Deep, Dark Secrets of a Bad Grad Student

I've been trying to be a graduate student for almost 9 years now. I take classes one at a time, until I can't stand it anymore, and then I stop for a while. In this fashion I've earned a license to be a school library media specialist (a.k.a. school librarian.) However, here is the rub -- we have a two-tier licensing system in Wisconsin. My license is non-renewable, so now I am taking the courses to earn my professional license, which I have to finish within the next three years. There is no reprieve now; if I want the license (and I do) I have to push on through, one class every semester -- including the summer -- until December 2011 when I am finally done.

I tried a regular graduate program where I would have gotten a Masters in Library Science along with my license. I lasted for two semesters there, before throwing in the towel. I hated it so much! Now I am in an online program designed to get classroom teachers into school libraries. It has been a much better fit for me,  relevant, interesting …

It is always a challenge. I'm a fairly intelligent person (I think.) I read a lot, I am able to apply what I am learning to real-life situations. However, when I am enrolled in a class I constantly feel rotten, like I am a bad person. I believe I have finally pinpointed what that is about. School these days involves a lot of the dreaded group project. In an online course, this involves group projects with people I may have only met in person one time; all of our communication takes place in that tricky medium of email and online discussion.  I realize that my overall feeling in this context is one of shame. I beat myself up if I don't go to the discussion forum often enough, don't add to the Googledoc or wiki in a timely enough manner, when it's my turn I don't summarize the discussion until the end of the day on which it's due. I feel as if I am always letting my group-mates -- who are essentially strangers to me, but in my mind, far better students than I am -- down.

It's so bad that once I turn in an assignment I don't want look at it again, because I'm so ashamed of my work. I have to browbeat myself before I log onto the class site. I'm procrastinating right now as I write this blog post!

Basically I always feel like a fuck-up as a graduate student. (Pardon my language, but I do.) I just don't want to do this. I would rather be walking my dog, playing my guitar, reading for fun, knitting, decorating Ukrainian Easter eggs, making soap, sewing, and being with my family. I don't care if I get an A. I just want to pass each course.

Whew -- got that off my chest. I feel as if I've been in the confessional. I have two more weeks of this course. The next one is a literature course; hopefully it will be more flying solo.

Steep Learning Curve

I just got home from my graduate course: Information Architecture. Information Architecture, you ask? What is that? Well, it's basically writing the code for building the underlying structure of large web sites. I had my first class last week, and left feeling seriously nervous after the professor said, "This is an 800 level graduate course, and I expect you to get into the lab and know how to blah blah blah ..."

Tonight we met in the lab, and there I was surrounded by young, computer savvy pups. The professor talked us through writing XHTML mark-up to put up a simple web page, and you know what? I got it! I had to ask the young woman next to me for help a few times but she had to ask me for help too. It was such a good feeling.

There are 3 of us women in the class, all about the same age, who are at the same level of inexpertise on the computer. We had a good laugh together last week when the computer geek professor shared that he has a new baby, his first. Now there's a steep learning curve! He shared that he expected to be back to normal in a month or so. Ha! I'll have XHTML down in a month. If anything, he'll be more sleep deprived!

I can't believe how excited I am about this course. I was doing the reading assignments for this week, and it made sense. I realized that being a knitter really comes in handy, because I'm so used to reading knitting patterns. Mark up is not much different. I follow a series of stitches and - voila! - beautiful lace socks. I use a series of letters and symbols and - voila! - a web site. I feel so capable.

I did have a bone to pick with the authors of one of my books. They were talking about information architects, and what professions naturally do that kind of chunking of information with usability and accessibility in mind (not necessarily on computers, but just in general) -- and they totally overlooked teachers!!!! I had to rant at Mr. Ether for a good 15 minutes about that. I mean, what do teachers do, if not organize information into chunks to make it accessible to users -- i.e. students? And the younger your students, the more you do it! Oy vey ... being in a profession which is so discounted in general (and probably more often by MIT graduates) is my cross to bear!

Stay tuned for the ongoing transformation of Luminiferous Ether into a computer geek (one who wears beautiful lace socks.)