'You at the back, Pay attention'
Well today is official start day of the new academic year and college has started in typical chaos.
For all those in the education profession that happen to read my irregular rants I am sure you can sympathise with events of today....
1) Chris arrives promptly in building at 8.00am to be handed a list of 'jobs' by Head of Chemistry. Chris looks at list and inquires why we need OHP bulbs when we now have overhead data projectors to be informed the IT dept over the weekend 'fixed' them and some of them don't work... A pile of photocopying but I have no new card for the machines as they haven't been produced. And all the posters need collecting from reprographics who haven't done them, great start.
2) Drink cup of tea while ordering OHP bulbs in 5min flat before I have to help hand out student timetables...
3) Students arrive en masse find that approx 50% of students have no timetable or an incomplete one and this is after our admin dept being in all weekend. Also no set lists for classes produced...
4) Decide to have a proper breakfast as I think I'm going to be doing a lot of running around today.......
5) Discover after first class data projectors in all rooms no longer working after the IT dept installed 'screen splitters', this is getting silly now, especially as we can't even resort to good old fashioned blackboards as we no longer have them.....
6) Drink coffee, listening to mass of teacher complaints and retire to the prep room to sort next weeks lessons....
7) gurgle, sneaky proper breakfast now repeating on me, I think the canteen staff were rushing too, thought my sausages looked a little undercooked.....
8) Ah respite, or so I thought lunch break turns into frantic explain the book issue lists to all staff members. And they pay these people to educate young minds how difficult is it to understand a list consisting of name, book number, tutor group and signature?.
9) Ah the afternoon, the absence of chemistry paperwork I 'blame' on the new chemistry lecturer. This is a slight untruth but all the paperwork is copied and on a clearly marked shelf in the prep room adjacent to the lab, is it too much to ask a lecturer to lift a box occasionally if they need the paperwork for their class?. Anymore moaning about paperwork and I will 'helpfully point out I am a science tech not the photocopy/tea boy.....
10) Slowly getting to grips with the now retired chem techs's storage and filing system. I really dread to think why all the biology 'chemicals' where stored in an area where it's apparent conc Hydrochloric fumes are escaping and effecting all and sundry and careful examination of some of the labels clearly state to be stored in fridge. Oh well loads of new chemicals to order, should have checked this in the summer....... But was assured all chemicals needed had been ordered. I just sort of assumed they would be stored correctly!.
11) Daydreaming about life as cryptozoologist. Coming to think of it I'm sure some of the new student intake could be considered 'unique so far undiscovered wildlife'.... Though I'll let the punk girl in the 2nd year physics group off as I had spiky red hair worse than that in my youth....
12) Fiddle, had to re-design an experiment for diffusion as all the 'rolls' of indicator paper of which I had 4 where all nearly empty. I wish the previous tech had finished rolls before starting another.... Oh well plenty of strips so lots of sticky tape and a glass rod in the tube should do the trick....
