tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-211527382024-03-27T19:54:35.518-04:00Excelsiorchips off the old blockBevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.comBlogger3835125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-56167491170595727202024-03-26T11:51:00.002-04:002024-03-26T11:51:29.224-04:00Winds of change, both literal and metaphorical<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I wasn't driving when this happened, which is a good thing because big trucks make me nervous, and when we're approaching an eight-mile-long steep uphill grade featuring blinking signs warning "High wind alert--Truck blow-over danger," I'm much more comfortable with a colleague at the wheel--especially if it's the colleague whose legendary calm would make her the ideal driver for a trip to the ends of the earth through an apocalyptic nightmare. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">So I'm sitting pretty in the passenger seat while my colleague struggles to keep us in our lane through wind gusts roaring down the mountain and pushing us toward the guardrail. Suddenly we see flashing lights. We join a line of cars and trucks crawling carefully past the wreck of a semi that has blown over on its side next to a cliff edge. Emergency vehicles have attached heavy cables to the truck, but with every new gust of wind the cables quiver and the truck scoots a little closer to the edge. In the battle between cables and wind, who wins? We're not staying around to find out.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Is this a metaphor for the current state of higher education? If so, are we the truck being blown off the cliff, the cables trying to hold the truck steady, or the drivers gawking as they try to move on and survive the storm? Who or what is producing the wind? Is it the FAFSA breakdown, the bleak enrollment forecast, the budget crisis, or the larger cultural disdain for higher education?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Judging by my conversations with colleagues from other campuses last week, we'd prefer to be among the line of cars crawling past the disaster than in the truck going over the cliff--but even then, I'm really glad I'm not the one driving the car. </span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-19657632629949772892024-03-22T18:15:00.005-04:002024-03-22T18:15:41.934-04:00Sound and silence at an academic conference<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">From my room on the 21st floor of a conference hotel in Atlanta, I can hear a distant hum of passing traffic, the occasional whine of a siren, a buzzing light and a rush of air from a vent--but no people. Not a human voice to be heard.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Nothing against people, but I've exceeded my quota for today. I'm with a small team from my campus attending the CIC NetVUE conference, where sessions ask us to listen and think and talk and talk and talk some more, which I have been dutifully doing all day long, both in and out of sessions--talking about the challenges of inculcating in students a sense of vocation, about renewing faculty members' commitment to the mission of the college, about deep listening and close reading and community-engaged learning, but mostly about the traumas small colleges everywhere are enduring.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">At many moments throughout the day I've felt the presence of a supportive community. Unlike many academic conferences, this one is characterized not by arrogant posturing but by collaborative exploration of our common struggles and goals. At lunch I sat with faculty members from various disciplines and types of institutions who started spontaneously sharing the most ridiculous comments students have written on course evaluations, and every single one of them felt familiar. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">So many ideas! One session encouraged struggling campuses to develop methods of lamentation--to allow people to grieve the loss of colleagues and majors and programs. Someone told about how in 2020 her campus invited faculty distressed by the demands of pandemic teaching to gather beside a river and release all their fear and anger in a primal scream.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Interesting ideas but by the end of the day all that talk turned into a screaming headache. My colleagues went out to dinner together but I suspect that every restaurant in walking distance is crammed full of conference attendees still talking talking talking, and I've had enough.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">So I've retreated to my quiet room. The fan clicks on and I hear a hum; far below on the highway a horn blasts and a siren blares, but here in my room I'm happy to sit still and listen to the silence. </span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-32230962317293611402024-03-18T08:46:00.005-04:002024-03-18T08:46:53.282-04:00Not quite the morning news<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">If I had to write a news story covering the events of the past seven days in my life, I'd be hard pressed to know what to put in the headline--the shrieks in the night, the sweets in my mouth, the boys in the sun, the boy with the gun...it felt like a lot but it really adds up to not much. But I'll start with the gun because it was by far the most bizarre thing to happen all week, even if I was an uninvolved bystander.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">We were enjoying a potluck lunch in the church fellowship hall (coconut cake--yum!) when a sweet church lady heard a knocking on the door. She opened the door to find a local urchin, maybe 12 years old, whose first words were enigmatic: "Tell God I said hello." The church lady asked him if he wanted to come in and get some lunch but he said no, his mom didn't know where he was. As the kid turned to leave, the church lady saw the gun in a holster hanging at his waist.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">What was a 12-year-old kid doing carrying a gun? Was it a real gun? What did he mean by "Tell God I said hello"? A good journalist would have sought answers to these questions and more, but the kid was gone before I even knew he'd been there and no answers were forthcoming.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">The presence of a gun tends to overshadow other events, so probably no one is interested in hearing about the community production of <i>Death of a Salesman</i>, which made me cry, or the student production of <i>Medea</i>, which made me wonder how the main character could do all that shrieking without seriously damaging her vocal cords. Both productions were very well done but I got annoyed every time someone blamed Willy Loman's failures on his old age. I kept wanting to jump up and yell "63 isn't that old!"</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">In between all that gallivanting, I graded exams, prepped classes, interviewed three candidates for adjunct positions, served as a judge at a cookie-baking contest, chatted with artsy folks at a reception for a visiting artist, and attended a baseball game in the bright spring sunshine.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">That warmth seems to have gone on hiatus, however, as tonight's forecast calls for snow. This morning as I drove to campus near 7 a.m., I was surprised to see a crew shell skimming along the surface of the river. Twenty-eight degrees outside with the sun barely glancing above the horizon and there were my students putting their muscles to work on the cold, dark river.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">It's dark and cold and we're barely awake but still young people are pulling their weight to move the boat forward--that's the story I prefer to tell, but it's hard to put that in a headline when there's a mysterious gun drawing attention just outside the door. </span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-14805158995950295242024-03-12T10:06:00.001-04:002024-03-12T10:06:05.040-04:00Wobbling on a shifty surface while trying to serve my students<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Lately I keep thinking about the time close to 20 years ago when I attended a college event on a docked sternwheeler. I don't recall the topic of discussion, but the boat bobbed on the water and attendees enjoyed an open bar, so when an administrator got up to spread his arms wide and admonish us all to consider the needs of <i>The students! The students!</i>, he wobbled a bit. Looked like he might fall over at any moment, in fact. People sitting near the front braced themselves to catch him if he fell or at least avoid the carnage.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Today I feel like that dude--wobbly, trying to remain upright on a shifty and uncertain surface, but still devoted to serving the needs of my students even though I could fall flat on my face at any moment.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Yesterday there were many such moments. First day after Spring Break and the time change and I arrived in my office to find no heat in the building. Outside temps in the mid-twenties; inside, colleagues sitting in their offices in full winter coats, hats, and gloves. I put up with it as long as I could and finally turned on my space heater--just for five minutes, just to take the chill off--and promptly blew a fuse, shutting off power to all the offices in my corner of the building.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">We lowly academics are not permitted to reset a circuit breaker, so I reported the outage to the building coordinator, who reported it to the Physical Plant, who sent someone over to restore electricity--four hours later. I guess they were busy. And so was I--trying to find a way to do my job without heat or electricity.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But I survived that. And I survived teaching in unheated rooms and sitting through a long, unnecessary meeting on a profoundly uncomfortable chair that made my bad hip so stiff that I could barely walk when it was finally over. And I survived three-quarters of the department chairs' meeting without any more than the usual amount of anguish. