Finally figured out what I’m doing this summer. I’ll be getting a little less than 2 months’ worth of pay (compared to normal monthly paychecks during the last school year) for the 3 months of summer. (Which is good; it’s more than I expected to earn through departmental support this summer.) I was originally scheduled to work only the first 5-week summer session. Then, when the official schedule came out, I was scheduled to work 7-11AM Monday-Thursday for all 10 weeks of summer in the math tutoring center. However, my final assignment ended up being only for the first summer session (the first 5 weeks of summer, and we just finished week one). I’ll be grading all the homework for an undergrad differential equations class. It’s nice because I can do it on my own time, instead of being scheduled for a certain shift. Plus, I really like grading. But it’s a little scary, because I only took undergrad diff eq myself a little over a year ago (spring 2010), so I’m not an expert. So, I have to be really careful when creating my grading keys that I don’t make mistakes and punish students who did the problem correctly. I’m given the final answers for the problems out of the book, but not complete solutions, so I have to understand how to do the problems to be able to issue partial credit. Plus, some of the assignments are custom-written by the instructor, so I REALLY have to know what I’m doing there, since he’s not making an answer key for those. It’ll be an interesting summer. I’ve already finished grading one assignment, though, and that went really well.
The biggest advantage of this arrangement is that I don’t have to work at all the second half of summer (basically after the week of the 4th of July). This means I’ll have 5-6 weeks of intensive studying for the algebra qualifying exam with no other commitments. My plan is to have all of my notes from both years of algebra completely typed up (I’m about halfway done with this already) AND to have already read all of the notes my professor posted online this past year AND to have started going through exercises (from the online notes, and from previous qualifying exams) by the time the first summer session is over. That way, during the second half of summer, I can focus completely on just doing practice problems and collaborating with others who are studying to help them with problems they can’t get and get help with problems I can’t get. It’s going to be a lot of work but honestly, I’d rather push myself completely to my limits in the next 9-10 weeks and then have something to show for it (a passed qualifying exam) than do some half-assed, hurried studying and fail and then have to make up for lost ground. The quals are altogether a terrifying process, but I’m cautiously optimistic…
In other news, the rest of my summer goals are going quite well. I’ve been making almost-regular visits to the gym, and I’m already on my third book of recreational reading. I’ve also worked my way into season 3 of Bones on Netflix. There’s a lot going on socially this weekend, but I think I may have to pass on some of the festivities so that I can scratch some things off my to-do list and make some progress on my algebra studying. In addition to my extensive math to-do list, as described above, I also want to go through my apartment and do some cleaning – throwing out things I know I don’t need and donating some clothes to charity that I don’t wear anymore. I bought a lot of new clothes while I was in Pennsylvania last month, so my dresser is overflowing again.
As crazy & busy as my summer will be, I’m really enjoying it. I love Texas in general, and the town I live in, and the people I associate with. I can’t imagine my life unfolding in any other way. 🙂
Oh, and while I don’t anticipate any vacationing or travelling for the rest of the summer, I am looking forward to planning some trips for the fall & winter of next year. (1-2 trips home, and maybe a Christmas vacation destination!) So, whenever I get tired of the day-to-day here, I am researching flight costs and trip itineraries for 5-7 months in the future. Never a dull moment!
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