Higher Ed Admissions

I will not be commenting in depth on the Supreme Court decision on college admissions that was handed down yesterday.  That decision won't really affect many schools, and the Ivy League schools can have work-arounds if they want.  Most students apply to schools that accept most everyone who applies, and that's not likely to change in the coming decade as we have fewer and fewer students heading off to college (less immigration combined with steep declines in birth rates since 2008).

As that Supreme Court decision was announced, I was doing training for my new teaching gig which stars in August.  It's the kind of online training that I suspect is common now.  I had four modules to complete, modules that covered e-mail safety, FERPA rules, and keeping everybody safe, including children (not students, but children).  Each module had a quiz at the end.  It took about an hour and a half, and my main response was, "People don't know this?"  I understand that we live in a world of lawsuits, and this training is more to protect the institution than to educate the new hire.

But here's what made it different:  I was paid to do this training.  I will be paid in real U.S. money!  You might ask, "How else would you be paid?"  With a lunch perhaps.  As an administrator, I've had to gather people in a room to do this training and monitor them, and we provided lunch, and my higher ups expected gratitude.

I am so grateful I am not in education administration anymore.  What a relief.

In addition to getting my training out of the way, I made some progress on my research paper that's due on Wednesday.  I've gotten my outside sources ready, and now I need to figure out where to put them.  It's a 5-7 page paper, so I don't have room to do much.

The past two days, we've had an increased work pace with the home repairs.  My sister-in-law and her electrician fiancé arrive today to help us finish doing the wiring for the house.  I've been sitting at my desk with my back to it all, getting the online class that I teach ready to go live (which happened yesterday) and writing my research paper and doing research for that paper.  Wednesday felt chaotic because the counter top measurer came too.

We are making progress, although it's achingly slow.  I really hope we have more of this done by the end of August, when my schedule gets more intense.

That said, it's been a good month.  I wrote a post on my theology blog that looks back on my first month as a Synod Appointed Minister, a great experience so far.  I've completed one class of teaching, hurrah!  I am hopeful that I've been supportive as my spouse moves forward with these housing remodeling tasks.

Let's see what July brings!  How can it be July already?