Adjunct Faculty
I was reading this article in the Washington Post about the life of adjunct faculty. Adjunct faculty are part-time teachers at the collegiate level and it’s a real shame the lives some of them lead. These are dedicated ambitious people and many of them are seeking full-time tenure-track jobs but apparently there was a huge phD boom in the 90s that left academia with a surplus of qualified potential professors to lead the nomadic and financially unrewarding life of an adjunct.
It Should Be Easier!
Why is it so difficult to get registered for more than 19.5 credits? If you go through the process a few times, you start to wonder why the powers that be haven’t come up with an easier way to handle this “unique” situation. First you fill out a form listing all of the classes for which you’re currently registered and the classes you have yet to register with all that great information like your name and such. You then take it to the advisor for your department who signs off and tells you to take it to academic services for them to review. Now here’s the thing that gets me: after all that running around with a piece of paper, Academic Services puts an ELECTRONIC authorization through for you to register for excess credits. Isn’t that a little weird?
It’s actually easier to register for a class after the add date than it is to do so before that deadline. I needed to register for two additional two credit classes but unfortunately myUMBC was acting kind of funky Friday afternoon (probably with all the other people logged on trying to add classes) and I wasn’t able to do so. With two short emails and a couple hours to let things settle, the issue was resolved as opposed to the three days of running around to get the original excess credits situation sorted out. That’s completely backwards, right?
I’m not digging it…
Lecture classes CAN be Interesting!
As a performer and director, I’m an artist. I practice theories and techniques that are already in place and throw in a few of my own on stage and at the podium but as an artist it’s not often that I’m challenged to theorize. As a result, lecture and sit-at-a-desk classes are really really boring for me because it’s just not my thing but today I think I found a new appreciation for courses like that and people who process that way.
I’m taking this sociology class (Sociology 101 to be exact) that has the potential to be excruciatingly boring or ridiculously exciting. Today was one of those ridiculously exciting days because we did what the professor asks us to do all the time: voice your thoughts/opinions. It started out pretty dry, but everyone was really interested in the topic of discussion (equality in society) so we all–this 70 person lecture course–talked and voiced our opinions and it was great!
It makes me wonder if every class could be that interesting and if you could learn that much by simply just letting go of your inhibitions, raising your hand, and saying what you think. Even in a course that requires some technical know how and you really don’t “know how” it’s amazing how making one comment, posing one question, offering a single suggestion, or presenting a thought can motivate others to participate and change the entire climate of a course that is generally perceived as boring and useless.
Community College versus University
So I’ve been thinking lately about teaching college. University jobs in music seem so difficult to maintain as a vocalist. Everything at the university level is about research and doing research as a singer means nothing other than singing, right? The problem is that doing legit singing–”research” caliber performances–means doing 6-week runs at opera houses and such. How are you supposed to teach if you’re gone or 6 weeks at a time?
I looked at the other end of it: teaching at a 2-year college. Apparently at community colleges, it’s all about your teaching and not so much about your research. It’s still important but not nearly as important as it is at a 4-year institution, but you sacrifice some of that perceived professorial prestige and of course take a little pay cut by not teaching at university.
What to do? What to do? What to do?
Lorem Ipsum
I do some web development work to pad my pockets a little bit and one of the things I always run into when putting websites together is not having the actual content from the customer. As a result, I use the Lorem Ipsum text which is conveniently available at www.lipsum.com. The only problem is when I ask someone to look over a site in development and let me know if they see anything that looks strange or should be fixed, the first comment is always about the Latin text.
I remember seeing the Lorem Ipsum text back in elementary school. I don’t know why I saw, but I know that’s where I first saw it so I’m assuming other people my age saw it early in life too. That doesn’t seem to be the case though. Every friend I’ve asked to look over a website for me has said, “you should really make sure the website’s in English.”
So for future reference, if you ever see “Lorem Ipsum…” it is standard dummy text used in the print and web industry to fill in for actual content that has not yet been written.
Black Friday
Alright now I’m not a shopper at all. I can’t afford to be. The last time I went to a mall, it cost me three hundred dollars but this Black Friday business is really appealing. I was just on the Target.com site and they’re having some INSANE deals starting at 6AM! I saw a portable GPS unit for $137 and a 22″ flat panel monitor for $120 bucks! I paid $250 for my 15″ flat panel three years ago to give you an idea of the size of that price difference. Good stuff, eh?
I never really knew or understood what all the hoopla about this day was, but everyone I talked to in school this past week has been talking about getting up at some obscene hour of the morning to go shopping and now my family’s including me, so I figure it’s time to give it a go.
Kids…Wow!
My sister’s in town for the next couple of weeks with my four year old nephew and four month old niece. Now, my parents and I lead pretty standard and boring adult lives so when we’re home it’s always quiet and neat. At the end of the week, we have a bunch of spoons and coffee cups in the sink to give you an idea of how we live (on the go). Needless to say, this isn’t a kid-friendly house.
I haven’t seen my sister and the kids in a couple of years, so the last time they were here it was just my nephew who was about two. Let me just tell you, four year old boys are violent. I’ve never seen so many broken toys in my life! In the three days they’ve been here he’s:
-broken the kitchen Venitian blinds
-poked holes in my leather piano bench
-made an enemy out of our little Lhasa Apso
-accidentally smacked the baby in the face while sleeping
-tried to remove my right arm during a play fight
All of this is only after about three days! I’m starting to get used to the lifestyle now, but having him here makes me feel really old. Isn’t it amazing how in a matter of ten or fifteen years a person goes from playing with blocks, terrorizing small pets and destroying model cars to paying bills, drinking coffee and enjoying Seinfeld? Mmmmm Seinfeld.
Funeral
Today was my uncle’s funeral. It was a very said occasion, but it was wonderful seeing how many people came to pay their respects to him. There were hundreds of people and some really great things were said. The remarks that were made put tears in everyones eyes because even though we all knew he touched a lot of lives, we had no idea how profoundly he changed people.
It was a sad day, but there’s always a silver lining.
Changes
I got a call from my Mom at the end of my conducting class tonight telling me my uncle had passed away. He was diagnosed with stage four cancer in August and now he’s gone.
I went to visit him last night, but no one answered the door at the house and I was going to leave but something told me I needed to go see him, so I made a few phone calls and I was finally able to get in to see him. It certainly wasn’t the powerful person I remembered.
It’s amazing how quickly things change. I’m going to miss him.
Bizarre Weather
I can’t believe we’re more than half way through the semester, and I think it’s because of the weather. One of my professors pointed out that we only have about a month before our concert performances start! One day it’s hot and humid, and the next it’s like 55 degrees.
Anybody else thrown off by this crazy weather?
