The next day, after Shiller finished his class, he collected the homework as usual, but today he noticed that all thirty two assignments were neatly handed in, and from the thickness of them, it seemed like everyone had written the required number of words.
He found it odd; despite his insistent reminders about homework, there were always a couple of students who would fail to submit. Among those who did submit, not all were sincere. Some would only write a few pages, stuff the rest with blank paper, or even blatantly hand in copied work from somewhere else.
But this time, as he stood at the lectern and glanced through the papers, he found that everyone had written their essays diligently. Although some were poorly written, clear signs of those who had never written a paper before, at least they had tried to stick to the topic. Their phrasing could be compared to that of an illiterate in despair, but at least they made the effort and did not stray from the topic.
Seeing him flipping through the homework, the students did not dare to breathe a word. Usually at this time, when the class was about to end, the students would be packing their belongings. But now, none of them moved, all sat very still in their seats, waiting for Shiller to speak up.
The reason for this occurrence was simple. The previous night, the entire class heard about how Shiller had gone as far as confronting Gotham's underground king, Falcone, for Evans' assignment.
In the era before Batman, let's tentatively call it the "Pre-Batman Era," where in Gotham the weightiest words were Falcone's, said by him and the twelve mob families under his control.
Just how powerful were these mob families? Sal Maroni, the overlord of the East District, was nothing more than a lackey for the Loren Family, and the Loren Family was low in rank among the twelve mob families.
The first rank went to the Falcone Family, with Godfather Falcone having the absolute final word among the families.
In this era, you could be ignorant of who the mayor of Gotham City was. You could even be unaware of who Bruce Wayne was. But you had to know the surnames of Falcone and the other twelve gangster families; otherwise, you wouldn't survive in Gotham.
Since learning of Shiller's relentless pursuit of homework that had led him to the Godfather of Gotham, the students' experience of making up their homework last night had been nothing short of thrilling.
Shiller was genuinely pleased, however. Thus, he said: "The situation with the homework this time seems quite promising. It appears that everyone has taken it quite seriously and completed it. After I finish grading these papers, I will give everyone an extra ten points. Those whose work is particularly well-done, if you have no plans for graduate study, you may come to my office to discuss the matter of recommendation letters…"
As a result, there was sudden, thunderous applause in the classroom. Nobody knew whether it was for the rewards Shiller had announced, or if it was they, the survivors of a close shave, applauding for themselves.
And all of this was being observed by Principal Sheldon.
You could call Sheldon resolute in a more generous sense, or stubborn. If he set his sights on someone, he would go to great lengths to get them. Although Shiller's strong attitude left Sheldon unable to act immediately, he had been constantly seeking opportunities.
The principal had access to all the surveillance cameras in every classroom of Gotham University, where he could monitor the teaching of the faculty. This feature had become Sheldon's primary method of supervising Shiller.
In the following few days, all the students in Shiller's class sat as quiet as a mouse. Evans took it upon himself to assume the responsibilities of class president, collecting and distributing homework every day, managing the classroom discipline. Everything in class was orderly, beyond reproach.
This all gave Sheldon a certain false impression.
When he was working in the administration office of Princeton, most of the students were basically at this level. After coming to Gotham University, he was too busy trying to maintain his footing and never made an effort to understand the students' capabilities. As far as he was concerned, it was a student's duty to do homework. While Gotham University might not be ranked as highly as Princeton, it didn't seem like the quality of the students was suffering.
At least not in Shiller's class.
Sheldon was only concerned with observing Shiller's class. In Shiller's class, all the students were very quiet, and the tasks assigned were completed quite decently, making Shiller's teaching plan proceed smoothly.
And so Sheldon developed another idea.
As is known to all, his policy of banning alcohol on campus was in a stalemate.
At present, those who were willing to adhere to this policy had mostly handed in their alcohol. Those who hadn't, however, were hardliners who would rather fight back with guns than surrender their right to drink.
The students may have taken up arms in protest, but Sheldon couldn't resort to using his power to impose such bans on drinking. He was not native to Gotham, his way of thinking still keeping to the norms of civilized society. And because of this, the policy remained in a rather awkward position, unable to be implemented any further.
Having realized that they did not respond to coercion, Sheldon now wished to make a gesture of goodwill.
Prior to handling administrative tasks, Sheldon once was a professor, an Oxford University graduate with a degree in modern literature, and had taught at both University of California and Metropolitan University.
