Dr. Phil's Dreamwidth Journal

It's That Time Of The Year

Yes, I've not been posting much lately on LiveJournal/Dreamwidth. Hell, I haven't been posting much on Facebook, either.

The reason, of course, is that it's the end of Fall semester. Final Exams were last week, the last week of class rush the week before. And now it's Grading Week, that abbreviated period that ends with the Death Clock running out Tuesday at Noon. (grin)

So I haven't given up on blogging. I'm not ignoring you. I'm just up to my armpits in grading papers.

Dr. Phil

May The First

It's Grading Day -- I had to get my grades in by noon. Actually I got them in by 11:20am, hardly even close. (grin)

But first I had to get up early and drive Mrs. Dr. Phil to the GVSU Holland center to meet up with five other people, part of an annual expedition to Nicaragua as a part of GVSU's Applied Global Innovation Initiative. She'll be serving as a volunteer, along with her stepmother Pat, in a program led by two faculty (Engineering, Business-Marketing) and GVSU students for UNAN students and faculty in Esteli.

This group will travel together out of Chicago's O'Hare -- where they'll meet up with Pat -- and as I write this I know they got as far as their layover in Atlanta. (grin)


8:30 in the morning, Mrs. Dr. Phil in her great new hat at the left.
Six people, five seats, rented minivan, and gear for the program and nearly three weeks. (Click on photo for larger.)


This goes here and this goes here -- and this one from the project will count as this person's second checked bag... (Click on photo for larger.)


And it all fits! (Click on photo for larger.)


The adventure begins here. I'll get Mrs. Dr. Phil to provide captions for everyone later. (Click on photo for larger.)


All loaded... (Click on photo for larger.)


...and the doors are closing... (Click on photo for larger.)


...the trip to Nicaragua departs the GVSU Holland campus. (Click on photo for larger.)

I'm not going to Nicaragua -- darn it, Mrs. Dr. Phil gets to add one more country to her passport that I don't have. Partly it's that there's no way I could have handled Finals and Grading Weeks with packing for heading south to 12° N latitude. And I haven't flown anywhere since I hurt my leg nerve which is slowly regrowing. And I'm not really built for the weather at 12° N latitude -- it's going to be humid and in the 80s here in West Michigan for a couple of days this week and that will be brutal enough. The weather down there was raining and 95°F.

After grades were sent in, I kept it pretty light for the rest of the day. It's been a LOT of reading the last week and my little eyes are tired. Tomorrow? Time to start working on the summer writing projects!

Dr. Phil

As Grade-a-Thon Continues...

I find myself about two-thirds through the Topic 1 Science Literacy Book Report papers. I was struck by the reason one student gave for reading Frankenstein. As an older title, it was available as a free e-book.

A lot of students choose their books based on which titles are left to check out from the WMU Waldo Library, again for free. A few bum the books off of friends and family. Sometimes there's a book sitting on their shelves which they've "been meaning to read" for a number of years.

And while I wouldn't advocate theft, free books are good.

But what struck me is this is the first definite example of someone reading an e-book, as opposed to hardcover, trade, paperback or audio book. Frankly I've been expecting people to say they've read them electronically, on iPod, iPad, iPhone, Kindle, Nook, Sony, laptop or what have you. But this is the first one.

And then they didn't mention the platform. (grin)

Perhaps next semester I'll do a survey about where they got their books.

On The Other Hand...

Disappointed with many of the Topic 2 Worksheets whereupon the students use their car to take real world data and then analyze it. I'd warned them once that Physics pedagogy research shows that many Physics students believe one thing in the classroom and then forget it outside. And the lousy use of calculations, significant figures and just wrong application of Physics equations and variables afflicted maybe half the class.

And yet as a class they did outstanding work on their Final Exam, taken the day after they turned in their worksheets. I guess it is true -- Physics doesn't apply to the real world. (NOT)

Sigh.

Dr. Phil

Monday

Drove into the office on Monday of Grading Week. Though the university will close between Christmas and New Year's and they are threatening very cold temps in the buildings with the new thermostat controls in place, it was surprisingly warm in my office. Yay. I've had years when I was waiting for the grader and it was too cold to think, write or type.

