📓 College English and the Pandemic: Thoughts

This year was quite an intense one; I got engaged, graduated with my MA, moved across the state, lost multiple pets and family members, welcomed new pets into my home, began my PhD, and started teaching again, completely online. I'll be the first to tell you that it's not ideal (the entire year, of course, but here I just mean teaching and learning fully online) but that complaint is coming from an incredibly privileged position. Not only did I not lose my admission offer, but I kept my role as instructor and am still working, so it's not all bad, I know. But there is of course a big loss; the first year of a program this important is not meant to be behind a screen, where I hardly meet anyone, know anyone; where my students get to see me twice via a video chat all semester, where I don't get to discuss with them as a group and learn from them, getting instant feedback; it's all asynchronous, which is becoming a word synonymous with impersonal. 

I am trying, though to make it work--and some days I feel like I'm doing a good job, and some days I feel like I'm not. It's been hard for me as both a student and teacher, trying to balance those roles while also learning new modalities for handling them, but I can't imagine how much harder it's been for my students. College English is a tough class as is; not because the material is hard (I intentionally make it as accessible as possible) but because most students don't wish to be there. You have to not just teach them, but you have to make them want to learn; not every student wakes up motivated to write research papers (I know I don't). It's hard to engage a student at any level, and it's even tougher when it's all digital. So for the first time in awhile, I felt myself being exactly in my students' shoes: starting a new program, all online despite being told we'd be in person, and everything just feels off, icky, and tough all semester. 

And then I get an email like this one, and everything changes: "Hello Professor Ozias, I apologize for last week. I had a hard week and couldn't communicate well about your feedback for my project. Thank you for your feedback about all the assignments. You challenged me to get out of my comfort zone and learn more, while at the same time offering compassion and kindness when the world is turned upside down. I appreciate you doing everything and keeping us motivated throughout the semester. I'm glad I took this course with you. Thank you!"

The challenge may be tough, but we're all in it together. After I received this email I knew it was all worth it--it just makes the victory of completing the semester all the more impactful. And as I wrap up grading my students' work and finishing up my own, I can't help but be excited for the next year, and what normalcy, or hell, even abnormalcy, it may bring us, because whatever the pandemic, school, and the world throws at us, we know for sure we can handle it now.