A few weeks before exams—Friday morning blues on the 3rd floor

Grades are the Be-All and End-All of the Turkish educational system. That and the Ö.S.S., the university entrance exam (but that’s another story). Actually, I find the grading system here both unfair and enabling. Hence, my rant:
First of all, 45% is a passing grade in Turkey (in the U.S. it’s 60%). Here’s the curve:

• 85 to 100%  is a 5, the top grade (no pluses or minuses, thank you)
• 70 to 84% is a 4
• 55 to 69% is a 3 (considered average)
• 45 to 54% is a 2 (still passing, but unimpressive)
• 25 to 44% is a 1, not passing
• 0 to 24% is a 0, a dismal failure

Each student has 1-3 oral grades (usually class work) and 2-3 written grades (exams) for each class in a semester, depending on how many times the class meets per week. The system for oral grades is determined individually by each teacher, while the written grades come from uniform common exams. For example, we have about 10 or 11 sections in each grade, and all those sections take exactly the same exams for each course they take. That’s to keep things equitable.

The kids arrived bleary-eyed today after a week of late nights studying.

The other thing we do to make grading fair is moderation—sometimes a struggle. Everyone on the English team grades the same 2 or 3 exams according to the rubric, then we compare the grades we gave. Next we discuss differences and figure out how to adapt our grading to an agreed-on norm. It’s hard. After hours of grading our own students’ papers, we have other teachers re-grade (moderate) some of them, particularly the highest and lowest ones. It’s VERY time-consuming, but it’s important in this culture where parents sue the school over grades. Really.

Few studied this morning, though other days they were more focused.

At least a few of the girls studied…

…as did a few in room 304.

Now, imagine a teacher who feels philosophically opposed to grading in the first place, and plunk her in a situation like this where life is all about grades. I’ve had to rethink my approach to education and move from my preferred  +, √, —  “evaluation system” and go back to a traditional 100-point system. ARAUGHH!!!!
Oh—but there’s MORE!

My own juniors (in another testing room), focused as usual (that’s Nisan waving.)

In the end, the student who squeaks out a low 4 with 70% gets the very same 4 as the student who earned 84%, fourteen percentage points higher. Enter: THE BEGGARS. Yes, folks. We have them. They’re well-intentioned, of course. “Oh, it was so close, can’t you just give me/him/her a few more points?” Grades are so important here that parents get into the act along with their kids. Not only is final exam time stressful, but it sets off a barrage of BEGGING! PLEADING! BARGAINING! (Gosh—I haven’t been offered a bribe yet. Hmmm…)

Hard at work on the history exam–one more to go!

Think that’s enough? Well, there’s even more, my friends. It’s the way the grades are averaged. Within a semester, grade percentages are averaged together to find a numeric percentage, which determines the semester grade. BUT—the two semester grades are averaged in a new and enabling way. If you get the same final grade both semesters, that’s all well and good. A 3 and a 3 average out to a 3. If you do better one term, though, the top grade rules. For instance, a 3 and a 2 make—not 2.5, but 3! (Remember, no pluses or minuses.) So, for instance, a student who finishes the first semester with a low 3 (55%) and does a bit of slacking off the second semester and barely squeaks out a 2 (45%) should have an average of 50%. Right? Well, that 50 magically becomes not a 2 (which it should be) but a 3, just the same as the student who earned 69% both terms for an overall average of 69%, a high 3. There’s nearly a 20% difference over the year for the same grade. Hmmm… Something’s wrong. It just doesn’t seem fair.

Saffet takes every exam seriously. He wants 5’s, and usually gets them.

I figured out that a student who fails with a low 1 first term (25%) and a low 2 the second term (45%) ends up with a passing grade of 2—with a mere 35%, ten percent below the (already low) passing grade of 45%. Such a deal for the low achiever!
And there’s MORE, my friends. If, after a dismal year a student is unhappy with his or her grade, there’s the option of taking a grade-changing exam during the summer. These exams are difficult, but for the intelligent but lazy student, they’re a godsend. I don’t even want to KNOW more about them.

They’re all focused—except Yunus. No surprise.

