Nerd Confession: I Graded All Day Yesterday and Loved It! Finally Found Time For My Students

This was me, yesterday. I tried to pep up my running look, otherwise I spent my entire day on a laptop. Once upon a time I used to plow through over a 100 student portfolios a year, averaging 30 pages a piece. Now, I have trouble finding time to read 18 essays a semester. What is up with that?

Truth be told, teaching is at the heart of what I love doing. There's nothing more important to me that helping a student to compose something that matters to them and that helps them to showcase growth as a writer.

Yet, with academia, teaching is not necessarily at the core of the work I do. I still feel that the best work is in the classroom, but the demands of what I do have me out in the field, attending meetings, organizing events, and supervising possibilities. When I can actually find a few seconds to read what my students are writing, I am stoked. And reading student work over the last 48 hours has been a blessing. By noon, today, I should have the latest batch read and with feedback.

I also think I enjoy these days because I don't shower. Chitunga, a young man I mentor and advise, said to me, "Yeah, that's a male thing." He said this to me yesterday when I also looked like crap.

But I peacock'd it out when I ran yesterday (and even found time to take a walk). I should also point out that I cooked, as well - even cleaned some in between offering comments to students. Did I physically see anyone? Not really. I talked to my mom and that sort of counts. A few text messages were also sent.

So, I'm accomplished. Nope. No eggs. Nope. Not Easter dinner as I did it in Syracuse. Just a fantastic three days off to actually do the job I'm paid to do. It feels so good to catch up.

Happy Rabbits Day!