The course itself was a bit of a roller coaster. See, in order to graduate, either ed law or ed finance are required...and budget cuts cost the department the prof that taught ed law. Dr. M volunteered to teach ed finance (a new area for her as well) - and since I've already taken 3 classes with Dr. M, and since I find law more interesting than finance overall, I decided to take ed law. The course was co-taught by the Director of Student Life, Dr. J, and his lawyer friend Gary Okuda. The banter between the two of them was fun to watch, and they each provided a very interesting perspective that was both necessary and relevant to our class.
There were many gripes in the class, the first one when the midterm was moved up a week and the format was changed. I admit that I cringed as well. Since there was much griping, there was an offer to do the original format of the midterm - which many of us decided to do. Now this is the part where I gripe..... The format of the midterm exam was already changed on us, but we weren't told the point breakdown until after the exam. Logically, if there are x number of questions on the exam, you'd figure that each would be worth an x number of points. I came to find out (after the exam) that the points were not equally weighted (some questions were worth more than others). I think that it would have been better to at least inform us of this and perhaps indicate which questions were worth 1 point and which were worth 6 points. With the take home optional midterm (which was a ton of work!) I had only one small complaint, which was to give us the rubric upon which we would be graded on before the exam. Had I seen the rubric before the exam, I wouldn't have changed the content of my answers, but I would have changed the format which I think would have been to my benefit.
Overall, at the point of the midterm, I was okay with where I was, but I know many of my classmates found this big slam to be disappointing/disheartening and some dropped the class while others just decided to tune the course out and sort of stop caring...I don't think that was the intent of the profs, but it was the result.
I had bigger concerns. About halfway through the course, my father died in a work related accident. I still don't know the nature of the accident, other than that it was a fatal fall that was so serious that even if he had been able to recover, his brain injuries would have rendered him a helpless vegetable. --Obviously this was a much bigger concern for me than my class was. I continued to attend class as much as I could, which was difficult since I planned his memorial, and took an incomplete for the course with the final exam to be taken in the summer (I just took it last week) and the final paper to be turned in before classes start in the fall (yikes!)
Other changes in my life include me leaving my job. I don't think I really fully understood how unhealthy that job was for me. I believe I stopped working roughly 2 weeks ago, and I still feel like I haven't recovered. I'm still not sure what the long-term looks like, but right now I'm in the cast of The Sound of Music, and will be going to school full-time in the fall. I will also (hopefully) be working part time at my high school with the orchestra.
The Friends of the Library of Hawaii booksale is going on right now and I'm just not as into it as I was last year. I found tons of Toni Morrison but I have a Toni Morrison that I haven't read yet and I figure that I should probably read that before I buy more. I also found some books in almost perfect condition that I own and paid (almost) full-price for! That's always a little disappointing. I saw lots of Kingsolver but didn't pick any up because I think I have them all...I decided to pick up just one Margaret Atwood. Though the literature and fiction seemed to have a great selection, I was rather dissatisfied with the sociology, education, and psychology sections. Perhaps they were picked over - or perhaps the selection this year wasn't as good as last year. It's okay. I have a paper to write this summer, anyhow.....
