Maybe I shouldn't have started this blog now, not with everything that's been going on.

Just got back from the student organization team-building session this evening. Am staying overnight in school considering it's easier than having to commute home and back by tomorrow morning. Besides, the Security Office might reprimand us if we keep making overnight permits if no one is going to be using them.

The team-building session was fun. Last night the students were divided into four groups and told to make a spaceship using discarded bulletin board materials. That was supposed to teach them about resourcefulness. In fact, one group used the facility's wooden podium lying on its side as part of their rocket, so they could actually "man" it.

Next they were supposed to assign crew positions, like captain, communicator, navigator and engineer (there were at least four members per group). That was supposed to teach them about effective delegation.

The last part of the evening was for them to buy accessories for their rockets. They were allotted one million dollars, and each of the seven faculty there were supposed to sell them different things.

The youngest faculty (and student scholar) was the one who sold out everything he thought up, because they all had cool sounding names: black hole bombs, fork catapults, sonic guns and ultra electro magnetic tops.

I sold supposedly practical things, like a solar dish for collecting and reflecting sunlight, an externally mounted flamethrower, paper star charts, photon tubes and torpedos, and nebula-dispersing propellers.

But the point of the exercise was that they were only supposed to get a compass, which was going to be used for leading to the planet of their mission. The compass cost $900,000; it was expensive but necessary, not like the others which were cool-sounding but irrelevant. After all, a flamethrower and a sonic gun won't work in space. So they were supposed to learn about proper allocation of resources.

This morning's activities were the obstacles where they would attempt to use all the things they bought. A "black hole" simulated the exercise of trusting their leader to walk them through a path blindfolded (actually between and beside the two swimming pools).

But I wasn't there for that part because I had to attend a seminar on Kara educational programming software in Canlubang, just a few kilometers away. It was great, visually and in presenting the concept of manipulating commands to achieve a result.

Our secretary was there, and she gave me the test paper of the student who took the removal exam yesterday. He was able to give the answers to some problems although he didn't show the solutions (meaning he found them out through trial and error). Therefore he didn't get full points for those problems.

Ultimately he didn't reach the score we agreed upon. I almost had a change of heart wanting to pass him anyway, until the secretary told me she already passed the grading sheets I gave her last Tuesday, even though the deadline is Friday.

So the student's grade stays as is, because I'd rather not go on record as requesting for a change of grade for any reason other than completion of requirements, which is now counted against the faculty.

The second part of the team-building session will have to wait to be told until next time, as well as Wednesday's department Christmas party, along with Friday's course card distribution, because this one needs to rest now.