And Then They Made Me an Assistant Professor
So I had an exciting Wednesday. I had to be on campus early yesterday for a meeting. I was on campus at 9:30 a.m. and was in the English building at 10 a.m.
The meeting began a little weirdly as we stopped to look out the floor-to-ceiling windows that are on three sides of the second floor room to watch a cop with siren blaring speed through campus. One of the committee members mentioned that her day had started similarly because a social studies project caught on fire at her daughter's school. We all laughed it off and put the police car out of our minds.
For about ten minutes.
I was asked a bunch of the normal questions; how do you like teaching? why did you go into it? blah, blah, blah. I had just been asked "What is your teaching philosophy?" when the speaker phone on the table burst into life. At first, we thought it was a test. Then the voice came over and said, "There has been a dangerous incident on Fifth Street. The campus is on lock down. Please find a safe place and lock all doors." For five minutes straight, it repeated the message as the administrative staff went around and locked us in.
We continued to talk. Periodically, the phones and the outside speaker system would burst into life and repeat all the information. We kinda assumed it was a test. Last month, they did a "realistic test" on the Nursing Building (important!), which involved not just campus police but the city police. That's what we thought was going on. It may have been in the back of my mind that locking down the whole campus is a bit extreme for a drill. Then they asked me a question about my research where the answer was "The American case studies all ended in bloodbaths, which was not relevant to what I was looking at." When I said "bloodbaths," the eyes of the lady across from me got very wide so I turned to her. She was staring out the windows. I followed her gaze. There was a lady in SWAT gear holding an assault rifle. The lady turned behind her and yelled something. Then there were *two* ladies in SWAT gear holding assault rifles.
It was not a drill. So one of the professors pulled up the university homepage. The entire campus was locked down because there were two separate reports of a man with a rifle or an assault weapon crossing Fifth Street onto campus.
Then the head of the committee said there was nothing we could do so we needed to finish the meeting. Have you ever tried to answer questions whilst watching two SWAT officers out the corner of your eye? It's not an easy thing to do.
After we finished talking, I was moved into the faculty break room so the others could discuss what they wanted to do. That was fun. The professor in charge had barricaded both doors with tables, turned off the lights, and had the blinds down. When anyone knocked on the door, he demanded their name; if he didn't recognize it, he wouldn't let them in. When the English department secretary brought a group of the people holed up in the English office in to use the bathroom, a grad student walked in. He turned to me and said, "Wow. There's a lot more people here than I thought." So I said, "It's the biggest non-classroom in the building." (They had ushered the kids who weren't in classrooms in there or the English, Business, BITE, and Foreign Language offices.) He nodded and looked around the room. Then he asked where the head of the English Graduate department was. I replied that she was probably locked in her office. He turned to me and said, "Why would she be locked in her office?" This was an *HOUR* (maybe more) after lockdown had occurred. He had walked across campus without anyone stopping him. And then someone had let him into the building. Someone who didn't know him and whom he didn't know.
While we were in the break room, a couple of people kept us updated with info from CNN and Facebook. Among this was that the man with the assault rifle had on a white cowboy hat and his wife thought he may be disturbed. (Remember that!) Also, there were several rumours that he was on the bus. The local station had footage of SWAT surrounding a bus at Fourth and Reade. This is the bus I take to get to campus. Terrified doesn't even begin to describe how I felt. A little while later someone read a report on Facebook that there was screaming in the Nursing Building and the gunman had taken hostages. About ten minutes later, someone else read a Facebook update that the cops had come into the Nursing Building and were asking the students to get on the floor room-by-room as they searched.
Then the university website finally updated saying that the cops would be searching every building, room-by-room, and would transport the students off campus after their building was cleared. About 30 minutes later, the all-clear came across. Those of us trapped in the faculty break room decided that they must have found the guy; otherwise, they wouldn't have let us go.
I went back to my office in another building and found out that was exactly what had happened. They had found the terrified man in one of the on-campus food courts with a white fedora on the table beside his umbrella. For three hours, we were on lock down. Because of an umbrella.
I'm really proud of the university. If this had been a real incident, they did almost everything properly. The English building is the worst building to be in on campus, though. Some of the classrooms (especially the big rooms on the ground floor) don't lock, some of the rooms (such as the room we were in) don't lock from the inside, and most of the non-classrooms on all three floors have floor-to-ceiling windows. And sometimes people let people they don't know into the building.
However, I am very ashamed of social media. I know, now I'm one of those "This is ruining our kids' brains!" people. But even the sheriff's department said it was a problem. Someone mentioned to someone else that the Nursing Building had a realistic test the previous month. Someone else had over heard that and somehow it became "The Nursing Building has hostages." which was then posted on Facebook; then, the cops had to check it out because as far as they knew, this was credible information. This wasn't the only rumour either. This fed panic and paranoia and resulted in multiple buildings and several buses getting shut down. Also, how paranoid do you have to be to see an umbrella and think "That's an assault rifle!"? And it was two different people who did that! Then, there's the matter of the wife. Was it Umbrella Man's wife? If not, whose wife is she? And regardless, how does her husband feel? She told CNN he was disturbed! Is that grounds for divorce? I feel like it should be.
On the plus side, I really impressed the committee. They thought I had good answers to all the questions, and they were surprised at how well I thought under the pressure, which was considereably more than normal. So I passed. Hooray! In June, I'm officially an assistant professor. I'm still not on the faculty page, though.
