Results

I know you're all eagerly awaiting the results. I know I was. But I didn't get them right away.

The morning ran smoothly, with an exceptional sunshine breakfast (each Wednesday, a different pair of teachers provides breakfast for the faculty). I decided that if today was the end of my career, I at least had gotten to start the day with pumpkin french toast and bacon.

The test started smoothly, and then kids kept raising their hands. I quickly realized that some of the pictures photocopied on the test were awful. A volcano they were supposed to identify (fissure volcano) was unidentifiable. And then, two pictures they were supposed to label were unreadable. I had to pull the dean out of the hallway and ask her to cut-and-paste the two pictures onto a separate document and make 80 copies. And distribute them. She was great, and we got half-decent pictures. Still not ideal, though, and I think the results for those questions will be weak. Not the best test conditions.

And then they finished the test in about an hour--and they still had another whole hour. They were really starting to get antsy by the end of the two hours.

Finally, finally I could start grading. I put my head down for about four hours and cranked out some grades. Unfortunately, the spreadsheet that was programmed to calculate all the statistics was not set up yet--because they were still working out the details of the practical, which was changed yesterday, and which wouldn't actually count in the combined score for the NSA.  I made popcorn and drank apple cider until the spreadsheet was ready.

In a flurry of data entry, the numbers filled the page. And they were GOOD. Class average: 86%! One student passed for the first time all year. Only 5 students failed, and three of those were special ed. One special ed student passed (I knew she would). Only about a dozen students scored below 80%. One entire class had no failures. There were two 100's.

Tomorrow brings more detailed data analysis, but I did my happy dance today. I silent-excitement-ed my swelled head all the way home.