I spent my day listening to interesting ruminations and exclamations on the direction of our department.

It was a very exciting experience… for those valid members of our department who are full time and who are actually considered as mandatory to our growth and development in the many directions our Director would like to go.

Adjuncts, however, were only mentioned in “The Spirit of Inclusion.” That means we’re not required to be in on any of these progressive committees, these pow-wows about the department and how we can up our count of majors… we’re not even really wanted there, but the Spirit of Inclusion says we’re welcome to come by! You won’t be kicked into the gutter like a dog, guys! COME ON IN. /eyeroll

Yeah. It was fairly frustrating to feel utterly useless for several hours of my day, and like I’m not accomplishing anything academically. I’m not publishing academic papers, I’m not doing research projects on pedagogy, I’m not getting my short stories in the America’s Best Short Stories collections like one of our full time coworkers… I’m doing fucking NOTHING and it made me feel like shit all day.

Our afternoon session was helpful, as it was directed at all of us adjuncts and aimed towards ways of more efficient teaching. A lot of twists and turns that will help us not frazzle out by October, which is great. But I just… still feel like shit. And I don’t know how to go about fixing that.

I won’t be taking a class this semester, as none of the ones I KNOW I need (about 2 or 3) are offered now (they’re just summer courses, oddly enough)… and the ones I could take I might already have satisfied within my undergraduate degree. So my goal this semester is to get myself analyzed by the DoE… and to put in an application for the phD program at a nearby college. Yeah, I’ve talked about doing this before. Yeah, I backed out of applying before. But honestly? I don’t know where I should go or what I should do. Sacrificing 60 bucks for the application fee to have a chance at a stipend job and a terminal degree…? Sounds reasonable to me. So we’ll see how that goes.

I’m just struggling with issues of academic excellence right now. I don’t feel like I have it at all, and if I don’t have that… what do I have?