Everything is finished!  The students have all had their final one-on-one interviews with me, and all the grades have been posted, the absences entered into the university system, and my semester portfolio turned in.  The students have two weeks to contest their grades.  Two weeks?  Yes, in Korea, a tiny country where almost every house has high speed internet access they still give students two weeks to contest their grades.  Usually, if they want to contest what they got, they'll do it right away.  So far no one has ... oh wait.  One student wrote me this email:


Hello!

Last semester I'm happy to listen your lecture.

I enjoyed talking with you and many students.

However, I saw my conversation grade yesterday.

I thought that my grade is a little low.

And I heard that in absolute evalutation many students get good grade.

Is everything left to your own discretion?

Why did I got grade B+? 

Please tell me~ㅠ_ㅠ

Would you upgrade my score?

I really need your consideration!

If I get A0 , I can take classes more. It is school rugulation.

The reason is that I complete a course in teacher education.

It means that I have two major subject.

I have to take lesson more than other people.

I need to take three required subjects next semester.

If I give grades 4.0 , I can do it.

But I can't do it. I got B+, so I lack point a little.

Please consider it again~^,^

My guiding criterion in that class was how much they talked.  It's a conversation course after all, and the more they talked, the higher their grade.  This young lady didn't talk even enough for a B+, but I was generous.  Now, I can guarantee that if I don't up her grade to A, there will be repercussions that could eventually result in my contract not being renewed,  That's how they do it here.  Korea is not known for its high academic standards, and every semester we have to decide whether our academic integrity is more important than our jobs.  I have learned from several mistakes that the job is more important.  It's their country; they set the standards.  They threaten us all the time not to renew our contracts unless we do as they say, and happy students mean they will stay at our school and therefore mommy and daddy's money will stay here as well.  Follow the money.  That's where "education" is these days.

The one that needed to be said

Nobody in my family will come and get me at the Detroit airport when I fly in from Korea. So, I had to make a car rental reservation to drive to my hometown of West Branch. The closest place to my hometown where I can return the car is a small airport 50 miles away. Even at that short distance, a mere 50 miles, an hour's trip (after my 6,700 miles and 13 hours to get there from Korea), nobody wants to go that far on "the fourth of July weekend" to drive me back after returning the car. They're afraid of the horrible traffic, even though the weekend doesn't start until Friday evening and the car return is Friday morning. Here is what I wrote to my family, then deleted and didn't send. However, I needed to get this off my chest:


The entire state of Michigan has a population that is one third the population of Seoul, South Korea, a single city. You do not have traffic, trust me. If everyone in Michigan decided to go to one place all at the same time, you still wouldn't have traffic.

I'm sick of it. I'm sick of my own family believing that me traveling literally halfway across the planet to see them is easy, cheap and stress-free. It isn't. There is not a one of you I wouldn't go meet at any airport, literally any, or risk life and limb to pick up even if you had only gone a few miles to get there. I could never allow anyone I love to be stranded anywhere for any length of time if I had the means to prevent it.

I know my value to my family, I have known it for years, but I persist in visiting you all anyway because you are dear to my heart even though I am of little account to you. When you're gone, any of you, I will be beside myself with grief. On the other hand, if I were to die tomorrow I can guarantee that not a single one of you would bother to come and collect the things that were special to my life or see where I lived or show any interest in my accomplishments. So enjoy this visit; it is the last I will make. There are places I would like to see, but I haven't, because I thought visiting you was more important. No more. I will see the places I want from now on, and if you want to see me, you'll do the traveling, you'll spend the money, you'll take on the stress.

Love,

Mike