September, The Start of the Year

I love summer. I love walking around buck naked, I like gardening, I like a lot of stuff about it.

But the real start of any year in my world isn't January. It's September. I think one knows if you are oriented toward being an academic if the approach of September brings you new ideas, a desire to read stuff, a reminiscent fondling of your books. That's what September does for me.

I want to get out my plaid skirt, but I don't own a plaid skirt. I want to buy new sweaters, even though it is too hot to wear them. I want to sharpen my pencils, organize my book bag, and get ready to learn something.

Fortunately, being an academic, I can do all these things. I can buy new books and deduct them from my taxes. I can do literature searches and mark them with yellow highlighter. I can investigate new computer programs that allow me to organize a ton of quotes and references for articles I haven't even conceived of yet.

If all of these things sound as appealing as a dental cleaning, don't go into academia. The biggest rewards I get from teaching is the learning I do myself. My learning style is a "Converger" meaning that I like to perceive information abstractly and process it actively. I want to test theories, apply common sense, handle information and see if it works. I don't like to be given answers, because I'm too distrustful to believe it just because someone said it.

As a teacher, I want to give my students the skills they need in life. I use a lot of movies because it is a great way to get across complex ideas quickly. My favorite question really is: How does this work? or more exactly "How does the World work?"

I live close to a college town, and this time of the year brings a ton of new students to the many colleges in the area. While summer is a sleepy time here, and traffic is light, the fall brings a crush of cars, a collision of older adolescents and toni parents with carefully applied make-up and clean clothes. We locals know that they don't really live around here. We know anyone who looks like that is either coming to a college reunion or dropping off or visiting their kids. Even though they fill up the restaurants and make getting around more difficult, I love to see them come. I like to look into the faces of their 18+ kids, and try to imagine just what they must be making of this life transition. Are they scared? Are they delighted? Have they applied themselves studiously and are anxious to dive into their chosen careers?

They are all very clean and organized looking now, but I know that over time their looks will change. Their clothes will get wrinkled. Their hair might be more outrageous. Their sunglasses will look odd or piercings will appear. Even 'dress up' will be a little less dressy, and most of their shoes will be comfortable most of the time. In other words, they will begin to blend in.

My constant questioning about how the world works, my love of documentaries that 'teach me something,' and my natural laziness to dress up almost ever, allows me to blend in to this college scene too, although my age clearly sets me apart from it. I love the way college-aged students-- really all college students--are tossed together and end up saying "What the fuck?!" It is easy to be an angry progressive these days. It is delightful to live around people who are questioning why things are the way they are and what should be done about it.

Being an adjunct professor is about the best job ever, as far as I'm concerned. I've been an Associate Professor and a College Administrator, and these roles place way too much "tar" on my feet. I have things to teach, and I just want to get right up close and teach them. I don't want to sink deeply into academic bureaucracies, advocate anyone's 'viewpoint' except my own.
I want to be like the college student, him or herself, a free agent struggling with just how much I can be myself and get away with it. It is that pull of "fitting in" and "being your own person" that comes up for me again, now close to 50.

That's probably why I like September so much. Once again, I get to learn new things, and try to get across a confusing message to students who take my course: I want you to disagree with me, you don't get punished for that. And I also want you to work hard and come to class and do the readings. So yes, I do have classroom power and I do make demands. And I make them because that is my role: to teach you something I know. And one of those demands invites you to test out the role of having your own opinions and disagreeing with me. That's how I learn and grow. I learn and grow from people offering their own ideas, once they've come to understand mine. My job is to have the ideas and to clearly present them to you. Your job is to understand them and then to make them your own by rejecting some, clarifying others, accepting a few more. It isn't the ideas themselves you have to accept as "truth." It is the process of thinking.

I am fond of the line that states “Thinking is one of the hardest things people can do. That’s why it is done so rarely.” If, at times, a student find herself frustrated, confused, or anxious, and she doesn’t immediately look for someone or something to blame, I consider that she's made great progress in understanding the often contradictory theories I’m trying to teach. I know it is easier at times to just be doctrinaire. "Just the facts, Professor." No. Don't take my word for it. Dust off a few books, and find out for yourself. It's September. It's the month for learning new things!