Met all of my classes and...

I feel like I am already behind.

Blerg.

In an aside

I have to complete this online training thingie for IRB issues for NewSchool. I am being a very, very bad student by skipping straight to the quizzes that you can re-take. The IRB chair encouraged this, saying "well, you are learning by seeing the wrong and right answers." In hir defense, it is new questions each time, so I guess i am learning. However, to do the course properly would take 10 hours. 10. hours.

Other side of the desk

So I was contacted by a grad student asking me to do an interview related to her dissertation research on academic bloggers. I did it yesterday, and it was an interesting experience, mostly because a lot of the questions, I hadn't really thought about before.

East coasters and afflictions

So my folks, being somewhere on the upper East coast, are right in the line of fire for Irene.

They're not worried...the family has owned the house since 1954, and it has never in that time flooded above the basement (although it did get to the top step once, and that was a little scary.

Meanwhile, my department at work has seen a huge number of afflictions including:

Secretary in main office's husband had a heart attack
Other secretary in the main office's daughter hit by a car while on her bicycle
One associate dean had to have suspicious lesions cut out of his mouth
The other associate dean's mother died
One co-worker had emergency appendectomy
Another had an aneurysm discovered and had a quite invasive repair
Another's husband had a recurrence of brain cancer they though was in remission

And they had some kind of student rally outside my office with a lot of clapping and cheering. I'm not ready for youthful exuberance, yet.

First days

Today was the first day of school for both Offspring and Bun, who got back from grandma's at about 9:30 last night.

Offspring was excited, but very nervous, as you might expect. I think the large group of girls her age at the bus stop (6 in her grade, 4 in others, plus one poor 8th grade boy) was encouraging, though.

I have a 4-hour faculty meeting this afternoon, which means I won't see her until she's been home for quite a while.

I am taking advantage of a couple of meeting-free hours this morning (hurray!) and no kids to get some serious work done on my courses.

The Prof. Family voting heuristic

Unless they are clearly evil, vote for the smartest candidate.

A wee ray of hope

We had a grad faculty meeting today. Remember those classes I was teaching to them last fall? Where the students were wanting to me teach all this stuff that I didn't even know myself? Where I really thought I was dying? Where my evaluations were beyond horrible?

We got results from our assessment in student learning that we're putting in for accreditation, and guess what? They did learn what they were supposed to.

So I feel a little better.

Comfort

I just put Offspring back in bed today. She's nervous about starting a new school this week, which I completely understand, since I switched schools in seventh grade, and it really took me two years to sort of find my place.

The most amazing thing happened today, though.

We had heard from our realtor that there were a lot of girls Offspring's age in our neighborhood. We were out walking one evening, and met one of them out with her family, who confirmed that they are 7 of them at the same bus stop, in the same grade at the same school.

Well. tonight I got home and Spouse was there working outside and told us a group of girls had come by to meet Offspring, and they were just up the road. She ran and caught up with them and chatted for a bit (and told them about her current D & D obsession, which is not the conversation starter I would have suggested, but what are you going to do?) I think it went pretty well, and I am so impressed by a group of 13 year olds who would do this.

I wouldn't have at that age.

I hope it bodes well.

I don't feel better

But I do feel excited, so that's good right? I just have to spread that excitement to my students.

The community partner works with refugee resettlement in a city about 20 miles (30 mins) from my university. That's definitely my biggest concern. That, plus the fact that although the connection between what we are doing and the objectives for the class are very clear to me, I am not at all sure about how to make them clear to my students. By ridiculous comparison, it would be like I'm teaching radiology, and I am having my students X-Ray animals, when it is obvious that their jobs will involve X-raying people.

So that's going to be a hard sell.

That said, it's a very worthwhile project, and I know my students will get useful things from it, so in that sense, I guess it's worth doing.

Any tips from anyone who's worked with service learning would be much appreciated!

Discombobulated

Today was the first "wear a tie" day back at work of the semester. It was a reception, lots o' speeches, a department meeting.

I find my self growing concerned about preparing for the upcoming semester. Also, the mean course evaluation score on 3 questions that matter for my department is 4.21/5. Apparently, we are all, in fact, above average. Except me, that is. I wonder what this says about the students, department and school.

