EBICHA ZONE - Column

The system of class observation visits among faculty members has started in my graduate school. Though the class visits had originally been ‘recommended’, it has finally become an "obligation" to visit and observe other faculty members' classes. Fortunately or not, I have not yet played the role of "the observed", but even as "observer" it feels rather strange. When I look back, I can say that this is the first time I have seriously audited another professor's lecture since I have finished graduate school. I usually audit another faculty member's class only for the last memorial lecture before his or her retirement.

I enter the classroom with anxiety. I am not sure why I am nervous. This feeling of nervousness is different from the one that I feel during my own lecture. Also, the feeling of nervousness is similar to the feeling of stepping into a place which I must not enter. In other words, it's as if I'm “invading someone’s privacy”, though this phrase might not be suitable for expressing my nervousness.

If we think about it, the university classroom is a “microcosm” of each professor, a “closed space”. Compared to the atmosphere in the physical sciences, where research and education is done with a team, in the liberal arts, where the education is done individually, the atmosphere tends to be much more closed. Mutual inviolability is a tacit rule among the faculty members. The class visit systems help professors to break down their psychological walls. On the other hand, this causes the feeling of nervousness. I am rapidly learning to manage my nervousness by visiting couple of classes, however. This might be one of the effects of the mutual visits. Like a voice from heaven, “This world is not yours alone,” sounded in my mind. The most important thing is that I need to keep these words in mind even when it is my turn to be "the observed". I have started to feel another kind of “nervousness”.

(S.F)