the signature incident

I had a small conflict with one of my nursing instructors a while back, and I've been obsessing over it ever since. I don't why I didn't think to just blog about it!

A Monday or two back, I went in to see my Nur356 Professional Concepts instructor about a test we had taken recently. My grade was, I thought, quite low considering that she had said she would give us bonus points for attending a certain out-of-class lecture. When she was looking at my grade, she said, "Oh, I know. You must be the signature I couldn't read [on the sign-in sheet for the lecture]." She proceeded to produce the sign-in sheet and said something along the lines of "really, that signature isn't legible," in the tone of "your signature isn't acceptable."

Now, you have to understand that we have a daily class sign-in sheet that has all of our names printed next to the place where we sign our signatures. So, all that was required was for her to look at a sign-in sheet and match my signature on it to the one on the sign-in. And that's assuming that my signature really is illegible, which is an exaggeration. So, in essence, she chose not to read my signature, even though she had promised points on a test.

Why? Although not illegible, it is not an exaggeration to say that my signature is large and distinctive. Essentially, she decided that my signature did not represent the type of cowed and broken student she prefers to have in her classes.

Aside from the bold-facedly unethical removal of points from my test, I am aghast at the attitude completely inappropriate for a university setting. The type of person she wants for her program is completely opposite the type of person that instructors should be trying to cultivate, and you don't critique someone's signature anyhow. Honestly! If she wants to teach elementary school, she should leave academia!