Hugo Schwyzer

Originally published August 30, 2005. It’s appropriate again this week.

If there’s one thing I don’t like about the first week of classes, it’s the task of saying "no" over and over again. 

Like many community colleges, we have far more students than we have slots available in most of our classes. It’s a very rare course where I am able to accept everyone who shows up the first day trying to "crash" a class.  More often, as with the three classes I met today, I have wait lists of one or two dozen students.  I generally do lotteries for available seats, and ask all those not selected to leave.

I’d like to enroll everyone, of course, and be the "nice guy."  But if I did that, I’d be left with a classroom too tightly packed for anyone to move, and in serious violation of city and state fire and safety codes.  I’d also be overwhelmed with papers and tests and journals, and my grading load — with seven courses and no teaching assistants — is already immense.  So for reasons of both safety and sanity, I have had to get very good over the years at saying no.

Students beg and plead and, invariably, explain why it is that without this particular class, their entire academic career will be ruined permanently and the dreams of their parents dashed.  Some students get teary with frustration at the depressing process of huddling in doorways and squatting on floors and ingratiating themselves to be admitted to over-crowded classrooms.  A few try flirtation or flattery; on one or two occasions long ago, various bribes were rather openly proffered — and politely refused.

I know it’s no fun for the students to put themselves through this.  I honor them for doing it.   The smart ones continue to call and visit every day, hoping that some enrolled student has dropped and a space has been freed up.    Often, but not always, I am able to accommodate them, but I won’t do so if it means a dozen bodies on the floor and students barely able to breathe.

I find that saying "no" to a student who wants to get into a class is much harder than saying "no" to a student who has asked me to rethink a deservedly poor grade.  When I’ve assigned a low grade to sub-par work, I generally feel quite confident in my assessment of the student’s product.  But the way in which students get into classes seems so arbitrary (and unfair, as returning students get priority), that I have a hard time defending the system that leads to the composition of any particular class.

Two true lottery stories:  one year, I had about two dozen names on a list for my women’s studies course in which five spaces were available.  There were perhaps 17 women and 7 men trying to get into the class; by strange chance, all five of the slips of paper I drew had men’s names.  It was completely random, but as one of those women who wasn’t selected left, she muttered in disappointment, "God, even in a women’s studies class I’m f*cked over by men."  Lots of people heard her, and it set an awkward tone for the remainder of the morning!

Another year, I had three spaces available on a lottery list for a modern Europe class; one of the women on the list (of some fifteen hopefuls) was a very pretty, bubbly scantily-dressed blonde.   Her name was the first name that appeared — at random — when I pulled slips of paper out of a manila envelope.  After the class, two students who weren’t selected publicly accused me of rigging the lottery to pick the "hot girl", and they complained to the dean.  (Who laughed them out of her office; incidentally, the "hot girl" ended up one of the top students in that particular section.)

Sigh.  I’m not asking for pity, mind you; saying no and dealing with the justifiably frustrated and disappointed is part of the job description.  But it’s pretty damn near my least favorite part of what I do.

Sigh