WWDD?

I’ve been “successful” as a two-year college faculty member. After five years, I just gotten “tenure” (or out of probation status). I’ve been teaching, researching, and doing institutional and disciplinary service.

I’ll be honest, I haven’t been successful with finishing my doctorate. When I was hired I had just finished my doctoral coursework. Over the past five years I’ve completed my comps, proposed my dissertation topic/project, and collected data. I have been sitting on my data for two years now. I’ve gotten some writing done, but obviously not all of it. It has become overwhelming and frustrating.
Last night I met with my dissertation chair Duane Roen. He is an amazing individual. I left feeling excited and ready and able to continue working on my dissertation and actually finish the beastie.

As I sit here and blog, I’m also watching Discounted Dreams. It’s a PBS special about community colleges talking about a variety of issues facing community colleges and their students. One of the things it demonstrates is that CC students are juggling full time jobs, families, and trying to successfully finish their programs. Do I do this to empathize with my students, not consciously. But, I am empathizing. I know that Duane’s continued support helps me, both in terms of specific help on writing the dissertation as well as continued moral support and the example of working hard and going the extra mile. I hope by modeling myself after Duane as well as understanding and empathizing with my students I can continue to grow as a community college faculty member.

Thus, whenever I have a difficult moment in my professional career, I continue ask myself “What would Duane do?”

September 17 2007 | Posted in MCCCD