kitchen table math, the sequel: to do

Monday, February 20, 2012

to do

So I was thinking of actually writing a post, or possibly reading a post (I'm behind)...when I decided I would check my course enrollment first, to see whether the two absent students are absent or no longer enrolled. The other students were bugging me about it on Wednesday, so I figured I'd get that taken care of.

But no. Turns out I can't check class enrollment because my user name and password no longer match. I don't know why.

I was semi-taking that news in stride (I say "semi" because last semester's brush with IT took two days to resolve) when I opened up my scanned copy of the sheaf of papers that came with my contract and discovered that - lo! - I have to re-take my college's online Sexual Harassment Training Unit and send a paper copy of the training certificate to Human Resources. Which I can't very well do if I can't log on, now, can I?

Moving right along....I see my college has undergone significant planning for responses to potential health or other emergencies to guarantee continuity of instruction, resulting in adoption of a new 16- or 17-step process for temporarily suspending a scheduled in-class meeting. Well, OK, the instructions don't actually say 16 or 17 steps; the instructions say 2 steps. We have a new 2-step process. But the 2 steps come with a whole lot of sub-steps, bullet points (2 kinds of bullet points: solid and hollow), add-ons, and admonitions, and the time it's going to take me to talk to the IT person, fail to fix my user name and password, talk to the IT person's supervisor plus take the Sexual Harassment Training Unit (at least an hour last year, as I recall), and master the intricacies of canceling class should the need arise is starting to make me feel a tad...pressed.

Back soon!

6 comments:

Catherine Johnson said...

Also in the section on class cancellation, the college advises me that copies of irreplaceable files and documents should be kept in a safe location or backed up and further instructs me to Maintain a list of important emergency contact phone numbers handy, in your office and at home. 

And people complain about Dodd Frank.

Catherine Johnson said...

One of my students, a couple of weeks ago, made me promise to text everyone if for some reason I can't make it to class.

I find that my students don't use email and are hard to reach by phone.

Good thing I got an iPhone for Christmas.

Glen said...

Does sexual harassment training require you to accost strangers or just your fellow classmates? Either way, I admire your nerve. I'd be so embarrassed. What about shy people? It'd be worse than public speaking. Are there, like, levels? White belt, yellow belt, black belt? Is it a national certification?

Jen said...

Imagine the lucky people for whom sexual harassment comes naturally.



I'm trying to remember, but it seems like there's a way to email a text...my college age son reminded me about it.

It's true that they really don't like email, but I think the recommendation that it be checked once a day is usually followed by college students -- and should be!

Anonymous said...

I'm seriously thinking about leaving my job at the end of the year in large part because of the time commitment to do things that aren't teaching.

Anonymous said...

One of my professors created a Twitter account for the very reason of notifying students of class cancellations.

Of course that means your students have to create Twitter accounts to follow you.

Then they need to 'follow' you and to choose to get text notifications of your tweets.

Mostly easy peasy.