Year-End Review

In all my disconnected babbling yesterday I forgot to mention my year-end review. The summary is that it went well, very well. In fact, not a single negative comment was made. I went in and sat at the table with the graduate faculty members and one of them said, "So, *A*, this meeting is just so we can hear how you've felt about the year and talk about how you're doing and answer any questions that you have," and I sat there for a second and then said, "Here's my question: Why don't you tell me how I'm doing? Because I know what I think about my year but I'd like to know how YOU think I'm doing." And everyone laughed at me and then basically told me that I'm doing well. I'm apparently coming up with interesting research questions (seriously?), I'm good at critical analysis of the material we deal with in our courses, blah, blah, blah. They congratulated me on my conference work but didn't say anything more about it, which I think means I hit the right balance (apparently the professors here are notorious for either pressuring people to do more conferencing or telling them that they're stretching themselves too thin, so since nobody said either of those things to me I'm guessing two to three conferences in a year is what I should keep aiming for).
Then they asked me what my plans are for courses next year and we talked about that for a bit. And then I finally got to find out what my assistantship is for next year. The conversation went something like this:
Me: I haven't registered for any classes yet, though, since I don't know what my assistantship is for next semester and I don't want to schedule a class for a time when I might have to be teaching.
Dr. AMP: Actually, you're going to have a flexible assistantship next semester, so sign up for whatever you want to take.
Me: What am I doing?
Dr. AMP: We're putting you on Special Projects.
[And then I suppose I must have made a confused/worried face because everyone immediately jumped into the conversation]
Dr. Hyper: This is in no way a reflection on your teaching!
Dr. AMP: Oh, no, no, no.
Dr. New: You're great in the classroom. Really, *A*, we're very happy with your work in the intro class.
Dr. Hyper: We'll most likely put you back in a classroom in your third year because we do want you to keep getting that experience. But this year we need you to help us out with other things.
Me: Okay...So what exactly does "Special Projects" mean? And who am I going to be working for?
Turns out that I'll actually have two 10 hour assistantships next year (as opposed to the single 20 hour one I have right now). 10 hours of it involves working the reception desk in the department office, which sounds kind of lame but is totally fine with me. One of my good friends works that job right now, and a lot of times when I stop by the office she's doing her own schoolwork. So basically I think I'll have to answer the phone and do some e-mailing and filing and stuff, but I should also have a fair amount of time to do my own reading. The only downside will be that I'll probably still have to be on campus by 9 AM a few mornings a week. The other half of the assistantship sounds more interesting. Apparently I will be assisting Dr. AMP in doing research for some new programs that the department wants to start. I'm a little unclear on what exactly this will entail, but Dr. Hyper mentioned that part of the reason they put me on the job is that I'm a strong writer and they me to help with writing grants. Which, again, sounds kind of boring, but I actually think it will be really helpful in the long run. Assuming I ever get to a point in my life where I'm not a student, I'm going to be spending a lot of time writing grants for any projects I want to do, so it will be really nice to get some hands-on experience doing this now.
So that's the basics. There are two other things that were mentioned, though, that puzzle me a little. The first is that Dr. AMP said, "Oh, and just so you know, we are also thinking of you as a back-up TA, so you need to be prepared to step into a class if something happens." I don't know what to make of this. True, we did have a situation this year where someone left in December who was supposed to be here all year, and they did have to shuffle a couple of people's jobs around and give someone on probation his job back just because they suddenly needed another instructor. So maybe they're just trying to avoid the whole "Surprise, you're teaching a class now!" situation by warning me in advance that there's a possibility that that could happen again. But it seems a bit weird to already be anticipating losing someone at some point next year, so I'm wondering who it is that's inching close to the chopping block. (Or maybe I'm being negative and they're just concerned that some of the incoming students who have TAships may not end up showing up in the fall after all) The other thing is that Dr. Hyper also mentioned that the nice thing about my not having to teach and grade is that I should have more time for doing my own work and hopefully getting some articles ready for publication. Which I think is sort of a subtle way of saying, "You need to publish something next year." And while it's flattering that they seem to think that I'm capable of creating something worthy of publication in a journal, I can't help but feel that they're overestimating my capabilities (both in terms of publishing my own work and in terms of my being able to create useful documents as part of my assistantship).
Basically, I'm happy with my assignment for next year. Assuming that I don't get put into the classroom after all (which I suppose is a pretty good possibility or they wouldn't have mentioned it), I'll have an entire year without having to do course prep or grading, which will be really, REALLY nice. And hopefully I'll learn some interesting things. But I can also see how an assignment this "flexible" could rapidly turn into a situation where a lot of work and responsibility is getting piled onto me. At least with a class there are definite times when you have to be there and a fairly set amount of work each week (unless you're grading midterms or papers, when the workload gets substantially higher for a week or so at a time). But with something like this, things could easily get out of hand. I think I'm just going to have to be really good about actually monitoring how much I'm working each week and pointing out if its turning into an unfair situation.
The nice thing, though, is that I think this assignment shows that they have a good amount of faith in my writing and research abilities. And that's really exciting. Because frankly, I already know that I'm a good teacher. Not that there aren't a lot of things I could improve on, and not that I don't have moments where I feel like I'm bumbling around in front of my students like an idiot, but in general I'm reasonably confident about my teaching skills. But this assignment gives me some affirmation about my writing and research skills as well, and that's the sort of confidence boost I need because I'm still not firmly convinced that I actually create decent research.

Anyway, I have to go clean my apartment and get ready for the concert tonight. Bye!

P.S.-My throat is feeling a lot better, but the lymph nodes are still sore. Just in case you were curious, which I highly doubt you were.