Busy work

I take issue with certain aspects of administrations in univeristies at times. Obviously, there is historically various battles between different areas of colleges and univeristies, be it undergraduates, graduate students, post-docs, faculty, or administration. Everyone thinks that what they are doing is vital to the success of the university, and in many ways that is absolutely true.

However, as institutions grow, or decide they must add this or that program, there are quite a few issues that arise. For example, there are many departments on a university campus which are overstaffed, or just plain not needed. Or, if they are, they haven't much to occupy their average day, so they come up with busy work.

Case in point: I applied (and received) an internal grant for summer funding to work on my research. Obviously such internal grants aren't highly competitive, but still, I am sure that some people did not receive the grant (note though, that being a new faculty member definitely gave me priority over others, I am sure). To get this grant, as in other cases, I had to write a five page proposal justifying it, and yadda yadda yadda.

One of the requirements of accepting this grant was to attend three two-hour sessions hosted by whatever-the-name-of-this-particular-department-is, all about "How to write a successful grant proposal."

In other words, those who succeeded in obtaining this grant are the ones who must attend these seminars, wasting six hours of the summer. I know external grants are much more competitive, and that this department is very useful if one wants assistance in writing such proposals, but given that this is largely all they do, there is obviously a lot of free time to kill. And they take it out on us. (Shouldn't those who did not get the grant sit through this?)

Ironically, most of the faculty in my group are associate professors who have obtained many other grants in the past, so it is even more of a waste for them.

But this happens when the adminstration grows so much that there are too many departments focussing on such small aspects of the university. I like that there are sources for assistance whenever I need it, however there is no need to waste my time unnecessarily. Luckily I will be finished with these next week, so it's all good.

And back to...work?

Traveling definitely has an impact on my mental state. Being out of town all last week, I was out of my element, as it were, and thus while I got work done things were happening at a different pace. Then though is the problem of returning. Getting in Monday (after returning the rental car), I had one thing after another to get caught up on, with a new student coming in to work (so most of that day was spent with him).

Then yesterday I had a complete waste of time in the morning with a meeting to attend that was required by my summer grant (two hours gone, just like that), and the afternoon was spent again catching up two students on various things. Now today I believe my other two students will be in so I will catch up with them, and that'll happen any minute now.

So I have to get work done at the moment, and I've caught up on most of my administrative work that had to be finished now. So I have to do something. But I am not really in the mood to do so, and I have to think about specifically what I would like to do at the moment.

This is a perennial problem, whenever I have a million things to do, most of which are second-long, mindless issues. When all of those are done, the fewer bigger things have to get tackled and I'm not in the mindset to do them. But I will!

And hopefully get distracted immediately by a student.

Worth the money?

There are regularly articles about whether or not college is "worth the cost." That is, given the soaring cost of college tuition, do you get your money's worth?

News articles are often told by way of polls, as in, "this percent of college graduates believe X" while "this percent of Americans believe Y" and so forth. I don't believe this is a very constructive way to discuss the issue, but then again, modern media is very focused on public polling, since obviously if something is believed by the majority, then it must be true.* I personally believe that even the ridiculously overpriced tuitions of many private schools are worth it, in many regards, but I don't really wish to discuss this in great detail.

What this made me think of, however, was what students do to get the most out of their (or their parents') money. In my courses, I teach scientists who may or may not go on to continue "doing science," but they are majors in this particular field (I am for the moment not thinking about the students taking classes outside their major), and thus are interested to some degree in learning about science. Depending on how many courses a student takes each semester, the cost per hour for a given class is on the order of $100 for this particular (private) university.

There is sometimes an attitude that I have noticed both here and at other institutions (sometimes even among graduate students who are not paying at all, but instead being paid to go to school!) that the students are here to be taught, which is very different than the students being here to learn.

For example, I had a discussion with a student the other day, about a different class he was in. He discussed his severe disappointment with how the class was taught (often a complaint made about many professors, I'm sure about myself as well at times), and that he didn't learn anything in the course. I responded with the idea that this is a moment that he, as a student, should have stepped up and worked that much harder to get as much out of the class as he could, by looking at other resources and finding ways to learn the material in other ways. The typical response emerged, that being, "Well, I was really busy with other courses."

This is a sentiment I understand. I am relatively young, and recall my undergraduate days (for now) very well, and I get it. But I also remember wanting to work as hard as possible to understand everything I could, at least in my major classes. I get a sense that this is not the norm, that many students expect to be taught everything but not have to do any additional work on their own. I do not have enough experience to know when this trend began, and perhaps it has always been the norm, and I was an outlier. (Most likely if this is true, it is true for all academics.)

So discussions of whether or not college is "worth it" bug me, because it all depends on the individual student. In fact, there are some of my students that seem to not put any effort whatsoever in their classes. I feel as though they think that they are paying a lot of money for a college degree and expect to get it, even though they do very little of the work. I look at those students and believe that college is not worth it for them. These are most likely students who thought Science was cool, and wanted to major in it without really understanding the work involved.

They will leave school with a mediocre knowledge of the subject matter, thinking that the piece of paper they receive will be their ticket to do anything. The problem will arise if they try to get a position that "needs" their specific Science degree, as any employer will interview them and realize how little they know. Having the degree is necessary for many jobs nowadays, but having the knowledge is essential for getting a job that actually uses the degree you have.

They do not seem to understand this.

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* Please note the sarcasm.

Meetings

My department here is very small, with six full-time (non-visiting) faculty. One result of this is very few faculty meetings, which for the most part is a good thing (just listen to any faculty member who has weekly or bi-weekly faculty meetings). All of ours have had to do with the search for a new faculty member, pretty much, and it makes me think that we won't really have many whenever we're not actually in the midst of a search.

This leads to several issues though. For one, when someone wants to do something (i.e., invite a speaker, host an event, work on rewriting all of the freshman science labs), they can just do it. This on some level is good, but it leads to this isolation in the department where everyone just is sort of doing their own thing, and well, inefficiencies arise.

There's also a feeling of a lack of cohesion. For example, I was never "formally introduced" into the department at some meeting, and while I knew everyone, and they all remembered me from my interview, it was just a strange feeling when I arrived.

