasn’t doing much to help, and no one wanted to add to the heat by turning on the lights.
Most of the students, actually, were very excited about taking this class in playwriting. One student wasn’t even registered, but was determined to keep coming to class until the teacher let him in. He said, during introductions, that he planned to become an English teacher.
OK. Good luck with that.
What startled me most when I sat down at one of the tables was the cheerful greeting a young man near me offered.
“Hi,” he said, and introduced himself.
I keep forgetting that young people today are not like I was at that age, when I considered everyone over thirty to be aliens and old people like me totally irrelevant and one step away from non-existence.
The students here are so friendly and non-threatening. What’s up with that?
I am a burnt-out writing teacher, but I love being a student. I can’t wait to start this week’s assignment.
