Exams are finished, and now I am grading them and doing various other end-of-the-year chores. This is actually a hectic time of year. An example is that positive senior failures were due at 1:00 pm this afternoon, although some teachers’ last senior exams ended at 12:00 noon. I had that situation last year, and it is almost impossible to finish grading and make such decision in one hour. Forget about eating lunch at all under those circumstances!

I expect to finish all my grades tomorrow morning, which gives me nearly 3 days to finish my other chores, since school ends for teachers next Monday. It will be impossible to work on Thursday with graduation in the morning and the school’s retirement banquet afterwards. I have always marched at graduation, but this year I have been placed in charge of diplomas, although nobody seems to know exactly what I am supposed to do with them. Since the graduating seniors go to various classrooms to pick up their diplomas immediately after the graduation ceremony, I assume I will be sorting the diplomas alphabetically and bringing them to the teachers assigned to each room. That does not sound like anything too stressful or too difficult.

The retirement banquet should be an emotional one this year, since Joe McDermott is retiring after 30+ years teaching in the district, the majority of them in the high school. He has made a lot of friends during those years, and has been a vital part of the math department. I was flattered that he asked me to sit at his table with his friends and family, since I never knew he liked me very much. We'll all miss him a lot next year.