Teachings

For Mr. Nagel, Mr. Phan, Mrs. Haines, Ms. Wong, Mr. Stephens, Mr. Kwan;

for John, Evan, Eric, Sarah, Danny, Reed, Deniz, Q;

for so many others like them.

Collected from emails, notebooks, and Zoom transcriptions by Katherine.

I wanted to send a little 'digital care package' to you all.

here you go. it's a long one. don't be scared.

'We are so good at sending emails when things go wrong but often forget to send information about the good things. I am in the upper gym with [your daughter] right now watching her take the cheerleaders. You would be so proud of her calm, gentle manner with the little girls. They are listening to her and love it. She is pretty confident with them and the more she does this the more her confidence will grow. If I come up again I will try to remember to bring my camera with me.'

You all kept the class group chat alive?

see our school through fresh eyes.

Um, as I speak. I hear myself saying, I hear myself expressing my own ideas and my own thoughts, my own fears my own beliefs, my own sort of, you know,

This is very exciting and so happy

Welcome to ___! I had a good first lecture, and I hope you did too. There's another one on Wednesday at 8:30am ___, and I'm excited to see what we learn next! Please read on for a couple of quick action items. Technological and psychological bandwidth survey. Each of us is affected by our own psychological bandwidth and technological situations, and I'd like to get a sense of yours. Action item (optional): Fill out this anonymous Qualtrics survey before the beginning of Wednesday's lecture: ___

Send me a short check-in about your week. I'm going to ask everyone attending the lab to do the same each week, The goal is to do a little community-building, and for me to keep tabs on all of you (with an aim of keeping everyone happy and well). You don't have to write much if you don't want to. It shouldn't be formal. I put an example.

present to yourself. Cause books are gifts. To your brain.

Apologies for the click bait. Please find 5 mins to do this individually somewhere. If anyone says that I return work quickly, l'll know that you aren't doing this properly. Enjoy.

'Aaron. Can I pick on you for a second. Is that all right.' 'Yeah, sure.' 'What I hope is a nice way. Um, can you see why you were maybe hesitant about not being sure if this was the wrong activation'

If you have space, time, and willpower,

Hey peoples,

It's early! Have a good night. Don't go to a party. best,

the buzzing cruel vicissitudes of life,

everyone's schedules completely explodes

I'll be right with you! Just finishing an email, hold on stay there!

Make decisions and claw your way through!

I think we'll do some lying on the floor tomorrow

I'm only sort of joking.

to my deep embarrassment,

(I am okay.)

wanted to check in with you

there was a pretty amazing double rainbow this morning... and the clouds have been really great lately w the storms... probably a pretty nice sunset tonight. thanks, ___

What say you? Does this spark joy?

You know, I don't have that much to get through today. And so if people if anybody to sort of wants to vent, a little bit.

I want to make sure that we all feel that we can speak when we need to.

Fill in your own favourite silly apology from an incorrigible apologist. Then, scroll down:

Emailer's note: 'I should also add that ___ and ___ are both excellent creative writers in their own right and have pursued this craft in their universities. (They were also head boy and head girl when they were here). Do join up and participate in good dialogues about your work and writing!

How lovely to hear from you! Of course I remember you!

YAY!

Thank you for sharing. Make an office hours appointment if you want me to praise you more, or if I failed to address a question you asked me in your email.

we'll go scavenging for rooms until further notice. [shrug emoji]

Wow, some nice work! ___. To round out your search, consider: ___. Teacher moment: ___.

Regardless of whether you've given me anything before this date, I will treat the hard copy in my cold dead hands and its soft copy brethren as your draft, so feel free to make small edits here and there if you haven't looked at it recently.

Keep it up!

ii. It's handy to have a living document of this process, and though I won't mandate because you're adults, I encourage you to create a google doc and share this with me. iii. For those of you who've already shared something with me, great. It's really just for me to feel secure in the knowledge that the needle is moving. I only point to the 'panic button' not to cause panic, but to suggest that if indeed you're knee deep in bad ideas and suffer from a newfound paralysis, please feel free to send me a very specific question and I will respond when I'm sure you're not just testing to see if the button is connected to anything.

it was super interesting and the prof reminded me a bit of ___ in how he really invited discussion and went with the flow

I'm learning so much!

