Chapter 3063: Mercury Chronicles (13)

Jenna left with her thesis, and Bruce watched her retreating figure and sighed. After a long moment, he decided to call Shiller and talk about Jenna's situation.

But soon, with a bang, the door was pushed open and Clark walked in, followed closely by Diana.

Seeing that both of their faces looked troubled, Bruce cautiously asked, "What's the matter?"

"Bruce, you've had so many kids, and this isn't your first time teaching, so how could you still make such a basic mistake?" Diana, always direct, spoke up, and Clark quickly tugged at her.

Bruce looked puzzled, clearly not yet realizing what was going on. Clark sighed and said, "Did you leave a thesis assignment for Classes 3 and 4 today?"

Bruce nodded.

"Then why didn't you leave one for Classes 1 and 2 yesterday?"

It was only then that Bruce remembered. For teaching quality, the four classes were split into two groups, with different schedules for the first two and last two classes.

For example, Bruce's criminal investigation class took place with the first two classes on day one, while today it was the turn of the last two classes.

But after Jenna's incident at the end of the first day's class, Bruce, who hadn't assigned any homework to those two classes, decided to leave assignments for the latter two to figure out whether the issue was indeed with Jenna.

This would clearly lead to many obvious problems.

The classes were not divided by race or power; people from all races were mixed, forming new classes, but they still tended to stick with their own kind outside of class.

This meant that inevitably there were members of each race in the first two classes as well as in the last two. When one group found out they didn't have homework and the other did, they would ask, "Why don't I have to write, but you do?"

This group wasn't like the students at Gotham University; they were the top scholars from various races, understanding that their studies were aimed at empowering their races, so how could the professor play favorites?

Bruce's approach led to widespread discontent among these scholars because if you could leave homework for one group and not the other, it implied you were teaching one group well and neglecting the other, which is a practice that severely affects a teacher's credibility.

Moreover, unlike other professors who dressed in business attire, Bruce typically didn't wear suits or glasses, often teaching in sportswear, which made him look even more youthful than some students. Coupled with his discriminatory mistake, it prompted many students to demand a reevaluation of the teaching staff.

Diana felt overwhelmed because she felt Bruce was not taking this project seriously, arguing that even a lunatic could wear a suit and tie without much trouble.

Clark had a more objective view, suggesting that Bruce was perhaps too exhausted from other commitments and hadn't yet adjusted his mindset. Plus, his lack of formal teaching experience meant that problems were to be expected.

Clark put his arm around Bruce's shoulders and walked him over to the couch, then said, "I know, Bruce, you're the smartest person in the world, capable of handling anything with ease. So you can really relax and not worry about what others think, just be yourself."

"But sometimes the world needs a serious moment to show you care about something. It's not about whether you really care, as long as you make people feel that they are sufficiently valued, things will go smoother."

"Of course, you don't need me to tell you these things. Diana and I just want to say that we need to focus on this task as soon as possible, and we hope that, as usual, you'll be the quickest among us."

Bruce rubbed his temples, his brow furrowed, and said, "You don't have to soften the blow, Clark. My state has been off recently; I wouldn't have made such mistakes otherwise."

"How about we make some changes first?" said Clark patiently. "Maybe you can explain a little in the group chat to calm the students down, and then wear formal attire in class tomorrow?"

"I will." Bruce nodded and said, "I'll post the teaching plan I wrote in the group so they'll know I didn't play favorites; it's just that I was too busy and forgot to assign the homework. As for the formal attire… do you guys all wear suits to class?"

"Didn't you also attend university?" Diana said. "At least at the universities on the East Coast, professors must wear formal attire when teaching."

"Uniforms and formal clothes serve to emphasize our roles. Normally, we can be their friends and comrades, but in class, they must recognize us as teachers and keep the proper respect. Dressing differently is the best way to distinguish these roles."

"Actually, our initial plan was to wear Superhero costumes, but considering you might not like wearing the Batman costume, we decided to emulate ordinary college professors and wear suits," Diana continued explaining.

"Alright, I'll wear formal attire. How are your classes going?"

Diana moved around from one side of the couch and said, "Not bad, the students are of high quality. Nearly every one of them is a leader in their race, and they are diligent, hard-working, and hardly anyone complains of fatigue during physical training."

"I also think they're not bad," Clark smiled and said. "They absorb the basics of human society quickly and accept the complexities of ordinary human interactions well."

"But it seems like you are having trouble," Diana said. "Even with the basic criminal investigation course, I find it almost impossible to glean details from those gory photos."

