I told the staff that I didn’t care if my students froze.

They laughed nervously but I think they understood.

The students were not so understanding.

The problem is that while the students get to sit for much of the class, my job is to stand at the front or rush around answering questions and putting out small fires. Because of this, I prefer the room to be somewhere closer to sub-arctic than sub-tropical. (The students, rather selfishly, prefer things to be more sub-tropical.)

I also feel that keeping the room cooler encourages students to stay awake. Once it gets warm and comfortable and cozy there’s nothing they’d like more than to put their heads down and enjoy a brief slumber and miss a good portion of the class. Or they are about to die of hypothermia because it’s so cold. Either way, they shouldn’t fall asleep.

My students have learned to bring jackets and have also quickly figured out which part of the room is the warmest, or at least out of the direct breeze of the air conditioner.

Of course, once speeches started today, despite earlier complaints that it was cold, everyone was sweating. By the time they stopped, class was over.