One good thing

I wonder if I have perhaps been sent a better class this fall, to make up for the troublesome class (the one with Entitlement Boy) over the summer.

It's the planning-stage time for their independent projects, and I've had more people come to me with good ideas this semester. (And fewer come in and throw up their hands and say, "I don't know what to do" and when I ask them what in ecology interests them, they shrug and say "I don't know...I can't think of anything.")

Some of the projects have been unusual. One person wants to do community surveys of shelf fungi in a couple different forests (I have never had anyone propose a fungus project before; most people at this level seem distinctly uninterested in fungi, unless you're talking about them as a pizza topping). Another one proposed a project that is probably too complex for the level of equipment and analysis we can do here (too bad, because it was a really good one) involving looking at a disjunct population of insects. And a couple other people have approached me with, "I've collected these data as sort of a side project on this other project I'm doing, could I analyze them and write them up for this class?" As long as they're not double-dipping (and in both cases this semester, they aren't), I'm happy to do that: they have a project already underway!

Also, they seem in general to have better attendance (though that might change; often as the semester rolls on attendance declines. I'm actually considering, next semester, doing a penalty of five points for every unexcused absence over, say, 4 absences. I hate doing it but I'm beginning to think I hate doing exam reviews to the six or seven students who are earning As anyway more. And I hate showing up on a Friday morning and finding only the high-dedication people there.) And they discuss more, and they seem to be better about answering my questions. (Though that may be only because I threatened to call on people randomly if no one answers.)

And I have a TA. He's actually IN the class, but that's no biggie, I don't have the TA grade anyway. And he's very responsible, so it's nice (for a change) to be able to give someone a list of "I'd like you to do these things to prep for lab" and then show up and find all the things ready to go. It's funny how important that is and yet how small it seems to write it out. It's very helpful to have a good lab-prep person.