Sippi Lovin'

I am now officially one quarter century old. True indeed, the clock does keep runnin' runnin' & runnin' runnin'. My birthday passed uneventfully on Monday the 6th of June and I failed to remember the significance of the date until one of my students asked how old I was. I began to tell her I was 24, then realized it was my birthday and revealed to her that I had forgotten until she asked her question. Well, the woman next to her found this utterly hilarious and before I realized what was happening, the entire class knew I had forgotten my birthday. My forgetfulness, at least in this instance, turned out to be a blessing in disguise as I was then able to attribute the giggling to that and not my youthfulness. A handful of my students have already pointed out that I am young enough to be their children.

Speaking of clocks and running, I've taken to the roads again. A peer of mine, Mark, approached me at the end of the spring semester with questions about training for the New York City marathon. I gladly agreed to draft him a training program on one condition, he allow me to train with him. Fortunately, he assented and we've been running together ever since.

It has been several months since my ill-fated ankle incident, but therapeutic gains were meager through the first six months. I wasn't able to run a step until last October and while I haven't maintained my running journal as dutifully as I once did, a quick glance the other evening revealed that I have come a long ways from 10 minutes every other day. Mark and I are regularily running 45 minutes now and we even managed two epic ten-milers. I am looking forward to the months ahead and intend to race once or twice this fall just to get the competitive juices flowing again.

Incumbent, Johnny Dupree, mounted a comeback in the polls late Tuesday night and went on to win roughly 60 percent of the votes. I have also learned that when Dupree won four years ago, he made history as the first African-American mayor elected to serve the city of Hattiesburg.

Speaking of firsts, Laurel, just 15 miles down the road from Hattiesburg, elected its first ever African-American mayor when Melvin Mack defeated three-term incumbent Susan Vincent. Interestingly, in the months leading up to the election, Vincent dropped her Democratic affiliation and was seeking reelection as an Independent. Mack then won the support of the Democratic party and took the seat from her.

Hattiesburg's mayoral elections are set for tomorrow Tuesday, June 7th. Incumbent, Johnny Dupree, a Democrat, is expected to face stiff competition from Shawn O'Hara, an Independent, and Betsy Rowell, a Republican. (Mrs. Rowell is expected to make an especially hard push for the office.) There is much signage to be had in town and debates have been featured throughout the week in place of prime time programing on NBC's local affiliate, WDAM. I was surprised to discover that Johnny Dupree is both a Democrat and African-American. I would hesitate to label this the norm for in-state appointments and offices, but I've noticed that Hattiesburg isn't alone in their political attitudes. I find it odd that Mississippi, a state with ideals so conservative they're actually flamingly conservative, allows Democrats to ever set foot in office.

Sure, Mississippian Democrats probably fit the Clinton/Gore mold more snuggly than the Howard Deanian mold, but there is a singular defining characteristic a Democrat ANYWHERE must meet: he/she must be pro-choice. Quite honestly, I worry that this remains the only clear distiction between major parties today and fear this is especially true in Mississippi.

Shawn O'Hare and Betsy Rowell, however, are caucasian and in addition to their race, hold political ideologies that more closely resemble what I had expected from my southernly government officials when I first arrived...that is, aside from Betsy being a woman and all. It's hard to be a part of the good ol' boys club if you ain't a boy. Which leads me to wonder if race really matters as much down here as I/we (northerners) thought it did. The ethnic makeup of Hattiesburg is split almost exactly down the center and everyone appears to coexist just fine.

Forrest and Lamar counties, where Hattiesburg is situated, have more white than black citizens, but again, I hear nothing about racial tensions. As an added bonus, I thought the median household incomes and home values from this survey were also noteworthy.

The more time that passes between posts, the more trepidation I have about attempts to bridge that gap...that's what you call an undesirable positive relationship I guess.

Overall, life in Southern Mississippi has been treating me well. I survived the spring semester and wasn't even loath to leave the comforts of Minnesota when my return flight rolled around. I am presently enrolled in two classes for the summer semester, "Theories of Learning" and "Psychometric Theory." In addition, I am teaching a section of "Abnormal Psychology" to upper level psychology and education majors here at USM. I quite enjoy the subject matter and no one has fallen asleep in class just yet (mind you, there are only 30 students in the class and we've had just two classes together.)

The act or art of teaching is really much different than I had anticipated. I have given several presentations on a great number of subjects since arriving last fall and was anticipating that my teaching experience would be very similar. As it has turned out, I see as many similarities as differences. The most notable difference being that none of the audience members took notes in any of the earlier presentations I gave. Naturally, the students in my class are concerned with taking notes and as a result, they pay little attention to the quality of the presentation...in other words, they care little about the delivery. If I so desired, I could read my supplementary notes verbatim and I highly doubt more than 3 would notice. In fact, I'm afraid they hear little of what I am saying until they've written everything from the slides in their notebooks. In hopes of encouraging them to listen as they write, I have assured them that I won't be flipping through slides before they had finished writing.

In all honesty, what I would like to do is provide all of the students with copies of the notes before lecture. In the ideal world, this would free them up to listen, ask questions, and supplement the "canned" notes as they saw fit. Unfortunately, USM doesn't have the kind of money to allow me to make copies for everyone and if I were to post their notes online for the students to print themselves, well, then the only time I'd have a full classroom is on exam day!

So there you have it. The trials and tribulations of teacherdom.