Still in Shrinkwrap - My First Class Session

My books are still in their shrink wrap.

My first class met today and I met my new teacher and saw my fellow students. Here's how it went.

I found Engineering 303 just north of Old Main on the University of Arizona Campus. As I approached the building from my office, it occurred to me that my dad might have taken classes in that building during the middle 1930s. When I entered the room, it further seemed as if he could have been in not only that classroom, but in the very desk.

The room had a whiteboard rather than a black chalkboard. It had an American flag mounted just over a copy of the U.S. Constitution. My desk seemed as if were bought on special from a high end thrift shop or a low end antique store. It was one of those desks with only half a surface. I've never figured out why they did that. It was wood and it must have lost its finish back in the 1950s when the rest of the world was moving to Formica surfaces. It wiggled nicely -- about two inches left to right and about one inch front to back, with squeaks.

As I entered the classroom (me - late 50s, white shirt, beard) Inoticed how the students looked at me and quickly announced that I was not the professor, just one of them. The "them" were (was?) a room full of 20 year olds, all 30 of whom seemed they'd rather be anywhere else. I imagine there are some bright enough kids in the class, but they did not look like Arizona's "world class" University's most shining stars. On the other hand, I was in there with them, all of us hoping to get through a class that we all should have mastered during out sophomore years in high school.

Four p.m. and the teacher hadn't showed up. What to do? At about five after four I decided to call the Pima College Math Department and ask, "What's up?" I asked a young man who was playing on his MacBook to try to find that phone number for me. He couldn't. I called April at the Journalism Dept. office. She gave it to me instantly. I called but after several minutes on the phone, a tall, youngish (early 30s?) man in a blue tee-shirt, blue shorts, and black low-top tennis shoes walked in. 4:10 p.m. This was obviously not the retired physics professor from Montana who I had expected.

The teacher spent a couple of minutes getting a feel for the class. How many of the of us had textbooks? About seven. He offered to scan some of the pages and put them online until folks bought their books. One girl wanted to add the class. Another couldn't figure out which section she was in. Was it this one? The prof didn't have a class roster. He didn't yet have a syllabus. He was polite. "I wish I could help you."

There would be no homework assigned. A sigh of relief from some members of the class. There would be in-class quizzes and a couple of exams. The questions on the exams would be just like the ones used during the review section. O.K.

Turning to actual material the prof explained that the first section is about translating English expressions into numerical expressions. Cool. I'd like to know how to do that. As an aside, he also said that in physics sometimes, people purposely "obfuscate the English."

Now, for some examples. No, not yet. When the teacher reached for a marker, there weren't any. After asking the class if that was normal, he headed out in search of some in other classrooms. He came back to report that there weren't any.

Some student comments as he returned empty-handed:

"Let's call it a day."
"Let's get to know each other."
"You really don't have a roster?"
"Just assign some things in the book we don't have."

Hang tight, he'd try again to find a marker for the white board.

While he was out, three students slipped out the door.

This time, success. Black erasable marker in hand, our professor headed for the board.

He flipped to the beginning of the book and picked out a couple of confidence building review examples. Our job was to write a numerical expression based on a phrase.

The first one: "Six less than a number." O.K., that would be x=n-6.

Should I break the seal on my book's shrink wrap and commit. Not yet.

The teacher offered some advice for us as we began to solve problems: "If you don't know where to start, try something anyway. Write something down."

I've said that same thing to my own journalism students about writing stories. I've done it myself. Start writing and see what comes out. I could relate. Cool.

Next example: "Sixty-five percent of a number." I can do this. .65x.

It occurred to me that I could also do that in 7th grade.

Miss Cronin, my seventh grade math teacher popped into my mind. She was my one and only good math teacher - ever. No telling how old she was. She seemed old but she might have been 42 or 38. She was tall, thin, unmarried, and dedicated to math. She bragged about how she had been a math major rather than an education major. And I learned more in her class about numbers than in any single class before or since, through my bachelors, MBA, and Ph.D. I was a whiz with a slide rule. I learned how to manipulate log tables. I figured out how high my model rockets could go using tangents. I imagine that if I had only one or two more teachers like her during high school, right now I'd be thinking about retiring from a career as an engineer rather than having had a career in editing, writing, photography, and broadcasting. I guess, in some ways I ought to be grateful to those awful math teachers I had. But at the same time, I'm glad I had Miss Cronin. Her math magic never left. I think of her and my wonderful high school English teachers when I wonder about how one person can and does make differences they will never know about.

Our prof spoke a little bit about the most elementary aspects of set theory. I wondered what the difference was between the number 6 and the set {6}. How can an integer be a set? And why aren't they equal to each other if they are the same number? He had a good answer but added, usefully, "It's sort of like having and defining rules. Like in a game. These are the rules we are going to play by." I was O.K. with that. The idea of inventing and working with and living within the rules of a defined universe seems attractive. At least it's a different world than the one I live in and might be fun to explore. I wondered whether you get to a point in math where rather than living in a black and white world, things become a zillion shades of grey again.

We moved through a few more examples and I couldn't believe how polite the students were. They were either respectful or comatose.

After about an hour the teacher looked around and said it's felt like it's been only five minutes for him at the front of the class talking and moving around, while acknowledging that it must feel like a whole longer for us sitting there listening.

At five he gave us a moment to stretch, get water, whatever.

I overheard one girl during the break say, "As long I get a good grade."

19 students came back for the second hour.

The prof talked a little about the concept of "absolute value." I knew that stuff. Good. One girl said she understood absolute value to be simply the distance from zero on the number line. Turns out, not exactly. Shades of grey already? That was interesting.

After class, he asked those of us who were left to sign in so he could check who was there against the roster when he gets it and he promised to have a syllabus on Wednesday. I wondered whether I'd open my book packet by then and begin working problems.

I was the last student to sign in. Then, I asked him is name.

"John."

"John who?"

"John Lapeyre."

The individual I was expecting was Gerald J. Lapeyre, the professor emeritus from Montana State.

I asked, "So, are you related to Professor Lapeyre from Montana?"

My new prof answered, "He's my dad."