[Englecturers] workload committee meetings

[englecturers at lists.ucr.edu]

Dear Capitan Steponsky,

In response to your call for description of what we do, here is my typical 
work week at UCR teaching three classes this past spring quarter. Let it be 
known that for many reasons, I try to limit my day spent working to five per 
week although that is seldom the case in practice. And this is the best case 
scenario--usually not the case--of me teaching three of the same classes 
(which limits prep work). Also, sometimes our dated technology (obsolete 
computers, hand-me-down printers, broken copiers, and telephones that don't 
allow outgoing calls) tend to make the day a bit longer.

Monday

5:00 a.m.: awake, dress, personal hygiene time.
5:30 a.m.: Check email from the weekend and respond to students' concerns.
6:00 a.m.: Re-read (or read) assigned reading for the day.
7:00 a.m.: Leave for UCR
8:00 a.m.: Arrive at UCR. Finish reading and responding to email, read and 
respond to mail.
8:30 a.m.: Meet with students who cannot attend regular office hours or grade 
essays or finish reading for the day or create handouts or update Blackboard 
or prepare current research for lesson plans for the day.
9:00 a.m.: Meet with students during office hour or grade essays or finish 
work listed above.
10:00 a.m.: Teach class. Meet with one or two students briefly before class 
and with one or two students after class.
11:00 a.m.: Teach class. Meet with one or two students briefly before class 
and with one or two students after class.
12:00 p.m.: Teach class. Meet with one or two students briefly before class.
1:00 p.m.: Meet with any and all students after class who cannot attend 
morning office hours.
1:30 p.m.: Drive home.
2:30 p.m.: Eat lunch.
3:00 p.m.: Grade essays (typically 3 per hour). All essays are returned within 
one week after due date. On days with no essays, read through student drafts 
on paper or via email. Other days, read through and comment on Blackboard 
entries.
6:00 p.m.: Eat dinner.
6:30 p.m.: Finish grading or reading or prep work.
7:30 p.m.: Family time until 9:30 p.m.
9:30 p.m.: Wrap up grading or prep work.
10:00 p.m.: Finished for the day.

Tuesday: My day off from UCR!

Wednesday:  Same as Monday

Thursday: My day off from UCR!

Friday:  Same as Monday and Wednesday.

Saturday:
6:00 a.m.: Grade essays or read and prepare for upcoming week's classes.
12:00 p.m.: Family time for the rest of the day.
9:00 p.m.: More grading.
11:00 p.m.: Finish for the night.

Sunday:
Same as Saturday.

So on weeks that essays are being graded, I spend about 52 hours per week for 
three classes; on other weeks, that number drops down to around 45 hours per 
week since in-class essays are often graded faster than out-of-class essays.

Also, the computer program that the Vice-Provost may be speaking of is 
Calibrated Peer Review (or CPR) which I have used once or twice at UCR. This 
program allows students to submit essays on-line, read through and assess 
three sample essays (written by the instructor) and then read and assess three 
of their classmates' essays and finally read and assess their own work. It may 
limit grading time (although the prep time is astronomical) if we are 
comfortable having students grade each others' essays. I use it as rough draft 
peer review for the students which adds another level of work onto my 
schedule. If you want to know the particulars, just ask.

I agree with L.'s idea of including sample papers in your narrative; perhaps 
69 of them should be included to show the typical two-week workload of 
somebody teaching three classes.

Keep on Steppin on!

