As professors, we receive evaluations from our students at the end of each semester. Some evaluations are glowing, some are critical, and once in awhile they sound a little bit like this, “You gave us so much work in this class that my girlfriend dumped me because I was not spending any time with her. If I ever see you on the street, I am going to kick your a**!”
That was not an evaluation I received, rather it was received by my favorite professor of all time, Charlie.
Back in the spring of 2001, I was working on my Master’s in Business Taxation degree (sexy, I know) from the University of Minnesota. I enrolled in Charlie’s course and two weeks before it began, I received a thick packet in the mail from him. It contained a bunch of pre-reading, a couple lengthy case study assignments, and a letter. In the letter, Charlie told his prospective students that the course would be a tremendous amount of work, and if we didn’t have time to invest in the course now, we should take it later. Facing a busy time at work, I promptly dropped the course.
Unfortunately (or so I thought at the time), this was a required course, so I enrolled again in the spring of 2003 and received the same darn packet and warning letter. I put a half-hearted effort into the pre-reading and case studies.
I met Charlie at 9:02 on a Saturday morning. Class started at 9, but I couldn’t be bothered to show up on time, especially as I did not sign up for a Saturday morning course. It was supposed to meet on Wednesday evenings, but we had to switch the first day to Saturday morning to accommodate Charlie’s schedule (I later learned the conflict arose as the University asked him as a top professor to fly to Austria to teach a course at a partner-university there).
The open seats were on the far side of the room, so I sauntered through the front to claim my spot. Charlie was going through the first day monotony of reviewing the syllabus, so I joined many other students in daydreaming. I quickly woke up when Charlie said, “I’ll start class promptly at 5:30 every day, and I understand that sometimes you may be late. If that is the case please just be respectful and walk through the back of the room to avoid disrupting the class.” Message delivered, point taken.
As class progressed that first day, my attitude toward Charlie warmed as I noticed his intelligence, passion, quick-wit, and engaging teaching style. Then I was quickly humbled when it came time to review our case studies, and I found out I hadn’t even made a half-hearted attempt at the case studies, I quarter-hearted it at best. He was very quick to tell students when their logic was incomplete but praised students who had really prepared for class.
At the start of the next class (which I showed up to on time, sitting front and center), Charlie gave his 50 students back detailed grades on our day one case studies and my scores were weak. I had put forth a much stronger effort on day two’s case studies but again found that I needed to do even more, as reflected in my errors during class discussion and in the grades I received. I began to realize that I was not thinking critically enough.
As the class periods ticked by, I found my performance, critical thinking, and learning greatly increasing in the course. It reached the point where I was putting forth a very strong effort, receiving A’s on all my work, but still never nailing the assignments. I absolutely loved being able to earn high marks and make strong contributions to discussion, while still learning an immense amount during class. It kind of became a game for me, knowing that I wouldn’t be able to achieve the correct answer, but testing myself to see how close I could come.
In my eight years of teaching, I have taught about 1,700 individual class periods. In that time, I feel I have had one perfect class period, back in the fall of 2008. In advance of that class, I had students work very hard on a case study which would be graded. We then spent the entire class period discussing the solution to the case study. The students who worked the hardest and who thought the most critically were able to make strong contributions to class discussion and received A’s. However, the case study was so complex that they were not able to achieve the correct answer and they still learned a considerable amount during the class.
I also recall a class period when Charlie introduced us to a difficult problem and very quickly (much too quickly it seemed at the time) showed us how to reach the solution. At the end of class, he handed us the final solution, but not the steps on how to reach it. Figuring out the steps would be critical in performing well on our final project. I remember working for several hours over the following days trying to figure out how to reach Charlie’s solution. When I finally nailed it, I was elated, and he praised the way I incorporated those steps into the final project.
These steps are probably the most important technical skills I use to this day in my consulting practice. But, here is the kicker. Had Charlie simply given us the steps to the solution, it would have saved me a few hours at the time. However, I would not have learned that skill in the same way and would not be able to differentiate my consulting practice the way that I do.
In short, Charlie made me work harder and think more critically than I ever thought I could, and when I did , he rewarded me. No, the “A” I received in his class was not my reward, the skills I learned and confidence I gained were.
Yesterday, I met Charlie for a long lunch (it was probably the longest lunch I have ever had that did not involve frosty beverages). I had not seen him in nine years and it was the first time I really chatted with him. It took a little bit to get over the awe of being in the presence of my favorite professor, but once I did, it was fantastic to connect as peers.
Thanks, Charlie.
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