Oh fuck me. Anyway, summer has dwindled. I'm within 4 weeks or so of having to be back on campus. I sometimes walk in that office and see a fine layer of dust on things. I like it like that. I imagine that's how it will be after I die. They'll leave the office as it is, put Plexiglas over the door and bring new faculty by: "That's where Hiram kicked it. We still don't have his Spring grades. Doesn't it smell like whiskey and iced tea?"I'm baffled at how quickly the summer goes. It springs, flies, shoots past. It starts with such promise, such languor.
The speed of summer cannot be calculated. It's Einstein-ian. It collapses, folds, triples in mass, whatever.
I literally got an email from a departmental administrator asking for a rough draft of my syllabus for Fall.
A rough draft? Do you think I'm working on several drafts of that thing? I'm changing the classroom number, folks. I'm changing the dates. I'm doing what I did last semester. You can't stop me. You can't make me grow or learn. Oh, I'll do different patter in class, but I'll be goddamned if I'm going to be NEW and fresh.
If you want new and fresh, hire someone else. Oh, wait, you can't. You're stuck with me. And me with you.
Lord save us all.
Love you, Hi! The syllabus nazi has already sent me a reminder for fall. What do they think I'm going to put on it this year that requires their look-see?
ReplyDeleteYou don't really think adminflakes look at all that paperwork they make you submit. At Tuk U, we submit reams of the stuff. Adminflakes wallpaper their expansive arses with it to ward off liability and other bad juju.
DeleteI'm getting reminders that the BB courses are available -- EVEN THOUGH I STOPPED WORKING THERE A MONTH AGO!
ReplyDeleteHiram, soak up these last days, brother!
ReplyDeleteBeing stuck, I hear you. That is one of the dilemmas many of us face, I think. I'm HERE, but I always think about where I MIGHT be instead. What if cards had fallen a different way. Would that move to Ohio been a good one? What about that odd job in Seattle?
ReplyDeleteMaybe those would have been the places for me. I'll never know of course, because I bet all my money on this place, which at times is fantastic.
Do we ever settle?
God, I look forward to that magic time when I can stop pretending to grow ever more student-centered. Sure, I'll keep fine tuning things, but it'll be so I can get the most out of a course, not so the snowflakes can be .... What does one do with snowflakes anyway, beside keeping them cold and dry? The approaching end of summer has dried up my river of metaphor. Summers seem to go by more quickly now than when I was a student. I hope that stops at some point (well, as someone once observed, that which cannot keep going on must stop).
ReplyDeleteI think that, this year, "you can't make me grow or learn" is going to be my new mantra.
DeleteI'm pretty sure most of the students have adopted that one already.
DeleteAt my former employer, we had an annual ritual in the form of a staff barbecue which was held shortly before our summer break. The cooks were members of the institution's administration, the only time we ever saw them doing anything useful, let alone something that benefited us.
ReplyDeleteOne year, one of the administrators gave a speech. He said he was amazed at our dedication and how we would be spending our summers working on improving our course material or something like that.
I was sitting a table across from a colleague from another department. He looked at me and asked: "Who's he trying to kid?" I nodded in agreement and answered: "My thoughts exactly."
This year I, too, was all set to simply change dates on my syllabi. And then, the dreaded note from the bookstore arrived: "The text you selected is no longer in print. The publisher isn't doing any updates. Please select another text for the class." At least this time, I got the note before students showed up to the bookstore to buy a book and were told it wasn't available anymore. So now I have to find a new book to use... and I cannot just 'change dates' dammit.
ReplyDeleteFeeling stuck? Oh, yeah! I'm at a SLAC where I finally the aside from the whole different book thing) have my shit together and can somewhat sail along, hitting only the occasional bump in the water (usually a drowning student). While the misery is... well, miserable, I shudder to think about jumping back into the market and starting all over again elsewhere. So my defeatist stuckness is somewhat my fault and my giving in to fears of it not getting any better than this (although I know it must be better elsewhere; or at least better paid!)...
In the past, we wouldn't get reminders to post/share our syllabi online until sometime in Week 2. Last year they got their acts together a bit and pushed to have them all online in time for registration week, but it has never been made clear if/what reprimand exists for those who fail to comply.
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, since I'll be on leave this fall, I already feel out of the misery loop of which my friends and colleagues are starting to complain (especially those of you back on the home continent, who are down to counting days instead of weeks).
I must confess that, out of a desire to make my life easier during the first weeks of class, I make the syllabi and Blackboard sites available about three weeks before fall classes begin. It is my hope that by doing this (and following up with an email with a list of the textbooks) the students will actually arrive to my classes during the first week with the appropriate materials. (Hear me laughing at my own naïveté!)
ReplyDeleteBut does it work...even a little? Well, mixed results to be sure. I do think pointing out which textbook we will need during the first week has resulted in an increased number of students actually having that particular book (especially with threat of assignment linked to said book); however, students still show up the first week of class and complain that they can't complete assignments because they don't have the books. And often this extends well into weeks two and three. But at least now I can cut them off with a curt reminder that I did send them the list of textbooks well ahead of the start of classes, the Blackboard site has also been available since that same date, and it is their responsibility to figure out how to get the work done. And I feel somewhat relieved about that.
The very few times I've completed my syllabi more than a day or two before classes started (or, in the old paper-based days, the copying deadline), somebody sent me an email with a long list of new things that Absolutely Must Be Included In All Syllabi 12-24 hours *after* I thought I'd finished.
ReplyDeleteI occasionally send students who send reasonable but very early emailed inquiries about how a class will work (reasonable in part because I teach hybrid and online classes, and some haven't encountered that format before) the syllabus and/or welcome/warning letter from a previous semester, with the caveat that some things may change. I suppose I'd probably do the same if an administrator asked unreasonably early, but for the most part, the people reviewing our syllabi are department-level administrators who know me well (and vice versa) and who are way too busy trying to make sure the newly-hired adjuncts and TAs are teaching something that at least vaguely resembles the course description to worry too much about me. I'm occasionally outspoken when I don't agree with the usual way of doing things, but I do manage to work mostly within the (fairly flexible) boundaries set by the course requirements.