Read Online Winter Jacket: New Beginnings by Eliza Lentzski - Free Book Online Page B

asked.
    Thad nodded. “Even the full professors. They’re all in an uproar.” He jerked his head in the direction of the mob of faculty members clogging up the hallway. “Hence the angry villager routine. I think they’re getting ready to storm the castle.”
    “Merlot’s at it again.” I breathed out a heavy sigh. Kathy from Sociology was going to go postal after she heard about this new development.
    Thad ran his fingers through his surfer-boy hair. “Yeah, and it gets worse. We’re not going to be given any notice about when the observation is going to happen. Someone can sit in on one of our classes whenever they feel like it.”
    “That’s ridiculous,” I snorted. “What’s the point of having tenure if the Dean’s office is going to monitor us like we’re children? We’re the experts in our subjects,” I scowled, “not some administrators who’ve never taught a class in their life.”
    I’d already had to go through a rigorous teaching evalua tion process to achieve tenure. It was intimidating because often a class’s performance was out of your control. If you had scheduled a discussion of a reading for the class period, but the majority of the students didn’t actually do the reading, you were stuck and had to think up something on the spot to do instead. One of the perks of being an Associate Professor was not to have those watchful eyes on you anymore.
    “So what happens if we get a bad review?”
    “The email claims it’s tied to performance raises,” Thad said. “You get a bad review, you don’t get a raise.”
    I couldn’t help rolling my eyes. “So, once again, our tenure is pointless.”
    He nodded, looking full of remorse.
    “Well if the villagers bring out their pitchforks and torches, let me know,” I tried to laugh. “I want to watch.”
     
    I circumvented the road block by the mailroom and walked down to my faculty office. I needed to make a fresh start on my second book proposal while there was a lull in student grading. The disturbance of my fellow faculty and their inspired grumblings floated down the hallway. I closed my office door to shut the voices out so I could get some work done.
    I was also curious to learn more about this new Dean who seemed intent on keeping her faculty on a short leash. A web search of her name produced no helpful results – just pictures of nail polish. Typing in ‘Dean Jessica Merlot’ was even less revealing; the latest news on Paula Dean showed up at the top of the search engine page. When I browsed the university’s webpage, my research came up empty as well. Dean Merlot was too new of a hire, and the IT Department was too lazy for the appropriate webpage to have been updated. Dean Krauss’s headshot smiled back at me where Jessica Merlot’s picture and biography should have been located.
    When there was a brisk knock at my door, I hastily closed all the open web browsers as if I’d been caught looking at pornography; it wouldn’t have surprised me if the Dean’s office had installed spyware on our work computers and knew when we were searching for information on her.
    I opened the door, more reasonably expecting to see Emily, Thad, or one of my other colleagues, still fired up about Dean Merlot’s recent proclamation. I wasn’t prepared to see my student Loryssa though.
    “Hi,” she smiled affably . She gave me an awkward-looking wave. “Do you have a minute?”
    “I, uh, I’m actually not even supposed to be on campus today,” I stumbled.
    Two expertly sculpted eyebrows rose on her unlined forehead. “So that’s a no?”
    “Can it wait until Monday?” I winced.
    The smile slipped from her face. “I had some questions about the reading for next week, but I suppose it can wait.”
    A cumbersome guilt settled over me. I couldn’t ignore a student request just because I was afraid that my willpower would falter. I was actually pretty proud of myself for reigning in my wandering eyes lately, and I hadn’t had