I spent yesterday on campus — that’s a photo of, I think, the school’s mascot up above — talking with instructors and bookstore employees. I tried talking with someone at the library as well, but I was only able to leave my card thanks to the (quite noisy) renovation that was happening.
This is the first of three campus visits I’ll make this month — we’re tasked with about six meetings each at three different schools a semester — and this one went reasonably well. I still have to pull together my notes, and follow up with a couple of people by phone, but the heightened nervousness I was feeling at the start of it kind of went away. To be replaced only by ordinary nervousness, but at least that’s a step up. I think I was just so out of practice, since we don’t have to do this over the summer, and had such a difficult time actually scheduling these appointments, that I was fearing the worst.
I wouldn’t say yesterday was the best, but the weather was nice, the campus was small and easy to get around — it’s ten minutes from my door and I’d never been there before — and I think I walked away with some interesting feedback. And my hat’s off to the one professor at the end of the afternoon who still agreed to meet despite having her young ear-infected son and nowhere for him to be except for underfoot.
Anyway, today was a pretty good day as well. I had three phone calls with instructors planned, which turned into one. (The first wasn’t there but called me back; the second apologized for giving me the wrong day; and the third was apparently on the phone with someone else when I called…and, in all fairness, hadn’t confirmed the time with me anyway.) But, more important, I finished the large report I wasn’t expecting to finish until at least tomorrow afternoon. It’s been delayed a lot longer than I wanted it to be, and I’m glad to finally have it off my plate.
Not least of all because I won’t be in the office at all next week.