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But then the Powers That Be unleashed the new departmental budgeting process (surprise!), which exposed my areas of greatest anxiety and incompetence: working with spreadsheets. At first I thought okay, give me some time to figure this process out and I can get it done, but then they announced the deadline. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">The ground shifted. My heart started racing, my brain spinning, my head wobbling. No way I can complete this complex task in that amount of time, I told myself, but then the tiny Puritans who live in my brain starting huffing and puffing about the necessity of meeting the deadline, but then my deep-seated anxieties about money started screaming that the deadline is impossible, and then those prim little Puritans reminded me that it would be unseemly and untidy to allow my head to explode in front of all those people whom I respect, and then I started silently drafting a letter of resignation. <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">An over-reaction? Maybe, but it was nothing compared to the way I reacted when I finally arrived home to discover that one of the ravening beasts who shares my household had eaten up all but a tiny sliver of the pineapple-upside-down cake I'd been saving for myself. After the day I'd experienced, the absence of cake felt unforgivable.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">After a good night's sleep I'm still feeling wobbly and I'm waiting for the next shift in the uncertain surface I'm standing on while I try to appease the tiny Puritans and the anxiety monsters and the ravening beasts, but I haven't written that letter of resignation just yet, mostly because I'm devoted to meeting the needs of my students. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i>The students! The students!</i> I cry, hoping that someone catches me when I finally fall on my face.</span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-1007904504368800242024-03-08T16:48:00.001-05:002024-03-08T16:48:39.382-05:00Swanning about<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">After being away four days and ignoring a million emails and piles of work, I really didn't want to come home. As a delaying tactic, I took a scenic route that added nearly an hour to my journey but rewarded me with views of swans--and not just once but in several places. The stretch of Killbuck Creek below Millersburg widens out into wetlands where I saw herons, geese, ducks, and swans, which from a distance looked like white lights hovering above the dark water.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i>I need to get out on that water,</i> I told myself, but it was too cold and I lacked essential equipment. Still, visiting Killbuck Creek gave me ideas, made me long for my canoe and some sunshine and a picnic lunch. Along the drive I saw forsythia blooming and then when I pulled into my driveway I was greeted by a host of golden daffodils bobbing in the breeze.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Spring is coming--I can feel it--and today, just for a while, I saw it all around me. It was an extra-long journey home, but I don't regret a single minute.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYTiVz78uAcB_i5fPN8si8QgFpeVOd6eBJLhYU6gF3FRPuJ6yl44HiS7QeHvOmG99ULQFkb-XJLnxk5XRs4urP5DTk1M0FotYDB2zRgKH4YOizDwX0FTHkufDjUC_TJZ67GQvJHk-sd08_kGmJPbrRTj6t2dGRUHkHvoEdxwyTcoLd-YdD26fo6Q/s2784/DSC_0658.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1613" data-original-width="2784" height="185" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYTiVz78uAcB_i5fPN8si8QgFpeVOd6eBJLhYU6gF3FRPuJ6yl44HiS7QeHvOmG99ULQFkb-XJLnxk5XRs4urP5DTk1M0FotYDB2zRgKH4YOizDwX0FTHkufDjUC_TJZ67GQvJHk-sd08_kGmJPbrRTj6t2dGRUHkHvoEdxwyTcoLd-YdD26fo6Q/s320/DSC_0658.JPG" width="320" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_S29F9T4gl-EdzB-MToom_WP0gjgLoAoAsDSp06IWBEQwwWjegYhS2JCS7SPj0zFfQS9-36DPy6NrZCt2aLZL8yrr3RRZ0EuMJlpHtdCyAQsdJTNwxriqsi823-0-1T_ePmNx4JnLCV9bsJgMNR_Dc1EVao74wU7-vGyCxEdTCyaLxQwQZBmz6w/s2996/DSC_0660.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1763" data-original-width="2996" height="188" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_S29F9T4gl-EdzB-MToom_WP0gjgLoAoAsDSp06IWBEQwwWjegYhS2JCS7SPj0zFfQS9-36DPy6NrZCt2aLZL8yrr3RRZ0EuMJlpHtdCyAQsdJTNwxriqsi823-0-1T_ePmNx4JnLCV9bsJgMNR_Dc1EVao74wU7-vGyCxEdTCyaLxQwQZBmz6w/s320/DSC_0660.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /> </span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"> </span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-76956501922552085692024-03-07T18:45:00.003-05:002024-03-07T18:45:44.038-05:00Great weather if you're a duck<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">After two days of t-shirt weather, we bundled up yesterday to stand in persistent drizzle and cold wind at the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, where my adorable daughter and I observed great blue herons building nests and courting, and then we took a quick jaunt alongside an old canal to see a beaver pond where ducks and geese dabbled contentedly. Poor lighting means bad pictures, but it was worth seeing the birds at work, unbothered by the weather.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjX4mcym3qtkQb-QhruRbNCFOI-JDxz3wbGP0ekM1JI1SbK1vSNML9FEMtC7s0WJqLGnEmE0uytz9QuMYPqBwxzjlbyt60jC-3iE8uJYGgIowltbjhu2ZHizme7cLWFKL0GdQTXgeGvSDoMuJRTTuiqvGvD-YMo8sMiraTKuUeZyKMjy62NIXN38A/s1467/DSC_0541.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1021" data-original-width="1467" height="223" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjX4mcym3qtkQb-QhruRbNCFOI-JDxz3wbGP0ekM1JI1SbK1vSNML9FEMtC7s0WJqLGnEmE0uytz9QuMYPqBwxzjlbyt60jC-3iE8uJYGgIowltbjhu2ZHizme7cLWFKL0GdQTXgeGvSDoMuJRTTuiqvGvD-YMo8sMiraTKuUeZyKMjy62NIXN38A/s320/DSC_0541.JPG" width="320" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdIkm1LORFRCk6G2cKiNQYEGW4OsQTXrry2CLtYUKTO_t_VmVeZi1mhi1iN4O_NHTSjVqkhohx5fhSm69LlSzkqxnm11aJw-ZuIy0880XwctNAM1gjllIoKcmsGOskmgmR3nvhUdo26iiX2ZhFvDbttT_PiWWTe6ssf7mNFMhKLeBP4vNvmhzygQ/s1278/DSC_0546.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1278" data-original-width="1190" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdIkm1LORFRCk6G2cKiNQYEGW4OsQTXrry2CLtYUKTO_t_VmVeZi1mhi1iN4O_NHTSjVqkhohx5fhSm69LlSzkqxnm11aJw-ZuIy0880XwctNAM1gjllIoKcmsGOskmgmR3nvhUdo26iiX2ZhFvDbttT_PiWWTe6ssf7mNFMhKLeBP4vNvmhzygQ/s320/DSC_0546.JPG" width="298" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">How does he carry a stick that big?<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYsknGx4Trd8pNdaObooJjYd62U9uRlxGGFbssRYk9w2c6VkCua57k1RhxndNmyJYWGa3OIGEsEWbIOffW4pZ5D5USl__NVO9c13CH6eN0Rs_NuusQ0bXoi6Clh3OV3f2TYkz_rGaluHzojSLpACGsDJRNQAe04aEbAoeRJsI3rDKbT4I418pewQ/s5376/DSC_0553.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3641" data-original-width="5376" height="217" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYsknGx4Trd8pNdaObooJjYd62U9uRlxGGFbssRYk9w2c6VkCua57k1RhxndNmyJYWGa3OIGEsEWbIOffW4pZ5D5USl__NVO9c13CH6eN0Rs_NuusQ0bXoi6Clh3OV3f2TYkz_rGaluHzojSLpACGsDJRNQAe04aEbAoeRJsI3rDKbT4I418pewQ/s320/DSC_0553.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Every black blob is a nest at the heron rookery.<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheTebLznq2xMtsyv3Odd7g9Vzl2ivYlW45d0XOmZHhwUPdYjEeWuE2iFnnRLNqpWT4NZIFt5yZ0HdBzfn9UsrYp3dmQ06AmfK9RK-xugi_ZFXnMoQM4qk_KThQcBEZvp-gOnP4iC_dX_0m5KMUHYZm2WtcekQyob57ef5xU2d0AjkyjofgDOM_nw/s1514/DSC_0585.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1179" data-original-width="1514" height="249" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheTebLznq2xMtsyv3Odd7g9Vzl2ivYlW45d0XOmZHhwUPdYjEeWuE2iFnnRLNqpWT4NZIFt5yZ0HdBzfn9UsrYp3dmQ06AmfK9RK-xugi_ZFXnMoQM4qk_KThQcBEZvp-gOnP4iC_dX_0m5KMUHYZm2WtcekQyob57ef5xU2d0AjkyjofgDOM_nw/s320/DSC_0585.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwXqperoySjpoPZWET1vezJj_dEJxciCxuPfPNe3DKLROjvMVFh1SodXb4QX5f7ID_oRXcFTyoBAmtLhLAmV-G6cHi70dwGHZMyZ5nY-i7mQnaH2yc1xOIv-1UX47R7X1G8HnNGPIliCplP23CZdaHhoexzCtIL0-tDRSX57PODaNO-HZPzk-2Ww/s3521/DSC_0611.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1648" data-original-width="3521" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwXqperoySjpoPZWET1vezJj_dEJxciCxuPfPNe3DKLROjvMVFh1SodXb4QX5f7ID_oRXcFTyoBAmtLhLAmV-G6cHi70dwGHZMyZ5nY-i7mQnaH2yc1xOIv-1UX47R7X1G8HnNGPIliCplP23CZdaHhoexzCtIL0-tDRSX57PODaNO-HZPzk-2Ww/s320/DSC_0611.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpWERlklw_XVi91kw084Hoo_S2DaYKZz9T1IWQXyVMAnMVp0lXcL-1lwCtgBlr9Yea29cOTjwuuBZfcqJe6_pVeQiyi5JuKYxw0NY3E8ZXSB8teqDDGhGmHeI_CLEOn7EgAfGoa_n6iYRGDT4wSRZFsZl3OSAxc_3fo1IdeASzJzinGdg9hj3pHg/s2171/DSC_0613.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1736" data-original-width="2171" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpWERlklw_XVi91kw084Hoo_S2DaYKZz9T1IWQXyVMAnMVp0lXcL-1lwCtgBlr9Yea29cOTjwuuBZfcqJe6_pVeQiyi5JuKYxw0NY3E8ZXSB8teqDDGhGmHeI_CLEOn7EgAfGoa_n6iYRGDT4wSRZFsZl3OSAxc_3fo1IdeASzJzinGdg9hj3pHg/s320/DSC_0613.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtbRWhJeBNui-MqzPVaw63HnYa1chnQ52Kv5W5qiKyrGNEgvDHEx0MKCgm3iGuDoAIOiKx0aK1b_dbURA-NpuK5ph4AnKCAyt7gnS3Q02ydEsww5ozAFhGLlfm2IdPcQhmOXhP2j91EvWe9DTmbZrBgo6wmRz79jMApHe7GTsyHvDfjDeAIfxy2A/s3723/DSC_0621.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2207" data-original-width="3723" height="190" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtbRWhJeBNui-MqzPVaw63HnYa1chnQ52Kv5W5qiKyrGNEgvDHEx0MKCgm3iGuDoAIOiKx0aK1b_dbURA-NpuK5ph4AnKCAyt7gnS3Q02ydEsww5ozAFhGLlfm2IdPcQhmOXhP2j91EvWe9DTmbZrBgo6wmRz79jMApHe7GTsyHvDfjDeAIfxy2A/s320/DSC_0621.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIHKFUuMhA6uyUwMWzbTfthUHSpUNWdJ2rmeAKRnFAoM9L79axXA7LPYv58UN8_0NZNcdlkl08g8FZP1DcyxegHdA0DQJ-WbKnyEfI49BWvk1qp2_GMfBDajCc5cxMEYujHCYEteMp1of5u85tPJBDyCz-FtP8rzPtY6h8VE2QhaLcQbYXDWgy1g/s4274/DSC_0632.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2383" data-original-width="4274" height="178" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIHKFUuMhA6uyUwMWzbTfthUHSpUNWdJ2rmeAKRnFAoM9L79axXA7LPYv58UN8_0NZNcdlkl08g8FZP1DcyxegHdA0DQJ-WbKnyEfI49BWvk1qp2_GMfBDajCc5cxMEYujHCYEteMp1of5u85tPJBDyCz-FtP8rzPtY6h8VE2QhaLcQbYXDWgy1g/s320/DSC_0632.