My Last Semester as a Professor

I am about to begin my last semester as a college professor. Hooray! Join me throughout the semester for an ongoing series about my last semester.

So Wednesday begins the first day of my last semester as a professor. I teach two classes this semester, and then I'm done. I'm off to fulfill my dream of becoming a professional writer.

I'll be including in my blog an ongoing series about my last semester! Won't you join me throughout the semester as I reflect upon my last days? I'll be reflecting upon the state of college education, the broken parts and the beautiful parts, and I'll be remembering good and bad memories of my days as a teacher and scholar.

Thinking about becoming a professor, or about getting out of academia? I hope this will help you make up your mind! Here's a few articles I wrote about the advantages of being a professor and the disadvantages of being a professor.

So, I have the roster of students who will appear in my class this semester. I love reading the roster. It's like picking a promising novel off the bookcase with anticipation, hoping this will be a book filled with unforgettable characters and a life-affirming story line. That may be what I have liked most about teaching: the fabulous cast of characters who gather in my classroom every semester and gift me with a glimpse of their lives.

The characters that have shared their stories with me have been a treasure. There was the student from New York who abandoned his business aspirations after 9/11 and instead wanted to join the CIA to protect his country. There was the girl who gave a speech about her snake, Drake, and brought him in as her visual aid (which didn't go so well, because a student who worked for housing was in the class, and poor Drake was deported from the dorms). I've had single moms, a Hollywood stuntman, former soldiers (including a Navy sailor who was on an infamous submarine that capsized a Japanese fishing boat), aspiring teachers, aspiring pastors, and all kinds of ordinary students with amazing stories. I've had girls with eating disorders, a student with AIDS who probably is no longer with us, and a very sweet student who broke my heart when he died in a bar fight.

So, please join my as I reflect upon my last semester as a professor! Here's the index to my ongoing series of blog entries. I'd love it if you would leave comments in the discussion, as I want to know who's reading this and what's on your mind.