Today, I Smile Genuinely

As you are all well aware, my excess time is spent tutoring (not mentoring, mind you) other students who need it or desire it. There are those that I encounter who are just plain lazy and desire nothing more than an immediate solution to their homework. One such student that I tutored was like this today, but actually, today really made me smile.

The student at first wanted help with his homework in a management course. Having fallen asleep in class, this student was what we college folks call, "S-O-L." Not only did he not want to complete his assignment, he also knew not how to even begin. Throw in a time crunch of a few hours for a project, and you have our situation.

We began by analyzing the homework assignment, step-by-step. Beginning with the quantitative problems, I began by pulling out a calculator and telling the student I could not remember anything. I lied. I then told him to remind me about what he recalled and to try to focus on that. So he tried. He failed a lot. Retracing his steps and glancing over the daunting material numerous times, he whined and made suppositions on the overall quality of the professor's teachings. I then pulled up a spreadsheet on the computer, ignoring him. Deciding that he needed to be nudged further, I began entering all of the numbers into the spreadsheet that was given in the problem. I knew that entering an entire table's worth of data would normally take him hours, so I challenged him with evil looks. When he saw how quickly and efficiently the data flowed on the spreadsheet, something in his eyes was piqued. The student's apathy dissolved into mild curiosity. Halfway through the data entries, he began fervently asking about everything; about the computer's capacity to integrate abstract thought with quantitative functions, to practical  usages of managerial principles.

By now, there were merely minutes left until his assignment was due and a plethora of problems left to complete. You know what though, the student took that opportunity to perform under pressure and it was systematic precision at its finest. Literally taking the keyboard away from me, he began computing solutions. His answers flowed so quickly and smoothly that he finished his work and even ended up having time to purchase a soda pop and run to the bathroom (not quite in that order, ironically)! After completion, he even presented pointers about I could have been better in my approach to the same set of problems. And he was right, his suggestions were that much better!

This student... his apathy... it seems to me that it took nothing more than a mild computer program and the Celtic Stare of Death. This is what a professor undoubtedly feels after seeing his or her student perform and exceed expectations. Was this the first tutoree to achieve this sort of task at this caliber? Actually, yes. Most other students I tutor become complacent with having the ability and knowledge to approach the same problem, but not zealously venture further. This is only conjecture, but I would venture to say that this student even had a thing or two to show the professor in class!

If you cannot tell, I was quite proud of this specifc student. It is not like a college student in this day and age to surpass his master, especially with ideas as complex as organizational design and theory. But you know what I learned, aside from better practical managerial applications? A handful of these experiences and a myriad of students like him, and the world will be theirs. If my students were like him, I know that they would definitely make me their leader, because is it not true that a leader should not be as good as his subordinates? After all, his subordinates should be in the position where they would excel the furthest.

Today, I smiled a genuine smile for the first time in a long time.