Here in the UK, we have had an unusually early spell of cold wintery weather. For the first time in 36 years (that's the memory of the oldest-serving member of the department), the campus was closed for three glorious snow days. Of course, now we are rushing to cram in the rescheduled classes, but that's not the good bit.
Our academic year is an idio(syncra)tic blend of two semesters and three terms, like many UK middle-of-the-road institutions. The first semester doesn't end until the end of January... so the EXAMS for the first semester are IN January. Formally assessed coursework normally comes in just before the Christmas break, and we are expected to have all the work marked and grades entered for when the 'flakes come back after break, so they know where they stand before they take their exams (rules are different for courses without exams, but in my BasketWeaving Department it's normal for about 80% of undergraduate courses to have an exam as part of the assessment mix). In other words, Christmas 'break' is spent procrastinating grading, doing research whilst thinking about grading, trying to be social whilst worrying about grading or grading and getting complained at by family and friends for being antisocial, grading, fantasising about joining the foreign legion, grading grudgingly and in summary the 'break' is ruined by the grading (yes, OK, so the truly efficient will polish it all off in the few days before Christmas, having already shopped/wrapped/mailed/cleaned/cooked/decorated/visited in the months before the holiday. But I'm not one of them or I probably wouldn't be here. Misery is usually not allowed into their lives for being inefficient).
Ah, but the snow days... they meant that some classes had to be rescheduled! And 'flakes could not get into contact with Profs! And 'flakes who lived in rural areas couldn't get to campus on other days too! They couldn't get to the library! Their computers at home all conveniently broke/lost internet connection! And HOW COULD THEY POSSIBLY DO THEIR ASSIGNMENTS? Much anguish... and to avoid lots of individual pleas for special allowances, the decision was taken to move ALL the end-of-teaching (next Friday) coursework due dates to the first official teaching week in January.
This means that we profs will have no grading to do until January. OK, we'll grumble a LOT in January, but... the bliss of it! Only research, graduate students, papers for January conferences, families, in-laws and out-laws and turkey and travelling to deal with. The travelling will be so much nicer without the piles of grading...
I was pleased to read about the tuition riots taking it out on Charles and Camilla's car....
ReplyDeleteIt's amusing, but it really doesn't help the cause. A lot of people see students as idle layabouts anyway...
ReplyDelete...and then there's the academics, with their ridiculously long summer holidays and only being in the classroom for 6-12 hours a week, I mean, clearly we're all spongers off the state.
ReplyDeleteI sympathise with the emotion but hope that if any real students were involved in the violent/destructive stuff they are thrown off their degree courses very publically. 2 to 1 in favour of the new fees, and some frustrated people (or some agitators) decide to smash things? How is this going to make students look like a worthy cause, compared with healthcare, schoolkids or the elderly? Considering what the government are doing to the disabled, playing on media spin of them being 'workshy scroungers', this is just playing into their hands.
I haz a major Grumpy
I'm glad you got at least a bit of an unexpected reprieve in the middle of what sounds like an especially difficult year. I still haven't figured out whether I prefer the system I knew as an undergraduate (early-September start, reading period and exams after Christmas, end of year in early June) or the one under which I'm working now (late August start, reading day and exams closely crowding before Christmas, finished by mid-May). As a Prof, I think I might prefer the earlier calendar, but only because the students wrote their papers, as well as took exams, in January, leaving the holiday period, as you will have it this year, blissfully grading-free (and also, for those undergrads who kept up, studying-free). At least this year the calendar works out so that, if I grade intensively enough next week (and nobody plagiarizes), I'll have a week free before Christmas.
ReplyDeleteHey, it's snowing all over here in the Great Lakes area of the U.S. The roof of the Metrodome in Minneapolis has collapsed. As I sit in my cozy house, looking at the wet, heavy snow pile up, I'm praying for a snow day Monday--and I'm an atheist.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you have a reprieve, Grumpy!
Wow! I cannot imagine Minnesota with too much snow even for Minnesota. I thought y'all were just now thinking about closing the bathroom window. Is your roof okay, Greta?
ReplyDelete"There are no atheists in a foxhole."