Well, yesterday I hit what I hope will be the nadir of the semester. I went to my first-year (FY) writing class, and only eight out of 18 people had shown up with drafts of their third papers - this despite the fact that they get tons o' points for bringing drafts and doing peer editing with each other. It was just really depressing. For one thing, I wasn't sure if it was me, and for another, if they don't do the work in the class there's a very strong likelihood they won't pass; their final portfolio counts for 70% of their grade, so if they did absolutely nothing and turned in an A-quality portfolio (highly unlikely if they did nothing), they'd still only get a low C.

So I was thinking that half the class was just not going to pass. And I was wondering what that would mean for me; at the beginning-of-semester orientation, the administration really stressed retention rates and pass rates. What if I can't meet the expectations?

And the flip side is, you can't get blood from a turnip. (I do seem to have quite a few turnips . . . ) Although I knew these students would be "underprepared," as we say, I was underprepared for exactly what that would mean. For instance, one thing I've noticed is that when something gets hard, they get easily frustrated and tend to shut down. So what to do? Do I try to structure things so they never reach that frustration point, or try to help them through it? (I had one student the other day who just got petulant in the library when it took her 25 minutes to find sources in the online databases . . . okay, so it took a long time, but why petulance??) I don't yet know how to handle this. Reflecting their feelings back to them seems to help some . . .

Anyhow, last night I had nightmares. I dreamed I was teaching in high school (sorry, Cheryl! Just that I think I'd be temperamentally unsuited . . . ), which is a nightmare for me because I never wanted to be in the situation of teaching people who were trapped in the classroom involuntarily. (But then again, at least in high school you wouldn't have had the cream skimmed off the top - people are often at community colleges because they have few options, intellectually speaking.)

I woke up feeling very depressed. I noted that the job of the guy who got my old job at Pharmacy has been advertised, and I thought about applying . . . but ultimately decided that I need to keep my Eyes on the Prize: no going anywhere until I've had My Summer!!! And, too, I reminded myself that I promised myself I'd remember that it's just a job. I'm past the point where I think I'm going to save the world, or even have a vocation in that way.

Then I pissed and moaned because I got to campus too late to get decent, close, free parking . . . It seemed cosmically unjust that I would feel so abused, and then have to pay to park besides.

So when I got to my office I talked to Dan, my colleague across the hall, who's the team lead for writing. I told him about the dismal number of drafts, and he replied, "Yeah, that happens a lot." I know he has very draconian policies about drafts (if they come in late he won't comment on them); I told him I'd considered doing that, but I didn't think I could enforce them because [a] I'm a softie and [b] I was afraid to forego the learning opportunity - which made me sound principled to myself . . . And as we talked further, I began to see that the issues I'm facing are not the result of me, personally, but the result of these students being who they are, and I'm certainly not alone.

I ended up feeling a lot better, a lot less responsible. Once that happened, I was able to relax . . . I had a lot of fun with my Business Writing class, and even had some one-on-one interactions where I felt I was actually teaching people things . . . I then went to the offending fy writing class in a cheerful mood. I calmly told them they were putting themselves at risk for failure, and then we moved on . . . I ended up the day feeling quite happy, actually. It's very nice to have recovered some perspective, to have had some positive teaching moments, and to feel like maybe there's more to look forward to than the arrival of summer . . .

So I only have one class tomorrow, and then it's the weekend again. I'm going to see another University Musical Society performance with my friend Cynthia. This one's called "Forbidden Christmas," and it stars Mikhail Baryshnikov (although it's not a dance). Stay tuned for a review . . .