Our Finest

There’s this dude who registered for my class but never showed up, so as per university regulation I sent him a warning letter (for missing 10 percent of classes) followed by a barring letter (for missing 20 percent of classes). A barring letter means a student is prevented from sitting for the final exam and a zero-credit Y grade is recorded in the official transcript. It’s as good as failing a course, or worse.

Anyway, the very next day a few students from the class approached me to tell that their friend, the mysterious phantom dude, is away at his hometown. Supposedly, dude thought that he had dropped the course. Supposedly, I say, because that was the story they were telling me but the record says that he’s still registered. Funny thing too, because after adding or dropping a course through the online registration system, one is supposed to print out a confirmation slip before logging out. They gave me a withdrawal form they filled in on behalf of their friend the phantom dude (very nice friends, I thought) and asked me to sign it. “But I’ve already issued a barring letter,” I said. “Help-lah, sir,” they said.

So I brought the withdrawal form, already signed, to the kulliyyah office. “The student is the one who’s supposed to settle this personally, not you,” said the admin staff in-charge. “The head of department needs to sign the form too, and the student has to pay RM300.” So much for trying to be helpful, I thought, and took the form back to the department office and dumped it in the head of department’s signature tray.

“How about the barring letter,” I was asked later, “do we still process it?”
“Sure,” I said. What I have is the fact that dude hasn’t been coming to class; and a story that his friends – yup, his friends, not himself – told me that he thought that he’d dropped the course.

Yesterday, I received an email from phantom dude. He wrote that he called and spoke to the dean and deputy dean, and they told him that it’s my call to revoke the barring notice. I cannot just issue a warning letter and then cancel it. “Write me a letter,” I replied.

When I logged into my email account this morning there was another email from phantom dude. He wants me to “check” his letter before he sends it. Come on, lah!