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc68ymbjB0A5EQD1nc-A-Jccvjk4WY9bxs183GolY009IJtoOeC307x2sH8iDsF8LstC8Ik5D31EU-CaWSVsUj3pOlb4Cxjl1LH4pKL6URCa8FODgYEtRXfufvZy3CPoKuJMWAAnGyZH1Ekq5BNqpM0PZc2-DnoAIOkT2ET2wlaS2WItRHlvW7tQ/s4999/DSC_0634.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2889" data-original-width="4999" height="185" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc68ymbjB0A5EQD1nc-A-Jccvjk4WY9bxs183GolY009IJtoOeC307x2sH8iDsF8LstC8Ik5D31EU-CaWSVsUj3pOlb4Cxjl1LH4pKL6URCa8FODgYEtRXfufvZy3CPoKuJMWAAnGyZH1Ekq5BNqpM0PZc2-DnoAIOkT2ET2wlaS2WItRHlvW7tQ/s320/DSC_0634.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I love the elegant pattern on the female mallard's back<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2ttGAE5UBWv00-5zRu9OGhawGAuGw26uPLg_6Wk5KdDmMNKLEUWv2jr8UF5ltZnO93T_07ZCipdl1JBD2ypxsFUCRPR13r8K9zOTv-hIzvZaYZq0zSJFcIwSZ2LjovBVvq-qiBz9B44Yrbr38PVOSxyITFhZhRSt7lQYGGx7tk9O6m3oHv0oCiA/s4687/DSC_0635.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3246" data-original-width="4687" height="222" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2ttGAE5UBWv00-5zRu9OGhawGAuGw26uPLg_6Wk5KdDmMNKLEUWv2jr8UF5ltZnO93T_07ZCipdl1JBD2ypxsFUCRPR13r8K9zOTv-hIzvZaYZq0zSJFcIwSZ2LjovBVvq-qiBz9B44Yrbr38PVOSxyITFhZhRSt7lQYGGx7tk9O6m3oHv0oCiA/s320/DSC_0635.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBkFWyiJDZuYxfaYmWyF92YJOk-2oRpbkRSkHuN_4VdslEmExx2w9LuPkeiG_2vXBVnLacLnLVClzBD59y5qMKiKvU1Z3B06xrro_fYSivrfZNLAp_krpHqQvip5minWjIi0zCXV48Duu3EUnOkC-1j8RQNeiH19meJ7dGm75QYjNyJhHmrucWYA/s1525/DSC_0644.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1062" data-original-width="1525" height="223" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBkFWyiJDZuYxfaYmWyF92YJOk-2oRpbkRSkHuN_4VdslEmExx2w9LuPkeiG_2vXBVnLacLnLVClzBD59y5qMKiKvU1Z3B06xrro_fYSivrfZNLAp_krpHqQvip5minWjIi0zCXV48Duu3EUnOkC-1j8RQNeiH19meJ7dGm75QYjNyJhHmrucWYA/s320/DSC_0644.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Wood duck!<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhO5BBubl0iPjwKf-w7c7G7M3mPTThK0BrvAsRuOhHG2czaKoNrRRSfwdGBfb-ClHP-5TkokIQO7LTnYrP5rjbJl5_z4oWkW3p_cCe1u1W6CY-HAwLxcPcRRueyyGgU8QfbHJdid419YILMCTytscn8CaJfdwgfULfiQO-P28V-jHly0U-e-sPRKQ/s6000/DSC_0647.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4000" data-original-width="6000" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhO5BBubl0iPjwKf-w7c7G7M3mPTThK0BrvAsRuOhHG2czaKoNrRRSfwdGBfb-ClHP-5TkokIQO7LTnYrP5rjbJl5_z4oWkW3p_cCe1u1W6CY-HAwLxcPcRRueyyGgU8QfbHJdid419YILMCTytscn8CaJfdwgfULfiQO-P28V-jHly0U-e-sPRKQ/s320/DSC_0647.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Evidence of beaver activity<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /> </span><br /><p></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-61117582211434539412024-03-05T12:16:00.006-05:002024-03-05T12:16:58.050-05:00Sometimes it's hard to break away<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">My primary purpose this Spring Break is to distract myself from the ongoing situation at my beloved place of employment, and I use <i>situation</i> because I'm trying to avoid more descriptive phrases that require unwieldy words like<i> </i><i>apocalyptic</i> and <i>abandonment</i> and <i>thumbscrew-inspired decisions-making</i>.<i> </i></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But it's hard to avoid thinking about the <i>situation</i> when my inbox contains yet another email from a valued colleague announcing a move to a job in the private sector after 25 years of teaching, plus an outstanding student's request for a letter of recommendation so he can transfer his skills, intelligence, and passion to a different institution. Even at church I couldn't escape the <i>situation</i>. A congregant asked me questions about opportunities for a young relative to study in a particular program, and I had to work very hard to tactfully avoid speculation about whether that program will be fully staffed in the near future.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">So I had to get away. My all-over-Ohio excursion was nearly thwarted 90 minutes into the trip when my tax person texted to let me know she needed a particular form signed by me and my husband right away. I sat in a Wal-Mart parking lot in nowheresville, Ohio, texting with a tax person who at first could not understand why I wasn't willing to drive back home to print the forms, find my husband, get his signature, scan the form, and send it back, and then after she agreed to send a version that could be signed online, she couldn't understand why I couldn't get my husband to sign it electronically immediately. (Because Monday is his day off and the weather was gorgeous and there's no wi-fi connection out on the tractor.)</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But we worked that out without disrupting my trip too long, and then I spent a lovely day visiting an old friend, looking at overpriced hardwood desks at Amish furniture stores, visiting my former favorite mall only to discover that many of the stores were empty, and spending a relaxing night far from home and campus and tax persons. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Along the way I took a wrong turn and stumbled upon a boardwalk out into a wetland, and I made a note of its location so that I could head out there to see the sun rise over the wetland this morning. Except the parking area was blocked off and the boardwalk entrance was boarded up--"closed for repairs." Thwarted once again! But the weather was gorgeous (40s and sunny early, 70s and sunny later), so I found another park and took a hike through woods that will no doubt be stunning in a few weeks when the spring ephemerals start popping up. This morning it was just me and trees and woodland birds and some turkeys gobbling in the distance.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But I can't think about the <i>situation</i> while attending to turkeys or watching woodpeckers disassemble a tree, so the excursion was successful so far. The next leg of the journey will take me to the grandkids, and if their youthful hijinks can't distract me from the grim facts back home, nothing will. <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"> </span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-68601510276097110202024-02-28T09:17:00.001-05:002024-02-28T09:17:56.050-05:00Time flies when you're having whatever you call this thing we're having<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">It's the kind of day when people burst into the building shaking out their umbrellas and smoothing down their hair. High winds blew me all over the road this morning and I saw signs that tree limbs had already been removed from the road. The briefest foray out-of-doors results in rambunctious hair, so staying inside and grading seems like a good plan.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Students have papers due in the American Lit Survey this morning so naturally I'm fielding requests for extensions. I'm happy to give students until the end of the day if they think it will help, but I can't give longer extensions without a persuasive excuse because I need to grade these papers before midterm grades are due, which raises the question: how did we get to midterm so quickly?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">They say time seems to speed up as we age and I can attest that it's true. Has it really been 20 years since we bought our house, 15 since our daughter got married, 10 since the birth of our first grandchild? Impossible! Two more years feels like a long time but when I look at how swiftly this semester is passing and how much I want to squeeze into the next four semesters of teaching, I fear that retirement will arrive before I'm ready.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">And of course the recent campus cuts have resulted in frantic revisions to the General Education curriculum and the English major, which will affect what I'm able to do in these next two years. The Gen Ed revision means I'll never again teach two courses I took great care to design, losses that don't exactly break my heart. But I'm only slowly coming to learn what the changes to the English major will mean, and I wonder how many of my beloved courses I've taught for the last time without realizing it.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Next fall looks good, though, and my approaching retirement gives me an excuse to opt out of some heavy lifting. Yes, we'll need to appoint a task force to do a full overhaul of our General Education curriculum, but I don't intend to help design a curriculum that I won't be present to teach. Besides, I've already reached my career quota of new General Education curricula, and anyway, in ten years all our students will be Online Influencing majors taking courses taught by Artificial Intelligence, areas in which my expertise is hardly relevant.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">And so I plod on, shaking out my umbrella and smoothing down my hair and responding to student emails demanding extensions. I'd like to request an extension on life, please, and make it ASAP. There's no time like the present to grapple with a diminishing future.<br /></span></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-70592840430727009602024-02-26T09:31:00.001-05:002024-02-26T09:31:33.055-05:00Peddling influence<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I've been haunted by a disturbing <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/22/us/instagram-child-influencers.html?unlocked_article_code=1.Xk0.RCZM.EHMw9LbSPqbg&smid=url-share" target="_blank">article </a>in the <i>New York Times</i> about parents who post their children's photos online and then attract sexual predators, which is appalling enough, but the detail I can't get out of my head is the claim that one-third of preteen girls want to pursue careers as online influencers.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I have questions! Most of them, though, place me firmly in the Old Fuddy-Duddy category, like "How do preteen girls even know what an online influencer is? Aren't their parents monitoring their internet usage?" But no, the article points out that at least some parents encourage their children's online presence, seeking to open doors to careers in modeling or acting or influencing.