The Next Meeting

The blinking lights on my bike do little to discourage cars from passing so close I can feel the wind blast made by their mirrors as they fly by.

Big pick-ups are the worst, and I think their drivers are acting out some kind of bike commuter phobia when they cut it so close.

The sun is not quite up, but the eastern sky has grown light enough to see the debris in the bike lane.

I am on my way to work and have seven miles to cover. It is still hot, even though we are several days into fall. Sweat runs off the brim of my cap visor.

Sweat will also soak through my shirt that I change into to teach. My students don't mind too much -- just as long as they don't have to sit next to me.

After the morning classes I will work on the course web site, grade papers, record attendance, and get ready for the next meeting.

The meeting, of course, is about planning and assessment. Always and forever assessment. It's the mantra of modern teaching, and I spend more time dealing with reports, evaluations, and assessment than I do teaching.

We here in the teaching world are fanatical about assessment, about data, about drilling into the data to better assess what we are doing, which we do less and less of because of the time we spend on assessment.

In the meeting we will pass papers around and look at the Likert scales and then make changes so we can then compare the Likert scales with the new, improved curriculum.

We don't talk much about teaching.

We don't talk much about students.

We don't talk much about class size, funding, wages, the decline in interest in the teaching profession.

But we do talk assessment.

Can't wait for that next meeting.