Examination Hall

Last month, I had been to a PU college for invigilation duty. It was a short assignment of three hours for four days. It had come up on our apartment WhatsApp group and six of us from the apartment went to three different colleges. It was the Mid-term exam. 

I saw a boy using scale to make a line after every answer. And tearing the sheets to separate each one. I used to do that too! It was so nostalgic. 

The examination hall reminded me of my own student days. I was an academically good student. Unlike others, I loved exams (except math, physics and chemistry). It was a joy writing answers to questions, creating my own kind of artwork on paper with nothing but a pen. 

I recall the race against time during an exam. The invigilator saying one hour left. Thirty minutes left. Last five minutes left. I could hear my heart pounding. I liked the sound of that. Ooh! The way I ran my fingers across the paper attempting each and every question and ensuring I did not leave any question unanswered. 

I really liked the whole environment of an examination hall. The silence - sometimes sweet, sometimes eerie. Even libraries, with big boards everywhere, daring everyone to "Be Silent" are not as silent as an examination hall. The silence that is only broken by the invigilator's stern rebuke at disobedient students or someone coughing or sneezing or pens dropping or sheets ruffling. Each sound made in the hall is amplified several notches. 

Can anyone who has ever been to school ever forget the staring you receive when you ask for additional sheet? That small act is a case study in human behavior. It shows you your status in the class academic hierarchy. 

A "dumb" student asking for additional sheet makes everyone laugh gleefully. It is the joke of the day. Muffled laughter everywhere. After all, what on earth is HE writing? That is the question on everyone's minds. Most probably, he is writing the questions itself to fill up the answer sheet and pretend he has understood the subject. Sometimes, he himself is sniggering. Sometimes, he keeps a straight face and that makes it even more funny.

A "bright" student asking for extra sheets draws heavy sighs from everyone. On the one hand, ordinary people are gasping for breath trying to remember and vomit the answers, whatever little they know, and on the other hand, there is this fellow, filling up paper after paper. Merciless monster tormenting others! 

In college, my history lecturer Gurumurthy Sir once held out my paper to the class and said look how beautiful this paper is. I know just by looking at its neatness and handwriting that this student knows the answers. Also, it is a joy to look at answer sheets like this. Learn from her. I remember I was sitting in the middle of the bench and when he passed my paper to me, I was melting in shyness. I wasn't very confident then. I was definitely not arrogant. So all these compliments and public praise made me even more humble and I would lower my head and not look at anyone and bite my lips. I wish I had learnt to take compliments well. I wish I had taken great pride and beamed. I was happy, of course but I relished the happiness silently, when alone, revisiting the moment and replaying the compliments. But in public, I didn't know how to react. It made feel very shy. 

Another important part of an exam was the discussion pre and post it. Before the exam, there were some students great at causing panic. They would throw up random questions/topics/concepts and ask loudly did you read this? This will come. Teacher said this is important. That was enough to create a mad frenzy among the audience. People would go berserk trying to find out what the answer was. 

The discussion post the exam was another stressor. Was this answer right? Was this option correct? Oh God! The sleeplessness this post-exam discussion would induce. We would self-correct our paper and check how much we would probably get. If we got more, it would be such a victory. And if we got less than what we calculated, we would hang our head in shame. 

Another thing I remember is the tying of the thread through the hole, through all the sheets, numbered so we don't get the order wrong. That was an elaborate ritual in itself. 

When I became a lecturer and naturally, exam invigilator, I would enjoy watching the myriad ways students tried to copy. Their finger movements, head signals, cough codes - it was a nice time pass activity "catching" the culprit and reprimanding them. 

One thing I noticed in the exam hall this time was the board work. So neat. So clear. So legible. So beautiful. 

 

As a student, my papers were extremely neatly written. But as a teacher, I could never write so nicely on the board. My board work was a mess. I think fast. I write fast. Paper could withstand the speed of my thoughts but boards couldn't. Sometimes, even I would forget what I had written or couldn't decipher the words. God knows what the students could read from what I wrote on the board. I admired teachers who had great board work. It was impressive how some wrote. Calligraphy at work. Mine was was bad. That was something I wished to improve but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't. So when I saw this board work in the PU collage where I went as an invigilator, I couldn't help but click a picture. 

Passing three hours as an invigilator is no joke is what I realized during this assignment. As lecturers, we know our students. We know other staff. But, during this invigilation duty, it was an unknown college. Also, I was stepping into an academic institution after more than a decade. Three hours staring at unfamiliar faces! The only thing to break the monotony was handing out additional sheets, threads and walking up and down. The experience was invaluable because it brought back so many memories - from school, from college, from university. As a student, as a lecturer. 

I want to be a student again. I have truly loved only three things in life - being a student, being a teacher and being a traveler. I can never reach a state of satiety with these. I want more and more of it.