Important News?

Not my credit card, but it is the correct bank.

I was working through my bills this morning where I noticed sitting on page 2 all by itself a section titled “Important News.”

Here is the “Important News”:

“Get movies delivered 2 ways and earn up to 3,000 miles when you become a paying member of Netflix.  Instantly watch TV episodes & Movies Streamed from Netflix right t your TV via a Netflix ready device…”

It goes on like that for two more paragraphs.

Important news indeed!  An advertisement masquerading as a terms of service change?  *shrugs*

Stuff like this cheapens the English language and supports my cynical nature in anything a business communicates to me.  I wish they would only call it important if it truly is.  I’m so glad I no longer work in advertising.

Tire Woes

Not my tire

I was performing some maintenance on my car yesterday (oil change and tire rotation) and discovered a nail in one of my tires.  It could have been there since October (last tire rotation) so it was there for anywhere from 0 to 5000 miles.

I wanted to get it fixed today but could not find a shop open on Sunday.  *ugh*  Fortunately, I’m not on car pool duty tomorrow.

Perhaps I’ll have better luck Tuesday?

Please send eye bleach and mental floss

Today I lived the nightmare of gay men everywhere.  I spent most of today taking my incontinent 95-year old female patient to the toilet.  This included multiple sightings of her kitty, and making sure it stayed clean.

I hope I get some extra credit from the sky-being for this…

The subject is A…

…But the test is on B.

That’s what happened tonight.  We were told that we were having a final exam on Anatomy and Physiology, so I studied for that.  Instead we got a 100-question multiple-choice test that was all theory.  It was all “Patient ‘A’ came in exhibiting symptoms ‘X’ and ‘Y’, the nurse knows that this means…”  No diagrams, no “explain the flow of blood through the heart”, no questions that were actual Anatomy and Physiology questions.  I suppose that they all have something to do with anatomy and physiology since that is the study of the body and structures.

Naturally, since the test we were given was not on *any* subject matter I studied as I studied the relevant chapters and material (and indeed some of the questions again were on material we did not cover in this section), I failed the test.  Well, I got 70% but failure is anything below 75% for this course.

It would certainly be helpful if I was given a test on the actual subject matter and not a complete theory test.

I’m just a tiny bit pissed about this one.

In other news, I managed to pass the course with an 86%.  I have no idea how since nothing has been consistent anywhere with what we’ve been doing.

Tomorrow I get to go deal with my patient.  A 96 year old cancer patient with dementia that is convinced anyone that comes in their room is stealing from them.  I suppose the good news is that anything the patient throws at me probably won’t be traveling at a high velocity when it hits me.

If you’ve seen my life…

…please tell it to come home.  I used to have one, but lately I’ve found that the really nice one I had before, the one where I had lots of free time, has been secretly replaced with one where I have zero free time.

So if you’ve seen my former life, tell it I’d like it to come visit.  Soon!

In other news… I have a free week the first week of May.  I’d like to take a short trip, preferably in the western US, outside of California but inside the Mountain or Pacific time zones.  Do any of you have a suggestion for something that I could do with a time limit of 4 or 5 days?  I’m also considering southwestern Canada, since I’ve not been.

Lack of Consistency

I should change the name of the blog to Adventures in School with all the entries I’m making about it lately.  I guess it’s o.k. though, it is what is going on in my life right now.

Last Friday we took a test, and we had a curious issue pop up.  The person grading the tests is being hugely inconsistent.  We’re being asked questions about items that are not showing up until later chapters, one group of students are marked incorrect on an answer and another group of students receives positive credit for the same question.  IE a multiple-choice question that the answer is “A” a group of 10 students mark “A” and 5 get it right and 5 get it wrong.

To which I say, “WTF?!?!?”

We are also receiving questions that do not give enough information to formulate what is the correct response.  Then there are two possible right answers.  It’s a case where we need to flip a coin and hope for the best.  The specific question was, “You are moving a client in their wheelchair towards a curb, what way do you tilt the wheels to move safely over the curb?”

Well, there is a huge, important piece of information missing, specifically how am I approaching the curb?  Am I going down it or up it?  Both appropriate answers were provided, and I picked the “wrong” one.

I’m getting frustrated.  I’m expected to read and retain the information and when I do, I get marked wrong for correct answers.

My feeling is with what I’m paying for this course that:

1. The people grading the tests need to be consistent.  If one student gets credit for an answer and another does not for providing THE SAME ANSWER, that’s a problem.  Either all the answers in that case are wrong or they are correct.

2. The questions need to contain enough information so that if there are two possible right answers for a scenario, we have enough information to determine which one is correct.  There was no case where there was a more correct answer, both possible answers were equally correct given the information provided.

The last test the grading errors cost me 6 percent of the grade.  I received an 88 and I should have been given a 94.  For me this isn’t such a problem on the class that I’m passing.   However the one I’m barely passing, if it has the same issues, that 6 percent could be a huge issue.  It could be the difference between a pass and fail.

I’m not sure how I’ll address this.  Perhaps with the program director privately first, and if nothing is done perhaps shame them in front of the class?

I think most of the issue is that they are using old test materials from a previous edition of the textbook.  Still, that doesn’t account for the inconsistent grading where two students are being marked differently for the same answers.  I’ve been a teaching assistant in the past, and I know this type of thing is unacceptable.  The expectations are high for both students and instructors, as they should be.  Students are expected to do the homework and reading, and instructors should be providing honest and accurate testing.  I feel like I’m covering my part but the instructors are not.  *ugh*

A puzzle indeed.

Polly Pass A Cracker?

Yup, another post about the class parrot.