Actually, before I got to the office I stopped at the WMU Parking Office to get a new parking sticker. Yeah, as a part-timer I have to get one of these every semester. Except... the clerk was having trouble getting the right menu item and so snagged a passing uniformed Public Safety officer. Turns out as part of the new part-time instructors union, I get to have a regular parking hang tag. Yay! Actually, it's a GH grad student tag -- the contract was accepted too late for Public Safety to make part-timer hang tags for 2010-2011. But this will be really handy, especially on days when I have to drive a different vehicle.

Meanwhile, my erstwhile grader managed to get the final exams and quizzes 18, 19, 20, 21 and 22 into my mailbox. Triple-Yay! Nothing like having the papers back and not gnawing the insides of my cheeks waiting for the grader to show, and also inputting the scores and not having to drag papers home. And have them cluttering the house until January.

Monday Night

I had one old pesky quiz to grade, then curve the final, massage the grades. And found myself ready to input the final grades at 11pm. Usually on a school night we'd be tucking in the kitties downstairs, but with vacations looming, I started right in. Later in the night I posted the grade breakdowns on the class webpage. By the time I went to bed I was totally done for my Fall 2010 class. And it wasn't even 11:58am on Tuesday!!! (grin)

Tuesday

Play! I'm off now. Mrs. Dr. Phil is on vacation this week. So we headed off to Celebration Cinema North to see Tron Legacy in IMAX 3D and Harry Potter 7.1. Reviews coming, but it was a fun afternoon.

Now... writing to do.

Dr. Phil

Before You Can Even Start To Get Any Work Done

With only 41 students left in my summer session course, it looked pretty much like I might be able to finish up Grade-a-thon early on Monday, instead of the last minute before noon on Tuesday. I might've just had the grader send me the final exam and last two quiz grades, but I did have a student making up the Final at noon, and besides, it is so much easier to be able to look over the graded Finals and make sure everything's all right.

As a part-timer, I don't get a yearlong parking hang tag. Instead, every semester I have to go into the Parking Office and get a new sticker or card or tag -- they keep changing the procedures -- and register two of my three vehicles. I'm not sure I remember checking the summer tag, but typically the tags run out on the last day of finals/classes, which for Summer -II was Friday 20 August 2010. Okay, but as an instructor who has grades to do, why wouldn't this go until the Tuesday the grades are due? (grin) Now I wasn't actually expecting that they'd bother ticketing anyone during Break Week, but the real advantage to hitting the Parking Office on Monday was that there was no line. (happy grin)

Upon Arriving

Grader had put Q18/19 and the Final Exams in my mailbox at the office, so I now had that. Yay! Two more things to tick off the checklist. Quizzes -- done! Science Literacy Book Reports -- done! All exams -- done! (Save for the make-up Final) All exam and quizzes corrections -- done! Curve for the Final -- done! Time to implement the Bad Test Day Rule, the unwritten rule which adds points to the lowest of Exams 1-3 up to the average of the other two exams plus the final -- done!

All I Wanted Was Some Water

A pinched nerve or something has bugged me for a couple of days. I didn't fill a bottle of water or buy one on the way in, because I knew I had half a bottle of water left in the office. Don't you just hate it when you're sure you know something, only to find out it ain't necessarily so? (evil grin) Well, that bottle only had a swallow in it. But I didn't want to leave my office before my appointment person came, nor did I want to limp around unnecessarily if I had to. So I did something I thought was clever. When my make-up final person showed up, I gave them $1.25 and asked if they would be so kind as to go down to the Rood Hall lobby next door and get me a water. No problem. Except...

Student returns and says the vending machines now say water is $1.50 -- and they have no money. Well of course. They want to gouge the students more, so raise the rates as soon as break happens. Give student another quarter.

Student returns. The quarter slot is jammed full of quarters, which he found out by putting a quarter and having it get stuck and not dropping, nor will it give money back. But there is another vending machine in the lobby on the other side So I gave the student two dollar bills, hoping they'll scan as well as bypass the change slot.

Long delay. Student returns with bottle of water and a bunch of quarters. Seems the Coke guy was restocking the first machine and cleared the jam and gave him the right change and the bottle of water.

Interestingly, I was expecting the Coke machine to dispense Dasani, but instead I got a bottle of Smart Water. Actually GLACÉAU smart water, if you read the label. When I got home with the rest of the water, Mrs. Dr. Phil wanted to know why I bought "smart water", a marketing scam we both hate, and I said, truthfully, it was what the vending machine had.

