It’s the end of the semester and my hands are still pretty full. I have one last class to wrap up by writing a theory construction paper, and some final papers to grade to finish up my graduate assistantship for the year. This Saturday I’ll be volunteering to help out with the iOpening, in which our newly renovated Hinds Hall facilities will be dedicated. And that will be the end of the school year, at long last.
But it doesn’t really imply a break. I’ll be continuing service on the faculty search committee over the summer and likely into the next school year; there is plenty of work involved and we’ve just gotten started with the search. I’ll also be continuing to work with my advisor on projects related to developing FLOSS research infrastructure, and I’ve volunteered to help out with grant writing on top of that.
I’ll start up a couple of summer projects pretty soon, too - wouldn’t want to get bored without classes to swallow up my time. I’m determined to paint my drab living room a cheery green, and turn my thesis into a journal article submission. Another venture will be working on syllabus and course development with Derrick Cogburn for a new course on distributed collaboration technologies. In June, I’ll be visiting Manchester, UK for the eSocial Science conference as well; I’m really looking forward to it and feeling pretty lucky that I get to go.
New experiences for the fall are already lining themselves up. I’m eagerly anticipating a course on research design because I’m basically a methods geek at heart. I’ve also registered for a seminar on Organizational Behavior at the Whitman School of Management, which will complement the organizational sociology seminar from this semester. And I’ll have a new job, this time administering an NSF grant focused on research and design of a new curriculum for cyberinfrastructure information professionals in the STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) disciplines. It should be an interesting experience, it’s research-oriented, and will help me develop pedagogical skills beyond classroom teaching.