Of course I'm past that, and overall I think it's a good setup for the department, and I shouldn't complain for fear of things changing for the worst.

It's done

We had a meeting yesterday about the student in my class who is failing. And this isn't the "doing poorly" kind of failing, it's the "only turning in two out of nine homeworks" kind of failing. This student has lied flat out and also never followed through on the "I'm going to start working hard on this" statements that are spoken constantly.

He is an athlete, and well, because of this has a special "athlete advisor." The advisor, the chair of our department (who also has the student in a class of his), and I all met to discuss the fact that this student is not going to make it as a major in this department. The topic even came up that he would be in another class I am teaching in the fall, and the chair mentioned that I have a reputation for being very hard, even for the best students. I responded with, "Yeah, there's no way he'll survive that class."

It was a very sad meeting. I know that students come to college and not all of them succeed. Plenty of people do not get to do what they really want to do, but this was kind of sad. The student had always wanted to major in my field, and had very specific goals for his future. However, he wasn't willing to put in the extra effort to get this accomplished. The thing is that courses in my field are generally more time consuming than other courses, and the major itself requires 17 courses to get the degree (the average is 13-14 here), and that is in addition to the university-wide core.

I left the meeting feeling both angry and sad. Angry because of the fact that there are clearly people at this university would who like to help this student in every way they can (and I was one of those people), and he just didn't care. Or at least, he didn't care enough to put in the effort on his part. The sad part really came from the fact that the kid was failing miserably, and just didn't realize how hard the subject was.

And he didn't listen to anyone.

I'm right where I should be

I was feeling a little down this morning. Part of it has to do with the fact that C left yesterday to head back upstate, and of course it sucks that he's not here.* Also, the excitement of my birthday, which is this coming Saturday, has dwindled largely because I have a big talk to give on Sunday and I'm probably going to spend much of the happy day just preparing for it.

But then while I was working this afternoon, another professor in the department came to ask me a question about a freshman who was considering dropping his major, for this specific science that I study and teach, to just the "General Science" degree. This ultimately led the student (who is in my lab) to come talk to me, and I gave him my two cents, and helped him figure out what he should do for his major. He actually wants to do something else entirely, possibly, and was going to double major in general science in addition to this other major, to give himself more leverage in his future prospects.

I basically told him that he shouldn't drop the current major just yet, since all of the classes he could take in the fall would work for all degrees he's considering, and may allow him to change his mind.

After he left, I felt spectacular. I don't know if I really helped, but I think I did, and I feel as though he really appreciated it. I think in the end that he was happy that I spent that much time thinking about it with him, and of course I had to figure out the details of the majors and requirements, which I did in real time while he was here. It made me realize that I could very easily be a student advisor already without having any real knowledge of what is required out there.

But in the end, it cheered me up because I was doing what I honestly felt like I was made to do. It put a positive spin on an otherwise dreary day. I don't think it's a coincidence that the sun came out shortly after that little meeting.

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* Although we had an awesome weekend shopping at Macy's, going to the Bronx Zoo, and seeing "Company" at the Philharmonic Saturday night, so I can't complain that much.

Get used to it

I have to get used to the fact that there will regularly be students that I'm not a fan of. Of course there are those with personality clashes, and that will happen with all students. But then there are students that for a particular reason just annoy me, and that is because they are high maintenance.

Last fall there was a student that was very much like this and quite honestly, I was glad to not have to deal with him, much. He had questions on ever little detail (all the way to "what kind of calculator should I bring to lab?"), and some of it was being diligent, but other parts of it where him just being over paranoid about the grade. (It's a lab, for crying out loud!) But since he wasn't in my section, only sometimes did I have to deal with him. Sadly, he had to drop the lab for personal reasons, and so after that I had to deal with him no more.

Until next fall. I just noticed he registered for my section of the lab. Sigh.

I can't teach everything

I have to say that I have lately received a huge ego boost from several students. It started out near the end of last semester, and has become a bit out of control.

The primary reason I am happy is that things started out a bit rocky. In the first month of my course last fall, several students went to the chair saying that I was too difficult, and giving them too much work. By the end, they apparently praised me on the evaluations.*

I have to say that I like the fact that they are meshing with my teaching style. Obviously I like my style, and if it wasn't working then I would have to change it, so there's that. But also, there's something more. I have noticed this semester that it took some time due to how I approached my class, but eventually the students "got it." I don't think they like the material necessarily, but they got it. They understood my approach, and they understood my thought process.

It makes me excited to go in on days I teach, because of course I feel like I'm doing something right.

Now, I've got a great prank for them today, so I must be off.

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* I say apparently because I have not seen them. For some unknown reason, the evaluations are not given to the instructors, but to the chair who looks them over and discusses the results with the instructor. This is a ridiculous procedure that I will try to change, because I believe that all faculty should see their evaluations as soon as possible after turning in the grades, so that they could (in principle) see how to improve their next semester of teaching. But I digress.

Scared

I have a student who is very nervous about basically everything. I know that he wants to succeed, and he wants the absolute best for himself, but sometimes it is a little crazy. He is definitely one of the brightest students in my class, but at the same time I can say for certainty that he is the least confident. But we'll put aside a discussion of his endless "is this right" questions on the homeworks, and go to a different issue with his nervousness. Summer research.

So a couple of months ago he talked about working on summer research, either with me or at another institution, at a "Research Experience for Undergraduates," or some similar program. I of course told him he could work with me but that it would be better for him to go elsewhere. Partially because he is interested in more "practical" applications of the field, and so while my research would teach him a lot, it would not give him experience in what he thinks he wants to do.

So he applied and found out that he was accepted to a program at Columbia, which is the program that he really wanted. Fantastic, I thought, especially since two other students had already signed up to work with me over the summer. But now this student is panicking about whether or not to go. Obviously his choices are limited (the other places haven't responded, and he has to tell Columbia by Friday), but he is terrified about going somewhere new.

What is surprising though is that he has worked at City College for the previous two summers, so he is not opposed to other schools. I honestly do not see the reason for his fear. I think he feels that he was lucky to work for people at City College that he liked, and he knows he likes our department, but Columbia seems like a scary place. He is scared that he won't like it, or that his advisor will be terrible, and on and on. I also think that he doesn't feel "good enough" for the place.

