Attempts at Organization

Today I attempted to organize S302 a little better, unfortunately I still don't have permission to move around too many of the larger items in there. I had hoped to get to assemble the lap-table today too, but there is some question of whether or not I should be doing that or standing by for any SEM issues. Clarification is pending.

Spoke with Prof. Ericco a bit today, seems like he has pretty much got things handled in terms of his EPS38 lab and Astronomy lab. I mentioned the Enrichment Cluster Astronomy course, he seemed bemused by the idea of inductive learning.

I was able to sort through the five overhead projectors that we have in the prep room, and pick out one new-ish and functioning one to set aside for our section. I don't think that anyone actually uses overheads in the department anyway, no one that I've talked to does. I'm just waiting now on confirmation that I can get rid of the remaining four. There's a lot of wasted space in the prep room, it could become pretty functional with some effort. Apparently the person here before me went through a real herculean effort to get it to this level, so I can be thankful for that.

SEM 'school' has become a priority, so I will definitely be going to that. Should be interesting. I think that starting next week, since there's a long break in classes this week, I will be logging in a lot of co-pilot time at the SEM.

I didn't get in touch with the people organizing the CollegeNow Oceanography program, left a message at their number though. I will have to just bring in the syllabus tomorrow and see what happens.

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Feast

The wife and I went to a feast this evening with Gigi in Port Washington. It was a bigger feast than I'd've expected. Casino tents, long rows of food tables with meatballs, sausage and peppers, fried calimari, zeppollis, corndogs, etc. The old gravitron was there. I wonder if there's just one of them owned by one carnival company, or a whole bunch? I suspect that perhaps its just one or two, that most of these carnival rides are just built for specific use during a short period of time, and that new designs come out after a season or two.

We decided to book a trip to Disney next week. Gigi's brother works there, and can get us free tickets to all the parks. Her grandmother also has a little house near it that we can stay at, so we'll just have to cover airline tickets and food and the like.

SEM School and conferences

Profs. Goodrich, Connolly, and Weisberg are hoping that I can attend an SEM 'school' session, from the 13th to the 17th of November. I can almost certainly find people to cover any setup that I can't prep in advance for the regular courses, but I am not too sure about what to do about the CollegeNow and Enrichment Cluster courses. Hopefully someone can be setup to cover them. We'll have to check in with the Department Chairman.

I got a call from one of the people involved with the CollegeNow program, and they're going to want a syllabus Monday, so I will have to work that out this weekend.

Start of Classes at KCC

Today was the start of classes at Kingsborough. I had come in on Tuesday to meet with Dr. Goodrich to set up for today's labs. It was a straighforward setup, the students would just be doing some exercises to either introduce or re-introduce them to the metric system. When they actually showed up to do it today, it was interesting because almost everyone had trouble with it. In the first lab session, only one student finished, but they made some odd mistakes on the units in their calculations. Whats interesting though is that the Middle School kids from the summer program seemed about as familiar with the metric system as these college students, if not, perhaps a little more familiar with it. Both the Middle Schoolers and college students had about as much trouble with the problems as one another though. In one session, a couple of students seemed extremely dismayed by the lab, and were concerned that the rest of the year was going to be as difficult. In truth, it will almost certainly get more difficult, or at least much more involved. They seemed concerned about having to do 'formulas and stuff'. I tried telling them that any science course is going to involve at least this level of difficulty, so if they're taking the course to fulfill a science requirement, then it might not make sense to switch out. They thought that the rest of the class would involve looking at 'rocks and stuff like that', which might've lead them to think the course would be 'easy'. I told them that it'll be up to them if they want to stay in the course.

I recall the first day of classes being hectic as a student, and it appears to be just as hectic for the profressors. I think that the schedule for the day had only been finalized the night before, if not this morning. One class, an Oceanography class, was supposed to be instructed by one professor, but, as it turned out, they had to teach a course at a different college at the same time, and couldn't do the oceanography course. When I walked in this morning, I was told this, and I think it had just been revealed to anyone this morning anyway. They asked me to be ready to go over to the class so that there'd at least be someone there for the first day. Turned out to not be necessary though, as another professor was willing to take the course over.

I'll also be instructing an Oceanography course through the "CollegeNow" program, where high school students take a college level course. The professor that is teaching the regular Oceanography course doesn't have much of an oceanography background, so we are going to be collaborating on creating a syllabus. The CollegeNow students would be doing the same stuff that the college students are doing. I'll also be instructing in an Astronomy course at the highschool on campus, as part of an "Enrichment Cluster". The students will have to create a set of presentations for an assembly at the end of the semester. Neither of those will start this week however.

An interesting first day. I can't tell exactly how much the rest of the year will be like this. I sat in on the lab classes and helped out, only having to leave for a while to meet with people connected to the Astronomy and CollegeNow programs. But for the most part I'll just be setting up lab course materials. The other classes that I am responsible for, the professors don't have any lab materials yet that need to be set up, that will come in for later labs.