Deadline Extended!! Best of the HFC V

[kizanski]

34 minutes ago, diablo175 said:Why shouldn't @kizanski, as a civilian, get to enjoy that loophole?    

My wife is a retired speech & language therapist.  Does that count?

[diablo175]

8 minutes ago, kizanski said:

My wife is a retired speech & language therapist.  Does that count?

[mathman]

3 hours ago, diablo175 said:

As another from the retired teacher category, if I had a dollar for every time I had an administrator tell me to extend my due date/ waive my late policy, I coulda retired a few years earlier.   

Why shouldn't @kizanski, as a civilian, get to enjoy that loophole?    

I think  you misunderstand my position.  Kizanski as the teacher decides to grade it when he is good and ready.  If the student or parent calls to ask if the work is accepted they can pound sand.  If they ask when it will be graded it will be graded "later".  If it is turned in on time it will be graded on time.  If it is turned in late it will be graded when I get to it.  It is overtime work and I didn't get paid overtime.  Lucsulla will just have to wait to see if they made the grade...  

Lucsulla( this is just a stupid teacher joke, has nothing to do with you) I think you may understand...

[mathman]

On 12/8/2025 at 5:47 PM, kizanski said:

Vive la HFC!

I’ve been waiting and so have you!
It has been five years, so it’s time to dive back in to your audio archive files for the Best of the HFC V!!
As we endure the jive of another holiday season, TBotHFCV will help us survive another long, hard winter.

Let’s strive to get the songs in to my email by December 31st, MMXXV.
For those that don’t make the deadline, do your best to stay alive for the next compilation because The Best of the HFC 6/Six/VI is due to arrive… Someday.
 

Send your audio files to kiz@hamerfanclub.com.
Be sure to include what Hamer instrument(s) you played and what HFC-ers are featured on the cut.

Since I am making stupid jokes I thought I would continue.  Does that mean HFC6 will use AI?

Yes, I am paying homage to a great photoshop artist.

[diablo175]

On 1/1/2026 at 7:48 PM, mathman said:

 If the student or parent calls to ask if the work is accepted they can pound sand.  If they ask when it will be graded it will be graded "later".  If it is turned in on time it will be graded on time.  If it is turned in late it will be graded when I get to it. 

Was riffing more on the general topic of grading in public schools and crazy parental/administrative expectations.   

We both know that kizanski, as an administrator (literally and figuratively) is free to do whatever he wants with the submissions and the rest of us can go pound sand if we don't like it. 

Circling back to teaching in public schools, I knew it was time to get the fuck out of teaching when I had an assistant principal ask me to revise my grading policies to accommodate a student (no special needs or learning issues) who made zero effort and turned nothing in. To add insult to injury, she was a PITA in class. It started out as, "can you give her an extension?" and "or can you maybe give her an alternative assignment?" (which I did, though under protest) She didn't do the alternative and the AP went in and changed her marking period grade from an F to a B. I lost all respect for that admin and that was the final nail in the coffin for my desire to teach. 

Relevance to Vol 5 of TBOTHFC?  Zero. 😄

Edited January 3 by diablo175

[mathman]

2020 was a year I knew I needed to get out even before Covid. That year I had 10 or 11 kids who just would not do anything and a few of them started saying why should I.  I can wait and do course recovery and complete all the work in one semester or one year that everyone else has all three years to do.

I was actually quite happy when the school’s closed and we had to go virtual for that group. I don’t think I could’ve took them for another quarter.

also nothing about HFC IV

Edited January 2 by mathman

[specialk]

1 hour ago, diablo175 said:

She didn't do the alternative and the AP went in and changed her marking period grade from an F to a B.

Wow. Why couldn't I have had an AP like that when I was in school? 😁

Edited January 2 by specialk

[Dasein]

Just seeing this -- I guess I missed it this year. Sorry guys.

[kizanski]

2 hours ago, Dasein said:

Just seeing this -- I guess I missed it this year. Sorry guys.

...

On 12/31/2025 at 7:28 PM, kizanski said:

Due to unpopular demand, I am extending the deadline to January 20th.

 

[LucSulla]

On 1/1/2026 at 6:48 PM, mathman said:

I think  you misunderstand my position.  Kizanski as the teacher decides to grade it when he is good and ready.  If the student or parent calls to ask if the work is accepted they can pound sand.  If they ask when it will be graded it will be graded "later".  If it is turned in on time it will be graded on time.  If it is turned in late it will be graded when I get to it.  It is overtime work and I didn't get paid overtime.  Lucsulla will just have to wait to see if they made the grade...  

Lucsulla( this is just a stupid teacher joke, has nothing to do with you) I think you may understand...

