Only a semi-colon...

“There is no real ending. It’s just the place

where you stop [pause] the story…”

- Frank Herbert:

fiction writer of Dune

The semester finishes a week from Monday. By then, the two sections of anatomy and physiology I teach will be over. Like ‘striking the set’ after a play, the intimacy I have felt with the forty-five souls with whom I have spent nearly ninety hours will come to an abrupt end. I have begun to feel a little empty-nesting melancholy.

The beginning…

The classroom was empty and dark. I got in early, turned on the lights, and looked around. Heraclitus might have been right when he said, "No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river, and he's not the same man.”

No doubt, I was not the same man, nor were my students going to be the same students. As a metaphor, Heraclitus hit the nail on the head!

The classroom, however, had changed, not at all. Huge anatomical wallpaper posters still hung from sliding tracks on the walls, like anonymous artists’ works…heart, immune system, lungs, livers, kidneys, and more.

Seven black four-seat lab tables occupied the room in the familiar configuration – two in the front, three in the middle, and two in the back. New blue high-backed plastic barstools had been added since the summer.  

In the front was a computer table from which I would lecture. Behind me, the same three whiteboards, aligned in a row, colored markers at the ready. Long gone the days of blackboards and chalk. Gone also lecture handouts. Now it’s all computer slides posted ‘in the cloud’ for students to download before class…which by the way, most do not.

I took my place behind the lecture desk, looked around, closed my eyes, and took a deep breath trying to take in the ambiance. Not so easy in an empty and sterile lecture lab.

Soon, children, soon.

Within a few minutes, the door opened, and with a rush of fresh air, the room started to take on life. As the desks began to fill, students looked around at the place, attempting to gauge the unusual nature of a classroom used for lecture and lab experiments.

For some of these young students, I’m the fellow who stands between them and the grade they need or desire. Frequently, it’s not about the content but simply another step in their academic journey – another box to tick off the list. 

It is not uncommon for students who have taken a course to share with one another details regarding the material and the instructor.  Since I have only taught a year, I’m still an unknown quantity. “Who is this instructor?” “What will be the workload” “How does he grade?” “What will he expect?”

After introductions and a review of the guidelines for the coming semester (e.g., syllabus review, rules for dissection labs, and general classroom decorum), they are given a pre-course quiz briefly covering all of the material they will be taught during the semester. As might be expected, they do very poorly. They are pleased to hear it is a no credit quiz and will be repeated at the end of the semester. They will be surprised by how much they have learned.

 With that, we shove away from the dock and begin the voyage, uncertain as to its success.

This is now…

We have shared similar space for sixteen weeks, resulting in many face-to-face contact hours. Within the first two weeks, I have their names and greet them individually as they enter the classroom. Names are important symbols in our culture. When a person is called by their name, it is a reinforcement of their worth. Subtle but powerful. Think about how you feel when a person uses your name.

As the semester progresses, I get to know them not just as students occupying seats, but as people. After four months, I know something personal about every one of them and come to see them as part of an extended family.

As in every course, not everyone captures the wonder that is the human body. I would not expect that. Yet even the students who do not do well, get a sense of how intricately and delicately we are put together. I try to remind them of the interactive complexity that goes unnoticed during their day-to-day lives…lungs breathing, heart beating, immune systems fighting disease, muscles, and bones working for movement, and so much more…directed for the sole purpose of supporting life. It is a lot of very complicated work designed for one purpose – to carry our minds around permitting the opportunity to acquire knowledge and understanding.

There are a small number of students who do see the course as not just another class in their academic journey. In the process of the semester, noticeable light bulbs flash in their minds. No epiphanies, but a gradual realization that human physiology is a wonder of the universe.

The semester finishes a week from Monday. All things come to an end, even good things. BUT, a couple of weeks ago, I got an assignment for next semester. And while this term is ending, I will have the opportunity to fall in love once again.

- ted