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But how can so many kids think <i>online influencer</i> is a viable career goal? It's like a pyramid scheme: the more influencers, the fewer people available to be influenced. And why don't the children aspire to be astronauts or doctors or writers or scientists or teachers?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">All those careers can lead to immense influence. I mean, how many of us can point to a particular book that changed the way we think about the world, or a particular teacher who encouraged us to pursue a field of study? How many people my age watched the moon landing and were inspired to pursue careers in math or science? Maybe they didn't all become astronauts, but they may have learned a thing or two along the way and developed the skills to contribute something meaningful to society.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">What will a child learn by pursuing a dream of being an online influencer? Maybe some marketing skills or effective camera angles? Help me out here! Is there really a crying need in our culture for even more young people excelling at the fine art of self-promotion?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I confess that I would like to have more influence than I do. If I could encourage more students to care deeply about the power of storytelling or the cultural value of poetry or even the effective use of the semicolon, I would feel that I've contributed something that might bear fruit long after I'm gone. But if online influencers keep influencing young girls to pursue careers as online influencers, we'll soon be so up to our eyeballs in influencers that we'll have no one left to be astronauts or doctors or writers or scientists or teachers.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But then I am an Old Fuddy-Duddy. Maybe someone can explain to me how to solve this problem, because I don't think I'm the right person to influence the influencers.</span> <br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-85941820168771975612024-02-22T11:27:00.003-05:002024-02-22T11:27:34.995-05:00Leaving my ducks in the dust<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">So I'm sitting on the sofa in my pajamas, drinking a leisurely cup of tea and reading the morning news, when my husband says, "It's almost 7. Don't you need to be on the road?"</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">"No problem," I say. "I can go in a little later this morning because I'm staying late this afternoon and my first meeting isn't until 10."</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Then, just to be sure, I check the calendar on my phone. Friends, my first meeting of the day was at 8. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">This morning I proved that if I put my mind to it, I can get from pajamas-on-the-sofa to fully-clothed-in-the-classroom in under an hour, as long as no one looks at me too closely. No makeup, no earrings, no frost to scrape off my windshield, no slow-moving school buses stopping to pick up students every 30 feet--made it in the nick of time, but one tiny delay would have been a disaster.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">As it is, I feel as if I've been running to catch up with myself all morning long, cramming in my caffeine quota while rushing into meetings clutching handouts still warm from the printer. This is not the way I prefer to operate. I'm a planner, the first one to show up for a meeting with all my ducks in a row. This morning all my ducks are scattered in my wake in a chaotic cluster of panic. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Now my morning meetings are over so I can relax a bit. I have some papers to grade, emails to send, classes to prep, and two more meetings this afternoon, but for the first time since 7 a.m., I can sit and breathe for a few minutes and wait for the ducks to catch up. </span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-52587505122041283022024-02-21T09:06:00.000-05:002024-02-21T09:06:02.540-05:00On driving and surviving<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Nearly two weeks after getting <a href="https://excelsiorbev.blogspot.com/2024/02/blinded-by-blights.html" target="_blank">pulled over and ridiculed</a> by a police officer who didn't like my car's headlights, I still tense up every time I drive through that little river town, which is right smack in the middle of my shortest route to campus. I have adjusted my schedule so I can leave the house after the sun comes up, which means I encounter more traffic and more school buses loading and unloading, but I still get nervous every time I get close to the tiny town where the police officer promised that he'd be <i>watching </i>me. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">This morning I saw a police car taking radar at the edge of town, where the speed limit switches from 55 to 35. Just seeing the police car made me tense up--even though I've always been careful about slowing down there. I'll bet the impatient pickup-truck drivers who ride my bumper itching for a passing zone don't get tense when they drive through that dinky little town. Will I ever again drive through there without fear?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">If the aftereffects of a minor chewing-out can linger so stubbornly, you can just imagine the lingering impacts of our recent campus bloodletting. Here we are in <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/news/business/cost-cutting/2024/02/20/another-wave-campus-cuts-hits-midwest-especially-hard" target="_blank">Inside Higher Ed</a>, where our campus cuts are placed in the context of a bunch of other colleges facing similar problems. We're in pretty good company, but that doesn't do much to diminish the local impacts. Departments are scrambling to construct fall course schedules, proposing changes to majors to reduce dependence on classes we can no longer offer, and searching for adjuncts to teach courses formerly taught by full-time faculty members whose positions were cut.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">This kind of struggle makes me even more tense than my encounter with a condescending traffic cop. It feels unjust to cut a position and then try to replace the instructor with a contingent faculty member who will be paid poorly, won't have access to benefits, and is unlikely to be invested in the future of the College or the education of students beyond the classroom.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">In addition, it's not easy to find adjunct instructors qualified to teach in certain fields in the Appalachian part of the state. A few hours away in Columbus or Cleveland we could find a deeper talent pool, but who's going to drive two or three hours to teach here for the piddly amount we pay for adjunct labor? All we can offer is a decent office--because so many positions have been cut that we'll have empty offices on every floor of my building.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Emotions are raw and anger bubbles up everywhere. Worst of all, though, is the fear: <i>If that position can be cut, why can't mine? </i>Faculty members have confided that they are afraid their actions are being monitored, that some malign force is watching their every move in search of some excuse to pounce.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I've adjusted my daily commute in response to paranoia about one solitary traffic cop who promises he's <i>watching </i>me, but what happens when that kind of paranoia infests an entire campus? Trust is a fragile vessel and easily broken; how can those of us who remain put the pieces back together when so many have been lost?</span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-38248906600208469542024-02-17T10:31:00.005-05:002024-02-17T10:31:56.763-05:00Caught on the trailcam<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">How many photos of my coffee table do I really need? The answer is <i>none</i>, but this morning I had to delete a bunch of them while downloading photos from the trailcam we got for Christmas. No, my coffee table has not been hitting the trail; it just happened to be in the frame while we were trying out different settings on the trailcam and getting it ready to go out to the woods. Apparently we hadn't yet figured out how to delete.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">After a month in the woods, the trailcam this morning offered up many many photos of the same plot of ground from which a woodland creature had just departed, or maybe the motion sensor was set off by a gust of wind. It got plenty of photos of squirrels, which is not surprising given the abundant nut trees in that part of the woods. It also caught raccoons, a possum, several deer, and a mystery critter that looks like the back end of a beaver, except it's in a spot where beavers generally aren't.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Also lots of photos of the resident woodsman carrying a ladder or chainsaw up the hill to prune fruit trees or pulling fallen trees down the hill with the tractor. Probably we ought to move the trail-cam to a less tractor-friendly location. I'd like to put it down by the creek to see what critters visit, but it would probably take a shot of every passing car as well.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Photo quality is uneven, which is not surprising since the trailcam has no sense of composition. Night photos look like something out of a horror movie, with glowing eyes atop blurry shapes that could be mistaken for space aliens or hoofed fiends though they're probably just raccoons.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">We've been hearing a lot of coyotes in the night but apparently they're not visiting the vicinity of the trailcam. No sign of foxes or turkeys either. I keep hearing that bobcats are getting more common in Ohio and I'd really love to see one, but dream on. In 20 years living in these woods, we've seen a bobcat exactly once, and it had disappeared before we could get the word "bobcat!" out of our mouths.