A Possible Career Move? I Doubt It!

Yesterday I received a panicked call from the Chairman, or Chairperson, of our History Department...but I should start at the beginning.

Here in the Workforce Development Center of Surry Community College we offer some selected AP history classes for seniors at Mount Airy and North Surry High Schools, two schools here in Mount Airy. I don’t know why they are offered here instead of on the high school campuses themselves. Mine is not to reason why.

At the beginning of the semester (January 2007) a new teacher was hired by the college to teach the AP class currently underway. She received her M.S. in December from UNC-Charlotte and this is her first teaching experience. Since her arrival here, I understand, she has been a challenge. She often misses class, sometimes with no notification. The Chair of the department has had to rush to Mount Airy from main campus a couple of times to cover for the errant hysterical historian. Apparently she is some kind of airhead with intense personal problems – divorced single-parent whose ex is constantly harassing her and stealing money from her bank account. It is a strange situation, but I just sit in my office and listen. After all, what do I know, right?

Now it seems she has not attended class since sometime last week and has even ceased calling in. Hence the panicked telephone call from the department chair yesterday.

“Bennie, this is Dr. _______. I understand you used to teach history!”

What is this? I thought. A fantasy gone wild? I would love to teach history, but that was not the route I took through the quagmire of higher education.

“No,” I answered, “I only read a lot.”

“Well, anyway.....” and then I was told the entire story of Miss Airhead and the Case of the Haphazard History Class.

“So, you see,” the chair concluded, “I need someone to teach the class tomorrow. Is there anyway you can do it?”

“I don't have 18 hours of graduate-level history required to teach history at this college,” I protested. “My graduate work was in finance and management.”

“I don’t care. Will you teach it?”

“Sure. Why the heck not?”

So now, I can add to my resume (or is that curriculum vitae?) college history instructor.

Ain’t life weird?