One of my favorite things about the end of the year is the preponderance of lists about everything possible during the previous year.  I spent a good hour yesterday afternoon porin[...]

I’m sending this update today from the Annual Conference of the Pennsylvania College Personnel Association (PCPA). For this year’s conference, I was the chair of the programming co[...]

If you are considering part-time (or full-time from a distance) doctoral work, you’re going to want some flexibility at work.  I’m fortunate to work in a department tha[...]

Do you always listen to the same type of station on the radio? Jess and I were driving through Erie the other day when we realized that regardless of where we are, we tend to gravi[...]

After a 5-day siesta from the daily grind, I was back in the office today. I like my job. A lot. But I struggle with Thursdays anyway, and with today’s Thursday also having a Monda[...]

Today my dad is having open-heart surgery at Hamot Hospital, in Erie.  He’s having a triple bypass surgery.  So far things are going OK.  We should be getting another update [...]

In my previous posts, I have written a great deal about the admissions processes that I navigated on my way to pursuing a doctoral degree.  I’m going to shift gears and begin[...]

After what seemed like years of waiting (but was actually more like 6-8 weeks) I started to hear back from the institutions to which I had applied.  Something that was surprising w[...]

Tom Petty was right: the waiting is the hardest part.  Once all of my doctoral stuff was submitted (approximately January 1, 2009), I got a pretty severe case of the “itching[...]

I meet with a lot of students in my job, and it can be difficult to know whether or not I am making a difference.  It can be frustrating because I work a lot, and the longer I̵[...]