I was out at Griffith today to sign a contract for the teaching work I’ll be doing this semester. I taught at various Universities around Brisbane from 1997 to 2004, and it’s been kinda nice having a break from it so far this year. But I’ve been missing it, and am really looking forward to getting back into lecturing and tutoring (not so much to the evils of marking!). I did my Honours degree at Griffith, and I’m fond of the Nathan campus. I’ve only taught there once before, so I’m also looking forward to a different cohort of students (you get a real sense of the diversity of student groups when you teach at various Unis and campuses).
I’ll be doing all the lecturing and tutoring in Nationalism and Development in the Third World, a 3rd year course in the Politics, Economy and Society major of the BA. I’ll also be tutoring in Employment Relations, a big 1st year course in Business. I think both will be very interesting courses to teach, given what’s going on in both areas at the moment in the “real world”. It’ll also be nice to be working with my old honours supervisor, Professor David Peetz again, though I’m not too sure about the requirement he has that tutors provide back up vocals when he decides to sing in lectures. Still, perhaps my occasional doo-wop doo-wah boy days in Brisvegas jazz band of the early 90s, Black Cat Circle, will stand me in good stead.
I think in second semester of 2004, I’d got a bit stale with teaching. This was partly because I had a tendency to take on too much work to maximise my income, sometimes teaching 5 courses across 3 campuses, and partly because I was getting a bit bored teaching the same stuff year in year out. So it’ll be nice to be able to concentrate on two courses on two days of the week at Nathan, both of which are new to me, and I’ll be able to combine this work with some consultancy stuff and other writing and research projects. To this end, it’s good that Griffith remunerates people for the work they do somewhat more appropriately than is sometimes the case at other Universities.
Anyway, I’m really looking forward to my first lecture next week. I love the interaction that comes with teaching, and also the chance I get to learn as well. I never set out to be an academic. It just kind of happened. That reinforces my sense, that despite my occasional desires to go off and do other things, it’s probably a vocation that chose me rather than a job I took. It’s one of the pleasures of my life to have work that gives me a lot of autonomy and satisfaction. It’s a pity that our society is structured so that such pleasures aren’t more widely available to workers generally.
It’s good that you feel that way about teaching and the academic life! (No high-paying corporate sell-out job just yet, eh?)
No, though it was good to know that I could get interviews pretty easily should I decide to do the high-paying corporate sell-out job thing. But I don’t see myself doing it - the jobs that interested me were public sector ones.
What will you do if people refer to the blog in your classes? Just out of curiosity, as I’m hoping to teach again also…
Doo-wop? We want mp3s!
There’s a demo tape - early 90s, remember. A friend was over for a red or two last night and she told me you can transfer tape onto cd, but didn’t know how it could be done.
Liam, I don’t really have a problem with that - I’ll probably mention it myself. Public/private issues don’t bother me too much. I used to draw attention to Backpages and Troppo threads when I was teaching last year. I might post some stuff that’s relevant to the 3rd year course here. My only worry is that the students might get monstered by RWDBs. I’m going to look into setting up a blog on the Griffith page (password protected for students) and perhaps getting them to put their tutorial papers up on it - since the way the assessment is designed envisages their sharing their papers with other tute members.
Marks for blogging. What a world to live in.
Oh, if that had only been around six years ago or so…
I’ve given marks for discussion forum (ie bulletin board) comments before - and it worked really well. That was in 03 before I discovered blogs.
” I‚Äôm not too sure about the requirement he has that tutors provide back up vocals when he decides to sing in lectures. ” Perhaps that can go in the AWA the university will have to offer you:)
I’ve already signed the contract, Andrew! The current EBA prevents AWAs being offered, though I gather Griffith has signed up for Nelson’s IR money so it may be a different story next year. Since the tutoring is in the Department of Industrial Relations, you could at least be safe in the knowledge that both parties know their way around an industrial negotiation! (Not that I’d accept an AWA, probably needless to say).
Mark: get a tape-player with a headphone jack. Then get a cable for a couple of bucks at Dick Smith or Tandy, that goes from the headphone mini-jack to a microphone mini-jack on your computer. Then fire up some software that will record the microphone, fiddle with the volume, etc, and chop it up into MP3s (or burn to CD, whatever you like). That’s a very rough-and-ready guide, I’m sure someone (is it the other Rob who is the audiophile) can give you better instructions for higher quality recording.
Tama Leaver has used blogs in his teaching; you might want to contact him to find out how he did it, and how effective it was.
