1

Situation 2
You are teaching an advanced ASL course. A student bawled out in class after receiving a D on
an exam. The student tells you that he/she never had a grade lower than A in ASL classes in the
past. What would you do in this situation?
If I knew that it were true that that student had never received such a low grade, I would have
asked for a private meeting with him/her before class in order to discuss the test score, thereby
avoiding such a scenario. There must be a reason for an A student to do so poorly.
If the reason for the poor grade was due to illness, inability to concentrate due to personal
tragedy, etc., Id schedule a make-up test and encourage him/her to, in the future, discuss the
situation with me *before* taking the exam. This is dependent, of course, on what policies were
stated at the beginning of the course during the discussion about the syllabus and expectations.
If the reason was simple failure to know the tested material, I would first check my roll book to
verify his/her presence in each class session leading up to the test and ask him/her if s/he had
been filling out the muddy sheets every class period. I would go over the rubric which would
have been distributed prior to the test. Because the student already knew on what the test would
be graded, I would assume lack of studying caused him/her to do so poorly when s/he normally
does quite well.
With that assumption verified, I would find out if s/he is regularly attending Deaf events (weekly
Silent Suppers, etc.) and encourage him/her to redouble his/her efforts to do so. Id ask if s/he
was routinely meeting with the classroom assistant (C.A.). If not, Id strongly suggest that s/he
make an appointment with the C.A. at his/her *earliest* convenience. I would find out if s/he
was consistently meeting with his/her practice/study group and advise him/her to attend *every*
session. I would also ask him/her to describe his/her study habits so that together we could make
a study plan to assist him/her in his/her understanding of the material.
However, if no such opportunity existed, and I was caught unaware during class, I hope that I
would have the wherewithal to politely say, When class is over, Id be happy to make an
appointment with you to discuss your grade. Instead of talking about the grade with him/her
right after class, Id prefer the student have some time to calm down before we met because that
kind of outburst is not only disrespectful, but unacceptable at any level and in any situation.
Then, during our private meeting (which, depending on how upset s/he was, would be held in a
public place with the knowledge of my whereabouts given to my husband and the department
chair), Id go over the same things stated above.