From my course blog.
The new semester starts on Monday at both places I’m teaching this semester: the University of Massachusetts Lowell and Endicott College. As such, I’ve had to update my syllabi. Among other things, I’ve adopted the newest (second) editions of both the textbook and reader I use in my Introductory Sociology classes. It’s funny that one of my friends recently asked “How do you keep it fresh?” Well, that’s one way. It wasn’t exactly a “rototill,” but the updates were substantial enough to give me pause. I’ll leave rototilling to my upper level course. I’ve just become aware of a textbook I may want to adopt for that, replacing the current aging entries. They’re not bad books, it’s just that a lot has happened since they were published, and they haven’t been updated.
But this is but one of the biannual rituals of teaching. Others include closing out incomplete grades from the previous semester, and I have had a few of those. So no, I haven’t really been “off” this week. While it’s been a slower pace than when I’m teaching four or more courses, I have had a single-pointed focus that has not been leisure.
I can think of no better way to observe this ritual than with an internet meme, courtesy of the free meme generator app I got from the Mac App Store.
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![LOWELL — A group of UMass Lowell professors who are upset with the financial package of former President Jack Wilson will protest the deal at a rally at the UMass Inn & Conference Center tomorrow.
The protest is being organized by adjunct professors at the university, who say Wilson’s deal is out of whack with their salaries, which they say have not been increased in a decade.
Wilson is receiving his $425,000 annual presidential salary during a year’s sabbatical, and will be paid $261,000, nearly triple the senior faculty average, when he begins teaching at UMass Lowell later this year.
Nural Aman, an adjunct economics professor at UMass Lowell, called Wilson’s deal “an insult to the parents, student and faculty” at the university.
“Parents are struggling to send their children to college,” wrote Aman, in a letter to The Sun. “Students are working longer hours than ever to pay for ever-increasing tuition and fees.”
Aman, who is also a full-time professor at UMass Boston, said the university’s adjunct professors make $3,500 to $4,500 per course, with no benefits or job security. He said the university’s administration should not be “permitted to run the university like a third-world sweat shop” by denying raises to adjunct faculty, while doling out “excessive bonus paychecks” to Wilson.
“(UMass Lowell) is our university, a state institution paid for with our taxes and established to serve us, the citizens of the commonwealth,” wrote Aman. “It is time to call the administration to task.”
Aman expects about 15 to 20 people to show up at the rally, which was scheduled to coincide with the university’s Online and Continuing Education open house. He said the demonstrators will pass out leaflets between 3 p.m. and 7 p.m., detailing their gripes to students and their parents.
A UMass Lowell spokesperson did not return a call seeking comment.
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(via UMass salary spurs Lowell protest - Lowell Sun Online)](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lxyeo6yz841qaoramo1_400.jpg)
