Thursday, February 26, 2015

Work at the University

This has been weird and slightly disorienting, and not clear enough by half.

I got hired by the Universitat Obert de Catalunya to teach an English course with them.  Great!  I was very happy.

They had told me there was only one position, but that even those who were good, but didn't get the position would have the opportunity to take their online course in how to teach English online.  That seemed a win to me.

I got enrolled in the course.  Great!

And, I received an email telling me that I was actually going to get a class, but they didn't know how many students I would have.  Great!

They put me in another course for people who would be teaching online courses with them for the first time, Great!

I went to a meeting, face to face, having taken time off work for this, and strangely there were 6 other English teachers there.  Hmmmmm.

One of them I knew and she said that she couldn't teach as she had to have surgery.  OK Fine, whatever.

I get into the course for first time 'consultors' as we are called, and low and behold, there are 10 English teachers in there, for what is reputedly 1 position!  But I had gotten an email telling me I would have a group.  OK, Fine.

Semester starts on the 25th.  At the face to face meeting they said we would see on our page in UOC when we got our group.  Nothing.  before the weekend, NADA
The 25th is a Wednesday.  Tuesday night, still a big fat blank.

No messages, nothing.

Morning of the 25th rolls around, my two new Master's classes come up, (great) but no class.

Not so great.

No note, no nothing.

So I go investigating.  Not one of the people in the 'How to teach English' class, nor any of the English teachers in the 'Consultors' class have been given a class.

No one.

(This makes me feel slightly better, as it is a question of numbers of students)

But I have to say, that I find the system pretty terrible, and there has been a really shortage of information.  As in, freaking nothing. 

And we all have to be polite if we want a chance of getting a class later, but honestly, it's been pretty shabby.

And the worst of it is?  It has kind of (temporarily) robbed me of my excitement about the Masters.  And I am still wasting time (I know I'm not, but the motivation isn't the same, let me tell you baby) doing these other two courses, still another month to go with them, no credit, no certificate, but work. 

Shabby.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Weird. Sounds like they are disorganized in the extreme.
Seadog

oreneta said...

Yeah, or their just jerks. It happens a lot here, something of a sellers market so to speak.

Anonymous said...

wow, that's messed up. Maybe it would be possible to drop down some anonymous complaint to the Uni? This is a University, it should be an example of "how things are supposed to get done", in my opinion. Or maybe they are specialized in "Spanish paperwork" classes :D

oreneta said...

Yeah, but you're still looking for work.....and who do you send it to? I do know what you mean, but I don't know where I'd send it.

Just kinda crappy.

Anonymous said...

drop in an anonymous letter in the Archchancellor's mailbox :p.

oreneta said...

Not a bad thought you know.

Hmmmmm......