Confessions of an Imperfect Student and a Demanding Professor
by, Judah Diament We have seen time and again that public figures, no matter how hard they try, can’t hide past mistakes. When you take on a public role, eventually the truth will come out. As the chair of the Department of Computer Science, I am no longer a private citizen, so it is safe to assume that my skeletons will eventually be made public. As such, I thought it wise to preemptively release the information and get ahead of the news cycle. So, here is my first confession: when I was an undergraduate student at YU, I received a C in Medieval Jewish History, a C+ in Intermediate Hebrew II, and a C- in Calculus 1. It was not the professors’ fault in any one of those cases; I had wonderful professors (Rabbi Dr. Bernard Rosensweig, Dr. Richard Steiner, and Dr. Norman Rosenfeld a”h , respectively.) I simply failed to perform at an adequate level. I know it is hard to imagine that someone who claims to be competent in any field could have possibly received multiple grades lower ...