Zeynep just asked me, “Are you writing about grades in Turkey or grades at Koç?”
“Aren’t they the same?” I wondered.
“I think it’s worse at Koç,” she said. “There’s more pressure here.”
Point taken. Poor kids… No wonder they dragged themselves to school this morning with bleary eyes and collapsed into their desks. Six days of this would undo anyone.
If I sound biased, I am. I hate grades, and it breaks my heart that they’re so important in this country. I also hate it that the system is so unfair yet at the same time so enabling.
The flip side is that it’s been a joy to teach these kids. I love them, and somehow we slog through the grading mire together. We get through it, and my hope is that they learn something in the process.
I always thought education was more about learning anyway. Did I miss something?

I arrived on Red Nose Day, a huge charity fund-raising day in England. Everywhere you turned, someone was sporting a clown nose. I even spotted a few on Saturday—the day after. This year Red Nose antics raised a total of nearly 58 million pounds—about 82 million dollars. Now THAT’S IMPRESSIVE!!!!

A few red noses on Saturday

Friday night three friends and I met in at the Victoria Theater for Billy Elliot, a truly powerful musical. Set with the backdrop of Britain’s year-long miner’s union strike of 1984, young Billy Elliot traded his boxing lessons for ballet class. His father, already stressed by the strike, nearly blew a gasket when he found out. Elton John’s music evokes feelings from elation to angst to anguish as the story progresses. I doubt there was a dry eye among us as we stepped outside after the show, still shaking our heads in wonder at this gifted young dancer (about 11 years old) and the rest of Billy Elliot’s amazing cast. A GREAT start for my theater weekend.

http://www.workingtitlefilms.com/featurePhoto.php?featureID=18

Saturday my friend Larry and I wandered Covent Garden most of the day— loverly. (It IS where Liza Doolittle sold flowers in My Fair Lady.) Unlike the bevy of flower and vegetable vendors it once was, Covent Garden is now a tourist spot. It still features an open market, but vendors now offer clothing, jewelry, and gift-type items. Pretty intriguing ones, at that. There are also shops, cafes, and restaurants to suit any taste
My favorite thing about Covent Garden, though, is the buskers. Musicians, jugglers, mimes, and you-name-it draw crowds of onlookers to every cobbled street and lane.

I’m not sure who’s the better actor!

one of many buskers—the man in the red derby

a knife juggler in a green beret—on an 8-foot tall unicycle!

A Chinese man plays the Sheng, a precursor to the pipe organ and the bagpipes.

We watched string quintets (very talented) who performed stunning acrobatics as they played without ever missing a note. A brilliant tenor entertained his extensive audience by removing a woman’s boots and donning them himself as he sang an aria from Carmen. Then he wrapped another woman’s scarf around his neck. Go figure! He was sheer delight, and the women he “stole” from were both charmed and charming with him.

a multi-talented chamber quartet performs acrobatics

a music aficionado among the masses

the tenorial robber

The tenor sings his final notes—a virtuoso!

After a pub lunch, Deidre, Larry and I trekked to the Noel Coward Theater, where we had box seats for Avenue Q, an x-rated version of Sesame Street. It’s about Princeton, a recent university graduate with no money who is trying to “find” himself. I blushed for the few children in the audience, as the music was more than risqué. In fact, the songs were hilarious. Just imagine puppets and their actor counterparts singing “It Sucks To Be Me,”  “Everyone’s A Little Bit Racist,” and “The Internet Is For Porn”, a spirited dispute between the sweet little monster named Kate and the more earthy internet-surfing Trekky Monster. Need I say more? If you have a chance (and you’re not a prude), be sure to add this play to your list.

You can tell  it’s not a children’s production…

<http://nationaltheatre.org/mainstage/avenueq.htm>

We wanted to catch dinner afterward, but as you may know, England isn’t renowned for its cuisine. Pub lunches are usually good, while the best evening option is ethnic food. We went to an Indian restaurant, the Govinda, where we had a delectably spicy vegetarian meal—cheap (at least for London). The  Govinda is a Hari Krishna restaurant, replete with interesting characters. Later that evening we encountered them again on their evening processions, singing and dancing their way through the streets of Soho.

Truly London—the signpost and the phone booth

I was so, so impressed with this solar-powered parking meter.

…and in Hyde Park, “a host of golden daffodils.” (Thanks, W.W.)

Sunday morning I was on my own, so I walked Hyde Park in the early morning sunsine. It was great to just walk, walk, walk. The daffodils were “nodding and dancing in the breeze” while the Bobbies were cruised the walkways, ever on the alert. After a long walk to Victoria Station, I found it hard to hop on the bus for the airport. Oh, well. All good things must end, eh? I seriously think I’ll plan one more trek to London. Want to join me?