Still, I would've been pretty mad to have not taken down enough money to hit more than one machine. Guess I was happy to have a younger man do the running on this one. But $1.50? (rolls eyes)

All Over Except For The Screaming

Student took Final Exam, I graded it, then cleaned up the last of the grading, adjusting a course curve so we get sufficient A's. Finally I could call up and log into GoWMU's faculty page and enter the grades. Yay! Grades done!

Of course there's done and there's done. When I got home, I took the grading spreadsheet, sorted the entries by the student's Personal ID number they assigned themselves, then converted a table to HTML pre-formatted text. Once I posted the grades online, I waited for the inevitable emails.

The hardest and worst part of my job is explaining to students, in detail, while their final course grade isn't as good as their last predicted grades. While many people did better on the Final Exam, some did worse. And I fear that some people give up towards the end and not turning in the last quizzes and tanking the Final Exam, somehow thinking that they've got their passing grade in the bag. Unfortunately, it doesn't work like that.

No, I don't do extra credit -- it's in the syllabus. Yes, I did apply the Bad Test Day rule, adding in the extra points to the total, not changing the exam scores. Several hopeful people thought they still had a chance, when in fact, they didn't. I hate it when people fail (most students have to get a C or better in their major, so DC, D and E don't work for them), especially when we've talked in my office about what they needed to do to get a C or a CB or whatever, and then they don't do it. Check the math if you like, but the spreadsheet doesn't lie -- it can add up rows quite well.

I tell people the first day I'd be happy to give everyone A's, if they deserved it. They get the points and even when the dean comes down hard on me and says What Gives, I'd be able to say "Look at these scores, look at these hard Dr. Phil problems -- and still they got all A's." Yeah, I'd love to be able to defend that to my bosses.

Alas, such is not to be.

Tuesday

I was driving around doing errands, and bypassed the intersection of Wilson & M-45 and took the back way, which eventually turns into Linden. At one point as the road finally straightens out, there is a very large tree which overhangs the road. Approaching it at 55 mph, I realized there was a very large bird sitting on the topmost branch, with a very distinctive white head. Yup - bald eagle looking around for its next meal. With traffic, it wasn't easy to pull of the road, turn around twice and hope to get a picture before the eagle flapped off, so I didn't.

Yes, there are bald eagles in Michigan, and not just the U.P. In fact:

Bald eagles can be found in every state except Hawaii. They are more prevalent in Florida, Wisconsin, Washington, Minnesota, Oregon, and Michigan; the largest concentration is in Alaska.

So we're in the Top 7 states for bald eagle sightings. (grin) Who knew? And what fun!

Dr. Phil

Ticking Off The End Of Semester Tasks

The Final Exam for PHYS-1060 was back on Tuesday. Tuesday afternoon, Wednesday and Friday, had people coming in to take late Finals and very late Exams 2 or 3. Amazing what studying for a final can do to give a good result in a regular exam. (grin) Maybe I should give the Final Exam first. (evil-grin)

Most of the quizzes processed. I still have a few I have to input into the spreadsheet.

That leaves the papers.

Of Course Now I'm Sick

Everybody else, it seems, came down with H1N1 or whatever during the semester and amazingly I did fine. And now that I've had both seasonal and H1N1 vaccines, now I come down with... well, something. Mainly it's a sore throat, sometimes a dry tickle that makes me cough. Some sinus clogginess, but I've been able to breathe and smell (and taste), so go figure. Haven't felt particularly fevery. Tired and achy from time to time. You know, like when you're sick.

The Final Grind

Friday I got the Finals back from the Scantron center, entered them, put in a curve and then did my "Bad Test Day Rule" magic for those who blew one of the hour exams, but pulled back up for the final.

So what I mainly have left to do is read the hundred and twenty odd science literacy book-or-movie reports. The class roster grading sheet I printed is some 2 pages plus. First objective met and the short page 3 is done. Need to put real damage in page 2 tonight and page 1 on Sunday. Grades are due on Tuesday at noon. Complicating things are that some company is coming in for a day or two. I've bought online tickets to the 3:30pm showing of Avatar in 3D IMAX on Monday for all of us. It should be spectacular, if nothing else. (grin)

Still, I'm pretty happy one to have the one class this semester. It makes all this endgame stuff so much easier.

All this means I'm likely to be scarce for the next couple of days in terms of new long posts.

Dr. Phil