Gratitude

Grateful to Teach; Grateful for a Break

Thoughts after getting my grades submitted today

Today I finished the last of my grading work for the fall quarter. This means I can read books I want to read, write what I want to write, and work on cleaning and organizing my house (I was going to say “hopefully” for that last part, but I know my girlfriend and my mom will read this, and both have already offered to help me).

It’s always a push to get grades done, and this quarter my grading process took extra time and effort as I taught four classes instead of my usual three.

If you’re a high school teacher, you might laugh at this because you might well be in the middle of teaching six classes right now. Do I think you deserve more prep time and smaller class sizes? I definitely do.

Lately, I’ve been teaching research writing and technical writing, and both of these classes focus on helping students learn to write an eight-page (or longer) paper by working through smaller assignments to complete their projects in more manageable pieces.

At the end of the fall quarter, I had somewhere around 800 pages of content to read and grade. I had already read rough drafts, so in a way, I read and commented on 1,600 pages over the last few weeks, plus the various smaller assignments that continued to come in.

I’m not a math teacher, though, so I’ll stop talking about numbers. I have a tendency to underestimate anyway.

I’m an adjunct English instructor at a small public college. I’ve been an adjunct for almost twenty years. Officially, I have zero job security as my classes are assigned to me quarter by quarter. I did lose one class last year because of reductions due to the pandemic, but mostly my work has been steady (knock on wood!).

Luckily, I live in Washington state where adjunct faculty can receive health insurance and retirement benefits if we maintain a regular schedule of teaching for one or more state schools.

I’m able to get enough work at one school, without being a “freeway flyer” who teaches at multiple colleges to be able to piece together more income. I have low overhead as I own my house, drove the same little car for 19 years before replacing it with another compact, and don’t have kids.

Because I’m not salaried, when I’m not teaching, I’m not getting paid. So I teach summer classes, too. For years I took on other small projects for the college that paid stipends as well. I wrote the curriculum. I helped students publish the college literary magazine.

Even before the pandemic, I was mostly teaching online. I like teaching online. I’m not sure that my eyes always appreciate me teaching online, and lately, I don’t think my low back is happy about it.

On days when I do a lot of teaching work, I get up and fold laundry and move around and look at faraway objects and try to keep my muscles and vision in working order. It’s a good job.

I think about some of the demanding jobs my family worked, especially my grandma (who didn’t finish high school) working at a hospital as a kid to pay off a debt from her dad’s hospital stay.

I’m tired tonight, and I’m grateful to have this break until the winter quarter begins.

I want to say something — in friendship or solidarity or understanding — to teachers and everybody else who feels grateful to do the work they do, and grateful to have a break from it when they can.

I’m too filled with 800+ pages of research paper language to put together the words for just what I want to say, but I hope you know what I mean.