Teachers Are the New Essential Workers

 Me to Student #1: Um, tell your roommate that everyone can see him right now, or at least tell him to put on a shirt. And pants. 

Student's roommate: Nah, it's cool! I'm wearing boxers. Hellooo, ladies. (Several female students in my class giggle.)

Student #1: I'm turning off my webcam now.

Student #2: I can't come to class today. My roommate just got infected with the virus and now I have it too.

Student #3: I can't turn in my paper tomorrow. I just tested positive for the virus. I don't know what happened. I mean, I did go to a party last weekend, but there were only, like, thirty people there.

Student #4: I don't have the virus, but this whole pandemic has made me really stressed out. I can't come to the live class sessions on Zoom anymore, but can you just email me everything I missed? 

Me: Excuse me for a moment. (Turns off webcam, mutes microphone, screams into pillow, and then turns everything back on.) No.

Before the fall semester started, I sent my syllabi for the classes I was teaching to my bosses. It was the same syllabi that I'd used last year, and they'd approved it. But since I am teaching my classes on Zoom this semester, my syllabi came back with many "suggestions" (translation: change this or we will point at you during the next faculty meeting on Zoom and yell, "SHAME"). They said that I shouldn't have every class be a live class; they told all the faculty that at least one class a week should be "asynchronous", meaning instead of teaching it on Zoom, we should provide recordings of ourselves teaching, post notes online, assign short writing assignments or group activities, etc.

On the one hand, I understand why they wanted us to make these changes. But when I revised my syllabus, I looked at my syllabus and realized that I was basically teaching THEIR class, not mine. One thing I always liked about college teaching was that although all the faculty had basic requirements to meet, such as assigning a certain number of pages or revisions for the students to write, teaching them certain skills, and so forth, it was up to us to decide what to include in our classes and how to teach them. But this time, it was all up to my bosses, and I couldn't help resenting that.

Also, the problem with all that asynchronous content is that it creates a lot more work for me to do and grade. I've been spending so much time at my computer that sometimes I have to take a break and lie down on my bed for a few minutes to rest my eyes. 

At the college where I teach, the students are allowed to live on campus (although some of them chose to remain at home and attend classes online), but most of their classes are online. They get tested regularly and the college keeps a close watch on their movements. The campus police has been patrolling the dorms to make sure they don't have parties, but trying to prevent undergrads from partying is like trying to prevent Donald Trump from Tweeting (and can I just say, "HALLELUJAH!" that he was not reelected! I was so nervous while I was watching for results of the election. It was like watching the end of a horror movie, where you're on the edge of your seat wondering if the villain will win and destroy everyone.).

At a faculty meeting on Zoom before classes started, one of my bosses said, "We need to be more lenient with the students this semester. They've been going through a hard time, so they should not be penalized as much for late work or absences."

The problem is that when the students turn in their work late, I end up staying up late to grade all the late work that are turned in several days after I finish grading all the other assignments. When students don't show up for the live sessions (and it's not always due to the virus because a lot of them will email me and say they overslept or that they "forgot" what time the class started), they bombard my inbox with emails or request extra appointments outside of the regular office hours that I hold on Zoom. And since they know I'm working from home, they expect me to be available to talk to them online whenever they need help.

Student #5: Do you have any office hours on Saturday? 

Me: I don't hold office hours on Saturday. 

Student #5: Oh. How about Sunday then? 

Me: No. 

Student: Well, do you have any openings for tonight, like at 11 P.M.? 

Me: Excuse me for a minute. (Turns off camera, mutes microphone, and takes an aspirin. Seriously considers giving up my stance as a teetotaler because I could really use a drink right now. Turns camera back on.) No. 

It's also been harder to track down the students who don't turn in their work at all. When I taught on campus, I could talk to them after class. But when they don't turn in their work, I can try to send them a private DM asking them to stay after the Zoom session ends so I can talk to them, or I can email them. What usually happens is that they ignore my emails and log out before I can talk to them. My boss conceded that if these students try to dump all their work on me at the end of the semester, I can at least say no to that.

