The East German Judge

The school held a speech competition. As English teachers, we were asked to write speech topics, but other than that, we were largely out of the loop. A couple of students came to ask me for some help, but mostly, I didn't know who was participating.

The English teachers had all been invited to be judges. Of course, by "invited" I mean "expected". Although I was coming down with a nasty cold, I knew there was no way I was getting out of this. Misery or no misery, I was in for the long haul.

Earlier in the day, a student came by to ask if I would give the oath for the judges. Yes, an oath. (On my honor, I swear to do my duty, to God and my country... wait, that's the Boy Scout code.) The students took the Olympic oath for competitors and judges and modified it slightly. (Everyone is all a little Olympics crazy around here, still.)

We were assigned seats in the front row of a lecture hall. The three English teachers (two A-Level and the one AP from downstairs) are all sitting in a row. Already the Eastern Bloc was in.

We were given score sheets, but no scoring instructions. We told to judge the speakers on content (out of 4), language (out of 3), and manner (out of 3) for a total of 10. We were told that one decimal place was OK, but 2 places was right. out. That's all.

I'm used to rubrics. In my previous school, we had a lot of presentations and I did a lot of judging. (SASE in the house!) In that system, a 3 was perfect (or nearly so), a 2 was passing, and 1 was failing. So, I fell into the same system. Since we were allowed decimals, I decided to hand out .5s as well. But I wasn't going to get into .3s or .8s. I'm an English teacher, not a math teacher. (Please ignore my life-long math abilities. I am actually horrible at arithmetic -- and spelling -- but you knew that already.)

The first nine candidates speak and we all judge. La-di-dah. I had hot water in my travel mug (I finally got one at Starbuck's on my Monday shopping spree -- it's the only place you can find a flip-top mug in this town). My sinuses were aching, but I was playing a trooper. There is an "intermission" and the Canadian was roped into MCing it. There are some silly riddles (what has 8 arms, 4 legs, and 9 eyes? a monster) and some brain teasers (how do you make 1000 out of 8 eights?). Then, they reveal the scores for the first round. Oh, cool.

But wait... they don't just reveal the scores. Oh no. They have a picture of each judge and the SCORE WE GAVE TO EACH SPEAKER! Holy shit, Batman. It's one thing to give a student feedback in person and explain your reasoning in a conference, it's another to reveal the scores in cold blood in front of a live studio audience. Oy.

And there it was, on the big screen, all the English teachers gave the lowest scores. It was a bit humiliating. We were handing out 6, 7, 7.5 and the other judges (administrators, mostly) were handing out 8.9, 9.2, 9.5. My Partner-in-Crime was the East German judge for most of the first round. The three of us took turns during the second round, and then there was the 3rd round.

By then, the other two English teachers were tired of being the bad guys and I started feeling worse. A lot worse. The entire inside of my sinuses were on fire. I was trying to squelch coughs. I had run out of hot water, and when I sent a student out for more, they came back with cold! (All the buildings have hot water spigots in them.) 

I swear, I did my best to hand out the same scores for all students. However, without training or a list of what specific behaviors warrant which scores, it's really tough to do. Maybe I got a little tougher. I felt bad for a couple of students, but I wasn't going to lighten up just because I was being embarrassed on the big screen. What's a little embarrassment? I can always explain to my students in person what I saw as their strengths and weaknesses. Every contest needs an East German judge. They wanted the Olympics? I gave them the Olympics.

At the end, there were awards. In true Chinese style, all the students won an award. There was a group of third place students, and the four teachers (three English and one of the conversational English teachers) were asked to hand out the prizes. (We were definitely the 3rd place judges.) Then, there were the second round speakers and the second round judges (the Centre and Center principals). And then the winner (who, although I was the lowest score and so had my score thrown out, was the speaker I gave my highest score to) and the first place judge, the Asst. Principal for the whole school. 

The one real benefit is that Mission Germ Warfare was successful. The A-Level teachers have an unofficial war with the AP teachers. We're on different floors. We want to have the smartest students. They're American, we're British... er, except for the Token American and Canadian, of course. You know, the usual stuff. Well, I've infiltrated them (played on their American sympathies) and made them think I'm their friend. And then... sat next to one of them for two hours -- with a raging cold. They should all be sick within the week. 

I'll be a star at the A-Level Centre.