A few days ago, I mentioned to someone that I’m a professor. “That’s so cool,” she said. “I always wanted to be a teacher.” I pointed out that she already is. She teaches Sunday…
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I’ve been teaching since I was 22 years old. In the 1980’s, when I started my teaching career, there was very little training offered to graduate students in English before we were put in…
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Is it only women who find themselves being asked “How do you do it all?” Generally speaking, the answer to that question is yes. I know for a fact that no one ever asked…
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I never know what to tell people when they ask “What do you do for a living?” Saying I teach English always leads to the question of what grade I teach. When I clarify…
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When I was in graduate school, I had a classmate who was an excellent poet. She won the departmental award for poetry writing at the end of her first year, beating out even the…
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I’ve been working since I was 16 years old. I’ve done everything from being a fast food cashier to managing warehouse shipments to my current job as an English professor. So, needless to say,…
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Last week, one of my colleagues announced that he’s leaving his position at the university where we both teach. The announcement took me by surprise, not only because I can’t imagine the university without…