Cold Calling

Cold calling is brutal. In my horribly cold calling class yesterday I was trying to figure out what is so horrible about cold calling. Who cares if someone asks you something you're supposed to know, and you don't know it? Does it matter?

I figured out that there are three main things that a professor can get out of cold calling students.
1) They can see who did the reading (sort of...to be discussed later).
2) They can stimulate class discussion.
3) They can horribly embarrass students and make them feel horrible.

I'm pretty sure there is space for all three of these at different points in life, however I am NOT a fan of cold calling for reason #3. Not a fan at all.

I have had 17 professors at INSEAD, and none of them cold called for this reason. They all gave the option to say "pass" or ask one of your classmates to respond in your stead. I'm sure that this impacted our participation grade, but who really cares (non-grade disclosure...).

In my class yesterday, first of all, there is a guy who sits in the front row, and he has a list of students, and when they say something insightful, they get a certain number of points, and if they waste air time, they get minus points. He says that if they convert oxygen to carbon dioxide, they get one point - for being present, basically. So, you have this horribly mean (but I don't think he's really MEAN, he just plans the mean game) professor cold calling people, with this guy sitting in front marking down his review of what you say. I know this is Wharton and all, and it's supposed to be high pressure, high level business environment, but I don't really see a reason for this. One poor girl got called on, and she "um"ed and "ah"ed until she was so red she had to just stop.

I have never been cold called (except once in finance, I think, but it didn't feel so bad, since I guess I knew everyone in the class, and INSEAD is just a warmer place), and I was trying to figure out how I would react. I think I would freak out and not be able to talk. This is why I think that it's not necessarily such a good way to tell if people did the reading. It's possible that you did the reading, but you just freak out when you get cold called.

So...since I had done the readings yesterday, I decided to just raise my hand and respond to his questions even if they weren't stellar responses (which the guy taking notes for sure noted), but at least I wouldn't be cold called and get negative points and get a super red face and never want to walk into the classroom anymore.

I didn't need to exercise yesterday, though, because I got my cardio just sitting in there. My pulse was racing for most of the class. (It's a good thing, too, because my shins still haven't recovered since running on Sunday! I'm hoping I can start to exercise again on Monday. I got really messed up by that run!).