A day in the life, summer edition

Now that the semester is over, all of my friends and family outside of academia say to me, "Wow, you must be so glad the semester is over, now you get vacation again until August!" (Or some other refrain along those lines.) And again I am reminded of how fundamentally misunderstood my job as an academic, and everyone else's job who is an academic, is. People think that as a PhD student, I take a few classes, maybe teach one if I'm lucky - and that's it. We need to do a better job of telling people all that our jobs entail! A lot of folks participated in the #DayofHigherEd last month (and I did too, writing a blog post for it). Hence this second version: "A day in the life - summer edition."

Here's what I did yesterday, Tuesday, May 15:

7:30am: Up, coffee, checking emails - nearly all work related. One related to my HOA board that I serve as secretary for that needed to be addressed ASAP.

8:00am: Read How we became posthuman by Katherine Hayles, a book on my digital media theory reading list.

10:00am: Break from reading to look at web project I'm working on with others and presenting at the upcoming Genre 2012 conference. I work on a collaborative project management doc and sending necessary emails and files to various members.

11:00am: Back to reading How we became posthuman.

12:00pm: Lunch, put in a load of laundry, feed the dog, and do the dishes.

1:00pm: Review plan for workshop presentation that I'm giving for the Computers and Writing conference this Thursday. Put finishing touches on our Prezi and make sure that I have all of my parts in order.

2:00pm: Take notes on book I read this weekend for my reading list, Where wizards stay up late: The origins of the internet.

3:00pm: Put together list of goals for the summertime and sketch out approximate deadlines for each item. Things on my list include:

• Follow strict reading schedule to finish all exam reading by Sept. 1. (This is my number 1 priority.)
• Give workshop at Computers and Writing on Thursday afternoon. 
• Finish joint manuscript currently working on by June 8. Need to prep for writing meeting we have this Friday. 
• Prep questions for Summer I class that I'll be studying with partner in scholarly crime.
• Finish hybrid composition course technology study - get all data in one place and backed up; set writing schedule with collaborator; identify target journal for manuscript. 
• Continue to work on web project that our research team is presenting at Genre 2012 at the end of June. I've been assigned the role of task management along with my research duties for the site. 
• Continue to think about dissertation prospectus and chip away at taking notes for that while I read and formulate a more thorough research description. 
• Work as RA for Campus Writing and Speaking Program research project throughout summer. Major task at the moment is data analysis from the courses we studied this spring, along with a grant report. Also have to prepare for two other conferences after Computers and Writing and then, hopefully, get a manuscript written. 
• Compile Enculturation special issue from Computers and Writing conference. This will be an ongoing project with Enculturation editors and reviewers until the issue is published in October.
• Prep for a new class that I'll be teaching next year.
  (As you can see, this is a huge list of ongoing projects. To complicate matters, every single joint project is undertaken with a different set of collaborators - that's a lot of people to keep up with and coordinate schedules with.)

4:00pm: Get ready to leave for meeting at with Computers and Writing workshop team.

4:30-5:30pm: Happy hour meeting with C&W workshop team. Final discussion of plans for Thursday and a bit of fun chat, too.

5:30pm: Leave for tennis lessons across the other side of the city.

6:00pm: Tennis lesson.

7:00pm: Pick up sushi for dinner on my way home. No time for food prep tonight. Walk the dog before eating.

8:30pm: Respond to emails for a variety of things - workshop on Thursday, HOA, research grant, Computers and Writing conference, etc.

9:00pm: Unwind with husband (finally!).

10:30pm: Squeeze in a bit more reading of How we became posthuman. I find this book quite dense, and it's taking me a while to get through it.

11:00pm: Bed. Coach Sunday kicked my butt at tennis tonight, and I have a full day planned for tomorrow!

So, friends and family, there you have it - sure it's "summer" (aka. I'm not taking classes), but every day, I have a full plate of reading for exams, conducting research, writing manuscripts, and dealing with other tasks related to my job - conferences, workshops, etc. etc.

What does your summer schedule look like? Share it! I think it's really important to make our work more visible so that people better understand the work that academics do - we might be fighting for our jobs, our funding, etc. in the future if we aren't better prepared to talk about the value that our work brings.