pimp
v.— «I can’t say how long the term “pimping” has been used in medical circles but I first heard the term six years ago when I began working at a teaching hospital. The term comes from the fact that the clinical instructors would “pimp” the medical students as a way of updating their(the clinical professor’s) basic science and epidemology knowledge base. Instead of heading to a library or surfing the net, a clinical professor such as a surgical attending would pick the brain of a third-year medical student who was fresh from the basic science classes. This is analagous to the pimp who makes a living by the prostitution labors of the men and women in his or her stable on the street.» —“Re: Etymology of the word “Pimping”” by Natalie J. Belle in Howard University College of Medicine Usenet: misc.education.medical Sept. 12, 1997. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Amid court-ordered busing in the 1970s, a middle-school teacher tried to distract her nervous students on the first day of class with this strange assignment: find a monarch caterpillar. The result? A memorable lesson in the miracle of metamorphosis...
In 1971, when a new public library opened in Troy, Michigan, famous authors and artists were invited to write letters to the city’s youngest readers, extolling the many benefits of libraries. One of the loveliest was from E.B. White, author of...