If I were a holiday decoration...

...then right now, I'd be one of those deflated snowmen that you find in the morning on your lawn.  You know, one of those fifty-dollar inflatables that fall victim to the elements overnight.

The late nights that come with the end-of-the-semester push have finally caught up to me.  Hopefully, after a few eight hour nights, I'll be back to my usual, inflated self.



What seasonal decor best describes how you feel right now (or wish you felt)?

Do faculty need more vacation time?

When you are a professor at a PUI, you are constantly giving giving giving of yourself to your students.  It's the best job in the world, but, particularly for introverts like me, by the end of the semester you can feel like you've been sucked dry.

Some of my PUI friends get five weeks off for winter break.  I know a few that barely get two weeks.

Winter break is important.  You need to rest.  Get recharged.  Brace yourself for the spring semester.



Is there such a thing as too much winter break?  ....and what is the humane lower limit for time off of school?

Academic appearances

I've been pondering my wardrobe options lately.

Does it matter what you wear in the classroom?  What about to faculty meetings?  Do people even notice?

Certainly our student take note of what we wear (I know I did when I was an undergrad).  Are jeans okay on a prof?  Does it make a difference if you are at a research institution or a PUI?  What about faculty rank?

Do appearances matter to anyone, or am I just entering into my annual I'm-going-to-overthink-everything phase?

Why it is awesome being female (at a conference)

As you all probably have guessed by now, I'm woefully behind in my blog reading.

Luckily, I did manage to catch a semi-recent post by The Prodigal Academic about why it is awesome to be a female attending male-dominated conferences.

TPA points out that there are no bathroom lines when you are one of a handful of women at a conference.  So true!  In fact, at a recent conference, another conference attendee (a rock star Big Name) was so surprised to have someone else walk into the bathroom (me), that we actually struck up a conversation....which led to talking about my research with my students.  Awesome.

The second advantage that TPA lists is that, as a minority presenter, you are more easily remembered later in the day.

The third deals with presenting while pregnant.  You can read it for yourself, since it doesn't pertain to me (whew).

The fourth is my favorite because it happens to be true AND I had never really thought about it before:

4. You are easier to find in the crowd, so it is easier to run into old friends and colleagues at coffee breaks without necessarily prearranging things.  (link)

And TPA's fifth advantage to attending a male-dominated conference?  Well, let's just say it deals with getting free stuff.


So what about it?  Are there more advantages that should be added to The Prodigal Academic's list?  Or do the wee annoyances (you know, like being asked eight times in one afternoon if you REALLY are a presenter and not a vendor representative) outweigh these benefits?

Finding friends

To be completely honest, I've been having a bit of a mid-tenure crisis this semester.  My attempts at seeking balance have crashed and burned.  I need some separation of work and life.

I know this is a common question, but my current state of affairs requires it:



How do you meet people outside of academia if church is not an option?



I know this brings me to a whole new level of pathetic, but why couldn't there be a friendmatch.com?  Or a matchmaking club for friendships?

What will we lock up next?

Today, driving around Conference City, I saw a car with a padlocked gas tank.

Wuh-what?

Is this normal?



I've considered padlocking the -80 freezer in the lab, but I've never thought to padlock my vehicle.


What needs to be padlocked the most in your life?

To Prius or Not to Prius

I'm thinking of taking the big plunge.


For the first time in eight years, I'm contemplating buying a new-to-me car.


I want a small, four-door car with good gas mileage.  I'm willing to go electric.  Or partial.  Or whatever.

I'm going to trade in my current small, four-door car with good gas mileage, and I'm willing to pay cash.  (Frugal Professor is frugal.)


Suggestions?

Are men more germy than women?

Perhaps I'm biased*, but I think that men are worse germ spreaders than women.  

Discuss.

*Because N.A. gets me sick ALL.  THE.  TIME.

Why do students do THAT?

I do not understand why my students insist on calculating what minimum grade they need on the final to get X grade in my class.

Is this really motivating?

Does it actually help to know you need a 106% to get a C in the class?  If you only need an 86% to get an A, will you only study an 86% worth?  If you know there is no chance to pass/get an A/whatever, are you still going to be motivated to study?


Why do students do that?

Is there a dress code for undergrads?

I am taking my undergraduate researchers to the Very Big Conference this spring.  And boy, are they excited.

One of them is so excited that she is asking her parents for "conference clothes" for Christmas.


When she told me this, my first thought was aw, aren't my undergrads great?

As I smiled at my undergrad, another question wiggled its way to the front of my brain:  crap!  What am I going to tell her to buy?

Obviously, I'm not going to recommend that she buy a skirt.  But should she wear a suit at the conference? Or just some business casual wear?

Is the dress code different for male undergrads?


Clearly conference dress varies wildly among faculty.  Some follow a business casual code, while others are more the jeans and polo type.


So what about undergrads?  Do you care what your undergrads wear to conferences?  What do you think of undergrads who show up in a suit?  Does the dress of students at all reflect upon their faculty member?