Honestly, y'all don't want my dystopian take on teaching, I'm pretty sure. 

If it wasn't for Camus, I'd probably be a full blown nihilist at this point. 

[kizanski]

"If it weren't for my horse, I would have never graduated college."

[mathman]

5 hours ago, LucSulla said:

Honestly, y'all don't want my dystopian take on teaching, I'm pretty sure. 

If it wasn't for Camus, I'd probably be a full blown nihilist at this point. 

I'm retired.  I enjoy reading about dystopian takes on teaching.  I enjoy reading all takes on edgumication!  bring it on.  Maybe we need a different thread???

[kizanski]

16 minutes ago, mathman said:

.Maybe we need a different thread???

Where's the fun in that? 

[LucSulla]

On 1/13/2026 at 6:13 PM, mathman said:

I'm retired.  I enjoy reading about dystopian takes on teaching.  I enjoy reading all takes on edgumication!  bring it on.  Maybe we need a different thread???

It starts with knowing that some of these students are slipping AI-generated material and other slop through. There's just no way I catch it all. It's too hard to catch it all dead-to-rights, and AI checkers aren't good enough to hold up as evidence. Plus, they are so much more likely to call an actual real piece of original writing AI-generated than to catch an AI paper that I can't countenance using them. 

Meanwhile, I have a lot of good students who actually do their own work, and some of them make Bs and Cs. But they are doing it. And they will have lower GPAs than a pretty good but unknown number of students who gamed their entire undergrad degree.

However, that is not the part that bothers me. What really bothers me is that, in the past, I used to tell classes that the students doing the work and really trying to learn would be the ones who went on to be successful and that those taking shortcuts and trying to game everything would be working for them at best. 

But that shit ain't true. This society is built for people who don't do the work. The students cutting corners and cheating, a few of them may faceplant, but I doubt most will. The way the game is currently constructed, being a sociopathic shitbag is more often than not a feature, not a bug. We reward being full of shit.

Nothing that the Pink Floyd song "Dogs" didn't say 50 years ago I guess. But it fucking kills me to know that it's a coin toss as to whether all that hussle will pay off more for the good ones than learning how to get away with it will pay off for the bad ones. They'll be better people I think, and I think they may actually find more beauty in our brief little existence. I believe they will be more likely to find themselves, when that final day finally comes, surrounded by friends and loved ones fading to black while decades of wonderful stories with wonderful people play back, and that's not nothing. But that's hard to sell to a 20-year-old. Telling them anything more practical and less philosophical and meta with a straight face is hard to do these days. And you know a lot of them will figure out that they may be better off just taking the easy road too and that they may subsequently give up and become just another shitbag, the real horror of which sacrificing the above when it comes time to go back in the box after the game is played. 

And some days, that really sucks. I find myself caring more about doing research and publication than teaching as of late, which makes me sad. I never wanted to be that kind of PhD. 

Edited January 23 by LucSulla

[mathman]

12 hours ago, LucSulla said:

However, that is not the part that bothers me. What really bothers me is that, in the past, I used to tell classes that the students doing the work and really trying to learn would be the ones who went on to be successful and that those taking shortcuts and trying to game everything would be working for them at best. 

But that shit ain't true. This society is built for people who don't do the work. The students cutting corners and cheating, a few of them may faceplant, but I doubt most will. The way the game is currently constructed, being a sociopathic shitbag is more often than not a feature, not a bug. We reward being full of shit.

This is also something that bothered me.  In the USA we seem to create systems that are intended to help certain people and then it is corrupted by some until it is the antithesis of the original intent.

Case in point that affected me daily in the later stages of my career as an Elementary and Middle school teacher.

The IDEA law of 1997.  For those who don't know it was intended to improve the educational opportunities of kids with mental and physical disabilities.  After multiple revisions we get to the point that now emotional disabilities are covered. Which could possibly sound like a good idea but the actual implementation of it is how it has in enshittified.

Now the kids who disrupt the classroom are given all the support and "opportunities" to improve their behavior and the students who want to learn have to watch the teacher spend 80% of their time and energy dealing with behavior rather than teaching.  

I had a student in my 6th grade math class about 8 years ago.  He started the year mostly okay but over time he got progressively worse with behavior and academically.  So after a few times talking with "parents" it was decided that the grandfather would follow the child during the school day.  (as is usually the case with many of these kids, it is their family that fucked them up,  none of the parents were involved, an Aunt and the grandfather were raising him.)

