Early Morning Squatter

AUC faculty received an e-mail a few days ago urging us to make sure we get to class on time so that our students don't suffer any more of the delays in classroom time that they've had to deal with since the semester began. Given the fact that the buses are often late and with two week-long Eid holidays slated for the semester, its understandable that parents and students (not to mention professors) are a little concerned that the student body is getting short-changed. So as a compassionate faculty member *cue violins* I do my best to brave the early morning hassles (such as my one-year-old's demands for chips at 5:30 a.m. or my five-year-old's meltdown over having to wear a blue shirt to school) and catch the early bus that will get me to my first class at 8:30. But then there are days like today when it seems like the Fates are mocking me and I think why do I bother.

Today, I taught class in my office. Literally. Squatting on my office floor, kneeling before a whiteboard in a red skirt, surrounded by a bunch of AUC students sitting cross-legged on the floor, I attempted to teach my students about online journalism without having the capability to provide students with a computer in a class to actually DO online journalism. I think you could call that ironic. They say necessity is the mother of all invention. I guess that's true of teaching styles as well. And my squatting stance made for some interesting Kodak moments I'm sure for the students. But somehow I can't imagine this is what either they or I had imagined class at the new campus would be like.

Now to be fair, it was a one-time inconvenience (I hope). After waiting for my locked classroom lab door to be opened by someone for 15 minutes, we decided to conduct class down in my office. The show must go on. And I've since been given a magical key to ensure that this doesn't happen again. But one of my students said after class "I can't believe my parents are paying this much to have me sit on the floor." It's a sentiment I can concur with.