Cushy conference accommodations?

I'm on my way back home after a week-long conference.  Although I didn't travel with students on this conference, I typically do.

When I was an undergrad, we crammed into hotel rooms.  Four or five of us to a room.  Always shared beds.  Even as a grad student, if other female students from LargeU were attending, we shacked up together.  Often beds were shared.

One of my colleagues feels that undergrads shouldn't share beds.  But only two students to a room?  That's just not practical in most cases.

What hotel arrangements do you make for your research students?  

Friday fill in the blanks: that's pretty dumb

The dumbest thing I saw this week was ______________ .





The dumbest thing I saw this week was monogrammed cars.  WTF.  Back to a (semi)regularly scheduled blogging schedule after this conference is over.

Should professors get mental health training?

As a professor, every day you experience a TMI moment.  Or four.  Students tell us things they haven't yet told their friends or parents.

Like it or not, you're going to be the recipient of a lot more information and emotion than you probably want.  Some situations don't require much of a response.  For example, when students inform me that they have a bladder infection, I really don't need to add much to the conversation.

But what about if a student confides that she is pregnant?  Or getting an abortion?  Or has been assaulted?

What do you do if a student loses a parent?  If a student has a manic episode in lab?  If a student has a psychotic break in your classroom?  If a student is suicidal?

What if a student comes to class belligerently drunk?  Or is disruptive to other students in class?  Or is verbally abusive towards you during a lecture?

I've experienced the majority of these in my relatively short teaching career.  While you can't prepare for every possible teaching or student scenario, a certain amount of preparation and anticipation can go a long way.  Training in proper ways to deal with these situations can go a long way.  Just knowing what office or department to call helps, too.

I've had a lot of training in crisis management.  I have participated in numerous training sessions on how to handle some of the situations I've mentioned above.  At my current institution, very little training if offered on how to deal with problem or troubled students.

I'm wondering if this is true across the board.  Have you received training in how to deal with students who approach you will some of the above issues?  Or do you think profs don't deal with these issues?  Or that we have to?

Drinking with students?

In grad school, it was a given that profs and students drank together.  After all, no one can work that many hours for that little glory without a serious cocktail habit.  (or maybe that was just me?)

If you teach at a PUI, the majority of your students are under 21.  I certainly wouldn't go grab a beer after classes with any of them.  THAT is frowned upon here.



But what about at conferences?  Drinking is an integral part of research conferences.  (or maybe that is just me?)

If an undergrad is 21, would you invite them out with a group of colleagues for drinks?  What about former group members from grad school?

Friday fill in the blanks: we're at midterms!

Back at the start of the semester, I never thought I ______________________.

Back at the start of the semester, I never thought I would be this far behind!  Yikes!

(I'm so far behind, I'm doing a Friday post on Saturday!

Friday fill in the blanks: compared to last year...

The students this year are ______________ compared to last year's.

I actually don't even know where to begin!

Friday fill in the blanks: high point of the week

The highlight of my week was _____________.

(The highlight of my week was 7 pm this evening, when it ended.)

Is my course prep normal?

When I started teaching, it took me four to six hours to prep a brand new lecture. Intro or not. No one told me if this was reasonable, but then again, I certainly didn't ask. I was exceptionally embarrassed by the sheer amount of time I spent before each 60 minute lecture.

I've since taught my intro class several times, but I still spend between 60-90 minutes on prep. Mostly I have ppt slides already prepared from previous years, but I still work out example problems for board work. I also usually need to make minor changes to slides for various reasons (new idea, new problems book, etc.) My upper level classes typically take three to five hours to prep. Still. Good grief.

My last post was a poll that inquired about your lecture prep time. Many of you clarified in the comments section about the different time requirements of different types of class preparations. Thank goodness for the clarifications, especially since my sweet CPP declared that the "poll makes no sense." (Love ya, CPPy! Is baseball season over yet?)

Many of you, I'm sure are faster at class prep. (I'm looking at you, GMP and Dr. Pion! And thanks for your enlightening posts!)

I want to work with JaneB! Care to join me, Namnezia and pika? JaneB wrote,

"My department has a workload model. It assumes 6 hours of prep time per new classroom hour and 2 hours per old (i.e. repeated) classroom hour, which is a general average across the whole (highly interdisciplinary) department."

That's pretty darn close to my current course prep times. Maybe I should think about relocating?

Question for you: how much do you prep?

Research with students

As many of you know, I am at a primarily undergraduate institution. I do all of my research with undergraduates.

While I have always assumed that the last statement goes without saying, I've recently learned that some of my peers do their research WITHOUT students.

Is this okay? Is it field dependent?

I always thought that it went without saying that the PI should, no matter what the classification of the school (or discipline, for that matter), do research with her students. Heck, even as a grad student I worked with undergrads.

So please tell me: is it okay or absurd to do research without students?