Tonight was "meet the teacher" night at Offspring's school.

She has not made it into the computer system yet, so she was not on any class lists and we were pretty confused the entire time. I think her first couple of days are going to be pretty rough.

Tomorrow, Apollo and I have to go to meet with the community partner for some service learning two of our classes are doing (one of mine and one of his). I am worried that it's going to be a spectacular train wreck. Hopefully, I'll feel better after tomorrow. At least I'll have enough dates to get my syllabus finished.

Wanna/Don't Wanna

Wanna

Have five or six concentrated hours to work on classes for next semester
Spend some quality end-of-summer time with my family
Have all my stuff moved into the new place
Go have a nice, long lunch
Blog more of the items rolling around in my head right now
See this (takeway - science=good; history of drug abuse = bad):



Don't Wanna

Sit in largely pointless meetings every day next week
Sit in welcome freshies for several hours today
Use AdSense (although thanks for calling my blog popular, Google!)
Pack/weed out to get stuff moved to the new place
Have the girlies start school this week
See this:

Back, not in black

I wore green today, but I feel a bit like a chump, since at the all-day retreat I had to go to today, at least 3/4 of the faculty were in shorts.

So I got the girlies dropped off, and here I am back at work. The retreat went about like I would have expected it to, made worst by the fact that it was for a class I haven't taught before, so I didn't really have a lot to add.

Tomorrow, an all-day teaching conference thingie (also pointless, but looks good on the annual report).

Friday, all-day school retreat. At least I'm interested in the subject matter there.

I have started making lists again. And I set an alarm this morning, and then realized we've moved the the coffee maker to our new town, Granolaville.

I think that was the worst part.

Day 1, Day 2, Day 3 in the car

So Spouse's classes are starting tomorrow, and I start our pre-class, endless meetings. We are taking the girls down to their grandparents (3 hours, each way) tonight. I also need to make a trip to our house in the city where I work to get some more things (1 hour each way) to get some more things. Then, I'll spend the night there (with our furniture!), go to retreat #1, and drive back down here. Round trip drive Thursday. Friday, back to grandparents to give them a break and to bring Offspring back.

And so it begins

I was away at the big conference in my field last week (in a dreary city that I don't care if I ever revisit), got back Saturday night, and we are pretty much jumping back into full swing of the year.

Today: Close on the house at 9 a.m. We went over last night for the final walk-through and the sellers were there moving a few more things out. We are getting such a good deal on the house that I was afraid they'd be kind of mad at us, but I think seeing our girls made them feel better. They are an older couple who has moved into a continuous care kind of place, and I think that since they had raised their family there, they were happy to see another family where the kids would grow up there. Or maybe I am reading too much into it.

After that, I am going to register Offspring for school.

We aren't moving the bulk of our stuff for perhaps several weeks, so we are moving enough down to kind of camp out there, since Spouse will stay down there after this. He has his pre-semester faculty meeting this afternoon, and his classes start on Wednesday.

Tomorrow: The house needs some work that would be good to get done before we move furniture in (see above) so we are meeting the contractor there to work out final details. I think I'll also be making a run to our present home to get another carload of stuff. That evening, I'm taking the girls to Spouse's parents. Their school doesn't start until nearer the end of the month, and

Wednesday: I have the first of 3 all-day retreats this week. And, we're back.

transitions

So we are closing on the new place on Monday (!). The appraisal on the house came back, and priced it about 10 percent below what we are paying, and this town is still a hot market because the schools are apparently fantabulous, so we really got a fantastic deal. (Other houses in the city and in the area where we are tend to go for 3-5% below asking).

Now begins the process of getting everything together to move down there. Since we just got a closing date yesterday, and I am leaving town this afternoon for the big conference in my field (lousy location this year, so the fam is not coming), we have not engaged a mover yet. Spouse's classes start on Wednesday, so we brought down some of the furniture from Nice State - a folding table and chairs, a couple of air mattresses and some sitting chairs. Spouse and Offspring are going to go ahead and move down there, and Bun and I will stay in the our present place until we get movers, since our work/school is close to here. We're hoping to be moved by the start of September.

