I'd Like a Little Ketchup for My Crow, Please

Because, after all my bitching and moaning in the previous post, our portfolio exchanges were actually rather satisfying. I attribute this to the participants; the majority of the full-time faculty weren't there, and truth be told, those of us with full-time status are the contentious ones. The part-time faculty come to talk about teaching in a productive, non-politicized way and without the baggage and agendas that the full-timers carry. It's amazing how the tenor can change when part-timers outnumber full-timers in a meeting. They are a great bunch of people, and I appreciate their commitment to a job that asks way too much of them and gives back way too little.

Because I'm going to be serving as the writing program coordinator next semester, I floated out a few ideas at one of the exchanges (we had separate meetings for basic and freshman comp), including having our in-class essay be a meta-cognitive piece on the student's portfolio and writing process rather than the sort of classic academic essay it currently is. That idea seemed interesting to a few people. I would do away with the in-class piece entirely given my druthers, but many of the other teachers feel some demonstration of on-the-spot writing is necessary, so a meta-text related to the portfolio is something I could live with.

Now, I just have to finish reading and grading my own portfolios. And then there's that Christmas shopping thing. . .