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But still we hope. Whatever passes by, the trailcam will be ready.<br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhd99KcAyB-ARDpy2b1Bh-AdNRlfEQguJl2ygndXtiiZ4pExg-J0EEe8e15QfM9O6E8HooK_0sq4ZFVrhsLCWqf_9J06lanSpfk6k6eb-nVKMW8U-ElURR5NRkmCkre5fa_8UYIrYskQVnnY-LnIXKsGZ4d04brxMgLAtLJFIiQGeptpHSJF1-Zsw/s3840/STC_0292.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2160" data-original-width="3840" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhd99KcAyB-ARDpy2b1Bh-AdNRlfEQguJl2ygndXtiiZ4pExg-J0EEe8e15QfM9O6E8HooK_0sq4ZFVrhsLCWqf_9J06lanSpfk6k6eb-nVKMW8U-ElURR5NRkmCkre5fa_8UYIrYskQVnnY-LnIXKsGZ4d04brxMgLAtLJFIiQGeptpHSJF1-Zsw/s320/STC_0292.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiReS1p1MnuoGc5mOOt_W91pDcNAV9VB5pcwKQYKkVoT6xoUGcIAisz4g_dboRn-leVfi8ErEBsJaYiqCFIoJYs_PonY8OURMvRaHqLt57lmGHgYaiKptX7nq94U95LAwrJI1sP3FfYtekqScOPooKUcRt66HAS9hwwlVZma_RQqlvrFU3Ml_I64g/s3467/STC_0291.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1920" data-original-width="3467" height="177" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiReS1p1MnuoGc5mOOt_W91pDcNAV9VB5pcwKQYKkVoT6xoUGcIAisz4g_dboRn-leVfi8ErEBsJaYiqCFIoJYs_PonY8OURMvRaHqLt57lmGHgYaiKptX7nq94U95LAwrJI1sP3FfYtekqScOPooKUcRt66HAS9hwwlVZma_RQqlvrFU3Ml_I64g/s320/STC_0291.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgs1PAbGITu_zBF1WIbB5PVc8B7W_PRN7h81f91sLewaxYwawDck8t343WeoDrNsgv4q2LA9SZGogrsqTDA95jvPSoAI3ms_m3rgQcqbQ9pJoIE95OIpQRBMLX1PyB0Vy3bKRitwnIgBkPnOpOLudkyT4dkYgNxL8Pn7hJOY-hBTBh_U_In_T-dSw/s1042/STC_0308.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="696" data-original-width="1042" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgs1PAbGITu_zBF1WIbB5PVc8B7W_PRN7h81f91sLewaxYwawDck8t343WeoDrNsgv4q2LA9SZGogrsqTDA95jvPSoAI3ms_m3rgQcqbQ9pJoIE95OIpQRBMLX1PyB0Vy3bKRitwnIgBkPnOpOLudkyT4dkYgNxL8Pn7hJOY-hBTBh_U_In_T-dSw/s320/STC_0308.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8ffceE_jgMdUUg9nnk90m1tKSmDQQ96eCHUhRm4DF31FIqGR6joVuxIznGPrUpDzFPwmDXQSLXvSpjnxcifMCsA1cj6Euemz672LtyVqYuYWp7NCLhBdqrIRW9sw1LkhE7nkwbEugAdT3H5uj1h5lfazfBcdn4aPcsnksTo4yslI1tiJy88ACKw/s1254/STC_0258.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="810" data-original-width="1254" height="207" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8ffceE_jgMdUUg9nnk90m1tKSmDQQ96eCHUhRm4DF31FIqGR6joVuxIznGPrUpDzFPwmDXQSLXvSpjnxcifMCsA1cj6Euemz672LtyVqYuYWp7NCLhBdqrIRW9sw1LkhE7nkwbEugAdT3H5uj1h5lfazfBcdn4aPcsnksTo4yslI1tiJy88ACKw/s320/STC_0258.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5t0Xj73kzkdGJ8o0x11glk9Ph5EJmcMUWyGgZUk6CoP3ZDm-QIXCY1Fnq0MzFJUUQu5hbyZFFArO8jZMJ6pXpWyyEpMJ449bD5DN5BBMGZCvVG_OXUhDQOugLZKPcMuYE7l7MuUZqE-fkDOt5uqz_5VKeljY1OSFLPMsUpBGeJVneBLCCeIuoWw/s1352/STC_0236.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="892" data-original-width="1352" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5t0Xj73kzkdGJ8o0x11glk9Ph5EJmcMUWyGgZUk6CoP3ZDm-QIXCY1Fnq0MzFJUUQu5hbyZFFArO8jZMJ6pXpWyyEpMJ449bD5DN5BBMGZCvVG_OXUhDQOugLZKPcMuYE7l7MuUZqE-fkDOt5uqz_5VKeljY1OSFLPMsUpBGeJVneBLCCeIuoWw/s320/STC_0236.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi61Ruqsuo1MDgGHrY5vhYFfgW3nW9sGU7T9IY61OIJTWmsGk2kbviQxq3jJa2tSKBXA5Ez4eWEBcftieCFDl24LQRLOdwrvcNklrHk5o7mR0cZOrnEg1c-oSSUtx5Jo7nrAb3q1xpuT600_G-I99bn7J8KFluebNPg5qpqr1H6OQXmBEhBhJnPMg/s880/STC_0247.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="435" data-original-width="880" height="158" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi61Ruqsuo1MDgGHrY5vhYFfgW3nW9sGU7T9IY61OIJTWmsGk2kbviQxq3jJa2tSKBXA5Ez4eWEBcftieCFDl24LQRLOdwrvcNklrHk5o7mR0cZOrnEg1c-oSSUtx5Jo7nrAb3q1xpuT600_G-I99bn7J8KFluebNPg5qpqr1H6OQXmBEhBhJnPMg/s320/STC_0247.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcn4BlOyLcOGtPUvrG5XOgnOP1tT2Em-T0Gy8Ppko3xg-eRQlCW0fYuj7x60qKl81q5qwRsGnVpNh8mZvjuD6JSHBV03rpfk9PVmv1_cZoi_-VzCT3plGunQx7vXkwiEal1v2RifQScpO-Bo-VvYlOZnHsjzsC0AD8B691R2fhBqBlLVCX8Awnzg/s3840/STC_0249.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2160" data-original-width="3840" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcn4BlOyLcOGtPUvrG5XOgnOP1tT2Em-T0Gy8Ppko3xg-eRQlCW0fYuj7x60qKl81q5qwRsGnVpNh8mZvjuD6JSHBV03rpfk9PVmv1_cZoi_-VzCT3plGunQx7vXkwiEal1v2RifQScpO-Bo-VvYlOZnHsjzsC0AD8B691R2fhBqBlLVCX8Awnzg/s320/STC_0249.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: georgia;"><br /></span><p></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-15259805766522495512024-02-16T11:09:00.005-05:002024-02-16T11:09:52.325-05:00Morale-boosting on a budget<p>I've been tasked with coming up with some activities to boost faculty morale, but I do not intend to pursue the suggestion that we offer a hatchet-tossing event. In times of stress and change, it's probably not a great idea for faculty members to be armed--one errant toss could shift our campus bloodletting out of the metaphorical realm.</p><p>But what can we do? A case of Xanax might make a dent in our current stress levels, but nobody's going to approve the expense. The HR office brought in massage chairs, but appointments are limited and the massages don't last long enough to loosen up the deep-seated sources of our pain. Yesterday at an all-campus event we were urged to stand and sing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" (because the academic year has reached the seventh-inning stretch). Participation was spotty and enthusiasm was low, and it seems that some of my colleagues didn't know the words. We need to get out more!</p><p>Okay, baseball season is coming up soon so let's get out there! Last year I attended a bunch of home games but never saw more than two other faculty members in attendance. Apparently we're not big baseball fans?</p><p>How about a guided wildflower hike? A long walk along the river trail? What will it take to help people relax: a fleet of kayaks, a pen of puppies, a coloring sheet and a big ol' box o' crayons?</p><p>Everything I come up with feels lame when juxtaposed with the losses we've been suffering, but on the other hand, maybe some small but meaningful activity could help distract us from those losses and think about the future more effectively. </p><p>When I moped around the house as a kid, my mom would open the door, point toward the yard, and command, "Go out and play!" Sometimes a change of venue provokes a change of perspective. The problem, though, is that wherever we go out to play, we can't seem to escape the problems that had us moping around the house to begin with.</p><p>So I don't know what to do. What are some effective methods for improving morale on a budget when everywhere we go we see signs of the very problems that depress morale? </p><p>I'm happy to open the door and point the way--but I don't intend to hand out any hatchets.</p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-86248398616336441672024-02-12T17:03:00.001-05:002024-02-12T17:03:04.979-05:00Bending to the breaking point<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Old buzzwords never die; they just get repurposed to meet new challenges. I give you <i>nimble, agile, flexible, </i>and <i>resilient, </i>the <a href="https://excelsiorbev.blogspot.com/2020/04/forget-multiple-versions-of-classes-i.html" target="_blank">buzzwords trotted out in 2020</a> to inspire the heroic efforts required to shift quickly from face-to-face teaching to pandemic mode. We nimbly flexed and demonstrated resilient agility, and if the effort wore us out, at least we knew that when push comes to shove, we can be as nimble as the next guy.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Now the same old buzzwords are pushing and shoving their way into meetings called to respond to staffing issues caused by cuts in positions. Departments, I've been told, will need to be <i>nimble, agile, flexible, </i>and <i>resilient </i>to find creative ways to staff essential courses, and that might require some of us to teach outside our areas of expertise.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Which, sure, is a nice idea. My primary area of expertise is post-Civil-War American Literature, but when I first started teaching here, I spent a significant amount of time developing new expertise in postcolonial literature because we felt our students needed exposure--but this was feasible only because I was building on a foundation of study and research from grad school. And I suppose that if it were necessary I could teach an introductory-level survey of early American literature, but I haven't taught or thought about most of those texts for 30 years! And forget about upper-level courses outside my area. I always include a Shakespeare play in my Comedy class, but only a fool would expect me to teach an upper-level Shakespeare seminar. May as well ask me to teach organic chemistry.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">No one would be foolish enough to ask me to flex that far outside my field, but recently I heard a suggestion that we could offer a little training to equip faculty members from other departments to teach first-year composition. No one would suggest that <i>a little training</i> would equip an English professor to teach chemistry, but apparently teaching first-year composition is so simple that <i>a little training</i> could equip anyone to do it. I'll bet my colleagues with degrees in Rhetoric and Composition are just kicking themselves for wasting all that time and money on grad school.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Like many of my colleagues, I am willing to flex--but flex too far and something's bound to break. Then we'll need nimble people agile enough to pick up the pieces. <br /></span></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-22982251343722567462024-02-09T08:50:00.002-05:002024-02-09T08:50:59.636-05:00Blinded by the blights<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Yesterday's events included an encounter with an annoying police officer and a severe case of carrot cake deprivation, both of which felt at the time like immense injustices except when considered alongside the long line of faculty members getting pulled into the Provost's office to learn that their services were not longer required. I thought that carrot cake would be the highlight of a very long, horrific day, but when I arrived at the department office, I found nothing but a smear of buttercream. On the other hand, I still have a job! So no complaints.