I've never met someone so terrified of his success. I mean, I know plenty of people who are unsure of themselves or their accomplishments, or of doing something new, but this poor student is practically paralyzed with fear. I'm not entirely sure what else I can do, except push him to do this, knowing that he will enjoy it. I told him that even if it's not the ideal situation, he will learn a lot, and he will get a lot out of it.

I have a feeling when the fall comes, I'll be spouting a lot of "I told you so"s.

Summer Research

I now have three undergraduates who wish to work with me over the summer. Two of them are from my university and are sophomores. I just met them recently (hadn't had them in a class yet), and wasn't sure what to expect. But then I got to sub for a class they both happen to be in, and now I'm feeling much better about having them work with me.

It is interesting how just a single interaction allows for me to get a decent idea of what to expect. Obviously, someone who is very talkative in class is not necessarily good at research, but at the same time it shows at least that they want to play an active role. So I think they'll be able to get a lot of good work done over the summer.

The third student is from this area, but going to school elsewhere, and he wants to do some sort of research in my field. This person does not want to get paid, which leads me to wonder. Did he not apply for summer REU (Research Experience for Undergraduates, funded by the National Science Foundation), or not get accepted to any? Did he just want to come home for the summer and we are the closest institution to his house? I'm a bit more reticent about this student, but at the same time I'm a little indifferent. Whatever he does will be just for him, and it isn't like he'll have to defend any funding he received.

I just have to figure out what to make him do.

And this is what I spend my day on...

Just like basically everyone else, I do not spend my time wisely. After this past week which was rather crazy I took Saturday off to have some fun with a friend in Manhattan. We had Korean food for lunch (yum!) and on a whim wound up heading to the top of the Empire State Building. I had been up there before but she, after living in the city for over 6 years before and now effectively living in the city, she has never gone to the top. So we played tourist.

Then, due to the fact that I have a 1st generation iPod touch that is slowly dying, I splurged and purchased a new one. I'm very happy I did, and by the time Saturday night was through, I had a newly synced iPod touch that had much more space for all of my music and then some.

But that was a well-spent day. It recharged me, to prepare me for yesterday, which was to get ready for today. This involved getting lecture notes ready for a class that I'm subbing for another professor, getting some of my plans for my class ready for tomorrw, as well as writing a quiz. Plus I had homework solutions to write up and had to read through the application of our candidate that is visiting today.

So what do I do? I knit this:

What is it, you ask? It is an iPod cozy. I didn't feel like spending $30 on a case that isn't that necessary, so I quickly put this together (thanks to a pattern on Ravelry). Who needs to do work when you can do things that are completely unnecessary?

But just for the record, I did also get most of my work done as well. So it wasn't a total loss.

No work day

Wednesdays this semester have been notoriously unproductive days for me. There are two parts to that, primarily the fact that I have a tutorial student (i.e., independent study) that comes in the morning, and then lab in the afternoon. This in and of itself isn't an issue, until you add in the fact that after we discuss the course, this student and I tend to start chatting about other, largely unrelated, things.

Then there's the fact that there are other students that just come by to chat every so often, and basically it becomes very tricky to get anything done. I'm not really complaining, because quite honestly I enjoy talking with the students. It becomes an issue on a day like today, where I have a talk to prepare for, and while it's "finished," there are a lot of unanswered questions with my results. Primarily, that I have none, because the data just make no sense anymore.

This luckily isn't the end of the world, but it's becoming more of a habit for me, it seems, to not be able to show results at a talk. Alas, it's all good, and I should get used to it. Next year will just get busier.

Make them think they're failing

The mentality of certain students is pretty amazing to me at times. Some are nervous and panicky over losing a point or two, because they just have to get perfect grades (and the person I am specifically thinking about is not a pre-med, just high strung). Some are laid back and clearly just enjoying the education (I have several of those in my class and they are a joy). Some seem exceedingly indifferent, they aren't doing spectacularly but seem to be trying, but at the same time it almost looks like they don't really care one way or the other. And then there are those who do poorly and get surprised when I tell them as much.

For example, I have three students that again I have had to submit a "danger of failing" notice. These are upperclassmen that are majors in my field, and as upperclassmen, we don't submit midterm grades (that is just for freshmen). Instead, we just notify the records office if the student is likely to fail the course.

Two of these students I had last semester and I submitted the same thing back then. They then worked very hard to get their grades up and they succeeded in passing just barely to obtain credit for the class. (Both of my classes last semester and this semester are required for the degree, so a grade of C or better is required.) So of course I was surprised to see that they hadn't changed their ways, and realized that I give very difficult homeworks that they have to get through, and I had to submit the same notice again.

I received an email over spring break from one student who seemed surprised at his* grade, and began panicking because he is supposed to graduate this semester. He then started going into detail about how he gets stuck on the homeworks and doesn't know what to do, and doesn't know how the other students do it.

I have said in the past several things about my homeworks to the students. One, work together, as that will save you a lot of grief. Two, always look at it the day it is assigned. This is not to say that you have to complete it that day, just look at it. It will give you an idea about what is to be expected. Three, (and this one is the most important that he should have learned last semester and most of the other students already understand), come to me with any questions and I can help! This is not easy stuff, and if you understood it that well already, you should be teaching the class.

Oh, and just FYI, don't act surprised if you get a "danger of failing" notice when you have been getting 7 out of 60 points on your homeworks.

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*Instead of being gender-neutral, I'll use "he, his, and him" for all pronouns to save typing.

Spring Break

It is spring break this week. Without any teaching, of course I have a weird amount of free time to work on my research, and I'm getting it done. I did the unthinkable, with regards to spring break: I headed north, to a colder climate. Not ridiculously colder, but still colder, as was noticed when we left the city Sunday and arrived upstate, where the snow began to fall (luckily not really accumulating). C has to teach this week (his spring break was last week), and so while he's working, I'm making my rounds of the coffeeshops in the area. It's worked quite well thus far, as I made a tremendous amount of progress yesterday. Hopefully by the end of the week I will have a lot of exciting things to talk about when I visit Yale the following week.

