Bubbleheads

There was a time in my career, before I transferred from Seneca to Manual, that I affectionately and, to a degree teasingly derisively, called my Advanced Program student bubbleheads.  If I remember correctly, there was no protest.  So I decided to do the same thing the next day with the same result.  As it turned out, they liked the tag and wore it like a badge of honor. That habit continued until 1987 when I transfered and died there. 

I asked a girl why no one reacted to the term and she said it was because it was me.  No one ever thought that it was said with anything but endearment.  Hmmm.  I probable teased the AP kids more than others.  They seemed to be more secure than others and were not threatened very much by my banter, which is exactly how I liked it.  

I will say one thing for bubbleheads, however.  They cheated more than any other group of students I ever taught.  I'm not exactly sure why but it may have something to do with the high expectations of parents, teachers and administrators.  Even friends got caught up in it.  Many of these kids were fighting and scrapping for scholarship money to college, they took every step they could, took every test possible such as PSAT,  AP tests, signing up for Governor's scholar positions, etc. that have possible scholarship money attached.  

My son Jeff got two full scholarships to U of Louisville because he was a Governor's scholar and a PSAT semi-finalist.  Fortunately GPA didn't count for this. Jeff was always around 3.0 just enough to stay in the AP program.  One of the smartest kids I have known. Both of my sons went to college on scholarships.  Both were on their respective high schools quick recall teams along with other highly motivated, and fiercely competitive kids.  My son, Brian, was the captain of his team at Male and a member of a very good Murray State University team.

All this competitiveness brought with it the desire to succeed at all cost and I think it included cheating.  Being caught, however had some serious consequences.  In my class, cheaters received a zero on the test and an "F" in conduct for the grading period, their parents got a phone call.  The students worried very little about the conduct grade because it did not affect their GPA.  Some parents made it important, however, and thus there was some stigma attached.

Even a cheating incident brought me to respect a kid very much.  One of my present Fb friends eventually told me a story that I did not remember at all.  He missed a day and consequently missed a quiz, which he could make up.  I told him that I would give it to him the next day.  He got with his cheating group and they furnished him with the correct multiple choice answers, sans the questions.  The young man took the quiz the next day and got a ten percent.  He realized then that I had changed the quiz.  I confronted him and said that I knew he had cheated and offered to give him another make-up the next day.  He held to his guns that he had not cheated because he did not want to lose my respect for him.  So I said OK and he got the bad grade.  He told me that it totally change his feelings on cheating and he never cheated again and actually lost a couple of friends because he would not abet in cheating.  You just never know what effect you have on people.  I wonder, sometimes, how many children I affected negatively.  I hope, not many.