Read Online On a Scale from Idiot to Complete Jerk by Alison Hughes - Free Book Online
Authors: Alison Hughes
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kids who try to get in the game, âshootingâ over top of people, etc. The ball sails wide and sends another kidâs burger flying into the giant dustballs in the corner, and all they do is yell, âCâmon, BALL! Pass it!â So this kid gets:
   ⢠No lunch
   ⢠No apology
   ⢠Yelled at
Add it all up, and you get two complete jerks (note how the solid and wavy lines spike on the jerk scale on the graph).
â Jerkish Event D : A girl approaches the popular group. She used to be in the popular group, but for some mysterious, much-gossiped-over popular-group reason she got kicked out. She says something I canât hear, but in a friendly wayâyou know, with a smile. The popular kids look at her unsmilingly, then look away. They totally ignore the girl, who is still standing there. Then one of them clearly suggests leaving, and they get up and leave the other girl standing there. Jerks. This may not sound like very much, but trust me, in junior high, it really is. All the jerks (Dot, Dash, Solid and Wavy) spike to complete jerks during this event.
This last jerkish event might also be depicted by a cool diagram (a diagram within the explanation of a graph! Does this guy ever stop?). Ever hear of Venn diagrams? Theyâre circles, mostly, developed by somebody named Venn, I guess. Anyway, all the circles sort of overlap in one shaded, overlapping part. It looks like the kind of doodling kids do on their binders in a boring class, but Iâm told itâs more significant.
Scientific Illustration #7:
Quadrants of Jerkish Behavior
In this illustration, all the circles represent the jerkish
behavior of the popular crowd. The overlap area shows
a highly concentrated and coordinated area of jerkish activity
(like when the group all dissed the formerly popular girl).
We will label that area Complete Jerk Quadrant because
quadrant is such a cool science word.
Conclusions: A highly detailed, multi-lined graph, a diagram and four lunch periods of research: Iâve spent way too much time on this case study already. And what did it prove? Interestingly, it didnât only show what everyone already knowsâthat these four jerks are indeed jerks (although itâs always nice to have that documented officially). It also demonstrated two very important general conclusions about jerks:
1) Leaving aside the really hard cases for the counselors and psychologists, jerks rarely demonstrate their jerkitude all the time. Much of the time, jerks pretend to be normal people. Like that fools anybody. But at key timesâduring jerkish events, episodes or opportunitiesâtheir true natures are revealed and the jerkitude spikes.
2) When we think of jerks, we often think of individual jerks acting annoying all on their own. But the really groundbreaking part of this case study shows several jerks working together in a group to create a massive jerkish event. Sort of like animals that hunt in a pack, only jerkier.
B) Teachers and Principals
  1) Teachers
We come to the tricky part of the project. You might think that talking about whether teachers can be jerks in a project that will be graded by a teacher might result in some kind of a conflict. You know, be a little awkward. Absolutely not. Weâre all objective professionals here. No names will be used. All scenarios described will remain anonymous and highly scientific.
Anyway, much like coaches, many, many teachers are wonderful people. They inspire kids to learn and devote themselves to education. Especially my favorite teacher, who is kind and caring and really appreciates a good science project when she reads one.
But letâs face it. Regular people can be idiots and jerks, so teachers are likely no exception.
For this chapter, I:
(a) held a scientific focus group (my friends) to
(i) develop a list of the kinds of jerkish behavior they had personally witnessed among their
   ⢠No lunch
   ⢠No apology
   ⢠Yelled at
Add it all up, and you get two complete jerks (note how the solid and wavy lines spike on the jerk scale on the graph).
â Jerkish Event D : A girl approaches the popular group. She used to be in the popular group, but for some mysterious, much-gossiped-over popular-group reason she got kicked out. She says something I canât hear, but in a friendly wayâyou know, with a smile. The popular kids look at her unsmilingly, then look away. They totally ignore the girl, who is still standing there. Then one of them clearly suggests leaving, and they get up and leave the other girl standing there. Jerks. This may not sound like very much, but trust me, in junior high, it really is. All the jerks (Dot, Dash, Solid and Wavy) spike to complete jerks during this event.
This last jerkish event might also be depicted by a cool diagram (a diagram within the explanation of a graph! Does this guy ever stop?). Ever hear of Venn diagrams? Theyâre circles, mostly, developed by somebody named Venn, I guess. Anyway, all the circles sort of overlap in one shaded, overlapping part. It looks like the kind of doodling kids do on their binders in a boring class, but Iâm told itâs more significant.
Scientific Illustration #7:
Quadrants of Jerkish Behavior
In this illustration, all the circles represent the jerkish
behavior of the popular crowd. The overlap area shows
a highly concentrated and coordinated area of jerkish activity
(like when the group all dissed the formerly popular girl).
We will label that area Complete Jerk Quadrant because
quadrant is such a cool science word.
Conclusions: A highly detailed, multi-lined graph, a diagram and four lunch periods of research: Iâve spent way too much time on this case study already. And what did it prove? Interestingly, it didnât only show what everyone already knowsâthat these four jerks are indeed jerks (although itâs always nice to have that documented officially). It also demonstrated two very important general conclusions about jerks:
1) Leaving aside the really hard cases for the counselors and psychologists, jerks rarely demonstrate their jerkitude all the time. Much of the time, jerks pretend to be normal people. Like that fools anybody. But at key timesâduring jerkish events, episodes or opportunitiesâtheir true natures are revealed and the jerkitude spikes.
2) When we think of jerks, we often think of individual jerks acting annoying all on their own. But the really groundbreaking part of this case study shows several jerks working together in a group to create a massive jerkish event. Sort of like animals that hunt in a pack, only jerkier.
B) Teachers and Principals
  1) Teachers
We come to the tricky part of the project. You might think that talking about whether teachers can be jerks in a project that will be graded by a teacher might result in some kind of a conflict. You know, be a little awkward. Absolutely not. Weâre all objective professionals here. No names will be used. All scenarios described will remain anonymous and highly scientific.
Anyway, much like coaches, many, many teachers are wonderful people. They inspire kids to learn and devote themselves to education. Especially my favorite teacher, who is kind and caring and really appreciates a good science project when she reads one.
But letâs face it. Regular people can be idiots and jerks, so teachers are likely no exception.
For this chapter, I:
(a) held a scientific focus group (my friends) to
(i) develop a list of the kinds of jerkish behavior they had personally witnessed among their
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