The meeting began a little weirdly as we stopped to look out the floor-to-ceiling windows that are on three sides of the second floor room to watch a cop with siren blaring speed through campus. One of the committee members mentioned that her day had started similarly because a social studies project caught on fire at her daughter's school. We all laughed it off and put the police car out of our minds.
For about ten minutes.
I was asked a bunch of the normal questions; how do you like teaching? why did you go into it? blah, blah, blah. I had just been asked "What is your teaching philosophy?" when the speaker phone on the table burst into life. At first, we thought it was a test. Then the voice came over and said, "There has been a dangerous incident on Fifth Street. The campus is on lock down. Please find a safe place and lock all doors." For five minutes straight, it repeated the message as the administrative staff went around and locked us in.
We continued to talk. Periodically, the phones and the outside speaker system would burst into life and repeat all the information. We kinda assumed it was a test. Last month, they did a "realistic test" on the Nursing Building (important!), which involved not just campus police but the city police. That's what we thought was going on. It may have been in the back of my mind that locking down the whole campus is a bit extreme for a drill. Then they asked me a question about my research where the answer was "The American case studies all ended in bloodbaths, which was not relevant to what I was looking at." When I said "bloodbaths," the eyes of the lady across from me got very wide so I turned to her. She was staring out the windows. I followed her gaze. There was a lady in SWAT gear holding an assault rifle. The lady turned behind her and yelled something. Then there were *two* ladies in SWAT gear holding assault rifles.
It was not a drill. So one of the professors pulled up the university homepage. The entire campus was locked down because there were two separate reports of a man with a rifle or an assault weapon crossing Fifth Street onto campus.
Then the head of the committee said there was nothing we could do so we needed to finish the meeting. Have you ever tried to answer questions whilst watching two SWAT officers out the corner of your eye? It's not an easy thing to do.
After we finished talking, I was moved into the faculty break room so the others could discuss what they wanted to do. That was fun. The professor in charge had barricaded both doors with tables, turned off the lights, and had the blinds down. When anyone knocked on the door, he demanded their name; if he didn't recognize it, he wouldn't let them in. When the English department secretary brought a group of the people holed up in the English office in to use the bathroom, a grad student walked in. He turned to me and said, "Wow. There's a lot more people here than I thought." So I said, "It's the biggest non-classroom in the building." (They had ushered the kids who weren't in classrooms in there or the English, Business, BITE, and Foreign Language offices.) He nodded and looked around the room. Then he asked where the head of the English Graduate department was. I replied that she was probably locked in her office. He turned to me and said, "Why would she be locked in her office?" This was an *HOUR* (maybe more) after lockdown had occurred. He had walked across campus without anyone stopping him. And then someone had let him into the building. Someone who didn't know him and whom he didn't know.
While we were in the break room, a couple of people kept us updated with info from CNN and Facebook. Among this was that the man with the assault rifle had on a white cowboy hat and his wife thought he may be disturbed. (Remember that!) Also, there were several rumours that he was on the bus. The local station had footage of SWAT surrounding a bus at Fourth and Reade. This is the bus I take to get to campus. Terrified doesn't even begin to describe how I felt. A little while later someone read a report on Facebook that there was screaming in the Nursing Building and the gunman had taken hostages. About ten minutes later, someone else read a Facebook update that the cops had come into the Nursing Building and were asking the students to get on the floor room-by-room as they searched.
Then the university website finally updated saying that the cops would be searching every building, room-by-room, and would transport the students off campus after their building was cleared. About 30 minutes later, the all-clear came across. Those of us trapped in the faculty break room decided that they must have found the guy; otherwise, they wouldn't have let us go.
I went back to my office in another building and found out that was exactly what had happened. They had found the terrified man in one of the on-campus food courts with a white fedora on the table beside his umbrella. For three hours, we were on lock down. Because of an umbrella.
I'm really proud of the university. If this had been a real incident, they did almost everything properly. The English building is the worst building to be in on campus, though. Some of the classrooms (especially the big rooms on the ground floor) don't lock, some of the rooms (such as the room we were in) don't lock from the inside, and most of the non-classrooms on all three floors have floor-to-ceiling windows. And sometimes people let people they don't know into the building.
However, I am very ashamed of social media. I know, now I'm one of those "This is ruining our kids' brains!" people. But even the sheriff's department said it was a problem. Someone mentioned to someone else that the Nursing Building had a realistic test the previous month. Someone else had over heard that and somehow it became "The Nursing Building has hostages." which was then posted on Facebook; then, the cops had to check it out because as far as they knew, this was credible information. This wasn't the only rumour either. This fed panic and paranoia and resulted in multiple buildings and several buses getting shut down. Also, how paranoid do you have to be to see an umbrella and think "That's an assault rifle!"? And it was two different people who did that! Then, there's the matter of the wife. Was it Umbrella Man's wife? If not, whose wife is she? And regardless, how does her husband feel? She told CNN he was disturbed! Is that grounds for divorce? I feel like it should be.
On the plus side, I really impressed the committee. They thought I had good answers to all the questions, and they were surprised at how well I thought under the pressure, which was considereably more than normal. So I passed. Hooray! In June, I'm officially an assistant professor. I'm still not on the faculty page, though.