I'm going to register Offspring in school there right after the closing. She has her annual physical on Friday, and we will get an updated shot record then, and that's the last piece we need. I've already been in touch with the guidance counselor for her grade. One thing that surprised me was how few school supplies were required, compared with every other year she has been in school. Usually, I spend $50-$100 on all the stuff that is on the list, but this year, it was about $20, which included a couple of PE outfits. I guess this is a benefit of the high property taxes in InBetween (our new city) - the school is able to provide more of the supplies. I am sure this makes the teachers happy, since there's more consistency in what the kids had available. In MidSized City, they tried to do this by having a very explicit list with brands of everything, which could really make you crazy because, or course, the same store that sells Faber-Castell pencils doesn't sell 4-inch, rounded tip Fiskars scissors and that store doesn't sell poly pocket folders with brads in purple - one of the 5 required colors. Things are a lot better now - you can even order a lot of supplies on-line (pro-tip for those of you with children starting school for the first time: I would totally do this. Or, if the PTA offers a program where you can write one check and they buy and package all the supplies, do it. If they don't, it's a good fundraiser idea that people might actually want to buy).

I was checking the teacher websites at her new school, and apparently, none of the seventh grade math teachers teach algebra, so I think she's going to be in a class with eighth graders for that one, which should be interesting.

Let's see...need to sign up for utilities at the new place and figure out how the heck to take care of wood floors. I remember we had them as a kid, but I don't remember doing much beside sweeping them. My sister-in-law has hardwood she is very proud of, and she cleans them with dry and wet Swiffer, but that seems a little environmentally iffy to me. We don't wear shoes in the house, so I think that will help?

I'm hoping I can get a lot done for the new semester in the evenings when I am at the conference. I am too cheap to pay $11/night for Internet at the hotel, so that should help : )

This is long and rambly, so I think I'll stop.

Spanky pants

In the not a fun day at the mall category:

This weekend was tax-free in NewState. We got all of Offspring's school supplies (and some for me too...I love me some school supplies) and some clothes for both girls.

I found a pair of jeans that actually fits me and after dinner tonight went to the mall to see if I could get another pair.

They no longer fit me.

Also, I have an extremely fabulous outfit that I had made for me when we did exchange teaching in an exotic foreign land when Offpsring was 2. Really beautiful stuff.

Sadly, I had it made at the end of a summer where I had had a mild case of tummy crummies brought about by the local food that had lasted pretty much all summer, and had lost quite a bit of weight.

So I can still get that outfit on, but it shows all of me that has redeveloped in the hip area for the last 9 years. So while I was at the department store, I tried on some "shapewear" to see if I could get something that would let me wear my super outfit and be decent at my upcoming conference.

No dice.

So bummer.

Someday I will post longer

So one of the things we wanted to get done before we move and start commuting is to get our cars gone over thoroughly for any problems, since it's a lot higher stakes now.

Took Apa, our station wagon, in to the AAA garage that we like on Thursday, only to be told that it's odd problem (signals flashing on the instrument panel) was a wiring problem and it had to go to the dealer because AAA doesn't have wiring diagrams for it. Oh, and it's a pretty serious problem, so don't dilly dally.

I didn't want to stick Spouse with dealing with it while I am conferencing next week, so I drove to Capital City, where his new gig is, and we took it to a dealer down there. Problem? There was mold on the instrument panel, which was shorting things out.

A little gross, but a much cheaper repair than a new instrument cluster, so good for us.

Things are moving apace on the house, and it looks like we will close on the 15th.

I have 3 papers at this conference, so I've made the poster for that session, and have to finish making materials for the live presentations this weekend. Then maybe I can think about next semester again.

Updates

So the structural engineer found issues that could cause problems down the road, but they can be remedied, and the seller agreed to reduce the price by the amount of the remedies. So it looks like we are full speed ahead.

The second/third author issue is dragging on and stressing me out.

Spouse has orientation at his new school tomorrow and the next 4 days. I am very excited for him.

That is all.