Tag Archives: schedule

November 28, 2012, 3:04 pm

Open Thread Wednesday: Scheduling a Department’s Courses

As one semester or quarter is coming to a close, a ProfHacker’s s thoughts inevitably turn to the next. Unless that ProfHacker is a Chair or Director of Undergraduate Studies who is responsible for planning the courses and schedules for the entire following academic year.

As a new, alt-ac faculty member in my department, I’ve recently become acquainted with how we go about this scheduling process. The DUS sends out a Word document as an attachment with six questions, ranging from asking about which core course the faculty member would prefer to teach, to graduate seminars, and the preferred time slots in which that teaching will happen. Faculty members type up their responses on the form and then return them electronically or printed out to the DUS, who then gets to work planning the schedule.

Someone in our department recently suggested that there could be a more efficient way…

May 31, 2012, 3:00 pm

How do You Hack Families and Academic Travel?

By Brian Croxall

A few weeks ago, I wrote to announce the Digital Humanities Winter Institute. While I wanted to make sure as many people know about this training opportunity as possible, I was also personally interested. I’m lucky enough to have some professional development funds for next year, and I thought that this could be a great opportunity to put those funds to use while learning R.

All of that changed, however, when I looked pulled up the DHWI dates on my calendar. Running from 7-11 January, the Institute starts the day after the 2013 MLA ends. Since I’ve already committed to be at the 2013 MLA, and because I’m co-leading a pre-convention workshop, I will be flying to Boston on 2 January; attending the DHWI would mean that I would be away from home for 10 full days. And as a father of three and a husband of one, I knew that such a proposal would not pass the approval process. Just for…

April 23, 2012, 3:00 pm

Scheduling the “Endless” Summer

By Anastasia Salter

Counting down the days to summer never gets old, even if the relative freedom of childhood is long behind. There’s an unfortunate set of expectations from outsiders looking in at our summers in academia, which can appear to be limitless. Sometimes, we even fall into that trap ourselves, imagining how every project, every exercise goal, will somehow be manageable during these short months. As Mark Sample observed on Twitter the other day, “Summer already feels like it’s slipping away and it hasn’t even begun yet.”

If this feeling sounds familiar, as it certainly is to me, this might be a good time to take stock of your summer before it’s already gone. The illusion of the endless summer can be dangerous. For many, especially in alt-ac or contractual and staff positions, it’s a complete falsehood: summer classes and administrative work can mean more scheduled time than ever, and of…

August 9, 2011, 8:00 am

What’s your daily routine?

By Natalie Houston

For many of us, August marks a time of transition as summer winds down and the fall academic term begins. With that transition frequently come changes in schedule: sleep and wake times, meal planning, commuting, work schedules, and recreation activities may all be affected by new schedules for you and/or other members of your household.

As you begin to plan for these changes, it can be helpful to look at what’s currently working well for you — even (especially) if you think that your summer routines can’t possibly extend into the fall.

What is a routine

A routine is simply a sequence of actions that you perform each day. You probably don’t have to think too hard each morning about how to take a shower, brush your teeth, and get dressed for the day. With repetition, many of the tasks in your routine become habits, like brushing your teeth, something you can do without thinking …