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">And I will have to keep driving to that job right past the annoying police officer who told me, "I'll be watching you." What horrific crime did I commit to merit getting pulled over in the tiny river town along my route?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">My headlights were too bright.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">The first thing the officer said when he walked up to my window was, "Don't you know where the dimmer switch is?" Yes, officer, I know where the dimmer switch is, and my only complaint about my wonderful car is that when I drive at night, people are constantly flashing their brights at me to indicate I have my brights on when I don't. He scoffed and went to the front of my car and told me to flip the brights on and off, which I did. "Something's wrong with these lights," he said. <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I explained that I'd already mentioned the problem to my mechanic, who told me my lights were just fine. "Well they're too bright," said the officer, and I said okay, yes, maybe they are, but what am I supposed to do about it? "When someone flashes their brights at you," he said, "Be sure to flash them back." And then he told me he'd been watching me go by with my lights too bright every morning but never had a chance to pull me over until now--"But I'll be watching you," he said, which felt like a threat. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">So this morning my early meeting was cancelled (because people who are losing their jobs aren't in the mood for an 8 a.m. meeting) so I thought I'd solve the problem by leaving home a little later, when headlights were still required but barely necessary. But when I got to that tiny river town, there he was, that surly police officer, waiting for me. When he flashed his brights at me, I flashed back, a move I will have to make every morning as I drive to work because there is really no better route. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i>Don't you know where your dimmer switch is?</i> What I really want right now is a dimmer switch to turn down the intensity of all the negative feelings swirling around campus. Whoever invents that will make a killing. </span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-48169345145590932372024-02-08T10:47:00.001-05:002024-02-08T10:47:56.821-05:00Feeling the ground shift once again<p><i><span style="font-family: georgia;">I'm so sorry about what you're going through. If you want to list me as a reference, I'd be happy to tell anyone what a great teacher you are.</span></i></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">This was my repeated refrain yesterday as word trickled out about the latest round of faculty cuts. My words felt lame and useless, but what else could I say? </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">For the past three years we've gone through a repeating painful cycle: rumors of impending cuts, anguish among non-tenured faculty members in vulnerable positions, relief for those whose lines survive combined with distress over those who don't, and scrambling within departments to cover classes without sufficient staffing. Those who have gone through multiple cycles probably deserve combat pay to compensate for the emotional anguish they've endured.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But then this brutal cycle is piled on top of a whole host of lesser insults, from draconian budget cuts to Kafkaesque procedures for purchasing essential supplies to the loss of funding for faculty awards and prizes. I'd like to express my profound gratitude to the people who so generously provided letters supporting my nomination for the research prize this year, but I regret to inform you that no prizes will be distributed.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But it's petty to complain about a measly prize when I still have a job. My job will inevitably change going forward as cuts to faculty lines require us to shift the burden for certain classes, but I'm still gainfully employed doing something I usually love. Meanwhile, today a bunch of my colleagues are stumbling around looking stunned, suddenly feeling the ground slip from under their feet and wondering where they'll land. I want more than anything to lend some support, but frankly, I'm feeling a little wobbly myself. </span> <br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-14637756466515729192024-02-05T14:49:00.001-05:002024-02-05T14:49:18.960-05:00Just can't see it<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I'm picking through a stack of exams from my American Lit Survey class, trying to find some handwriting I can read without straining. Large print, dark ink, neat handwriting--it's like a treasure more valued for its rarity. It's a mistake to read the more legible exams ones first because then I'll end up struggling through a sea of scrawls, but maybe I can tackle the difficult ones in the morning after I give my eyes a rest. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">In my morning class I struggled to decipher students' handwriting; in my afternoon class today I struggled to see my students. Waves of cooties are sweeping through campus, causing multiple cases of Covid and flu and bad colds and something a student called "fuzzy throat." When five out of nine students in a literature class stay home sick, it's time to make an executive decision to meet on Zoom. The problem, though, is that sick people don't want to be seen on video, and I guess healthy people don't either because I ended up trying to converse with a whole bunch of blank, silent squares. One student had bandwidth issues and kept having to reconnect. Another student had audio issues and had to share his insights in the chat. I don't know how to make eye contact with blank silent squares--it's like talking to a wall. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I keep thinking about the department chair who first hired me here, who decided to retire when his eye problems made it virtually impossible to read students' handwriting. If my vision gets any worse I can switch to online exams so students can type in their responses, which will require use of anti-cheating software but at least I'll be able to read the answer. But if we ever get to the point that I can't see my students' faces, I'm outta here. I don't mind meeting on Zoom occasionally while the place is overrun with germs, but I don't intend to conclude my career by talking to a wall.</span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-63824555442812569742024-02-03T08:17:00.000-05:002024-02-03T08:17:00.299-05:00Puzzling over meal madness<p><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i>We really know how to live it up on a Friday night</i>, I thought as I looked at our dining table, one end covered with jigsaw puzzle pieces and the other with crackers, cheese, and spreadables. Neither of us wanted to cook so we treated ourselves to Snack Supper: a bunch of little things to nibble on while working on a puzzle.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">It's a relaxing way to spend a Friday evening but I realized, even as I sat there chomping on crab dip and crackers, that if my father had come home at the end of the work week to find anything other than a meat, a starch, a vegetable, and a salad on the table, there would have been yelling. Mom worked nights as an RN but she was expected to make a full hot meal every day of the week. I remember once when she was too exhausted to cook and so decided, without conferring with Dad first, that just this once we could go out to eat at a local low-cost family restaurant; we were all dressed up and ready to go when Dad walked in the door and declared the plan unacceptable, and then he yelled and stormed until Mom produced a home-cooked meal that met his expectations.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">And those expectations were firm and specific: it wasn't a meal unless Dad was sitting at a table and being served a plate heaped with meat and several side dishes. Self-serve buffets were completely unacceptable. One time Dad ordered from the menu at a restaurant with a buffet and then complained about how long he had to wait for his order to arrive. "Don't they know I'm starving to death?" he asked, even though we were sitting so close to the buffet that he could have reached out and grabbed a yeast roll at any time.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Once we were on a short road trip together, me and my husband and our small children and my parents for four hours in our van, and we practiced normal road-trip behavior--passing around yogurt and granola bars at lunchtime so we wouldn't have to make an extra stop. But this was not a table at a restaurant with someone serving hot food, so Dad never stopped complaining about being starved, even though he took full advantage of the available food. It clearly wasn't about the calories; he had some deep need to experience the performative aspects of a meal and if the experience lacked a table, a server, and a plate of hot food, then he didn't feel fed.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">We felt fully fed last night even though the puzzle took up more space than the food. Our meal wasn't particularly elegant or well balanced or even hot, but the experience was more than satisfying. I've spent a lot of time over the years trying to piece together the details of my father's peculiar upbringing, to understand what led him to develop such specific and limiting rules about food and so many other aspects of human behavior, and I'll never put together the full picture now that he's gone.