I agreed to give a talk to an undergraduate organization. My talk is scheduled for sometime tomorrow, someplace on campus. Unfortunately I can't get anyone to tell me where or when. My schedule has filled up, so at this point I will not be able to give the talk unless it is in the evening (when I suspect it will be).
This talk is a major inconvenience for me, for a number of reasons. In other circumstances, I would cancel it without thinking about it. However, I love this particular organization, and would very much like the chance to get to know these students. What would you do?
Update: So I sent an email very similar to the one Anonymous in the comments suggested and finally got a somewhat defensive reply yesterday morning giving me the place and time. I went, I spoke, I was a big hit, and I think they are going to ask me to be their faculty sponsor next year. Yay!
Wednesday, October 08, 2008
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15 comments:
It's nice to see so many people are softies like me. But I really voted for "Prepare the talk and find out the time and venue by googling and then tell off the organizer for not being a better host".
Dang. I can't find it via Google.
I wish I could have chosen both of the cancel options. I will not do any talks unless I have clear time/place info within a day or two of being asked. This is not a party you are being asked to, or something you can do with no prep, and I think this kind of casual disregard for your time and effort is inexcusable! (Of course, I've got a reputation as a hardass!)
Threaten to cancel in a nice way. "I guess you've not been able to find a venue for the talk tomorrow night? Perhaps we should reschedule."
I don't think you should have to try to google your own talk, and I don't think you should have to wait for them to contact you. I think you will have to contact them to either cancel or "threaten" to cancel. Hopefully it can be rescheduled!
Woo-hoo! Teh Google is da bomb. I finally found it (but they misspelled my name in a horrible way). Now I'm going to pretend I didn't find it, send a threatening letter, and prepare my talk.
If you really wanted to milk the teaching moment, it might even be worth editing your threatening letter into a letter to the general body that oversees/funds organizations, observing that they need to educate their membership on professional behavior--including getting people's names right.
I like the course of action that it sounds like you took.
I really voted for "find out the time and venue by googling, then decide if you are going to prepare the talk." But, had it been available, I would have chosen "offer to reschedule, because of reasons 1 and 2."
If the arrangements for this talk are so nebulous and ill-publicized that you had this much trouble finding out about them, nobody is going to be there anyway.
EcoGeoFemme said it.
I have been in a similar situation and the students were angry about being chided rather than being embarrassed.
WTF? Sounds like these people aren't thinking. At all.
Whenever I teach or talk, I usually get something out of it and grow a little bit myself. Presenting it to someone else is a bonus. If one of those people actually appreciate it, sprinkles on the cupcake!
This is the reason that undergraduate organizations irritate the heck out of me. A bunch of moronic students run them.
I'd rather wander the campus, lecturing as I searched for the elusive meeting venue, than attend the "Reflective Process on Diversity" meeting tomorrow afternoon.
However, the Dept. Chair has decreed that we all attend the Dean's event, and I haven't got tenure yet. So I get to spend an uncomfortable 3 hours wondering which limb they want each of us to climb out upon to demonstrate our virtue.
Whee!
An expansion on the above
With apologies to all
I hope the line breaks work.
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats o'er fools and pedants,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of elusive students;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
My incisive lecture most sublime
I proclaimed both by night and day:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Ignoring me in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee
A student could not but be gay,
In such conspicuous truancy:
I gazed---and blazoned---but no-one thought
What wealth of ken to them I brought:
Yet oft, when on their couch they lie
In vacant or in wistful mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then each heart with unease fills,
And each to cramming their mind wills.
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