A great teacher, reincarnated

I just took my first intermediate epidemiology test. In contrast to most tests, where you walk out somewhat knowing how well or poorly you did, for me, epidemiology tests are complete wild cards. I have taken epi tests and felt very confident about my answers, only to be greeted with a less than satisfactory grade. I've also taken epi tests where I thought I failed, and instead did extremely well.

My favorite part about my epi class is my professor. I swear, she is the reincarnation of my high school history teacher, Mrs. Phillips (Mrs. P). I took three years worth of courses from this one teacher because she was that entertaining. Kind of.

Flashback to my first class on my first day in high school: world history honors. I stood outside my classroom, waiting for the door to unlock, when a flurry of blue polar fleece nearly took my arm off as it ran to open the door. The ball of blue polar fleece was Mrs. P. I still don't understand her obsession with wearing polar fleece in Southern California.

She then assigned my first real high school assignment: to write an essay titled "What is History." I spent a good three hours on that first assignment, partially because I wanted to do well, and also because I knew that there was no way I could get an athletic scholarship, so I had to pay for college with my brains. I also had Asian parents that thought anything less than a 100% on a test was failure (everything about Amy Chua's parenting techniques is true!!!). Anyway you look at it, the pressure was on.

When she returned the essays, we learned that we all got F's. Apparently, none of us figured out what history was. We later learned that she rigged the essay that way, and yes, we did eventually learn what history was. I eventually got an A in her class, although it was certainly a struggle.

The next year, in European History, a score of 40 of 75 questions correct on a test was considered a good grade. In her Art History class the year after that, she made me write a 20 page research paper, which excluded the pages contributed by tables and charts. 20 pages of seemingly endless text. And I could only write in the active voice, rendering derivatives of the verbs "be" or "to be" useless. Try writing a 20 page paper without using the words am, is, are, was, will be, and were. Just try it. Your brain will thank you.

You might be wondering why I decided to stick with this lady. The answer is simple: she was an amazing teacher. Although difficult, her classes made me comfortable with failure, desensitized me to blunt criticism, and taught me the value of endurance and persistence. I also learned more than I could have dreamed about history, politics, world religions, and art.

My current epi professor is not only the spitting physical image of Mrs. P, but she also shares many of the same personality quirks. Both my professor and my old teacher have distinctive voices and make very strong statements about their topics of expertise. Both are extremely passionate about their work. Publicly, both come off as acerbic people, but are extremely nice in person. Failure on tests is also not unusual. I'm also pretty sure they are both Jewish.

Before I started my epi class, I heard some scary things about her from her former students. Apparently, my current professor has habit of emphatically criticizing commentary and methodology, which makes many people scared to talk in class or to her. After meeting with her during office hours, my opinion differs greatly. I find her rather approachable.

I should thank Mrs. P in the afterlife for preparing me to take on feisty people. Many times, the bark is much worse than the bite.