Devon Hackelton



>===== Original Message From englecturers at lists.ucr.edu =====
>Dispatches from the Workload Committee War Front
>
>Dear Comrades:
>
>The Workload Committee sloughs on.  The goal of the
>administration is to wear us down so that the final report on
>the request for a workload reduction looks like something
>straight out of Kafka - interminable proceedings that lead to
>nothing.  The Chair of this committee - he who shall remain
>nameless but is a Vice-Provost -informed us at our last
>meeting that he wants a report that is entirely descriptive.
>In other words, nothing evaluative.  When we informed him
>that even descriptive language implies connotation and that
>CONCLUSIONS MUST BE DRAWN, he merely looked befuddled.  I
>personally believe that he is reading too much Stanley Fish,
>or is it too charitable of me to suggest that administrators
>read anything, or that they need a theory to believe that all
>meaning is meaningless.
>
>There is a willful obtuseness on the part of said
>administrator who, despite how many times we have told him
>what it is we do and what it is that composition requires as
>a discipline, remains strangely incapable of understanding
>why it is we are entitled to parity with other UC campuses on
>the issue of workload.  We are asking for seven courses to be
>a full time workload, and although we have demonstrated why
>this should be so for weeks now, and have asked for a motion
>to vote on this proposal, we still find ourselves needing to
>prove our case once again.
>
>Born of desperation, I have suggested that I write a report
>for the Committee, a catalogue raisonne if you will, of what
>we do, how we do it, and why.  We need to demonstrate how
>many hours over the 40-hour week we work and why we can't
>legitimately reduce those hours.  There are, of course, some
>things we can stop doing --  writing letters of
>recommendation perhaps, or talking to students about their
>lives and giving advice about classes, or limiting email
>time -- that might be things we do which are not necessary to
>our pedagogical responsibilities.  I'm sure if we think about
>this, we can come up with other things we do that aren't
>strictly necessary to our work.  This could give us some
>areas in which we could conceivably mitigate our workload.
>On the other hand, there are things we can't and shouldn't
>stop doing - like limiting time spent to help students write
>better papers!  Strange as it may seem, the administration
>doesn't understand why composition teachers should actually
>help students beyond the office hours assigned.  Even though
>we have patiently explained that seeing students beyond
>office hours in one-on-one tutorials, and that includes time
>spent with students via email and blackboard, are necessary
>components of our work, and the standard practice of
>composition teachers, and the recognized practice as outlined
>in the report of NCTE, they are SHOCKED, I tell you, SHOCKED,
>to discover this is a necessary practice.  Everything else we
>do shocks them as well.  Grading papers and evaluating
>problems - shocking.  Isn't there a computer program that
>just does all this, we were asked?  They don't understand why
>Blackboard is time consuming either - or in fact why
>technology complicates our jobs rather than making it all
>easier and more efficient.  In short, they don't want to give
>us parity and everything we do seems to them unnecessary.
>
>Linda, Ben, and I (with a lot of help from Katherine),
>however, remain your stalwart refusniks.  We refuse to let
>our pretty dreams of freedom be ground down by their
>jackboots.  The ways of the mighty are harsh and cruel and
>quixotic, but we refuse to write a report that doesn't DRAW
>CONCLUSIONS!  If we don't get consensus on this report, we'll
>just write our own.  It would be best, of course, if the
>entire committee voted to reduce the course load.  We need to
>finish this report before the end of the month.  Any and all
>help you could give me outlining what you do as part of your
>professional obligations as composition teachers and how long
>it takes you to do it, will be greatly appreciated.  I might
>add, that it is a given that we need to work on committees,
>keep up with our professional development, and the like, as
>part of our responsibilities.  That will all go toward some
>part of our IWC's.  What I need now is just something much
>more straightforward:  what we do and how long it takes to do
>it.  (I know, I know, I could have said all that in a two-
>line email).
>
>I know nothing can happen until after we get all our grades
>in, but I will start compiling this report right after
>Tuesday, and I expect I'll be working on it all through next
>week.  We need to be finished with all of this by June 30.
>That means I need to finish the report, send it out to all of
>you for your final ok, and then distribute to the committee,
>and then the committee has to vote on it, and the final
>committee report needs to be written.  But we will prevail!
>Remember:  this ain't no party/ this ain't no disco/this
>ain't no fooling around...
>
>Yours in solidarity,
>
>Stephanie
>
>
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