So, the grandfather follows the kid around and the kid doesn't act out because surprise!  his grandfather is watching. Then we have a follow up meeting.  The usual response these type of situations is that the "Parent" realizes the kid CAN behave and resolves to do something about it.  Not this time.  The grandfather decides it is something WE as teachers are doing that causes his behavior.  So, not his fault.  Fortunately for me this was happening in the last few weeks of school so I was done with him.  

By the time he left school he had an IEP (individual education plan) because of his "disability".   Which was that he said inappropriate things to other students and touched them inappropriately but he couldn't help it.  I knew some of the teachers who had him in 7th and 8th grade and they said it was living hell for everyone but that student.   This is the most extreme case I experienced.  But there were many more.

By the end of my career it was more kids and more parents that caused grief.  Couldn't wait to get out.

[velorush]

14 hours ago, LucSulla said:

It starts with knowing that some of these students are slipping AI-generated material and other slop through. There's just no way I catch it all. It's too hard to catch it all dead-to-rights, and AI checkers aren't good enough to hold up as evidence. Plus, they are so much more likely to call an actual real piece of original writing AI-generated than to catch an AI paper that I can't countenance using them. 

I was watching a video of a professor showing some system that actually showed keystrokes and time between keystrokes made by his students. I can't find it to post, but the professor was grading papers posted to Google's receptacle (Docs?) and he was able to access more or less a play-by-play of the paper's creation and seemed to infer the student didn't know he had that visibility. He tracked time between keystrokes, copy/paste, pauses, and was able to access combined averages for actions that allowed him to draw conclusions about whether the paper was created by a human or AI.

The ridiculous part is the professor had to actually do that assessment as well as the normal task of grading the effort, but it was interesting that capability was there. 

I'm so old I typed college papers. Only in graduate school did we have access to newfangled word processors - WordStar and WordPerfect, IIRC - no mouse and a monochrome monitor - first green then amber. 

 

[mathman]

When I was teaching Middle school in the last few years we started using Canvas as our online learning platform. It has a decent testing platform built in.  What I talk about next may make little sense to anyone, but anyway. I could use the questions and question formats I created in Examview and import them into canvas to create good testing questions of varying formats to really be sure my students were learning what I wanted them to learn.  Writing good questions and answers became a bit of a hobby.  Anyway. the great thing about testing with Canvas was it had real time tracking of the students testing on the platform.  It knew if they left the page of the test. It couldn't track where they went but it had timers so I know when they left the test and when they came back.  Sadly, too many kids just never understood that I know when they stopped focusing on the test and either went to another site to cheat or just to f around. And eventually many of them stopped caring.

[velorush]

In nerd school I was the graduate teaching assistant to the Dean of MBA. My second year they combined all sections of Econ 100 (required Econ course for non-business majors) so I had roughly 100 kids in the class. There was no way to administer exams other than the bubble answer sheets. The cool thing about that was the grading computer gave me complete statistical information on every question and with some personal information completed on each answer sheet on the front end (age, gender, year in school, etc.) I was able to see who was missing the question, what wrong answer was most frequently chosen, whether a bad question was missed by younger/older, men/women, etc. It was entertaining for the class and taught me a lot about, as you said, writing good questions and answers and trying to see if they were getting what I was trying to teach. 

[kizanski]

Dystopian teaching anecdotes aside (which I genuinely found interesting), I'm flicking the lights.

Last call.

[kizanski]

It has been expressed to me that maybe the small number of tracks submitted (6 so far) could possibly be due to HFCers having difficulty putting together a track "on short notice."

Keep in mind, none of us is competing for a Grammy.
If we were, I would win hands down in the Spoken Word category for my rendition of "Rubber Biscuit."

How does February 28th sound?

I happen to know for a fact that many of you have songs sitting on your hard drives this very minute.

Rough mix? Send it in!

"Not good enough?" Nonsense!

Send them in!

Email me kiz@hamerfanclub.com

• Your name and your HFC handle
• Who played on the cut
• What Hamer (and/or Shishkov) guitar(s) used
• The actual name of the song (not the file name, which is often slightly different).

Last call: February 28...  and I mean it this time!

 

Edited January 27 by kizanski

[hamerhead]

C'mon, you guys. If I can send stuff from the drummer's basement, you can send anything. In fact, I sent in 3 and told Kiz to pick. They're soooo bad, he refused.

True story.

[kizanski]

1 hour ago, hamerhead said:

C'mon, you guys. If I can send stuff from the drummer's basement, you can send anything. In fact, I sent in 3 and told Kiz to pick. They're soooo bad, he refused.

True story.

True story except for that last part.

I did choose.

I eenie meenied it.

[hamerhead]

Good move - saved your ears.

[diablo175]

Question: can we submit TWO items if the other one is a collaboration between you and another HFCer?  

[JohnZ]

y not?