All in A Day's Work....

A meticulous freak.
Yep.That's what I am.
Is it wrong? Is it right? It's all in the eyes of the beholder. Just like what I share here. My unforgettable experience as an academic administrator.

I remember everything just like it happened yesterday. It was in 2003, 6 years ago (And why do I remember it after so long? Let's not forget that meticulous freaky fact,shall we? LOL).

Someone at the office asked me to meet him (Mr.S) in the library.Without any openings, Mr.S' words ran like water to my face as soon as we sat down. He talked about how I should stick to what I do, what my job description is and respect what others do. After a few seconds,I knew it was about authority. And of course, ego.

Giving him another batch of extra minutes he finally mentioned a name. Ms. N. He said Ms. N was angry at me because I interfered her work in releasing students' reports. When my mind was still thinking,'Why on earth didn't she call me herself?',

Mr. S kept on talking until he realised that I didn't hear any words he'd said (kasian yah).

'Hey,this is important. So important that I have to call you down here instead of your cubicle.' I just raised my eyebrows. Oh yes, I listen. I heard what he said. But the fact was at that time nothing mattered.

Nothing more mattered than revising the scores of the students who lacked just 1 correct number to pass (At that time 55 correct numbers would make a student get a 1, an automatic failed status.56 correct ones can give a slight chance for a student to pass.) Nothing more mattered than rechecking someone's work because he/she was too damn reckless and ignorant to see EACH and EVERY student's score and treat the students as people, not as numbers.

I didn't have any intention to meddle in someone's work, initially but when I accidentally found a student's name that deserved a 'help' and he still had the failed status and then found another name, and another, and another, that's when I started to collect all reports she'd done. And I found more than a dozen. More than a dozen students who could fail, who would have to pay another batch of payment, who had to stand the anger of their parents,or who had to live with shame because of the failure (I'm really not kidding or exaggerating. Some students who had failed came to me crying. Parents came to ask the reason why.)

Honestly I hadn't thought about the consequences of what I was about to do. I'd thought she wouldn't have found out. But she did, somehow. Oh,well.... Guess everything was meant to be found.

Anyhow, let's go back to that library situation. After a few tens of minutes of talking, Mr.S was finally tired. Perhaps he could also see how my facial expression didn't change much from the start. When he inhaled a while, I started to speak.
'I didn't regret what I did. If she continued what she's doing now, I'm afraid I will do the same thing in the future. Is it my fault that she missed some scores to pay attention to? She's a leader, she's supposed to act as a my role model, right?It's you job to mentor her. I know the quality of her work and I ain't gonna sit still watching her do this again. And by the way, why isn't she here? She asked you to call me down here?'

Mr. S didn't say a thing. His face turned red. I guessed he was a bit shock with what I said. Or perhaps how stubborn I am. It didn't matter. I honestly didn't care.

I then said to him, 'If there's nothing else to talk about, I'm gonna leave now.' He was quiet. I took off silently.