Jobs for people with short employment attention spans
Week 4 of the semester, and I've decided that academia/education is the place for me. I really, really like the whole "new semester, clean slate" thing. I can't overstate this. The honeymoon feeling of the first day of classes has persisted all month, even as I took my show on the road and did a whopping 9 "what the library can do for you" class visit presentations (plus two very intimate library orientation sessions--despite their being mandatory for this semester's 13 new students, only one person showed up for each one). Tomorrow I'm taking the freshman comp students on a field trip to the real library. Wednesday is the book discussion group. Thursday I'm doing a "meet the new databases" workshop for the faculty. And I'm enjoying the hell out of it all.
I remember saying this in September or October, too. Then came midterm and the slow slide into bitterness. But I'm relieved to find out that it's a temporary condition that can be remedied with a new academic term, rather than that familiar "oh, God, what have I done" feeling that I seem to get after a certain period at a new job. Maybe this is like having a new job every four months--which is perfect for my attention span.
Of course, next week the higher education accreditation team is coming in, so I may be singing a very different tune after I have to be grilled on all things library. The official word from the administration is "don't lie." But I have a special meeting with my boss and the accreditation consultant (who knew there were such things?) tomorrow where we practice my responses, so I have a feeling I'm going to be walking a very fine line when it comes to the truth, especially for questions like "What is the library's budget?"
But then I'm doing a database workshop for the freshmen comp students. And one for the student body at large (we'll see if I get anyone to show up). And a session on finding images online and in our cool new art history database.
Hopefully my enthusiasm will keep me going until midterm, or even longer.
I remember saying this in September or October, too. Then came midterm and the slow slide into bitterness. But I'm relieved to find out that it's a temporary condition that can be remedied with a new academic term, rather than that familiar "oh, God, what have I done" feeling that I seem to get after a certain period at a new job. Maybe this is like having a new job every four months--which is perfect for my attention span.
Of course, next week the higher education accreditation team is coming in, so I may be singing a very different tune after I have to be grilled on all things library. The official word from the administration is "don't lie." But I have a special meeting with my boss and the accreditation consultant (who knew there were such things?) tomorrow where we practice my responses, so I have a feeling I'm going to be walking a very fine line when it comes to the truth, especially for questions like "What is the library's budget?"
But then I'm doing a database workshop for the freshmen comp students. And one for the student body at large (we'll see if I get anyone to show up). And a session on finding images online and in our cool new art history database.
Hopefully my enthusiasm will keep me going until midterm, or even longer.
posted by Madame Defarge at 4:44 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home