THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, July 25, 1994 TAG: 9407250040
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY PHILIP WALZER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Long : 137 lines
Make no mistake: If you're a student in Nancy Wade's class these days, it won't take long before a feel-good question, a zinger, a stray comment, gets tossed through the air with your name on it.
``Eric, how was the test?'' (Eric: ``Relatively speaking, better than the first.'') ``Louis with the cap on, how was the test?'' (Louis: ``About 150 questions.'')
Later, an aside: ``I had a real good time at HQ Friday afternoon, Michael.'' (No response required.) And then a toughie on bacteria: ``They are divided into three groups, which are what - Constantine? Becky? Jess?'' (Silence.)
Sounds like a grade school science class with all those first names, but it's really introduction to biology at Old Dominion University.
Forget about the sea of faces in a lecture hall or that professor booming her voice, straining to be heard. Wade's class meets in a cozy lab room, with just 18 students huddled around six lab tables.
Welcome to summer school.
``If I couldn't teach summer school,'' said Wade, an associate professor of biology, ``I would probably leave the teaching profession. I begin the full semester with 300-plus students, and it is absolutely awful not to know their names. In this class, I know all the names, so I can call on everyone.''
And that helps, sophomore Laura Post said. ``With 300 people, there would be no personal attention,'' she said. ``Here, it's a lot easier to focus yourself. If you have trouble, you're not going to get lost or behind in the crowd.''
Maybe not Post, but other students do get into academic trouble. For if the class sizes in summer school are reduced, so is the time.
Some courses are compressed into four-week sessions, meeting three hours daily, requiring a novel to be read or a programming assignment to be completed every couple of days. Tests usually are given weekly.
``I study every night, at least three hours, and studying that much doesn't even guarantee you a great grade,'' said senior Jess Vera Cruz, who is taking Wade's class.
Especially in technical fields, it can be overwhelming. ``I wouldn't want to be a student in one of my classes in a short summer session,'' ODU math Professor John A. Adam said. ``Over the normal semester, people can absorb the material and come to think about it better than if they're hit hard and don't have time to breathe.''
But Adam, like most professors, says most of his students actually perform better over the summer because they have fewer distractions and more time to study.
``The more serious students really have a better experience,'' said Leonard E. Dobrin, associate professor of sociology at Old Dominion. ``The less serious students get lost - the whole thing zips by before they can catch up.''
Summer enrollment has inched up at most colleges. Tidewater Community College's count as of last week was about 9,500 and ODU's was 8,000. Those numbers represent roughly half the schools' enrollment during the regular school year.
Virginia Wesleyan College has experienced the biggest gain in the area, with summer enrollment jumping 46 percent since 1989 to 420.
As tuition rises, college administrators say, students are growing more eager to knock off some credits over the summer. ``Students attend summer courses because they want to lessen their load during the academic year, shorten the time it takes to get their degree or take a course they have failed,'' said Sandra J. DeLoatch, head of the computer science department at Norfolk State University, where summer sessions ended earlier this month.
At Old Dominion, for instance, Vera Cruz has switched majors and is taking Wade's course to make sure he gets his sports-medicine degree next May. Senior Tomaysa Sterling, a political science major, is taking a criminal-justice class to make room for a paralegal course next year.
State officials, foreseeing growing numbers of students and shrinking resources, have encouraged colleges to expand summer sessions.
``It's a more efficient use of both time and space,'' said Margaret A. Miller, associate director of the State Council of Higher Education. ``Students might be able to get through their college education faster, and it makes better use of the space on campus if it is occupied year-round.''
And summer sessions add money to colleges struggling with cuts in state aid. At Christopher Newport University, summer school brings in about $1.1 million a year, Vice President William L. Brauer said.
Though most professors say they conduct courses no differently over the summer, some students think corners are cut. Lillian Lopez, an ODU senior taking inorganic and organic chemistry over the summer, said: ``They try to make the tests easier because they don't want to be bogged down over the summer.''
Justin Sutherland, another senior, said his recent world-religions class got squeezed a bit: ``They didn't even do Judaism.''
In fact, courses generally have the same number of classroom hours in the summer as they do during the year. And several local classes last week were hardly running at breakneck speed.
At Wesleyan, Robert Albertson maintained his luxurious pauses between each homework problem he reviewed to make sure his accounting students had no doubts. And at ODU, during a session on bacteria and fungi, Wade made time to talk about her distaste for sneezers who don't use tissues. (Viruses, she explained, can stay alive in the air for 20 minutes.)
Wade's style is crusty, quirky: She alternately throws tough jabs at students (``It's been some time since you've had first semester (biology), so you'd better pay some attention'') with personal banter (``Gene, your sons are going to make far more critical decisions than I made''). The summer, she thinks, softens her effect.
The rest of the year, when she doesn't know everyone's names, some students find her ``intimidating'' and feel ``put on the spot'' when she questions them, Wade said. But in the summer, ``they don't mind my calling them.''
Professors and students say the summer sessions bring out the best in the other: Students are more likely to participate in class discussions, and professors are more willing to stay later to answer questions. Lopez, the chemistry student, recalled a professor going 20 minutes ``overtime'' to dispel confusion about chemical bonds.
Greg Taylor, a Virginia Wesleyan senior in Albertson's class, said he gets B's on summer courses, a step up from the C's he gets the rest of the year: ``I'm kind of a procrastinator, but in the summer I can focus more on one subject. You can concentrate on it for four or six weeks and get it out of the way.''
Jim Hitt, an ODU senior majoring in psychology, also does better in the summer. ``You go to class every day,'' he said, ``so the stuff doesn't have a chance to get out of your head.''
But he has one complaint: ``Not getting to go to the beach. That's our major problem.'' ILLUSTRATION: [Color] LAWRENCE JACKSON/Staff
ODU Professor Nancy Wade enjoys summer school's small class sizes:
``In this class, I know all the names, so I can call on everyone.''
Sophomore Meredith Tabangin peers at a fern in Wade's biology class.
Students say the compressed classes help them focus.
LAWRENCE JACKSON/Staff
Nancy Wade takes a break during a summer biology class at ODU to
tell a story. The class, which has just 18 students, is held in a
cozy lab room instead of a lecture hall. ``If I couldn't teach
summer school, I would probably leave the teaching profession.''
by CNB