You may: Write a short story / Write a one-act play

Poems don't really exist until they've been read and responded too - Poetry is the encounter of the reader - and a very good poem - like a very generous poet - allows itself to be read personally :-)

Sorry - I'm sure it was frightening (for some of you) to see that your delinquent teacher had actually graded something of yours.

of the highest order, and not to be taken for granted.

Wouldn't it be grand if you guys came to class, I wasn't there, but you all just discussed ___ and came up with multiple thematic outlines and realized that my role is largely exaggerated? Of course, if you decide that you're a lone intellectual wolf, move more quickly alone, then so be it.

Is ___ reallly not worth taking if ___ isn't teaching it

i told ___ words to that effect and he said it doesn't have an effect unless the class is working with him to make the class so great. the hierarchical relationship there makes me think it's still mostly his influence

even if he thinks an idea doesn't really fit he'll really think about it and suggest ways you could change it so it works better. he never outright says no

___ is so great tho I'm so glad we have him he was like l'm always here

she's the nicest professor i've ever had at ___. favorite class

endearingly delinquent

I'm entranced

he said share with promising students, so I am!

he's a gem. genuinely want him to succeed

now I feel like I've made it as an educator :D

you've been too kind.

Thank you very much for your kind words - you absolutely made my day (I almost cried!). It is being able to impact the lives of students that makes teaching worthwhile, but being thanked and acknowledged for it is really the very loveliest thing that can happen.

I appreciate you taking care of yourself by asking for a bit more time

Enjoy, and again, I apologize if evidence of your growing proficiency feels like it'll be used for future blackmail.

my god. this woman. brilliant. ___. brilliant. ___ also brilliant.

but he's just so inspiring to be around. he has our ___ class and he makes ___ CLASS FUN. like, how even! and he's so good at engaging with students, and he's so passionate, and he explains everything so clearly, and i am just gushing now, omg, i'm still so starstruck LOL

if that class was a tv show it'd be the good place

i handed him the card i wrote and he said let's go talk outside! and he gave me a hug and said congrats and good luck and it was so nice and he looked v happy :DD

I would just be so happy

I'd love to see this succeed.

I'm also very moved by the fact that you found the class to be a positive experience.

I am not sure who had the better time -- the students, or me.

i am tattooed with the teachings of ___

Also ___'s space buns were adorable. He's like a millennial egirl i love him

___ is such a magical creature

dopest classmates ever

thanks ___ and all the TAs, couldn't have asked for a better GE over zoom - thank you for the effort you all put in

Thanks for the abundant love and support you give to one another!

It never ceases to amaze me how amazingly thoughtful, honest, and respectful

I'm insanely proud

this class was a real pleasure to teach.

infinitely grateful

I encourage you to continue

I could not have done it without

I am so proud of you all and can't wait for our celebration tomorrow!

I'm glad you got it.

Let's forget the building for a moment.

It's so weird. Like, just before I go like, I really want to thank you guys. This has been really hard.

I can't think of a better way to end than that. Think about others. You know, empathy is I think a human instinct. But, you know, like a lot of things that we do instinctively needs practice and training.

Thank you so much for being so considerate during this time, this has been a great semester

What a pleasure it was, for me,

I will miss our little group

I will miss teaching and interacting with you all next year. Keep in touch!

have a lovely day, sorry to miss you,

^^ thank you all so much :))

Folks, 'It was not so much as if they had departed this life but as if, sprayed from a hose, they were only shreds of bone, gut, and dangling tissue to which it would have been impossible ever to impute the quality of life, far less the capacity to relinquish it' (The Long March, Styron).

Apologies for being so presumptuous, but in the event that you are indeed invested for the next year, please continue reading. ___. Dust off your favorite excuse; otherwise, we'll see you then.

And so the cycle goes. We do our utmost to humanize these moments of tribulation and the fourteen-year journey that lies between.

Warmly,

I'm just grateful

And thank you for this,

Thank you for putting in the time to make this worthwhile.