|
|
A Visit from Satan By Lisa Beckham The class was Math
113. My professor had a name of
course, but he preferred to be called “Oh Captain, My Captain.” I think the rest of the class referred to
him, at least in their prayers, as Satan.
Sure, upon first glance he did not look like Satan. But does anyone really know what Satan
looks like? As of my first
semester in college, I do. His height
is intimidating. He has gray and white
hair; dark, thick eyebrows like all the “evil” people in silent movies; and
he carries his books and papers in a yellow bag from Kennedy’s
Bookstore. His sense of style is as
exciting as one might expect from a man with a doctorate in mathematics. He wears khakis and some sort of a blue
button-up shirt. But of course his
khakis expect “high-water” and show off his dingy tennis shoes. Having one’s own style
is not a crime, nor does it classify someone as Satan, but making me twitch
every time I hear the word “calculus” is.
In high school, I took AP Calculus and got an “A”; I lived for long,
complicated calculations. My teacher
said I would be able to sleep through Calculus I. I took him literally and signed up for the
class at Well, it didn’t
exactly go as I planned. There was absolutely
no sleeping involved. I began the
semester by doing all the homework assigned, even the suggested problems that
most people forget exist. I felt confident
that I would get an “A” on the first test.
It was worth 100 points, but there were 120 points possible. Surely a student with previous calculus
experience could pull off an “A.”
Besides I had a 4.2 GPA in high school and consider myself an expert at
test taking. My dedication to the
homework problems must have left me sleep deprived, because when test time
came I could only mange an eighty-four.
He actually expected us to be able to prove theorems on the test. I had never had to do that before and had
no idea how to go about it. It was a
miracle that I got an eighty-four.
According to him, “anyone can work out problems, but proving your
answers is what makes them right.” How often as an
engineer, I asked myself, is my employer going to ask me to prove the
fundamental theorem of calculus?
Nobody will care how I get my answers.
I’ll be paid to know how to solve problems, not to prove how I arrived
at the solution. I was already in the class, so complaining
wasn’t really going to help. I also assumed
that if I continued with the same work ethic, I would at least get “B’s” or
even possibly “A’s” on the tests. Boy was I wrong. Exam II, I got a fifty-six percent. But I
must have had a lucky pencil with me; I had a friend who got a five and others
took the test and got zeroes. How
could Satan do this to us? He expected
us to be able to think! I had no
problem doing that during class or on homework. But relying on my thinking skills during a
test was unimaginable. Having to
think of how to prove a theorem is unreliable. There is no set way of doing it, and if you
can’t think of how to do it, you’re screwed. Eventually, I had to
face facts. As an engineer, it will be
my daily task to use my thinking skills to solve problems. They may not be calculus
problems, but there is a good chance I’ll have to solve problems. Upon this recognition, I managed to pull a
“B” out of the class. I’ve never been
so proud of one grade in my entire life.
I realized, that all my upper-level classes in high school meant
nothing if I couldn’t learn to think.
I was taught thousands of facts, but they failed to teach me to
interpret what I was taught. Satan may have been my best teacher yet. |
|