I must say it is easier (for the short term) to get some things done here. Not because I get distracted in my office (which I do, but that wouldn't happen this week), nor because I don't have teaching responsibilities (I still have midterms to grade, but I'm putting that off since I know they will not exactly be the best). No, it's easier to get things done in a mildly unfamiliar environment. I have been to this city plenty, but since it isn't where I spend all my time, it's a lot easier to actually just get things done.

Of course, I'm sleeping a lot more now too, which doesn't hurt.

Strange dinner

I went out to dinner with our first search candidate and two other members of the department last night. I was toying with not going but I figured it would be a chance to (a) get to know the possibly newest addition to the department and (b) get to talk to members of the department that I never really talk to since overall it is a very antisocial department. I actually had a good time, but I feel as though the conversation sort of veered away from the candidate (who is very shy, and just as an aside, it is funny to see the difference in what I thought about this person based on the application materials, and to see how different the candidate was in real life), and me and this other professor basically had a long conversation.

In my defense, it had to do with something that I'd been meaning to ask him, so it isn't really like I planned it. But alas, maybe it took some pressure off of the candidate. I did enjoy the fact that I got to go out to a search dinner where I wasn't the candidate, it definitely was a lot better. It's also really good, to me, to realize that while I will vote on who we hire, I'm not as invested in this search, since it for a part of our program that I am not actively involved in. In that vein, I will meet with the candidate today for my "interview" but really it'll be much more relaxed.

At least on my end.

How to do everything

I'm a fan of NPR's "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me" radio quiz show. I've never listened to it on the radio, but in podcast form. I am excited because I will either listen to it throughout the day on Mondays, or if I head somewhere on Sunday I will pop it in, as it takes one full episode (~45 minutes) to get most of the way to anywhere in Manhattan. Either way, I look forward to it every week.

But the producers of that show have come out with a new podcast, equally as cheesy and except for being a lot shorter, equally as fun, called "How to do everything," which is basically a "guide" for just that. For example, part of the first episode included "how to make $65,000 by purchasing a house in Idaho that is filled with snakes and flipping it" (in this case, the infestation of snakes clearly brought the value of the house down, hence the possibility of making a lot of money if you could flip it).

This is one of my new faves, and I realized this since this morning I just thought about how I get to listen to it on my way into the office, and I got a little giddy. That's right. Giddy. Deal with it.

White Board Issues

I am an ardent fan of the old-school chalkboard. Not these new-fangled (that have been around for decades) white-boards. I am not a fan of using markers that are half the time dried out, or too weak to adequately teach a class. However, that is the type of board in my classroom, and as such, I must use it. [Sidenote: I find it is pretty much divided in my very unscientific study of this, and it seems by and large that more scientists prefer chalk while more humanities-types prefer the marker.] But this isn't about my dislike of the boards, even though it generally causes me to swear at least once or twice during class, amusing my students.

No, instead it is about the professor who teaches before me. First of all, this is not about whether or not he erases the board, as there are plenty of people who get all up in arms if the previous lecturer does not erase their work. I actually like erasing the board at the beginning of class, as it gives me a chance to casually chat with the students about random things.

The issue is that at times the professor clearly touchs the board with his fingers, which is something I do as well, so that right there isn't even the problem. Clearly though, this man has extremely oily fingers, because when I erase the board, as I move over a seemingly blank area, three or four fingerprints appear on the board, having been outlined by the marker residue on the eraser. I feel like I'm on NCIS or something, finding a way to determine the suspect of some terrible crime.

And just to be fair, I tried my own fingers and as hard as I pressed my thumb or forefinger to the board, I could not get the same effect. It is something that has caused quite some amusement at the beginning of class lately, primarily because I'm trying to erase the board, and then I have to scrub to erase the fingerprints!

Oh, and if you were thinking it, this would not be an issue with a chalkboard. The chalk on his hands would dry them enough so this just wouldn't happen. Just sayin'.

Rainy dog

I always find humor in Dante's hatred of the rain. It is coming down pretty steadily right now (though it's not pouring, really), and at first he was fine with it during our walk. With my umbrella I didn't care at all.

But after he took care of his business, he was done. He wanted nothing more than to be back inside, but he knows that he has to go on his "full walk," so he doesn't fight it. Instead of sniffing everything, he sniffs nothing, which is saying a lot consider how the only thing he usually wants to do is smell everything in our path. So instead, he has a determined (and mildly annoyed) look on his face as he trudges forward back home, and then gets thrilled at the notion of my drying him off with a towel. (Of course, he still has to go around to every rug in the apartment to dry himself off completely, leaving a hint of "wet dog" everywhere in the house.)

So now I have to get the energy to go to my office. I have a list of things that have to get done today, but mostly I'm dreading meeting with this one student. I had a long talk with him on Friday about his lack of work (i.e., he hasn't turned anything in, although he has taken all three quizzes), and well, he really does not want to drop the class. Of course, he may have to by the end of the semester unless he really starts to put effort into things. But he wants to meet today to go over things that he doesn't understand (because he missed several classes), and I have no problem with this, except for the fact that I have a nagging feeling that he just won't turn his game around. (And I shouldn't say this but quite honestly I have a slight hope he doesn't show up today, since then I will be able to insist he drop, since it'll be the second time he was going to come by to get assistance.)

Moving on...

Come to the Caf?

So this is the second week in a row that right after class, I was asked by a student to come with them to lunch in the "Caf," which is their cafeteria. Last week I just said, "Sounds tempting, but no." I figured it was just a joking invitation.

Then it happened again and I said, "You asked me last week," to which the student responded, "Yeah, and I'll keep asking until you join us!" It's a funny situation, because I know that my students like me, but there's a difference between having them be chummy (they come in to just chat all the time) and them wanting me to join them for lunch.

This is a weird situation of course, because of the question of boundaries. On one hand, there are a lot of faculty that routinely have lunch with students, and so it isn't really that out of the ordinary. (Back when I was an undergrad, we would invite faculty to parties at times, and sometimes they would come, so who really knows where the boundaries are.) At the same time, there is a danger in being "too chummy" with the students. Luckily, I'm past one worry, in that they don't seem to have lacked respect for me even though I'm extremely easy going. That's one danger.

