'Cause I got no class! (pausing while the laughter dies down)
But seriously, summer is a slow time in the library. During the school year I am always running around-- teaching a class, planning a program, answering questions, coming up with projects, implementing surveys and just generally doing stuff. But in the summer there are no classes to teach, nobody to come to programs and very few students around that need help with assignments. So I spend my summers planning for the upcoming school year, generating ideas and doing professional development activities. And I use up my generous allotment of vacation time to go visit family and have three day weekends pretty much all summer. I love my job.
This summer the whole planning bit is taking up quite a bit of my time because I am planning to teach a new, semester-long course in the Fall. I am so excited for the opportunity, but I also know that no matter how much I plan it's inevitable that there be surprises and challenges. This blog is both to document my successes (and occasional failures) in teaching this course as well as a gesture of solidarity with my students, who will also be keeping blogs over the course of our semester together.
Later, after the course is over I hope to continue writing to document my professional and personal development. But let's not get ahead of ourselves, first I need to finish writing my syllabus...
