Mary C. Henry

It’s mid-August which means that classes start pretty soon- two weeks from Monday in this case- so it’s time to reflect on the summer and think about the year ahead. I took last week off from working at all- not that I’ve had an especially busy summer- but I have had various things going on up until August 2nd and didn’t get to go on any trips so figured a no-work-week was in order before I have to get ready for classes. When my daughter was younger we always made a point to go on a trip in the summer- to see family, visit national parks, etc. But recently my husband has been doing long trips home to help his mom and our daughter is 19 now (one year of college done!) so it hasn’t been a focus for us. My daughter went to California with a college friend to visit my mom for a week in June, so that was nice for them. I didn’t want to intrude on their friend trip so stayed home. It’s too expensive for us all to go to Kenya every year, so I skipped that trip that my husband took, too. I...

As I've written on here before , I've always struggled with making the most of these wide open weeks in the summer and rarely feel that I've accomplished much by the time August rolls around and I have to get ready for Fall teaching. I guess I'm somewhat comforted knowing that I'm not alone in this , but I still don't know how to solve the problem for myself. There's so little time for research during the semester with my teaching and service obligations. For the last three years my family obligations have also required a huge and inflexible time commitment*, but I can't blame my lack of productivity on that and I really want to focus on summer for this post, anyway. As this article in The Chronicle explains , most faculty have unstructured summers without set schedules. Some people are off doing fieldwork or have the discipline to write on some kind of schedule. Some people continue coming into campus regularly over the summer to maintain a work sched...

Commencement was 56 days ago and Fall classes start in 51 days, so we're definitely in the middle of summer now. I was happy to realize that we're still only halfway through since I'm enjoying having a break from teaching after literally no break at all since January 2nd*. I taught j-term online (totally voluntary and for extra pay), then my usual load in spring, then I also taught the first summer session online (also voluntary and for extra pay). With our current calendar there is no break between j-term and spring or between spring and first summer session. I volunteered for both since I can always use the money (my daughter has one more year before starting college!) Having no breaks between sessions mean that grades for one term are not even due when the next one starts(!) So it's a lot and I'm thankful for the break. But, what about the students? I'm sure we have a lot of students who took courses during all three of those sessions, too. And many take mo...

Haven't blogged here in quite a while! I haven't been blogging anywhere, but I do have a tumblr for Geography things and spend a lot of time on Twitter . Maybe I'll get something up here in the near future. Otherwise catch me on the platforms above.

I was scheduled to teach a section of GEO 121 (Intro Physical Geography) this summer, but was told a few weeks ago and that we can't schedule any classes in our building this summer.  We're supposed to move out in August so that (long overdue) renovations can begin on our building.  Even though my class ends in June, we were told to move it.  My class is usually scheduled in both a classroom AND the computer lab, so I was immediately concerned about how I would swing this in another building. Then I asked if I could just move it to an online course and that is what happened! I'm excited about adapting my class for online (which I already planned to do for next winter term), but a little worried about the challenges.  I already teach the course in a way that is well suited for online teaching (I don't have much lecture, students work in groups, quizzes are already online, etc.), but I will also have to adapt my lab exercises. As of now, I'm planning to set up Googl...

Is it really the middle the summer of already?? Well, by official seasons it isn't since we only had the June Solstice nine days ago, but Miami had graduation on Mother's Day weekend (May 11-12), which was seven weeks ago. We start classes again in eight weeks, so we're just about half way through summer break. This year is a little longer because of the calendar change happening next year- we are adding a winter term during January and shortening each semester by a week or two. We start classes about a week later in August than we have been and finish about a week later in May (hooray for no more final exam grading on Mother's Day!!!) That means this summer probably has an extra week (with the early spring graduation + late fall start date). Wow, that makes me feel better, actually! I've fallen deep into my usual summer wanderings, feeling like I have no focus- especially since I spent the last two weeks around downtown Cincinnati while my daughter did a theater ca...