The other problem of course is something that is akin to "looking bad." This is not a huge worry, unless I would have lunch with them every day and clearly have too close of a relationship with the students (which would be frowned upon by both the administration as well as my husband). This is not a real worry either. I like the fact that even in the short time I've been here I have been able to build a good relationship with these students, since I know that it will stick with them forever.

Plus I like hearing them say things like, "Oh, when you teach that class next year it'll actually be a good one, unlike when we took it from [insert other professor name here]." That just makes me feel better.

Surprise!

So it's President's Day, and for the first time I am at a university which closes today. That's fine with me, this is my usual holiday schedule (which is different than a weekend schedule): I don't set an alarm (though I usually still get up near my normal time and today was no exception: 8:30), and from there I treat the day as a "work at home" day. So I get up and go through my normal morning including a shower (not done in the morning on a weekend), and sit down to work in my recliner until the battery in my laptop goes away.

So this morning I get up and go start my coffee, walking by the three windows which have the blinds open (being on the fifth floor with not many other similarly "tall" buildings in the neighborhood, no one can really see in, so I never close the living room or kitchen blinds). While my coffee is brewing I get dressed and when I go back to the kitchen I hear a very familiar sound outside, one that I wasn't expecting. It was that scraping sound of a snow shovel.

But certainly it didn't snow? Ah, but it did! In fact, we got a good 4 or so inches overnight! What a fun surprise! And I was so clueless this morning that I didn't even notice. This is what we get for getting so cocky about the near-70 degree weather on Friday. (Although I thought we already paid for that with the bitter winds of Saturday.)

Chat

I have been enjoying my first year here. The classes are fun to teach, I have almost enough time for research, and the students are for the most part good. Teaching majors of course helps, and while there are a few majors who seem to be majoring in this subject for very unknown reasons, I have few complaints. The really good students are quite excellent, and I like to think I've made an impression on them.

For one, several of them regularly come by my office "just to chat." They usually have five or so minutes before another class, and so they come by. Luckily it has usually been during times that I wasn't that busy (although it can be distracting). There is a part of me that thinks there should be more separation between faculty and students, but at the same time, I have had this type of relationship as a student (both undergrad and grad), so it's definitely not out of the ordinary.

Of course, I am egging them on. I have already had a few discussions about California with some students, both of whom are from there, and just to have some fun I just discuss all of the things wrong with the state. (Which aren't always bad things, for example, I have said that I am too bitter a person to be able to handle such perfectly sunny weather all the time, and that's sort of true.) One of my students is in love with In N Out burger, which is a statewide burger chain out there. C and I always go there to eat when we're out there, and while it's good, it does not hold a candle to What-a-burger in Texas.

That being said, my mother in law gave me an In N Out t-shirt for Christmas, so I am wearing it to class today (it's going to be 65!), because I can only imagine that this one student will probably freak out a bit. It'll be fun.

I'm not going crazy

So a few minutes ago a high-pitch humming began. It's rather piercing, and extremely distracting. At first I thought I was hearing things but it got Dante's attention and well, he got up and moved to the other room (although I think it's just as bad over there). It's bothersome enough I may have to leave the house early, and go to my office because even just now, in the midst of this rather waste-of-a-time post, I zoned out and just focused on the sound.

A positive side of this is that we lose the ability to hear higher pitches as we get older, and this is pretty high. Age will never get me.*

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* Although last night I realized age is getting Dante. He got up off the couch and made an "old-man" noise, which he used to never do. Sure he would always stretch like crazy, but this was a noticeable groan, as if all of his energy was going into getting up. Kind of sad, my dog is older than I am.

And yet

So the student finally talked to me. He was full of great excuses.

• "I never got those emails you sent" Um, that excuse is pretty lame, considering I emailed his Fordham account and one of my emails was sent as a reply to an email he sent me.
• "I came by your office a couple of times to ask you questions and you weren't there, so that's why I didn't turn in those homeworks." Equally lame. You are an adult now and have to learn how to take responsibility. You see me every day when you come to class, and that is a time to ask for a good time to come by my office.
• "Your office hours are when I have practice." Again, see above.

So then he asks if he can come by shortly after four today, to ask me questions, and he has not yet arrived. I will give him until five and then send him an email (that he probably will not get) to say that I waited for an hour. That is far more generous than I have to be. Right now I'm not really in the mood to deal with it, and I feel as though this is a problem that will not change.

If I don't get the third assignment by Friday (which, by the way is a week late), I will tell him he should drop the class because he is just wasting his own time. And mine.

Just drop

I have a problem with a student, "X." X has not turned in a single one of the three homeworks that have been due (and I assume on Friday I can upgrade that to four), but has come to most of the lectures (X has missed three or four). I have sent X emails several times to stay after class or come talk to me at some point about this, and every time X has managed to duck out of class while I'm talking to someone else, evading me.

Turns out there are several problems, as I went to the chair to discuss this yesterday. First, X is a sophomore, so shouldn't even be taking my class. He's an athlete, which means he has a different advisor from other majors (although I also noticed that X has not declared this has his major), and thus that is the source of the problems here. Also, it turns out he didn't turn in the homework for the class that the chair teaches,* so at least it's not only a problem in my class.

But really the big problem I have is with the blatant refusal to discuss this problem with me. I have to say, it would be completely within my rights to ignore the issue, send in an "F" during midterm grade reporting, and just fail the student if that is what it comes to. I think that is wrong, and thus am more than willing to work with the students to ensure they do not fail (without going overboard, of course). Since he refuses to speak with me, I need to now contact his advisor, which honestly I do not want to do, because I think I have better things to do with my time.

What I would like is to be able to just unilaterally drop him from the course. If (and note the big IF) he scores perfectly on everything from now on, he'll get a "C." I would like X to just drop the class, for his own sake (and quite honestly, perhaps if atheletics is such a major part of his life, I would personally advise him to drop science as a major).

I will not rant on the serious issues involved with athletics here, because I've done so before, and I do realize it will never go away.

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* As a sidenote, I find it interesting that while I have had three assignments turned in during the first month of the semester, the chair has had only one.

