Saturday, June 7, 2014

A Deep Sigh of Relief


Students were released mid-day yesterday to enjoy their summer vacation and a lot of the pressure / stress went along with them.  Not so much that the students themselves cause the pressure / stress but there are fewer deadlines and other constraints.  I can relax a bit.

 
I know I've mentioned what a difficult school year it has been for me work-wise... there wasn't much, if any, creative energy left to think about quilting.  To give you some idea of the unusual year it has been for me, I wanted to share the following graph showing the number of cases handled by each psychologist over the past year.



A "busy year" would 80 cases with an "average" year being 50-70 cases.  Yup, that big tall blue column is me...   if anyone would like further explanations of this graph, I will happy to respond via email.   

Another measure of "busy-ness" is the number of banker's boxes one fills up over the course of the school year with an "average year" filling one box to 1.25-1.5 boxes.   Here are the boxes I filled...

 
There were a lot of times this year where I honestly didn't think I was going to make it.  And yes, I have mentioned the uneven distribution of schools & work loads to my supervisors.



While we're in "work mode".... I thought maybe some of you would like to see my office at one of my schools....  see where I spent three days of the week.  To the right of the door as you enter is the "testing table.  Behind that is the ESL teacher's desk and some of her stuff.  The two file boxes are mine... I was getting ready to take them out to the car.  The "window" looks out into the 7th grade hallway... that's right... no natural light.


Just to the left is the following....  the desk is mine along with the dark file cabinet.  I have tried to bring some color into the vanilla-bland office and it does help.... at least for me.


The other file cabinets are storage for other stuff, like inactive files, ESL files, etc.


My granddaughters provided some office decor... you can figure out which two...

Yes!  The phone is in an obviously inconvenient location... but look at that super long extension cord.  Of course, the desk is too small for the phone to sit on.  

In addition to sleeping in this morning and meeting a friend for lunch, I've been planning my "summer sewing projects" list... more on that tomorrow.





10 comments:

  1. I'm so glad you can finally catch your breath and sew! Here's hoping the next school year will be more balanced.

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  2. Mmmm, that graph looks a bit skewed, methinks. I think it MUST mean that you're the best at your job and the person on your left and the one 5th from the right aren't exactly pulling their weight. Well, that's how I see it anyway! I bet you're going to enjoy your summer, Freda. Bring on the sewing! :o)

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  3. Sounds a lot like reality mimicking fiction. In the Scumble River Mystery series by Denise Swanson, the main character is a school psychologist whose "office" is a janitor's closet.

    Barbara in MD
    www.stashoverflow.wordpress.com

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  4. oh my....you deserve a break. No that is not enough.....you deserve a vacation! Soon. I do love the color you put into your space.

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  5. Why in the world did you get the lion's share of cases???
    You need to play with some colorful fabric--and get some sunshine!!

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  6. Very revealing graph. A couple of those blue bars are VERY short! If you don't score extremely high on your Work Performance Review, someone is blind.

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  7. Hurray for the last day of school! I'm an itinerant teacher for the blind and visually impaired. I'm the one who is sometimes in "your" office, or the speech therapist's office, or on the stage of whatever school I'm at during the day. I'm looking forward to seeing your summer plans for quilting. It's amazing how different caseloads can between teachers or service providers! Enjoy your lovely summer!

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  8. You deserve a quiet, relaxing summer - I hope you make it happen.
    Lillian

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  9. I hope you have a wonderful summer. I read about the projects you have in mind. Have fun!!

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