Spring Semester Goals Update

How is it going? This week is my spring break week. I was going to have a post for you about planning out my spring break, but the lead-up to NeMLA took more out of me than I thought it would, so here we are. As much as I’d like to take my own advice and really take a full break, with 60 midterms that need assessment and 44 rough drafts that need feedback, I just don’t have that luxury this time. So I decided to work for 2 hours or less each day and spend the rest of my time on personal projects or sitting in the sun with a good book. So far, so good.

Before I get into it, this is your reminder to avoid the comparison trap if it causes you pain (the last thing anyone needs right now). I find others’ goal lists motivating, but if you don’t, feel free to skip this one. For context, I teach a 4:4:2 course load of (usually) writing intensive sections, and I am not tenure-track.

In case you missed it, here’s my Spring 2022 Goals post where I outlined my academic (non-teaching) related goals for the current semester. Here’s the goals list with a strikethrough for the goals I’ve managed to tackle so far.

Goals

  1. Present (and be “present”) at MLA
  2. Prep & Deliver Center for Humanities Research Talk
  3. Finish full draft of Tweetsets article
  4. Chair/Present NeMLA panel/paper
  5. Share book idea w/ publisher
  6. Present at Computers & Writing Conference
  7. Mentor grad student(s)
  8. Create quality materials for CECiL

Numbers 7 and 8 are ongoing, but I’m really happy with how these goals have gone / are going, so giving myself a little credit. My third goal, drafting the Tweetsets article, is slated for the month of April when I hope to do another AcWriMo style sprint to make it happen. The C&W Conference isn’t until May, but I do need to still register and adapt a previous conference paper for this specific presentation.

Interestingly, a couple new academic writing goals have made their way onto my plate since writing this list. I have done my due diligence in asking for advice from colleagues and friends before committing myself to new things, but I am honestly very excited for these new opportunities. For now, I’ll share that I will be putting a call out for an edited collection – possibly even two edited collections on different topics. I’ll post a note on this blog when it’s official!

I wrap up by saying that I didn’t used to be someone who checked in with her goals regularly. I would set goals, forget about them entirely for a period of time (a semester, a year) and then find them again and be relieved if I had met any of them. Now, I’m trying to be a little more accountable to myself to see what happens.

How are your spring goals going? Do you check-in with your goals periodically? Let me know in the comments!

Stay tuned for more posts this year about teaching, research, and academia. Feel free to follow me on Twitter: @litambitions and Instagram: @ecacademic (where I really nerd out about planning). You can also follow this blog (see the email subscribe button on the home page)ALSO, check out my biweekly-ish podcast called Vita Abundantior in which I conduct interviews with awesome women and ask them how they go about living such abundant lives (available on all major streaming platforms, so please subscribe and review).

One thought on “Spring Semester Goals Update

  1. Pingback: Update! Baby Azar, Goals, CFP, ECA Newsletter | Tawnya Azar

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