Parenting

Far be it from me to discuss parenting as if I know everything about it. (Obviously with that intro, you know I will.) I know that having a child is a harrowing experience, and that it can be (if not is) one of the most difficult jobs around, if for no other reason it is a 24/7 gig.

However, I have come to the conclusion that my neighbor is the absolute worst mother. I used to think this a while ago, but really I was trying to give her the benefit of the doubt. But let's talk about why.

First, once a month (roughly, I'm not here every weekend but this has occurred at least three times since I've lived here and I feel like it's more often), she has an all-night party that involves ridiculously loud music (and saying something to her does nothing and calling the cops does nothing; I guess stopping murders is more important than a little noise). Luckily these have always occurred on Saturday nights, and often when I was getting home very late myself, so whatever. But I always wondered what she did with the child during these parties.

I found out the day after one of them. As I was coming inside with Dante, there was an older (and stress the "er" part, she was maybe in her early forties) woman with a child in a stroller, slowly bringing the kid up the stairs. I offered to help, and she at first declined because (a) I had the dog (and thus only one free hand) and (b) she was going to the top floor. Since that's where I was going, I insisted and helped her. Turns out this was the grandmother of the child of my neighbor.

Now, at this point I understand that parents need time off. Having the kid go to grandma's house is almost required on a regular basis if she lived nearby. But the problems here are primarily with the fact that the (very hungover, I could tell) mother did not go pick up her own kid, nor did she go downstairs to help her mother carry her daughter up five flights of stairs! Bad mother? Not really, but bad person? To some degree, yes.

But after that I started noticing how often she went out pretty much every weekend, with her mother staying with the kid (yes, I'm that nosy neighbor, but only when my neighbors make a lot of noise that is easy to listen to). The other night she went out and for over an hour the poor daughter just cried and cried. I felt bad for her. In addition to her mother just wanting to party all the time (the mom is probably something like 20), her mother just looks at her with detest it seems, when I run into them in the hall. Kind of breaks my heart.

Fizzling on a Friday afternoon

I wish my class on Friday were later, except for the fact that I don't like late classes. Generally, late morning is most ideal, and that is when the class is (well, it overlaps lunch, which is mildly upsetting but not a big deal), and most of the time I love that.

However, there are times when I am severely exhausted by the end of the week. This is one of those times and if my class were later in the afternoon, then I would be able to just teach the class and head out. Note of course that really all I'm hoping for is for the end of the day to be here, even though there really is no reason for me to stick around.*

Yesterday was a full day, with an early morning faculty meeting, a trip to Brooklyn to give a talk (and any trip that requires me to leave the Bronx is exhausting in and of itself; I am not a commuter-type), then after a bit of relaxing and prepping for class, I had a 9:30pm conference call last night (due to a previously mentioned collaboration with someone in Taiwan). So I'm ready for the weekend, even though there is plenty left for me to do.

Ah, maybe I will just head home.

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*Except for the fact that I will definitely not get any work done if I head home now, while I may get something accomplished by sticking around.

Just too early

I was reading another academic blog about the issue of weekend emails. That is, that people are expected to be "on call" at all times to respond to emails should the issue arise. The particular issue didn't have to do with students, but with other work-related issues. I haven't come across this too often (yet), but because of some international colleagues, I have had another problem come up several times, most recently this morning.

One of my collaborators is in Taiwan (T), while another is local (ie, in the same time zone as me, and we'll call him L). Of course it is natural that we get emails from T overnight. But this morning, while I was still in bed (as it was 5am), he sent an email to confirm that we were still having a conference call tomorrow night. L confirmed (that's fine with me) and said, "How about 10pm, although I mildly prefer 9?" This response was sent at 6:30am. A short time later, 9:30 was suggested as a compromise, and then L said "No, considering our last meeting, this will go past ten anyway, and 9 was just a mild preference, so let's say 10." This last email was sent just as my alarm was going off.

Now, let me say this, our last meeting began at 10, and lasted until 11:30pm. That being said (which I did in an email as soon as I could), I would prefer an earlier time for starting, because it lasted so long.

But really, I was frustrated that the decision was just being made, as if 6:30 in the morning is a perfectly acceptable time to expect a response from someone. It would have been better, I feel, for either of them to make a comment urging a quick response from their colleague, to weigh in. I almost felt like pointing out that we set it to be 9pm originally (which is 10am in Taiwan, so it's not an absurdly early hour, by the way), but I don't really mind it being at 9:30.

Why won't it cease to amaze me?

I have a particular problem with a certain type of person. It's common in students and generally the "everyday person on the street" and it grates on my nerves. Let me give you two examples

1. This comes from an email I received from a student yesterday, who hadn't come to class all last week. He was severely in danger of failing last semester and I could see the pattern repeating itself this semester, so I emailed him telling him I don't want a repeat of last semester. His response was to say that last week was really tough because the two sports he plays are overlapping right now and he had a lot of practices last week and three games this past weekend. Apparently this is important enough for him to not do his schoolwork (they had homework due Friday), or show up to a class that is required for his major. He's asking if he can meet with me outside of class once a week to "make sure he keeps up with everything," and quite honestly I am very close to just saying no.
   
   Quite honestly, he can come to my office whenever if he has questions, but I really do not think that because he wants to play two sports at once during the last semester of his senior year, I should have to waste my time trying to help him out. I did so last semester, only because I'm a nice guy and it was only for the last few weeks of the class. But the problem is that he wants everything to just be handed to him on a silver platter, as if he's entitled to it. This is common in a lot of students it seems (not all), and man I'm not sure how much I can handle.


2. The other story comes from the uproar here because alternate side-of-the-street parking is back in effect. As you have possibly heard, there's been a lot of snow up in these parts, and for at least the last month, parking rules went out the window (at least the ASotS and meter rules). People were all in an uproar that this was just the city's way to "stick it" to those up here in the Bronx who are struggling to survive, etc. Apparently "they didn't have time to dig out their cars."
   
   Um, it's been at least two weeks since the last major storm (after that we had more snow, sleet, and rain, but no real accumulation), and you didn't have time to dig out your car? If you didn't dig it out in two weeks, why have a car in the city? Also, one person was saying how the city should be doing that, helping, and handing out free shovels to help.
   
