Examinee (Part I)

I've been preparing young people for examinations. At this most intense period of their lives, it's interesting and perhaps somewhat sobering to see how they're coping. None of us 'old people' can avoid drawing a few comparisons consciously or subconsciously with our own personal experience of exams, so that's where I'll begin.

I've never been one for treating examinations as a particularly important part of the year, although they're a very important part of the calendar. That seems odd, so let me elaborate. The year goes on, and most parts of it are more important to my life; yet, the exams seem to take up a disproportionate chunk of time and bring down upon me the various inputs of other people who don't normally make noises at me.

It took me years to pass through the stages of response to exams. I hated them to begin with; I came eventually to be resigned, and then accepting. I actually enjoy them now, with a "Take that, foul fiends of examination!" attitude whenever I sit down to answer the questions.

At this point, some younger persons might scoff, asking when it was that I actually last sat for examinations. Ha, it was in 2004. I sat for two papers: one in Principalship and School Management, the other in Qualitative Research Methodology. I was excused from 4 other papers by virtue of turning in a reasonably good Master's thesis, and I was happy to actually get an 'A' for each of the two papers I sat for.

But the funniest thing was that the whole thing was FUN. Haha!