Publish or perish in the ivory tower of learning outcomes.
A small single-occupancy room in a monastery or convent where monks contemplated existence (and probably regretted their roommate choices).
The principle that brains have limited working memory, so dumping 50 slides of information per lecture is pedagogically criminal.
Thinking about thinking, or as teenagers would call it, 'overthinking everything'—actually useful in learning.
Allowing students to start a program at an advanced point rather than the beginning, because apparently prerequisites can be bypassed for select individuals.
The beefy defensive walls that made castles actually useful for something other than impressing tourists. These earthen or stone barriers were designed to make invading armies very, very unhappy.
Software like Canvas or Blackboard where you upload assignments and check your grade obsessively, because email is apparently too simple.
A ballet term for a single step or movement, from French for 'step'—which somehow makes tripping over your own feet while turning out your leg sound elegant. It's the basic unit of dance vocabulary, and it looks way easier when professionals do it than when you attempt it in actual class.
Three or more notes played simultaneously to create harmony—the sonic foundation of most music that doesn't sound like a cat walking across a keyboard. In architecture, it's the straight line connecting two points on a curve (far less poetic).
The branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge itself—basically 'how do we know what we know?' asked obsessively.
A research accomplice or paid actor embedded in a psychological study who pretends to be a regular participant while actually manipulating the experiment. Basically, a professional liar with scientific credentials.
A moody, dark aesthetic genre featuring cynical protagonists, shadowy cinematography, and morally ambiguous characters—basically what your life looks like at 2 AM when you're doom-scrolling. Often used to describe anything with brooding, mysterious vibes.
Rewording someone else's ideas in your own words while citing the source—like plagiarism's legal cousin.
Math word problems featuring zombies, monsters, and other spooky characters instead of apples and trains—making arithmetic slightly less unbearable by threatening to turn your students into undead.
In music, the symbol (♯) that raises a note a semitone higher—the accidental that makes your sheet music look more complicated than it actually is.
The theory and practice of teaching, or as some might say, the art of explaining things you understand to people who don't.
The affectionate (or not-so-affectionate) nickname for Testudo, the University of Maryland mascot, earned after students rubbed its statue for luck and got hilariously cursed instead.
Attempting to memorize an entire semester of material the night before an exam, a strategy with approximately 0% success rate but 100% prevalence.
Reviewing material at increasing intervals to move it to long-term memory—the opposite of cramming and actually backed by neuroscience.
Related to existence or being—academic terminology for 'what is real?' that makes philosophy papers 150% more confusing.
An acronym meaning 'Fucking Scientist Mode'—a hyper-focused state of academic/scientific productivity usually triggered by alcohol, existential dread, or a brutal critique from your advisor. It's when a grad student becomes an unstoppable research machine out of pure panic.
The science of who eats whom, who poops where, and why Mother Nature throws a tantrum when you disrupt her carefully balanced drama. It's the study of relationships between organisms and their environment—basically real estate with more biological consequences.
To narrate or describe events in exhausting detail, usually when someone asks "what happened?" and you oblige with an unnecessarily elaborate blow-by-blow account. In election contexts, it's the recount of votes—democracy's second opinion.
Evaluating student work as a complete picture rather than itemizing every mistake, which is supposedly more humane and accurate.
The committee that scrutinizes research proposals to protect human subjects, which means your study gets rejected for not being boring enough.