Syllabus blues

The first week or so of the semester, I'm always bogged down with administrative stuff and basically righting wrongs like Batman. So far this semester, I've had to:

• Email about 50 students trying to get into my courses. I'm not exaggerating. It's ridiculously common this semester due to increases in student acceptance rate and decreases in available funds. Also, students seem to think I'm magic or a schmuck and can/will let them into my course without the resources to do so (in this case, primarily desks).
  
• Constantly update my lists of students in my class. This changes daily, often hourly, depending on students' moods, their awesome distaste for me, their own shifting schedules, etc. Since I used Excel sheets to track my students' progress, I have to update those sheets regularly until the enrollment settles down.
  
• Change the room for one of my classes. After a history professor did the thing I was just talking about, he ended up with a group of students too big to fit his classroom, so he requested mine. I obliged. But this butterfly effected a second history professor because I'm teaching 75-minute classes on Monday/Wednesdays while they both teach 50-minute classes on Monday/Wednesday/Fridays. The end result is that I now teach in a classroom that has a map of South America hanging in it. (It might be North America; I can't remember right now.)
  
• Correct a book order that I already corrected then double-checked on but was still wrong. After I took over one course from an instructor who lightened her load, I tried to electronically change the book order to what I wanted instead of what she wanted. Evidently this failed. Then, after receiving an email reminding us to check our book orders over the summer, I attempted to email the bookstore to verify the change. I never heard back and didn't follow up. So, my students were confused and probably disappointed to learn that we weren't using the book that the bookstore had listed. It's since been fixed, but it was a concern.
  
• Finally get a faculty ID card. I'd gone the last year or so without one. Now, I understand, I can get my well-deserved discount at J. Crew.
  

On top of that, I bought a new laptop yesterday (just in time for my fantasy football draft) because mine was being especially squirrely of late, at least in part because the Ethernet port, which I never use, seems to have failed – perhaps overheated. Customizing this new laptop and getting all of my programs to work correctly, particularly email, is time-consuming, if not downright frustrating.

There's also a building list of to-dos, including renewing my parking pass, turning in my "conflict of interest" form, posting my syllabi to my department's website, etc.

But, despite these often menial tasks, I still prefer this moment of the semester to any other moment when I'd have essays piled up, waiting to be graded.

Quote of the Week:

The announcer's call for the final stretch of this race was good enough to make SportsCenter's "Top 10" because it's pretty fantastic.