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">And I honestly don't know how my mother put up with Dad's demands for so long. Of course it was a different time with different expectations about gender roles and division of labor in the household. Today my husband and I share the cooking duties and if we don't feel like cooking, we raid the pantry and make do with what we find there, even if it doesn't look like Dad's idea of a meal. If he were here he would look at our table with its unfinished puzzle and scattered snacks and let us know very clearly what's wrong with this picture, but to us, it looks just right.</span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-52283761979206202962024-01-31T11:12:00.001-05:002024-01-31T11:12:15.999-05:00Hula-Hooping to save the world<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">My five-year-old granddaughter approaches the Hula-Hoop systematically: first she measures her space and clears out obstacles, and then she takes up the hoop and makes it spin and spin and spin and then spin and spin some more, all the time clenching her fists and maintaining the firm, focused expression of a professional completing a difficult but necessary task that gives her intense satisfaction. She can keep that thing going for three or four minutes at a time and often doesn't stop until someone stumbles into her path, which annoys her. <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I watch her spin and wonder: when was the last time I focused so intently on a task that no one was paying me to do? I admire the way the small folk single-mindedly pursue each new obsession, whether it's Legos or rock-collecting or fart jokes. When a tree-stump in the yard needed to be dismantled, my seven-year-old grandson put on a hard hat and work gloves and took his hatchet out there to hack away at the stump as if he thought he was saving the world. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">And maybe he was. Maybe the ability to focus on a thankless task until it's done is a trait essential for human survival. It's one thing to tackle a tough job with an eye on the prize, the paycheck or the blue ribbon or the promise of advancement, but it's another thing entirely to devote long hours to a difficult task for the sheer joy of doing it.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I need more of that kind of passion in my life, but instead I spend a lot of time doing things I don't want to do because no one else will do them. I love a clean house, but I'll never get any sense of satisfaction out of dusting or cleaning toilets or scrubbing the algae off the siding. The things I do that bring me joy (outside of teaching, I mean) have been hampered lately by lack of time, lousy weather, and failing equipment. One of these days I'll get a new camera, but meanwhile, photography has become more frustrating than fulfilling.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">So at the moment I'll settle for getting my joy out of watching my grandkids pursue their passions. It's almost hypnotic the way that Hula-Hoop spins, its colors glinting and sparkling in the changing light, and my granddaughter's dogged determination to keep it spinning inspires wonder and awe. I want some of that passion! If I can't find it in a Hula-Hoop, then where?</span> <br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-81267572965598306542024-01-29T12:37:00.006-05:002024-01-29T12:37:54.274-05:00Shipwrecked in a shrinking sea of time<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I'm in the middle of a lively class discussion digging deeply into how Stephen Crane draws attention to the way his characters' perceptions distort their understanding of events as they bob on the sea in that tiny dinghy, but then I glance at the clock--<i>only five minutes left and so many miles to row!--</i>and I have to scramble to keep my head above water as we try to bring "The Open Boat" safely to shore. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I like to structure class discussions so ideas build toward new understanding--not just floundering in a sea of ideas but fixing a course toward firm ground. Lately, though, I've been getting swamped. Why do I keep running out of time? </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I start class promptly and I rarely keep a class one minute over our allotted time, but this semester I'm always racing to pack everything in before everyone packs up and leaves. Part of the reason, I think, is that my classes are a little bigger than usual this semester: more talkers = more talk. But I also feel retirement breathing down my neck and I know I have a limited opportunity to teach students everything I know and then I panic when I realize that I can't, and even if I could, how would I test them on all that?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Two years until retirement (ideally) but I'm already feeling the onset of endings. I doubt that I'll teach the sophomore seminar again, which is no great loss, but was last semester my final chance to teach Honors Literature? Will I ever teach the theory course again? I doubt that Creative Nonfiction will roll around in the rotation again before I'm ready to retire, but at least I'll get one more stab at the senior capstone course. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I feel this sense of urgency both inside and outside of class, this impulse to impart insight that will make a lasting impression on someone--anyone--so I won't just fade into irrelevance. But eventually irrelevance comes for us all, as Stephen Crane points out in one of his bleak little poems:</span></p><p></p><blockquote><span style="font-family: georgia;">A man said to the universe: <br />"Sir, I exist!"<br />"However," replied the universe,<br />"The fact has not created in me<br />"A sense of obligation."</span></blockquote><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">The universe is not obliged to provide me opportunities to leave my mark, but it does occasionally deposit me on shore, where, like the shipwrecked men in Crane's "The Open Boat," I can look back upon the sea with new understanding:</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;"></span></p><blockquote>When it came night, the white waves paced to and fro in the moonlight, and the wind brought the sound of the great sea's voice to the men on shore, and they felt they could then be interpreters. </blockquote><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">"What does the sea tell them?" I ask my students as the clock ticks away in the final seconds of class. My time is up and I can't find words and so I hold up the book and show them Crane's remarkable story and I say, "It tells them this."</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Our time is up. We've reached the shore in a sorry state, but at least I've given them something solid to take away. </span><br /></p><p></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-9723240054027394462024-01-25T13:57:00.002-05:002024-01-25T13:57:20.940-05:00Park your ideas here<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">How far would you go for a reserved parking space?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">The question arose during a discussion of low- or no-cost incentives for faculty members. If there's no money for awards or meals or conference travel or even branded T-shirts or water bottles, how do we encourage faculty members to do things that need to be done?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">The snarky response is <i>why do we need incentives to do the right thing? </i>If attending pedagogy workshops or engaging in research or professional development is going to make us better at our jobs and, over time, improve the level of excellence on campus (as if <i>excellence</i> were a measurable substance doled out as a reward for our best efforts), then we ought to do these things without regard for rewards.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But! Everyone is already doing so much that one more thing feels like an unjust imposition, and sometimes it takes just a slight nudge to move people toward doing the one small thing that might make a difference. We all know that the way to get students to attend an outside-of-class event that will enrich their learning is to order a bunch of pizzas. The promise of coffee and donuts can lure faculty to a morning meeting, and a free lunch can make a three-hour workshop look more attractive.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But when there's no such thing as a free lunch, what can we offer?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">This is where the reserved parking space idea comes in: put the names of all the attendees in a hat and draw one; the winner gets to pick out a campus parking space and park there for a month. Our staff recognition program provides a similar incentive, and winning staff members enjoy finding a parking space marked with their name, available whenever they arrive on campus for a whole month. The only cost is the portable sign to mark the space.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Would faculty go the extra mile in hopes of earning their own parking space, even temporarily? Or are there other low-cost ways to incentivize participation in enrichment activities? Somebody needs to find out, and I think that someone is going to be me. (But what is my incentive for pursuing this project?) </span></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-25156638323436776662024-01-23T11:58:00.000-05:002024-01-23T11:58:04.477-05:00Mothball mania; or, why I'd rather stay inside the classroom<p><span style="font-family: georgia;"><i>Who knows what mothballs smell like,</i> I asked my class, and only one student came up with an answer: <i>They smell like old ladies.</i></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">It's hard to imagine that the smell of mothballs would be relevant to a class discussion but even harder to comprehend that 90 percent of my students do not recognize the concept of <i>mothballs</i>. A character in <i>John Henry Days </i>discovers a mothball in the pocket of his suit at a social event and then fears that he's walking around as a marked man, carrying a foul scent into every strained interaction. It's a lovely image, but effective only insofar as readers are familiar with mothballs.