Bug Spray and Blackouts

Two days down in the Delta. We've got our teaching assignments for the summer...I'm teaching a class called Delta Writing Project, which is an elective creative writing class that students are electing to take. So I'm not teaching a remedial class. I think its going to be a lot of fun, but also a lot of work. We already have lesson plans due on Thursday and our students show up on Monday. Talk about hitting the ground running.
Yesterday was an 18 hour day that began at 5:15, when some girl knocked my cup of coffee all over my white shirt and ended with a 3 hour long tour of the Delta State University campus and its resources. Halfway through the tour, the entire campus lost power....for two hours. Well, that was my breaking point for the day. My parents called and I took all my frustration out on my dad, which I felt bad about 20 minutes later. I think, instead of trying to summarize my thought on the first day of Institute, it would be better for me to copy and paste the email that I sent to my dad to apologize for freaking out at him and explain that I wasn't really on the ledge after day one. In my opinion, I wouldn't be able to better summarize my thoughts on the day and my impressions of the Delta. So I won't try to. Instead, I'll leave you with this email that was sent after we got our power back around 9:45 (after it had been out for almost 2 hours).

Hey,

We got our power back about 45 minutes ago and I just finished doing my work that I have due at 7:15 tomorrow. I was really hot and sweaty when I talked to you a while ago and we'd been walking around on a "tour of campus" in the pitch black for 2 hours. And that started after I had 15 minutes to scarf down some dinner because it took us an hour to get back from school, which we'd left for at 5:50. I'd reached my limit for the day.

In the grand scheme of things, today wasn't so bad. The whole day ran pretty smoothly and I got to meet the people who are going to be in my advisory group, which has about 10 corps members in it. There are a couple people from Charlotte, two from the Mississippi Delta and one from, I think, Eastern North Carolina. I also found out what I'm going to be teaching for the summer. I'm teaching a class called the "Delta Writing Project," which is an elective enrichment class on creative writing for high school students. I definitely lucked out with that because they don't guarantee you a place teaching your actual subject since the summer is about learning to teach and not learning content. So there are some high school English teachers who are teaching middle school reading and math or science. Plus, my class isn't going to be a remedial class with students who have failed the course already. It's solely an enrichment class, which I think could be fun. And everyone is assigned to teach with at least one collaborative teacher for the summer, another corps member from one of the regions here. My co-lab is from the Charlotte region, by chance, and I think we'll get along pretty well. Tomorrow night we have our official opening ceremony and Wendy Kopp, the founder and ceo of TFA, is coming to speak to us. That's going to be pretty awesome to see! We're all kind of hoping she'll sign copies of her book that we have. 

Overall the Delta isn't so bad. Yes, its hot and unimaginably humid. And the mosquitoes are the biggest things I've ever seen. They're really more the size of small hummingbirds than they are insects. But it's not all bad. I'm not saying I'd want to live here (I could never handle that) but spending five weeks here won't be horrible. The community and the entire state of Mississippi is so invested in this Institute and in the corps members that are going to be moving here. It's really remarkable. Yesterday, the entire city of Cleveland came to campus to help out with registration and move in and tomorrow night the State Secretary of Education is coming to our welcoming ceremony. The Delta is the lowest performing region in the state, and Mississippi ranks 50th, nationally, in terms of education on a whole. So, to them, we're the best, if not the only, chance their kids have at a good education. It's kind of cool and incredibly humbling at the same time. 

And, in terms of history, the Delta is fairly indescribable. One of the history professors on campus is a specialist in Delta history and moved down here to study it 10 years ago after teaching at George Mason for over 20 years. He's one of the country's leading experts on the region. He's offering to give a tour of the area to corps members on Saturday, where we'll spend the entire day driving around the region going to different historical sites and eventually have lunch at a restaurant owned by one of the senators from MS, who is going to be there to meet us. The tour is going to start at 9 and go until about 4, which is really long, but I definitely think its worth it. The history major in me is very excited about the whole thing. I know of a couple people who are going to do it and Liz said she was going to go too. And BB King is coming to campus next week and we can see him for $25. I'm not a huge fan of his (honestly, I don't think I've ever heard much of his music) but the opportunity to see him perform is definitely something I'm going to take advantage of. I mean, he's BB King and when else am I ever again going to have the chance to see him perform, especially in such a small venue? It's like passing up the chance to see Elvis.

We have off on Monday July 5th, and I think a bunch of Charlotte corps members are talking about going to New Orleans for the long weekend. It only about 5-6 hours away and we've got the 3 day weekend. So far, I know of three girls that I'm probably going to be specifically going with but we're going to try and finalize it tomorrow or the next day. We would have done it tonight, but there was the whole no power thing.  

So, its going pretty well, all things considered. I'm sure its going to get much more intense in terms of the work load, but our nights also end much earlier after tomorrow. We'll be done around 5 or 6, which will give me time to go to the gym and de-stress and then spend time working on my lesson plans and what not. I definitely think its manageable as long as I stay on top of it, which I want to do because I need to be in bed by 10:30 so I can actually get some sleep. 

I might talk to you guys tomorrow, but I'm only going to have about 40 minutes to get back to my room, change, eat dinner, buy my BB King ticket and get to my opening ceremony. I'm not sure what time it will end and I'll have work to do after. Maybe I'll just talk to you on Wednesday.

...btw, Wendy Kopp was amazing and incredibly inspirational, as was the State Sec. of Education, who gave a great speech.