Mystery of the blank pages ....

To establish the ground work at the start for any process training, the trainer needs to take their batch through a battery of legalities to help understand the workings of the region they are servicing. (UK / US / AUS)

So when I was assigned my training batch for process training, there was a lot of planning and anticipation around whether the trainees would understand and clear the assessment on the Act’s and Laws around financial banking of the USA.

So, on day 15 of the training schedule, the batch was rostered to go through the Patriot Act: Section 352 (Anti-Money Laundering Programs), post which they had an assessment which required them to score 95% to clear.

The handouts were printed out, xerox copies made and distributed to the trainees to use. I then took them through the act along with the reasons behind the regulations and the impact if violated, step by step. Reading each part and explaining it, constantly asking if the group had understood.

However, as I got to page 3 of the handout, I noticed that one of my trainees, Priya, who sat right at the front of the class, was looking at her handout following every word I was saying at the point, and nodding her head in understanding.

But the page she was looking at … was Blank! Not a line … not a page number … NOT A THING!!
I wondered for a minute if I was imagining it and asked her “Priya, what are you doing? That page is blank! Are you not paying attention to what’s going on in class?”

She looked at me … then back to her handout … looked at the blank page … turned the page (to where it was printed) and said “Oh!” and continued to nod her head!!

Thinking nothing of it, I continued on with the session until I reached page 5 of the handout … That’s when I noticed that, again, Priya was busy ‘reading’ another blank page!

This really irritated me and I snapped saying “Really Priya! This is not acceptable behaviour! You either pay attention in class or step outside and continue with your day-dreaming!! But I will not have you sitting in class staring at a blank page!!”

Again … She looked at me … then back to her handout … looked at the blank page … turned the page (to where it was printed) and said “Oh!” and continued to nod her head!!
Needless to say, this had disrupted the entire class and everyone was wondering what was wrong with Priya.

We continued on to the last portion of the Act in discussion and by the 9th page were close to the end. Thinking I was finally done, I looked at Priya to check if she was following what was happening and Lo! And Behold! There she was … on another BLANK PAGE!

I could not believe it … and I sent her off to wash her face thinking she had dozed off and refused to pay attention. When the class re-grouped later, I double checked if the trainees had understood the content of the document before I hand out the test papers and received a chorus answer that they were ‘good to go’!

I handed out the test papers and post correction was not surprised to realize that Priya had not cleared the test, having incorrectly answered 3 questions. I took her aside and tried to understand what the reason for the failure in the test was and see if there would need to be a revision of the document before I gave her the re-test.

She sat there looking absolutely confused and kept saying that she understood the entire document and had not questions or doubts about the material. However, after having trained multiple batches realized that there was still something playing at the back of her mind and asked her “Priya, I can see there is something you want to ask me … what is it? Has it got to do with the test?”

To which she replied … “No ... I’ve understood the material. But I have one question … the questions I got wrong … were the answers from the BLANK PAGES???”