Sheldon thought that to control Gotham University, he also needs to form a close bond with the students. Just like Harvey was welcomed by everyone, this also seemed to be a good approach.
So, he wanted to teach a course himself.
As it happened, Gotham University's Literature Department was almost non-existent, with only one teacher teaching the foundational course. Literature and Philosophy majors hadn't been admitting students for years; after all, this damned place lacked the soil for literature and philosophy.
By reviving the Literature Department and leading the rejuvenation of literature majors, if he could attract a batch of literature students taught by himself, then he will have his reliable supporters within the school, or so thought Sheldon.
Moreover, it seemed like Shiller's class was quite comfortable, and the educational targets implemented were all good. All in all, the skies were clear, the rain stopped, and Sheldon felt confident once more.
Despite being a university professor, there isn't much difference between lecturing at a university and teaching primary school students. Sheldon felt as if he were a cloud gamer watching videos. Observing Shiller's class from behind a monitor, everything appeared relaxed.
The process of Shiller's teaching was simply walking into the class, waiting for students to settle down, fetching the textbook, and starting the lecture. In between, there would be one or two discussion sessions. After the discussions, it was either Shiller asked a question, or a group leader gave a speech. After the speech, Shiller would summarize, and then introduce some other content. As the class was about to end, he would collect the homework. And at the beginning of the next class, there would be a session for homework review.
This is how 20th-century university classrooms operated. No flashy PowerPoint presentations—most professors go by the book, which was especially true for subjects like psychology, which requires a lot of memorization. If you don't cover everything in the book, there's no point in even trying to understand the subject.
Seeing this process in recorded class videos, indeed there seemed no difficulty. If students cooperated, even the teaching objectives could be completed ahead of time, leaving some idle time for casual chat before the end of the class.
From the time students began to behave particularly well, Shiller was willing to share with them some of the mad murderers he had witnessed. Although Shiller couldn't recall many details due to his memory loss, these legendary experiences kept these young students utterly enthralled, allowing them to see that this unusually strict professor did have his unique strengths.
When he announced the establishment of the Literature Department, Sheldon fired the foundational literature teacher and decided to teach the class personally.
As with most cloud gamers who watch game videos, they always feel capable of taking the controls themselves, giving precise instructions from a god-view. Yet once they enter the game themselves, they are typically defeated and swept away, uninstalled, refunded, overwhelmed.
Sheldon was no exception.
Once he began teaching, he found that Shiller's classroom was an illusion. There were no obedient students here at all. The foundational literature course, quite similar to the basic psychology course in some respects, required much memorization and essay writing.
For the first assignment, out of dozens in the entire class, only two were submitted, one of which was only half the required length.
Sheldon, with his strict political style, fiercely condemned this behavior in the classroom. And the result? There was not a single homework submitted the second time.
Their neglect could be understood for a base-level course in literature, so tedious and mundane compared to exciting subjects like math and physics that naturally intrigued some students. None of the students at Gotham University would seriously listen in the literature class.
In the classroom, students did all sorts of things. Already counted as a healthy hobby was sleeping. Others were eating, chatting loudly, clicking game controllers, and even spinning pens publicly.
No matter how Sheldon shouted, none listened to him. Even if he walked out in frustration, it merely turned the class into a chaotic self-studying session.
Sheldon didn't understand Gotham. If he did, he should know that the students were already well-behaved. In this city, those who could attend a university were of high enough quality.
In this city, there were no cases of students threatening others with guns, bombing the school physically, kidnapping teachers or professors. Gotham's students could already be considered as the city's civilized front.
However, even they were about to drive Sheldon to his grave.
Especially since many students knew that the damn Prohibition was Sheldon's idea. Thus, they began protesting in Sheldon's class. Someone brought a whole case of champagne, uncorked a bottle in the front row, and sprayed madly at Sheldon, drenching him in alcohol. They even organized drinking parties in class.
Sheldon shouted about deducting their credits and expelling them. These students didn't care at all. Sheldon expelled two students, and the remaining ones got even crazier. One dark night, as Sheldon was walking in the school, someone threw two bottles from the bushes, injuring his head. He ended up in the hospital.
He couldn't understand why the same students who were so tame in Shiller's class became such extreme radicals in his.
Maybe he just hadn't heard Shiller say, "Around here, the only ones who can handle criminals are the criminals themselves."