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I came out of my classroom yesterday feeling energized and excited: my students had done the reading and had interesting things to say, and I was able to answer their mothball-related questions along with many others. <i>This is why I love my job</i>, I told myself as I walked back to my office, but then I opened up my email inbox and felt the love draining away.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I'm trying to master the new purchasing procedures--honestly, I'm doing my best, but dealing with spreadsheets and online forms is outside my skillset. If you need someone to guide students toward understanding why the ability to create narrative out of chaos, trauma, and debris is compelling evidence of the continuity of human culture, I'm your person--but that doesn't necessarily mean I'll excel at Excel. I'm a word person, not a numbers person. All those little spreadsheet cells feel like prisons for my creativity.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">And this week I've also been required to be the bearer of bad news about topics I can't share here. Receiving bad news is difficult enough; I've never enjoyed being told that my hard work will not be rewarded nor my projects supported. But serving as the conduit of bad news is like carrying a mothball in the pocket of your best suit--everything you do starts to stink.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I'm trying not to carry that stink of despair into the classroom. My students deserve better; they're putting in the time and effort to understand difficult readings, and they're doing their best to contribute to a lively learning environment. When I'm with them, I love what I'm doing; I just wish I didn't have to leave the room. </span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-61015313279576896072024-01-19T06:04:00.002-05:002024-01-19T06:04:38.245-05:00Pick your poison<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">You're head of a department with a meager budget. Would you rather</span></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-family: georgia;">Attend a 90-minute mandatory training session on new purchasing processes that are convoluted, inefficient, and demoralizing, or</span></li><li><span style="font-family: georgia;">Ignore the new processes and run the risk of facing harsh sanctions outlined in bold red print on multiple PowerPoint slides (because this time they really, really mean it), or <br /></span></li><li><span style="font-family: georgia;">Buy everything out of your own pocket?</span></li></ul><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">You've run out of your blood-pressure medication but the prescription can't be filled until you fix a glitch in your online medical record. Would you rather</span></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-family: georgia;">Sit in your car in very cold weather listening to bouncy hold music while waiting to talk to someone at your doctor's office who can fix the glitch, or</span></li><li><span style="font-family: georgia;">Turn on the car and let it idle so that you can have some heat during your 20 minutes on hold while the tiny Puritans who live inside your head brew up cauldrons of guilt about your carbon footprint, or</span></li><li><span style="font-family: georgia;">Decide that, on the whole, you can probably survive a while without your blood pressure pills?</span></li></ul><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">For reasons the rest of the world struggles to understand, you insist on living in a rural area lacking cell-phone reception and therefore rely on a landline at home--a landline prone to outages when the weather gets too wet, too hot, or too cold. When a winter storm hits and your landline provides a sharp shriek instead of a dial tone, would you rather</span></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-family: georgia;">Explain the problem to an online bot that responds onto to certain key words and insists that the technician who will be sent out to check on the problem will need to communicate with you via cell phone to confirm the service time, or</span></li><li><span style="font-family: georgia;">Tag-team with your spouse to make sure someone is at home all day just in case the technician shows up when the bot says he might show up, or</span></li><li><span style="font-family: georgia;">Drive five miles down the road and sit in your car on a very cold evening using your cell phone to try to reach an actual human being who can understand the situation and schedule a technician without demanding that he be able to reach you by cell phone in an area where there is no cell-phone coverage, which is the whole reason why you must have a functioning landline, or</span></li><li><span style="font-family: georgia;">Decide that, on the whole, connectivity is overrated and cancel your landline service?</span><br /></li></ul>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-32349440936983119552024-01-16T11:34:00.000-05:002024-01-16T11:34:02.920-05:00Storming onward<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Those fat fluffy snowflakes looked so pretty in my car's headlights this morning that I almost forgot how treacherous they can be when they pile up on the road.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Almost.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I sat in my car at the end of my road--still untouched by plows--until I could pull out onto the highway and take my place in a long line of slow-moving cars stretched behind a snowplow. I've always dreaded driving in snow, but four-wheel drive made me much more confident. Still, no one was driving more than 35 on the highway this morning, and traffic slowed to a crawl once we got into town. Those historic brick streets might look nice, but there's no good way to keep them clear in bad weather. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">A different kind of storm awaited in my email inbox, where a bunch of my advisees were eager to drop difficult classes and replace them with something less demanding before the add deadline. I don't know what to say to a student who want to know where the <i>easy </i>classes are listed, so I encourage them to choose classes based on their educational goals. But what do I say to an advisee whose primary educational goal is to remain eligible to play basketball? </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">And yet another storm swooped into our Center for Teaching Excellence, where I found a line of people eagerly waiting as soon as I opened the door, all wanting to buy the used iPads we're selling. I've never owned an iPad and I was not privy to the procedures for selling them, but the colleague in charge of the sale suffered weather-related travel delays. Until she arrived, all I could do was stand there looking stupid and trying to keep everyone calm. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">I'd been looking forward to this, my first full day back in the Worthington Center for Teaching Excellence, but by midmorning I'd accomplished nothing but fight my way through various storms. Now the snow has stopped falling, the email inbox has stopped pinging, and the iPad seekers have left the building, so I think I'll just sit here and enjoy the quiet. At some point I'll need to buckle down and get to work, but will anyone begrudge me a few minutes to catch my breath? </span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21152738.post-71035026335664584422024-01-12T14:16:00.001-05:002024-01-12T14:16:05.457-05:00From stunned to fun<p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Second day of the new semester and I've already had somebody crying in my office. In fact, I've had two people crying in my office, and one of them was me. It wasn't full-blown weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth--just a profound sadness over the loss of colleagues and the difficulty of the budget situation we're facing here.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">But there were no tears in my American Lit Survey class this morning. When I call roll on the first day I usually ask students to share the most interesting thing they read over winter break, but I did not want to face rows of students telling me <i>I didn't read anything</i>. Instead, I asked them to bring some color into this gray day--<i>Share something colorful, glittery, or cheerful you encountered over break</i>. They talked about taking small children to see Christmas lights, visiting Manhattan or Florida or Puerto Rico, wearing glittery party hats on New Year's Eve, and even eating grapes under the dining table during a family party.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">In the absence of grapes and glittery hats, this morning I offered my crying colleague a book I've been recommending to lots of people trying to maintain hope in the midst of various types of losses: <i>The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year</i> by Margaret Renkl, a series of pithy seasonal meditations sparked by the author's backyard. The first chapter instructs readers, "Wherever You Are, Stop What You're Doing." "Stop and look," she says, and then "Stop and ponder....Stop and listen....Stop and consider," and at each stop she shows us something ordinary in her backyard, a spot of color or life in disorderly surroundings. "The world lies before you, a lavish garden," she says; "However hobbled by waste, however fouled by graft and tainted by deception, it will always take your breath away." That's what <i>The Comfort of Crows</i> did for me, over and over and over again.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">After class I talked to another colleague who is angry and distressed by local conditions as well as the larger cultural disdain for education, but after we blew off some steam, she said her plan for this semester is to have fun--inside and outside her classes. I agree. There's plenty of reason to weep and plenty of opportunity for hard work, but despite it all, we're doing what we love while we can and we fully intend to enjoy it, glittery hats or not.</span><br /></p>Bevhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05412883073330413390noreply@blogger.com0