A week from Hell

I can’t believe it was only a week ago that I had time off because I was sick.

Here are a few notes about being a lecturer in the Gambia, I am not joking and yeah I probably am complaining…but you would too.

Firstly I got back from being sick to find out that the ECD course I was teaching for eight weeks had been shortened to seven weeks, to accommodate Ramadan and in the final week there would be a three hour exam (based on the six weeks of lectures I have given). So I only had one week left to finish off my lectures and get the students prepared for an exam. Forward planning is not done here, and informing lecturers is by word of mouth (you may be expected for a staff meeting and you will find out about it in passing ten minutes beforehand). It works, but occasionally it makes life difficult.

So that is one course. In the other course, in which I have twelve classes, I knew it was my last week which was ok. What I didn’t know was that I was expected to have all the students marks ready for them by Friday so they would know them before they leave, and that the students would only hand their assignments up on the Wednesday. That meant that I would have to mark over a thousand assignments and give six hours of lectures in one day. The problem also, as it turns out, is that the students all felt the need to explain individually the need for their marks and convince me to get it done for them. This meant I was so busy trying to explain the concept of impossible individually over a hundred times a day, to actually be able to do any marking. Apparently I would be able to do the marking if only I understood how important it was. Although I actually met up with staff, discussed my schemes of work and discussed my workload before the course started, no one thought they should tell me that the marks had to be submitted before the students left (and how you are supposed to get the students to do assignments based on five weeks of work and handed in, in enough time to mark them is beyond me). It was possible for those lecturers who only had three classes who had fewer assignments to mark and more time off to mark them.

In the end, clearly, the students do not have their marks. Because whether or not they feel the need to know their marks or to wait for them, if something is impossible, it remains impossible no matter how convincing you are. The joy for me was having a whole student body debating with me rather than even caring about the work I did put in for them. Every lecturer is a man for himself (literally because even when I was given the classes no one told me the deadline on the marks and because all the other courses are different I didn’t know to ask), so no one could point out my workload to the students, and the students are to blind to understanding they are not the only class. It has to be said also that many of the students handed their assignments in to me three pm on Friday and still wanted their marks – apparently the onus is on me at all times not on them.

The absolute highlight of my week was one student telling me that I was only teaching twelve classes for the money and when I explained that I wasn’t getting paid for it he said that’s ok because ‘you have plenty of money in your country’. It definitely makes it all worthwhile when that happens (sadly stuff like that happens every day).

The truth of the marking was that my class was a combined grade so in the overall scheme of things it didn’t even matter to the students final mark – they could pass without even passing my subject. This means that all the hassle wasn’t necessary and the head of school knew I had twelve classes and couldn’t get the marks in and had given me an extension in the last week anyway.

So what is it like lecturing in the Gambia – obviously for me it wasn’t a lot of fun. But it is pretty rare that lecturers would have a timetable like mine anyway. Most lecturers would have six classes at the most and be planning for two hour lectures not twelve one hour lectures (I had fifteen classes between the two courses). It is a lot of work for the students though. They have a full day of lectures and have to get all their assignments done. It is Ramadan which means they are fasting from around 5.30am to 7.30pm whilst sitting in a full day of lectures and doing assignments. It is no wonder they were so rude to me, I was an easy target for their frustration. They did also badger other lecturers too (not all the lecturers were able to submit their marks either).

The rooms we taught in are like really old bare classrooms. The desks are small and old and the students are really cramped in together (imagine 60 to 80 adults cramped in a room that should only sit around 30 children). There isn’t enough desks and chairs for all the students and many chairs are broken. This means that as the students move from room to room for the lectures they sometimes have to go and find a desk and a chair from another room. One time I was waiting to give a lecture (my class was late) and a class filed into the room and took out all the chairs and desks (they didn’t listen to me), so when my class came they had to go and carry all the desks and chairs from another room back into the room. By the time the students show up (around 10 to 15 minutes late) and get the desks and chairs in order (another 10 minutes) the lecture usually starts around 25 minutes late. The students then all have to be quiet at once in order for them to hear me – another nearly impossible task considering there are so many of them. The windows also are just wire mesh so if a class is sitting outside having a chat we have no chance.

It certainly isn’t easy, and at the end of the day the students are just like high school students. A few want to learn, most want an easy ticket to pass. They do copy each other work (many of my assignments are copied), they prefer to group work so that two people do the work and six get the marks, and they want to argue everything with you. Sometimes just sometimes, a student really understands what you are teaching, gets excited and talks about how they will use it in their class. That is when it is all worth it.