My bosses also told me not to make the students turn on their webcams, which means that during many of the live sessions, I'm often the only one with a webcam turned on and I'm literally speaking to a bunch of black boxes with students' names on them. It's disheartening, to say the least. It's also hard to tell if the students are actually paying attention or if they're just surfing the Internet or napping during my class. Based on the emails I've gotten where they repeatedly ask questions about things I already covered during my lectures, I'd say it's the latter a lot of the time.

I understand that the students are going through a difficult time. This is not the college experience they signed up for. And that's why I've set aside extra office hours (but NOT on weekends or at night) and given out many extensions to help them. 

But teachers are going through a hard time too, and we don't get extensions or extra accommodations. The government has deemed us "essential workers" now, so we're expected to basically suck it up and do our jobs. I might be required to teach on campus again in the near future, and I'm afraid to do that unless my department is willing to give me the money to buy a Hazmat suit. It's bad enough that the students used to give me the flu every year, partly because some of them would accidentally sneeze on their papers and then hand it to me. (That's one of the reasons that I now require them to submit their work online instead.)

I know it could be worse. My college professor friends in Small Town said that they have to teach on Zoom and in person at the same time, meaning they teach on campus but have to stay within sight of their webcams so that other students can attend class online. They also have to wear masks the whole time. 

And there are a few perks to working from home. I don't have to wear the mask. I can wear jeans and forgo uncomfortable dress shoes when I'm teaching because my students can only see me from the waist up when I'm sitting in front of the computer. 

And I am grateful to still have my college teaching job and my website job, especially since so many people have lost theirs. But sometimes, I find myself reverting back to the full-fledged workaholic that I used to be, where I do little else but work, eat, sleep, and scream into my pillow. I find myself feeling easily irritated more often now, and I've been stress eating again (I just can't say no to you, doughnuts.). That's also why I haven't been blogging; I literally have not had time.

I know that this is my job, and I really do have to suck it up, at least for now. And I am willing to help the students, and I have. But I can't help wishing that teachers could get more than just a "We appreciate teachers" Tweet, or at least that more people (like our bosses, for example) would acknowledge that by forcing us to accommodate the students in practically every way, we're being forced to work so many more hours with no accommodations of our own.

Sorry. I have to order some new pillows. I may or may not have ripped my old one to shreds.

What about you? Are you an essential worker? Even if you're not an essential worker, what has it been like for you at work now that things have been reopening? 

Throwaway Teacher

A couple months ago, Small Town Guy proposed a Zoom meetup for everyone in our social circle since we were all still living under the shelter in place order. I'd kept in touch with Small Town Guy and my other friends in Small Town through Facebook and texting, but I hadn't actually seen any of them since I moved to College Town three years ago.

The first time we all talked on Zoom, we ended up talking for more than three hours. It was wonderful to see all of them again and hear about their lives, as well as tell them about my life here in College Town. Small Town Guy is now living with his girlfriend. When I saw him on screen, I thought of how just a few years ago I thought I was head over heels for him, but whatever I felt for him paled in comparison to what I felt for the Model. Nevertheless, I couldn't help feeling a small pang when I saw him with his girlfriend in the house they share. I thought that if he had felt the same way about me back then, I might have suffered a lot less heartache than what I went through with the Model, especially because even though Small Town Guy has his flaws, he's not a narcissistic sociopath like the Model is. On paper, Small Town Guy was almost perfect for me (whereas the Model was wrong for me in pretty much every way), but he just wasn't that into me.

We all had such a good time talking to each other on Zoom that we arranged more Zoom meetups. But the most recent one ended badly, at least for me. I want to preface this by saying that I actually liked Small Town Guy's girlfriend because she was a nice person and I'd never had a conflict with her before. The Girlfriend, who is a tenured professor at the college where I used to teach in Small Town (though unlike me, she does not teach English classes because she works for a different department), kept talking about an award she'd won for her research.