   I'm all for social programs, but these people obviously do not understand where this "free" stuff comes from. It's like the magic "free" water in the tap, or people who think that electric cars will solve the energy crisis.*

I have to say that while I understand that life is difficult, these people need to realize that you know what? It sucks, but it is manageable. For those like my student, sometimes you have to give up something you like to be able to do something you're required to do. For those like the populace, if you want "free" things handed out, then stop complaining about taxes going up. I'm completely fine if taxes were raised and the nation/state/city could do more for the general people, but let's see the public outcry (from the same people) then.
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* It will solve the polution problem to some degree, but the majority of our energy still comes from dirty sources like coal and oil, and where do these people think the electricity comes from? Oh that's right, the "clean" outlet in the wall.

It'll happen

So I'm geared up to revise the lab manuals for the freshman courses. This is something I thought about last fall when I first saw what we had, and they aren't terrible, per se, but man they could be a lot better. Some of it has to do with just being rewritten but in a lot of ways, my main goal is to at least unify the styles of the labs.

But of course the main difficulty is having to type all of them up, since we have none of them digitized. Then the editing can begin. Luckily, it turns out that my TA for lab this semester is a student worker, so he gets his pay from federal work study money, and there are two hours free that he has each week. So I recruited him to my cause, and it begins today! With any luck, by the end of this semester the labs for the fall course will be finished. By that I mean retyped, edited, and all of the figures redone. Hopefully also we can have the second semester labs at least digitized, and then during the fall I can work on revising them before the spring hits.

Luckily I was able to find the student to help, otherwise I feel like this would have very easily fallen by the wayside. But nope!

And the sun is out today, no more terrible weather (now), and my students can't complain that they have to trek in horrid weather for class. And I don't have to ice skate to work today.

The semester has begun

So the semester is officially in full swing, despite the number of snow days we've had. Well, technically, no full day of classes have been cancelled, only delayed openings and early closings. Luckily my class is at 11:30am, so it has never been cancelled, much to my students' chagrin. Since I'm in walking distance (unlike the rest of the department who all live in the 'burbs), I have no need to cancel class, and I never will. In fact, a student said to me, "Yes you will, at some point." I responded with, "Only when the university cancels the class, will I do so." The big issue I think is that the students are used to classes being cancelled by the other faculty because they live so far, and thus don't want to risk driving in.

And of course there are the usual issues with the freshmen. I think they mean well, and they honestly don't think that the things they do are their fault, but I don't think I'll ever "have heard everything." Although I will say this about my students in the lab I'm teaching this semester. I was very clear that absolutely no late lab reports will be accepted, so if they don't turn it in when it is due, they will have to redo the lab at the end of the semester during the make-up lab session.

Student X, upon arriving to lab yesterday, told me there was a printer problem (sadly, this is a standard excuse but from my experience with printers, I usually buy it), and as such just planned to make-up the lab at the end of the semester. I asked X if the lab was available, and X responded, "Well, in my email." So I brought X to my office to print out the report, because well, I must say that I was impressed that the student didn't try to beg me to "please please please let me turn it in tomorrow, I promise!"

Good times.

Little things

The interesting thing about being a new faculty member is how much everyone else seems to not notice the little things that are rather, well, often embarrassing. Some of these things seem considerably unimportant to faculty but when seen through the eyes of the students, they can lead to problems.

For one, there are posters up throughout the department, some of which are quite a bit out of date. One of them (that is relevant to me) is about twenty years out of date, and sadly I just noticed it myself a couple of weeks ago. Of course a replacment is cheap and doable (we're in the process now), but it makes me wonder how much else is out of date. And since we as faculty know better, it's a lot harder to pay attention. Additionally, when you're at one place for long enough, then it is easy for things to blend into the background.

The other problem, and again, this is something that on some level I don't even care about but is a big issue for undergraduates, and that is with the lab manual for the intro science class here. This is taken by majors, non-majors (but still science majors), and non-majors that are fulfilling their one science requirement. The lab manual was updated a few years back (probably around ten years ago), and is very much in need of repair. The problem is that a lot of the labs were written so long ago that they were typed. As in, with a typewriter. While the lab is still fine (and for the most part written very well), it looks absurd in this day and age that they aren't all unified into a single style.

So enter my new project. This is something that looks very bad to the freshmen, quite honestly, and the look of the lab manual will definitely change (to some degree) the students' impressions on the labs they are performing. Considering much of our equipment is actually not that old, an update of the lab manual will make it all that more appealing.

I hope that in the future I don't become so complacent with the way things are that I'm not willing to keep things updated. Sadly, I know how I am, and it'll probably happen. So for the time being I will just enjoy the fact that at least now I care about these minor details.

Snow = class

So I think we are guaranteed to get snow (or a wintry mix) any day that I teach. We got more today, and luckily I walk to work. I have at least one student who lives up in Westchester, and well, she's stuck driving in. I know it saves money to live at home, but I do not envy this student.

In other news, it is finally real that we are looking at the applications for another faculty member in the department. That means that (most likely) I will not be the newbie as of next year. It's a little strange that I get any say in this, however, considering that I've been here less than a year. But alas, I will enjoy giving my two cents. There are only 73 to applications to look through, and there are some obvious cuts we can make (due to various requirements regarding this or that). This will lend to some exhilerating nighttime reading. Yay me.

Office or home?

Days like this make me again revisit the question of whether or not to work from home or go into the office. I have no scheduled obligations today, and the weather is biting (-1 wind chill right now). So working from home is appealing.*

The downside is that while I can get work done from home there is something that is very grounding by being in the office. In the evenings I do work while having the television on, so I'm less productive that way, but when I am home during the day, the TV remains off. But still there is the feeling that I'm in my home, and I think of other things that really should get done: cleaning, laundry, whatever (mind you, none of this other stuff gets done, but it's distracting).

But going into the office can get distracting very fast, with students coming to ask questions, other students coming to just chat, or my very least favorite, those coming to ask directions or bug me in some other way. My office is in the middle of the first floor, and students come to borrow my stapler for their homework they're turning in, or to ask where room 105 is (why the hell wasn't that room put in numerical order in the building? To irritate me, that's why.), or some other inane issue. I could close my office door but I have always been of the opinion that my door is (literally) "always open," so that would defeat the purpose. Plus if I kept my door closed, then I would have to get up to open it whenever someone came by. And if it were someone wanting to borrow a stapler, I would have to kill them.

