About to fly out the door

You can read that either way: I'm trying to get out of here in a (relative) hurry, and I'm also flying because today's classes were a blast. It was a grind of a day, with back-to-back meetings followed by back-to-back classes, but the classes were great, especially the later section. I also ended up having some relatively lengthy conversations with students after each class: this education topic has them humming. They may not know yet how they want to approach the topic, but the issues speak to them loud and clear. Of course, that's what I'd hoped would happen; I'm simply delighted that it's actually working out as planned.

I also had a pretty great conversation with one of my fellow panelists in the hallway after Academic Standing: she's the new senate rep to the committee, and our other panel participant is the vice-chair of the committee, so we get to see each other regularly, even if we don't get to engage in lengthy discussion. The only potential problem I see with the panel is that there are so many directions it could go--although that could also be a benefit. The three of us are going to meet in October to kick ideas around, but we're already sharing thoughts via e-mail. Again, it's the blessing/curse of having a number of articulate, intelligent people in the room: the possibilities are nearly infinite, and keeping to one thread can be a challenge.

I know there are other things I wanted to say today, but damned if I can remember a single one. If I remember anything really interesting that I wanted to share, I may post a P.S. I wish I had the energy (and mental acumen) left to get into more detail about why the classes were so great and what was so wonderful about the student interactions after class--but the main thing is that, at this point anyway, it all seems to be working pretty well. I could complain about students who are absent, or not doing work (or both), and I've already issued the first round of "early warnings" (well in advance of NCC's official system), but I don't want to worry about the usual student problems. I just want to work on doing more of what's working.

And to go home. And maybe sleep straight through until Monday.