Darned ABC radio...

For the last two years I've been listening to our local "chick-talk" radio. For those of you who are local to BNCC... 107.1 FM.... (it is best during the week, on the weekends they do re-runs and other stuff I don't like and I listen to NPR...).

The station itself seems to be doing really well. They have lots of local sponsors and increasing ratings overall. Their target demographic seems to be women of "mom" age... adult women who are interested in local and national public issues, but don't like the confrontational nature of other talk-radio formats.

Our local station uses 3 nationally syndicated shows to complete their line-up. One of those shows is the "Satellite Sisters".... and ABC isn't renewing their distribution contract. The show is really good -- the idea is that these five interesting sisters get together on the radio from different cities to do the show -- thus the 'satellite' part. Like any group of 5 sisters, they have very distinct personalities, inside jokes and all the other fun things about 5 people who know one another well. And ABC doesn't get them. Next Friday is their last show ---

The good news is that the Satellite Sisters will continue to do podcasts, so I can catch up with them when I drive....

Sleepy day...

The only productive thing I did today was to clean the kitchen. Otherwise, I napped, read blogs and watched stuff on TIVO.

I know I needed this day off, and the fact that I'm sleepy now tells me that I'm probably sleep deprived.

Tomorrow has to be a different day -- maybe tonight I'll clean the office so it is a good work space for me tomorrow.

or, maybe I won't.

Martian Child

On impulse, I went to see Martian Child.

We live very close to a huge movie theater, so sometimes when I want to procrastinate, I go to a movie. I don't see movies often (I have other ways in which to procrastinate), so I just find a movie that looks non-obnoxious and is starting in the next 10 minutes... It is kind of a random movie selector...

Today it was Martian Child... and it is good.

If you are a parent, you'll love this movie.

The general premise is John Cusak (or, however you spell it) as a widower who decides to adopt a child, because he and his wife intended to but never actually did it... He's a science-fiction writer whose work is about Mars. The child he meets and decides to adopt thinks He's from Mars.

There is no doubt the kid is kind of weird, but he's intelligent and generally healthy -- even though he spends the beginning of the movie in a box.... by choice. The story is about their developing relationship... and the challenges both of them face.

Go ahead and see it -- it is nice, sweet and compelling.

Lessons learned.... about faculty and how they are like students...

So, I'm division chair this semester. Since Wise Woman is on sabbatical this semester, I'm also the "senior" philosophy person, i.e. the person on whom all the administrivia is dumped without any release time or other compensation.

My major projects this semester have involved dealing with BICC and coordinating schedules for the division, including assigning rooms. I also sit on two committees....These observations are generalized from both of these projects... and all of them, even the contradictory ones, can easily apply to the same person.

My experience so far this semester is akin to the experience writing students have in peer review exercises... I'd never guess that people would be like that!

My general conclusion is that faculty members and students aren't all that different....

• Just like our students, faculty members can be sweet and wonderful. They can be creative and kind to one another.
• Just like our students, faculty members have complicated lives that get in the way of fulfilling their obligations.
• Just like our students, faculty members can be terrible about following directions --- even the easiest directions.
• Just like our students, faculty members can both ignore deadlines placed on them and expect others to meet the deadlines they construct.
• Just like our students, faculty members sometimes make-up rules that help them and then assert that they ARE rules.
• Just like our students, faculty members often fail to proofread. This can take one of two forms, either they write poorly or they fail to notice discrepancies on dates or other factual-type data in their written communication.
• Just like our students, faculty members procrastinate.
• Just like our students, faculty members have important insights, passions and points of view.
• Just like our students, faculty members have a hard time admitting they make mistakes.
• Just like our students, faculty members often fail to communicate. Oddly enough, this seems to a problem even in disciplines that are supposed to teach "communication".
  

Really, just like our students, faculty members are people...

who would have known....

Light bulb Moments...

My logic class took their first hard quiz yesterday.

I was nervous, especially for my morning class, as they have been pretty non-responsive as we worked problems in class. They've also been late and generally unprepared for class.

As of Tuesday, many said "I don't get it" -- about the general idea of completing a logical proof. Many more said "I understand what you do on the board, but I can't do it myself"....

My later class was a bit better, but there were still many students who didn't get it.

I could tell something was up when they turned in their quizzes...

everyone was smiling at me, and happy. The last student in my afternoon class wanted me to look at her quiz right away... she was nervous because she thought it was going to be harder. This is the last class she has to do to graduate. She'd already tried logic once, but withdrew because she was failing. She's getting incredible pressure from her mother -- she also has a good incentive. If she gets a B in logic, her mom will take her to Italy for a graduation present.

I figured they were either delirious, deceiving themselves, or they actually got it.

After grading the quizzes, I can conclude that they got it.

Almost all of them got As -- nobody failed.

We did have a few Ds, but they were really 65-69% D's...

Setting aside the uber-class I taught at the Air Force base in Red state -- I've never given a quiz that nobody has failed.

I don't think this is because I'm some kind of uber-teacher or anything. For one thing, the several students who were likely to fail the quiz didn't come to take it -- perhaps because I gave it the day after Halloween??

I do think it is because of the syllabus structure, which lets them figure out how to be logic students before they have to start learning to do proofs. It also lets them figure out that I'm not kidding when I say they have to do the homework at some point...(many of them do it after class discussion... which is ok with me, I suppose).

I also think that our embedded tutor program is working. Having the tutor come to class and the two of us being proactive about identifying students who are likely to have problems early, and getting them help early has helped. Add to that the fact that my tutors are awesome -- and I may have a situation in which my students actually learn...

Work Weekend....

Hubby and I are having what we call "work weekend".

Thus, he's in Red State and I'm here.

The nice thing is that I have most of my major projects at school in a place where I don't have to do anything about them immediately.

As for grading, I did the logic quizzes yesterday. I do have a stack of movie question responses to grade, but that is pretty much a job for my new stamps :).

I do have a meeting today, but it isn't a meeting for which I need to do a lot of preparation, and it will get me out of the house -- and thus to the gym afterward.

So -- for the most part, it is my work. You know -- that dissertation thing, that book-like thing I'm working on so I can stop going to school.

So, for the weekend is me and Supreme Emergencies.... YEA!

Is it unreasonable...

In my life as debate coach, I got pretty good at asking for money. I didn't always get it, but I was always good at asking. For me, part of being good at asking is breaking down a budget to the level of student experience.

So, I could tell an administrator that X amount of money would bring y number of students to z number of local tournaments etc... These are fairly complex calculations and generally they were based on assumptions of costs etc -- but, the assumptions were usually pretty good because I did my homework. I did this homework before EVERY time I asked for money, and I made additional handouts for the people who would be making the decisions.

• Is it unreasonable to expect an answer to "how many hours will you be open?" in response to a large request for money? Student funds are being used to support part of the infrastructure, thus the question was something like, 'how many hours will students not in your department's classes have access to this stuff?'.

• Is it unreasonable to expect someone asking for money for any reason to be able to articulate why they need it and how it will be spent?

• Is it unreasonable of me to worry about how we are educating students at BNCC if they can't answer these questions? How about if faculty and staff can't answer them?

• Is it unreasonable of me to be concerned that the students and faculty members in question hadn't anticipated the basic questions that might be asked concerning their requests for money? Isn't that part of preparing for the meeting?

• Is it unreasonable of me to ASK the questions?

• Is it unreasonable of me not to accept the "is / ought" philosophy on distribution of funds?

It may be the case that my time on this committee is limited by my own desire for sanity..... is it unreasonable of me to quit?