On Friday, March 13 (ugh, Friday the 13th) at 12:33am, the University of Alberta sent out an email announcing that classes would be “temporarily suspended” that day. After fiddling with the setup of my mic--it did not like one of my USB ports--I recorded and posted a lecture video to YouTube in time for my regularly scheduled behaviour modification class. I was off and running. And it feels like I’ve been running ever since. On the morning of Saturday, March 14, the inevitable happened and classes were moved to emergency remote delivery. And that’s where we are today, a year later.
Looking back, here are some numbers that summarize my past year:
- lecture videos recorded: over 300
- emails handled/received/sent: ~9,600 (Probably over 10,000 if you include automated notifications about meetings, exams, etc. That's more than two dozen emails a day, on average.)
- Zoom meetings, seminars, and webinars attended: ??? (A lot. Really, really, a lot. I don’t even want to know how many. Got pretty familiar with all the video meeting software: Zoom, Google Meet, Skype, Webex, Facetime...)
- major awards won: 1 (William Hardy Alexander Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching, 2020)
- awards that I nominated someone else for: 1 (my colleague Dr Jennifer Passey, who won the 2020 Remote Teaching Award)
- professional haircuts: 0
- haircuts by my wife (who is not a trained barber): like, 10? (I am NOT complaining. I think it’s amazing that in addition to being a physician, wife, and mother, she can also cut my hair so I look like a normal person.)
- things ordered online: around 100 (Not all from Amazon. I ordered most things from local businesses online that I picked up in-store or curbside. I try to buy local first if I can to support local businesses.
- online orders gone wrong: at least 5 (Just about everything that could go wrong did, with one exception: to my knowledge, no porch pirates stole any of my packages.)
Although I did pop in to my office a couple of times last spring, that was apparently prohibited (oops) so I have not returned in 11 months. There are no plants in my office, and on my last visit, I took home any perishable food. The last thing I want to see when I eventually return to my office is some infestation, like sentient plants, or sentient chocolate bars--or sentient plants that have survived by eating sentient chocolate bars. (Don’t laugh--I once had a mouse in my office.)
In the Before Times, I had a certain routine. I liked my routine; everything was...predictable. When the pandemic hit, that routine went out the window. Although we never had a true “lockdown” (just various restrictions), life was turned upside down. What to do but make a new routine:
- get up and make coffee (priorities, people!)
- get my kids up for online school
- shave, personal hygiene, etc. (It’s important--it makes you feel like an actual person. In the short term it depletes your willpower, but in the long run it builds it up.)
- get dressed: no sweatpants, no pajamas, no underwear-only days--ever! (Again, doing things like getting dressed signal that things are happening; it gives you some purpose.) On the other hand, I don’t wear ties anymore. (Ok, just on special occasions.)
- get to work: check email first for fires that have to be put out, and disasters that have erupted overnight; send messages that I forgot yesterday (oops); check eClass message forums
- then, it’s lunchtime, signaled by one of my daughters arriving at my desk announcing “Lunchtime!” Yes, lunchtime. That’s how long it takes me to deal with email: basically the entire morning.
- Spend lunch with kids. Difficult times can create opportunities. I don’t want this all to go by and all I have to show for it is...work. We eat and talk and joke. Then, back to work!
- record lecture videos: I try to be ahead by a class or two. Some of my colleagues have recorded lecture videos for an entire course over the summer. I thought I would do that, too. Ha! is all I have to say to that.
- Throughout the day, there are problems. There are always problems. (Like the day the power went out. Hey kids, no school! Luckily, I had already uploaded my lecture video for the day and just had to flip the switch to activate it, using my cell phone.) Over the months, the technical issues have decreased, but there are phone calls to make or answer, appointments to take kids to, snow to shovel/grass to mow.
- My wife will come home in the late afternoon, which is my signal to log off for a while. Mostly, it’s a signal to WHERE IS DINNER!? WHAT are we EATING!? Oh, the drudgery of making dinner. I don’t mind cooking, as long as it doesn’t take hours of standing and washing/peeling/chopping. Most days, I’m a put-the-ribs-in-the-oven-for-3-hours or slow-cooker-meat-and-veggies guy. Or, “It’s only -10 C out, that means firing up the grill outside!” When you’re at home all day, your spouse may come to the incorrect conclusion that all you’re doing is cooking dinner all day. You must disabuse your spouse of this notion. I wish she read this blog. Sigh.
- After dinner is another bit of routine. We go for a walk as a family. After sitting on my butt for literally hours, my back is aching and I need to move around. There is a pack of coyotes living in our neighbourhood, so we try to go for our walk as early as possible. Sunny summer days are great. Dark, cold, snowy winter evenings when the windchill is -20 C are not so great. Any colder than -25 and I’m staying inside with my sore back and a mug of hot something with a splash of adult beverage in it.
- Fridays we order takeout and have it delivered, again to help support local businesses. We don’t want our favourite restaurants to disappear! Cố Đô Huế forever!
- Sometime we have family game night. I don’t think that would have happened had there not been a pandemic. (Silver linings?)
My kids have, by objective measures, been doing pretty well with their online school. Some members of my family have concerns about COVID-19 due to certain health conditions, so we all decided together that the kids would not go in person when the schools reopened. Subjectively, though, it’s been hard. Motivation is tough. Not seeing peers is tough (there’s only so much interaction you get playing Among Us for the millionth time). My eldest daughter has now been doing high school at home for longer than she was at her actual high school. Will that be something she will look fondly back on in 10 years? Doubtful. On top of my IT duties and role as cook, I also have to be the family psychologist. Unfortunately, I’m not a “real” psychologist, so this is one of the most difficult aspects of this WFH situation. I do what I can. Sometimes it’s just sitting and talking. I hope it’s enough.
I’m not a teaching robot. (Once I was called a “teaching ninja” by my Department Chair which was pretty cool.) All of this is wearing on me, too. I have to plan, record, and upload videos. I have to answer the never-ending flood of questions. I hear from students who have gone through all kinds of unimaginable difficulties, including death, disease, and abuse. There are days when I can’t even.
And I’m not alone. This recent report done by The Chronicle of Higher Education reveals that most faculty are feeling anxiety, frustration, and stress. More than half are considering changing careers, or even retirement. Me too: one of the seminars I signed up for over the summer was retirement planning. The way the Government of Alberta is funding (or rather, NOT funding) higher education, I may have to retire sooner than I expect.
Now there’s the imminent prospect of vaccination and the hope for a return to normal life. It can’t come soon enough.
Screw you, COVID.
Why aren’t you...oh, nevermind. I’m sure you’re doing your best.
