Reprieve

The weather finally broke this week - the relief was almost tangible. But before it broke, we were the second coldest place on earth for part of Tuesday; the coldest was one of the research stations in Antarctica!

There's also a collective sigh of relief in the university as many of the major projects are being turned in, we've got only a handful of lectures left to prepare, and the seasonal gatherings/last seminars of the semester take place. I, at least, felt much happier with the way the semester was progressing this week, which I attribute to some interactions with colleagues, a marathon marking session that got a quarter of the major end of term projects out of the way, and the realization that everything except writing the final exams (and more marking) has been done for two of the four courses.

This got me thinking about the nature of academic life and wondering what it will be like to be a seasoned teacher. I know that everyone - from tenured folk down to first year adjuncts - feels a good deal of stress and anxiety during the semester that peaks mildly at the beginning of the semester, but pretty majorly in November. Such is the nature of the coursework; since you can't have students handing in assignments until later in the semester, after they've actually learned things, there's no getting around the bulge of marking that happens. And the beginning of the semester anxiety, though mild, is part of that whole 'getting to know you' phase that a particular class goes through where both the instructor and the students are figuring out how they'll work together. So some of the pattern seems inevitable.

[There are ways of lessening the end of the term marking bulge though. Presentations are often easier to mark since you mark while the student performs and then write up your comments at the end. Similarly, eliminating the ubiquitous research paper helps ease the marking load - in my poetry class, they have three poem analysis assignments scattered throughout the semester and a poet study proposal where they propose a short study of one particular poet, justifying their choice of poet by referring to his or her period/output/position etc. That's actually made it quite easy to mark for that class.]

But I wonder if I'll feel those ups and downs as intensely as the years pass. (Frankly, I kind of hope they won't be as intense, because they can be pretty exhausting.) For the first four years of teaching as a grad student, I taught writing in a fairly structured environment, so once I got past the first three semesters or so, things were just more of the same each semester after that.

Then the first two years after I left that program and taught, I was still teaching writing, just at a couple of different institutions, which meant I had some standard pieces that just needed to be adapted for different institutions or programs.

But over the last two years, I've started teaching literature as well - which I'm absolutely loving! - and in most cases, I'm developing everything during the semester from scratch. That's been pretty intensive. Rewarding. But intensive. This term in particular, I've been teaching 3 new preps, one genre course (the poetry one), a general education course (which has required me to present philosophical arguments as well as social science research in the classroom) and an upgrading course (which requires a huge breadth of material but also features some of the least prepared students). All of these have meant that I've felt a little overwhelmed more than once. That's why I wonder if I'll feel less stressed in subsequent years as I have all those experiences to draw from.

This coming term I was originally assigned just writing classes (though my favorite kind - tech writing). But now it looks like one might not run because it's underenrolled, so I was asked if I would take on a lit class. Another new one. I said yes, of course, because I'm a joiner, but also because I could see having some real fun with the class, even though I'll be pushing my boundaries yet again. Nothing's carved in stone yet, but it might happen. If so, I suppose I'm bringing some of the stress on myself, but also a challenge in developing yet more materials for presentation within the classroom.

But regardless of what happens next term, I do find myself wondering what it will be like 5, 10, 15 years from now when I've taught the Brit Lit II survey for 7, 12, 17 years. Will I be able to enjoy the facile expertise in teaching it because I've already done so so many times? Will I still feel stressed (aside from the marking bulge)? Will I get bored? What is it like to walk into a classroom knowing that you've done this successfully many, many times before? Is it reassuring? Or does it just seem repetitive?

Then again, the most important question might be: does it matter? Asking such questions presupposes that I will be teaching in that many years. Without a permanent position, it's hard to say where I'll be in x years. Maybe that's the only question I should be contemplating.