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*Note that really this is not an option today because I have already told a student I would be on campus at the very least this afternoon, and well, they have homework due tomorrow so I should be around.

Not very much support

Universities are around primarily for two reasons (and I won't get into the argument as to which should be the primary function): teaching students and doing research to add to the base of knowledge that exists. This is something that cannot happen with just students and faculty in this day and age, and there's generally a larger number of people hired at a university or college that are the support staff.

This is composed of assistants (and here some do and some don't mind being called "secretaries"), librarians, janitors, etc. One of the groups that nowadays are vital is tech support. This is what I want to focus on. The problem is that of course if a professor doesn't do his/her job, then the school fails in a small way, and if students just stop coming, then the school is also going to fail. But what is worse is that the support staff is vital to things working, and quite honestly it has severely failed here.

My research entails a large amount of time spent using computers, both local "small" computers as well as supercomputers that I connect to remotely. So while I'm not an expert with computers, I have come to realize that I know more than pretty much anyone at IT here. It has been six months since I have arrived and my faculty webpage (which I wish to use for research) is not set up yet, and well, everytime something goes wrong, it takes a month to fix it. (I know partially why, and I'll get to that in a sec.) Getting software installed on my machine (that the school has a site-wide license to use) takes 1-2 months, and trying to get access to my office desktop from off-site is basically akin to asking them to up and move the university to southern California.

The base of the problem is that there is one number for IT, and they will forward your request to the appropriate person. But as I have learned (with the last request above), the appropriate person isn't the knowledgeable one. That person will often have to contact someone else, and everything takes far to long to happen. I know that for large companies (Apple, IBM, Microsoft, etc), a large number of IT issues can be resolved by someone who knows basically nothing and is given a little packet of troubleshooting guides, but with a smaller place, I would prefer to talk directly to the tech person him/herself. See, when that happens usually you are cut off in the middle of your sentence when describing the problem since he/she is actually intelligent.

As it stands I have to talk to people who I don't even think know that computers can be used for something other than email and the internet.

Do I really care?

So a friend on Facebook just posted that she was deactivating her account because she spends too much time on it, and to message her if anyone wanted contact info to keep in touch. This is something that is very strange to me.

I guess if I ever deactivated my account, I would just do it. The reason being that anyone who I would care to be in contact with already has my info. My phone number hasn't changed in over six years, and while my email has, I generally update people that matter (and quite honestly anyone with half a sense can find my email pretty easily online).

A significant number of my "friends" on Facebook are more like acquaintances. I haven't any real need to keep in touch with them, but I do actually like knowing what's going on with them. It's a daily "alumni newsletter" for various times in my life: high school, college, grad school, and so forth.

For a brief second I thought about emailing her to get her info, but while I like hearing about what's happening in her life, I would never email her privately for any reason. It's one of those things that makes me feel kind of sad, but then I realize that in about three minutes I'll completely forget about it.

Slackers

I just read three interesting posts over at Female Science Professor that incited a constant annoyance that I (and most academics) feel regularly. It has to do with professors (and specifically tenured professors) being lazy and getting paid a ton to basically do nothing, with no fear of losing one's job.

I can't do justice to the posts, so I have the links and quick summaries below. What I will say is that there is a belief that seems to be prevalent (I've seen it a lot, even from friends) that being a faculty member is not a real job, and that all we do is teach ("Must be nice to get summers off!"). I know that some of this comes from the fact that people don't really understand what research is (I'll admit that I don't quite understand how research takes place in the non-sciences, and I'm married to someone who is actively researching in the humanities), and from the myth that if one gets tenure he or she can never be fired. So I will now turn the floor over to FSP:

Do Not Reply
The first of the posts, in which FSP recieves an email from an author of a book that she criticizes in another article (last fall). This book, called "Higher Education?" is what sparks the issue here. It is what makes the argument of tenured professors essential being lazy money-sucking fiends.

Dear Andrew Hacker?:
This is her public response to the author's email.

What Would John Stuart Mill Do?:
A mention of a strange anecdote from the book in question. Actually, here I will copy the last part because this is something that really bugged me. She discusses that the strangest story in the book (and I have not read the book, but this is more irritating than strange to me) as:

My vote for the strangest part of the book is the paragraph in which the authors describe a "workingman" who "jumped on a subway track to rescue a child who tripped and fell." The workingman didn't think; he just did it. The authors posit that professors on that same platform would not have jumped on the track to save the child:

"We wonder if, had some professors been on the platform, would they have paused to ponder how John Stuart Mill might have parsed the choices?"

This is again a common problem nowadays: You are a bad person if you think, but if you don't think, then you are clearly a hero. This is a symptom of a larger problem, as we have a society that villifies intellectualism and forethought. Gut reactions here are considered always superior to well thought out reactions. It bugs me.

Plus, I didn't even know who John Stuart Mill was (thanks Wikipedia!).

Attack of the non-existent mouse

Saturday night I had a bit of a scare. An hour after I had returned from the grocery store, I heard a bunch of rustling and squeaking. It seemed to come at first from the hall but very quickly sounded like it came from the kitchen. I went in there and kicked the door under the sink (where the trash is), as I wasn't ready to see the mouse. Nothing. Eventually I opened the door, and there was nothing there, and no sign of anything. I let myself believe that it must have been my neighbor returning home with his shopping cart (I had seen him leave when I was coming home).

Then a few hours later I heard it again and figured it really must have been a mouse. I was very unhappy about this, but Sunday night on my way home I got a trap and set it, and waited.

Up to now, nothing. I think I have pieced together one of two possibilities (not including the one where there might have been a mouse but it left, since that's not as likely). One, since I heard the noise again last night, but definitely in the hallway, it could just be the mysterious shopping cart (which I still haven't seen while it's making the noise, but still). Also, although I don't hear a lot of noises from this, I think my neighbors may have a cat, as of last week, since now whenever we come inside, Dante immediately runs to their door, sniffing it like he's hunting something.

As long as it's not a mouse.