Then we started talking about the classes we were teaching. I mentioned how a few of my students were not doing their assignments in the freshman composition classes I was teaching, and the Girlfriend said, "Well, that's because it's a throwaway class that no one cares about."

And that's was the moment that I wished that I was with her in person, so that I could do THIS:



via GIPHY

I didn't say anything right away, but through the webcam I could see my facial expression change from a cheerful smile to something more like this:



via GIPHY

I didn't say anything for a long time, until someone else commented that I was being really quiet. Finally, I spoke up: "You know, I don't think that the General Education classes that I teach are 'throwaway classes'. I think that they're important too."

The Girlfriend quickly said, "Oh, I wasn't talking about your classes." But she knows that as an untenured faculty member, the only classes that I am literally allowed to teach are General Education classes, like freshman composition and lower-level literature classes, whereas as a tenured professor, she gets to teach advanced classes and graduate seminars.

Small Town Guy did not say much either. He stayed out of the conversation and got down on the floor to play with their dog, maybe so he wouldn't have to look me in the eye or witness the smoke coming out of my ears.

I told them that I had to go and I logged out of the conversation. But here's what I wanted to say to the Girlfriend and to the others, many of whom were also tenured professors: "I'm not like you. I'm not on the tenure track. I most likely never will be. I admit that I envy you. But I don't resent your success because you earned it. But I work hard too, and I'm a good teacher. Yet no one will ever recognize the value of my work like they do yours just because I'm not a tenured professor. I'm not even eligible for more than half the awards that you've won because I'm untenured. Untenured faculty like me teach bigger classes and have heavier courseloads so that tenured professors like you can teach fewer, smaller classes that are related to your pet projects.

"Yes, it's true that most of the students don't want to take GenEd classes. But there's a reason that the classes I teach, unlike the classes YOU teach, are required for almost every college student in the country. The skills and knowledge I teach, like writing, are essential in college AND the workplace. I'm not saying that your classes aren't important too, but I AM saying that my classes are not 'throwaways' either.

"The reason some students ask for extensions isn't always because they view my classes as throwaways that they don't care about, as you so thoughtlessly put it. It's because they spend at least 6-7 hours a day on their phones and 1-2 hours a day on their homework. Then the deadlines start piling up and they panic and ask me for extensions. But not all of my students are like that. Some of them show me several pages of notes and outlines they wrote for a five-page paper. They want to do well and are willing to work hard.

"I know you didn't mean to insult me. But you did. And I need you to understand where I'm coming from, so that you'll understand why it's not okay to say crap like that."

But I didn't say that. I wish I had. It made me think of the pandemic and how although millions of people were furloughed or lost their jobs, others were classified as "essential" workers and were able to keep working. It made me wonder about the value people place on certain jobs and how it must have affected the people who weren't classified as "essential", even though their work was important too.

It also made me think of how that conversation, as well as the Girlfriend's attitude, was indicative of the hierarchical nature of academia. It's a world where there are way too many people with PhDs and not enough jobs, so we all have to do whatever we can to succeed. It's so competitive that it's cutthroat. And there's definitely a wide gap between the tenured faculty and untenured faculty because of the disparity in how we're treated and paid. But it's also a world that I chose to work and live in, so it's just something that I have to deal with.

But the next time they organize a Zoom meetup, I'm going to say that I can't join in. I'll just say something like, "Oh, I can't. I have to replenish my voodoo doll collection so that I can cast a curse on someone tonight, one that will hopefully cause them to have nightmares that make them wake up screaming or one that will cause their hair to turn into the snakes that adorned Medusa's head. But have fun on Zoom!"

I'm not saying I'll never talk to them again because I will. But I think it's best if I not participate in the next Zoom meetup because what the Girlfriend said still bothers me, and I don't want to lash out at her or any of the others.

What about you? Do you deal with competitive or condescending people in your line of work? Are you an essential worker, and if so, what has it been like for you?