Bruce shook his head, not saying much, because, as Diana mentioned, modern criminal investigation is a complex field that involves many disciplines. Just one or two lectures hadn't even covered the basics of criminal investigation yet."

After the two had left, Bruce briefly explained in the group chat and expressed his apologies, then changed the current assignment to optional, so those who wanted to write could, and those who didn't want to, didn't have to."

He also told the students that the current courses were not in-depth enough to write meaningful papers, but later courses would involve real cases, which would make the papers more valuable. For now, he recommended they focus on other subjects."

Bruce was actually just hinting subtly, "How many hands? With Shiller in the teaching team, yet still rushing to write his paper, tired of sleeping enough, right?"

As Bruce was thinking this, he flipped through the chat history and indeed found people discussing psychology homework, but what surprised him was that Shiller had hardly assigned much homework.

Since the classes had just begun and were still covering the most basic definitions, Shiller's homework was simply to memorize the basic definitions of psychology and be prepared for a pop quiz the next day.

Bruce clearly remembered that his first homework assignment in introductory psychology during his college days was to write about the life and theories of the psychology master he understood best, and even analyze the master's theories from his own perspective.

He should never have written about Freud.

But to be fair, Freud is indeed the name most familiar to ordinary people unfamiliar with psychology, followed perhaps by Pavlov, and then there are those more interested in literature and philosophy who recognize Hegel and Jung.

Bruce thought for a moment, then took out his phone and called Jenna. He said, "Jenna, you've taken psychology courses, haven't you? Could you go to Professor Rodriguez's office and ask him for a copy of his teaching plan? Yes, I need it for class, alright, I'll wait for you in the office."

To Bruce's surprise, Jenna arrived quickly and handed him the teaching plan. She blinked her large eyes and asked, "Is there anything else? Professor, I haven't finished the small group report for Professor Fries' freeze experiment."

"Is Professor Rodriguez in his office?"

"Yes, he's working on the next lesson plan."

"And he didn't say anything to you?"

"He glanced at me."

"And then?"

"Then he photocopied his teaching plan for me."

"Didn't he ask you anything?"

"Ask what? Oh, I was thinking about it, if he asked me why you needed the teaching plan, how I would explain it since I'm not very familiar with criminal investigation. But he really didn't ask anything."

"I don't mean about me, didn't he ask about you?"

"Why would he ask about me? He doesn't know me," Jenna said with a shrug. "He was looking down, reciting definitions all the time, everyone was taking notes, he wouldn't recognize my face, and besides, there's nothing special about me."

"So you mean he only recited definitions during class?"

"Yes, uh, I'm only telling you this, but I think his classes are a bit dull. Maybe it's just the nature of psychology. Besides copying a lot of notes, I don't have any profound impression."

Bruce's expression could only be described as utterly baffled. He said, "Didn't he emphasize the importance of doing homework well, or the serious consequences if you don't?"

"Is that necessary to emphasize?" Jenna was also puzzled, saying, "We are here to study. Of course, we need to do our homework. Can there be a more serious consequence than not learning if we don't do our homework?"

Bruce was momentarily at a loss for words.

"Never mind, you can go back now, but try not to tell anyone about me giving you private lessons."

"Don't worry, I understand. You have some insights beyond the facts about me, but I don't care what those are. I have only one goal here, and that is to study well. Nothing else can distract me from that."

"Good girl, off you go."

The following day, Bruce had no classes. He spent the morning writing the next lesson plan, deciding to use the case where Nigma was the victim in a serial murder case because it required incorporating real-life examples.

Previously, he introduced some typical cases of criminal investigation applications in a rather general way, but they were not systematic and never analyzed a complete case.

And analyzing some especially classic cases might lead students to look up the outcomes on their phones, which could bias their reasoning, likely resulting in reasoning backwards and not being objective.

Using unsolved cases might be better, but some cold cases still have no outcomes, which could lead to frustration among the students due to the lack of concrete conclusions.

Bruce knew that the Riddler's serial murder case would always be solved, and if he asked students to analyze these cases ahead of time, aside from leveraging their creative ideas to crack the case, they would also feel a sense of achievement when the truth came out.

Having made up his mind, Bruce earnestly wrote the morning's teaching plan, detailing how to introduce the topic, how to develop the discussion, and how to divide into groups for discussion.

Bruce wasn't naturally adept at these tasks; he had only learned pedagogy when he tutored Dick in his homework, and watching Shiller prepare for so long, he could more or less imitate it almost perfectly.