I sit about mid-way back in the class of about 30 students.  Last night my carpool buddy that sits in the back row noticed the class parrot passing notes to her friends during a test.  A closed book test.  Tests I’m struggling with and barely passing.

Grrr…

I don’t like to make stereotypes, but it just pisses me off that we have this group of students seemingly cheating on the tests.  They are all of east Indian descent and are “sticking” together.  Speaking their native language in the class, etc.  I won’t go into what I think about the language issue since this is a place I take a significant departure from my other liberal friends, however, I do take exception to coming by my grades honestly and then hearing about or seeing people cheating on exams.

That is grounds for removal from the course for both the person giving and receiving the test information, according to the information we received at the beginning of the course.  Sadly, since this is a private school, I’m sure they will find a way to keep these people in class so they can keep getting the money.

My advice to my carpool buddy that saw this was to note it, and keep an eye out for it again.  If he sees it again I told him he should go to the program director with it, along with the other people that witnessed the behavior.  He told me he is not the only one that saw this happen.

Anyone have thoughts about this?  I know Koko probably does.

School and the Student Parrot

I am officially finished with my first week of nursing school. I’m happy to report that thus far I’m averaging 93%, which is much better than I did when I was working on my degree several years ago.

I’ve run into an interesting situation in this class.

Since it’s been well over a decade since I last attended, I forgot about that phenomenon known as the student parrot.  Those of you in academia know this creature comes in many forms, but the one I’m talking about is that which decides the best way to get good grades is to be a parrot any time the instructor asks a question.  That is, the instructor asks a question and the parrot is so assertive that none of the other students can get a word in edgewise.

OK, I’m glad they are so smart and know everything in this simply large volume of information but could they please give someone else a chance to answer a question?  After all, the purpose of the lecture is for those students who are still acquiring information into their brain to be able to listen, ask and answer questions, and perhaps learn something.  Unfortunately, when the parrot speaks, one of the instructors focuses on them, and the class becomes an exchange between the instructor and the parrot.

That’s not the worst part about the parrot.  Nope, this parrot has the ability to do that wonder of science fiction called shape shifting.  That is it has the ability to change from one physical form to another.  Friday night the parrot turned into lead sled dog.  At the start of the class the bitch (dog, get it?) all on her own asked the instructor “Can we switch from having an hour for our meal break and make that 30-minutes instead…”  Perhaps not the specific words, but the gist is that she wanted to change the meal time for the rest of the 11-months we have from an hour to a half hour.

The instructor, without giving any of the rest of us who might feel differently a chance, immediately put it to a vote of the rest of the students in the class.  Well, what do you think happened?  Yup, we ended up with a 30-minute meal break.  A full one-third of us thought this was complete BS, but were not given a chance to present our case, mainly that extra half hour is being used for us to study, prepare our materials for class the following day, etc.  The question was asked and answered before we could raise an objection.

For me, the extra study time while at the classroom facility is important, as we are usually given a test at the end of the evening.  That extra 30-minutes to review the materials is crucial for us.  So why does the person who seeming eats the book and completely understands it get to determine that the rest of us are going to shorten the day so she can go home a half hour earlier?

I’m actually pretty peeved at this.  Should I take this up with the program director on Monday?  We have a situation where one student is starting to pull the rest of us around on a leash, and I think that is totally unacceptable.  Not only that, nursing *is not* a democracy.  I think it is more analogous of a military organization.  After all, the doctors write orders and we follow them.  We don’t get to sit around at the nurses station, take in the orders, then take a vote as to if we are going to modify or follow them as written.  That’s essentially what happened here.   One structure was presented, and now it changed by mob mentality.

This said, I’m glad the parrot is absorbing the material so well, but why should I have that extra time taken from me (and the other students who feel this way) because she wants to go home early?  I actually felt sucker-punched by this.

So I’ll ask if any of you have anything thoughts about how I should respond to this?  I can see this is going to keep happening if someone doesn’t say something about it, and soon.

School Starts

Today I start school.  It’s been 15 years since I was last in an educational program, so I am finding this quite challenging.  We got our first assignment some time ago, and I’ve been working through the first 8 chapters of the book, and it is taking me 2-hours for each chapter to get everything done.  I managed to complete the first day assignment.

Problem, I have 10 more chapters to complete before Friday.  I am in class 8-hours per day, which leaves me a small amount of time in the morning to prepare.  In other words, this week I will have at least 14-hour days devoted to school just to keep up.  *ack*

Of course, I’ve not yet been to class, so perhaps I’ll find another, simpler way to get through the material after we meet for the first time.  I hope so.  I’m finding it nearly impossible to get through the material in the time allotted.

In other news, I did get the microwave installed.  My mother now has one-third more counter space than she had before.  Sorry, I didn’t take a photo, and now that I do not live near the house, I probably won’t get one any time soon.  Still, I think she is happy with it and it works.

Some Light Home Remodeling

You would think that when I was done with the house in Conservative Hell, that I would have been done remodeling things.   Today I find myself working in my mothers kitchen.

Her house was built before microwaves were commonly used, so that meant that all her cabinets were designed without the use of a microwave in mind.  When an over the range microwave showed up for Christmas, it wasn’t a simple matter of taking the range hood down and replacing it with the microwave/vent/light combo.   Instead I found myself down in the workshop hacking 3-inches off the cabinet and reworking it so the microwave would sit over the stove at a height at a distance so that pots and pans could be used.

The cabinet when I started?  18-inches tall, when I finished, 15-inches.  That 3-inches makes a world of difference.  Instead of hanging below the base of the side cabinets 4 or 5-inches, it will now only hang below 1 or 2.

Much better.

I’ll take a photo when the microwave is finally on the wall.