Thanks, Rob. The link’s broken though. I’d wager that Brisblogger Jo Jacobs has probably used blogs in her teaching too. I’ve got some other stuff I’ve been meaning to chat to Jo about, so I’ll make a point of asking her as well.
Mark, just make sure all of your students know that a scholarly standard of writing and use of evidence is teh hotness!!!!!!1!!!
Yeah, if only we can figure out how to get the footnote code to work in comments, Liam!
Damn, sorry. It’s Ponderance. Sorry.
Cheers, thanks, Rob.
Quite like the last paragraph, Mark. If I could keep my current job and ditch the commuate I’d be quite pleased (though I occasionally work from home which helps).
On Irant’s point, I like my work too. I’m a photographer and graphic designer. I also get to work from home a lot. Only bit I don’t like? Weddings! (Pay well though…).
Do you wear the yellow vinyl dress to weddings, Kimbo
No, Mark! That would be unprofessional unless the invite specified vinyl or bondage wear (you’d be surprised at some weddings!).
I think I’ve only ever been to 3 weddings, Kim.
What is it about Brisbane and vinyl?
I’d have thought it was a crazy material for such a hot and humid place.
People don’t really have vinyl weddings, Liam. I do feel for the goths in Brisbane summer, though.
I bought the said dress in Europe.
Me too Mark. Must be the demographic.
I was wondering what you did for a squid Kim… Nice to know Nelson cant screw up all our lives.
Unless I have kids, Lefty E!
Must be the demographic.
Yep, 2 of the 3 were family weddings and there’s lots of those I’ve skipped too.
No one I know tends to get married. Or go to Church. Or vote Tory.
Hang on, Im living in a leftist ghetto…
Excellent!
My apartment building is something of a lefty/gay/lesbian ghetto. Very New Farm. Also good.
That’s great news Mark. There are lots of good things in teaching and researching - I’ve really enjoyed the times I’ve lectured (mostly to engineers - you have to make maths quite practical for them), and on a personal level, it’s very rewarding to have people say to you “oh, I didn’t understand XYZ with my old lecturer, but you’ve explained it really well and I understand it now”. Well, I was paraphrasing.
I tutored first and second year pure and applied maths 1997-2004, but by the end, I felt a little stale too - I felt as if I was just tutoring the same things, a treadmill. And marking the first year exams - marking one question on 1000 scripts - you turn into a machine for the week it takes!
Sach, you’d have to explain maths very simply to me too, and I’m not an engineer!
The fun bit is working out how to explain it in ways people will understand - eg calculus. Or explaining the pythagorus theorem in 3 dimensions. It’s great to see the light of recognition in people’s eyes.
I’m very happy, because on Wednesday night I e-mailed a proper little maths paper to a journal (well, a mini-journal). My first proper paper - the only other thing I’ve had published is a refereed conference proceedings.
I envy people who have written lots of papers - for many people who have finished a maths phd, they’d have about 2-3 papers published on average. But I’m not complaining! My little paper is called “Two generalisations of the Binomial theorem”.
Congrats!
Thanks Mark. I was very sorry to hear that you weren’t well last year - I hope you’re fine now.
Yes, thanks, Sach.
Are the .wmv files of your Intro to Sociology lectures still downloadable from the web, Mark?
Yes, I think so, Kim, but they’re password protected for QUT staff and students only. Partly to protect all the lectures from being ripped off (you’d be surprised how many academics have discovered their lecture notes being stolen by another academic from another university and posted on the web as their own). Anyone with a burning interest to see me in lecturing action could always email me and I’ll send on the file/s.
Thanks, Mark!
Shame, Mark, shame. Make the self-centred little full-fee-paying shits actually turn up to your lectures, don’t give them the opportunity to bludge.
Liam, wasn’t my choice. This was a huge subject (500+) and regarded very much as a cash cow for the School. So they decided to jazz it up as a subject available “wholly online” with no tutes, and save money on that and having to pay us sessional Lecturers to give lectures twice by saying “if you can’t fit into the lecture theatre, watch it online”.
Mark, you should post the religion lecture at LP. I really enjoyed having a listen/watch.
Yes good idea, Kim. Subvert HECS! Make sociology available free to the bloggy masses!
Fantastic, you can give out marks to the kids who have broadband
One thing QUT is good at, Liam, is technology access. The university gives away all staff computers to students with low incomes every 2 years. And a lot of money has been spent on heaps of really big computer labs on each campus with fast connections. Credit where it’s due.