Reply To: A December to Discover: ACUE Educators Making Magic!

[Rose Manduca]

Hi – the last day of the semester is always the final exam and for Fall semester I bring baskets with candy canes and chocolates plus X-mas pencils. Throughout the semester I have gifts (novelty journals/notepads, folders, pens, highlighters, sometimes little gadgets/”toys” and hand sanitizer gels & sprays in lab, etc.) for those students who earn an A or B on major exams and usually bring candy on class days of weeks with holidays. Years ago I used to bake but these days the classes are too large for that; they seem to enjoy the candy just as well. I will see almost all of them the first week in Jan for Spring semester so I don’t write special notes/e-mails until they graduate though I have one-on-one or small group chats with most of them throughout the semesters. They all know they can e-mail or call me pretty much anytime and many do.

To gear up for the next semester I strive to have my syllabuses and course outlines and first couple weeks of handouts/lab reports for the next semester done and duplicated before the X-mas break. I make notes to myself at the end of every semester of things I will change or plan to newly implement to refer to when planning each course for the next year. – R