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A Computer Science Concept that Helps Me Manage Overwhelm

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 Spring 2025 was rough for me. I was teaching a new course alongside one of my usual courses, which had over 100 students. On top of that, I was learning the ropes for the spring term responsibilities of my new role as Associate Director of Undergraduate Studies in the department. [ Also posted on Medium. ] In one of my lower moments of feeling weighed down by it all, I asked Microsoft Co-Pilot to create an emoji to express it all. This is what I ended up with. And it now lives in a few of my Slack workspaces to give some levity during those moments of overwhelm that never seem to entirely stop happening. That aside, overwhelm is real, and I feel my peers and I are especially prone to it in academia. And a computer science concept that helps me be realistic about what I can actually do is priority heaps. So I thought I’d share in case you also need a useful metaphor, and to ask you all if you have a metaphor of your own that helps when in overwhelm. What’s a priority heap, you ask?...
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A Peek Inside My Teaching Team's Task Tracker

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TLDR: This post is a behind-the-scenes look at a task tracker I’ve developed over years of managing teaching teams (from 3 to 36 teaching assistants). I share examples of the task lists we use each semester, plus templates for modules, exams, and weekly tasks. You’ll also get insight into how I design the tracker to streamline work and support my team. [ Also posted on Medium. ] I’ve written two blog posts about how I track tasks: my to-do lists and my teaching team’s to-do lists . But both are kind of abstract. I write about the things that go into them, but no concrete details. And I did this because I didn’t want to presume others’ contexts. However, that abstractness never fully sat well with me because, when it comes to learning, sometimes concrete examples or case studies are essential. So, this blog post introduces an example course teaching staff task tracker in a Trello board . Screenshot of some of the lists in the Trello board. This post is an experiment to see if peopl...
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Helping Students Connect the Dots: The Power of a Class Plan Slide

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 While going through my mid-semester survey this semester, I discovered an expert blind spot in myself. One variation of an expert blind spot is where an expert forgets to convey information that is vital for a novice to understand something. In my case, my survey reminded me how important it is to help students connect the dots by explaining why we are doing certain things in class. And one way to do that is by going over the class plan for the day. [ Also posted on Medium. ] So, I thought I’d write this post to remind you all of this little teaching practice. Perhaps you already do this, so here’s a reminder of why. Or, perhaps, you do not, and this is your invitation to try it since it does not take that much time to implement. The Practice: Class Plan for the Day The practice is where you start class by summarizing the plan for that day in a single slide. I do this practice with a slide called “Plan for the week/day” in my large (N = 80–120 students) elective data science ...
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Generative AI Thoughts, Timestamp Fall 2024

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 Generative AI (GenAI) exploded into the academic teaching landscape in 2021, and we have been coping ever since. I’ve been quietly thinking about it since then. I’ve shared resources via my podcast’s social media feeds ( Twitter/X , Facebook , Patreon , YouTube ) and my LinkedIn . But I have not written about it here on my blog nor created a podcast episode focusing on it. [ Also posted on medium. ] I haven’t posted anything about my personal opinion because I wanted to provide an informed one, and I prefer to do my thinking quietly. However, it’s been long enough, and the landscape keeps changing, so I think it’s worth saying something. By posting something, I hope to try to move beyond the initial “what do we do?” conversations. These conversations are the ones I feel like I keep having. And my response/conversation now is often about the same terms and frameworks that I’ve been saying for a while, which often signals to me that it’s time to write a blog post. So here are my cu...
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Your Productivity System Needs to Evolve with You

 If you follow this blog at all, you know how much I love thinking about productivity ( to-do list tracking , calendar time management , time tracking , etc.). So, hopefully, it should come as no surprise that I believe a person’s system that helps them be productive needs to evolve. As time passes, things change, and so must the productivity system! There are so many changes that could trigger a need to reflect and evolve: a change in service responsibilities, a change in a course, the arrival of a child, a change in how your kids need you, etc. [ Also posted on medium. ] So, this blog post is about how I deliberately and conscientiously evolve my productivity system. I’ll focus on what I generally do and provide some concrete case studies in hopes that they will help you think about your own situation. General Process My process has two main parts: a mindset and a monthly reflection . There are a few pieces to the mindset. First is just accepting that the productivity system has...
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How I Track My Time

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A common tactic for better managing your workload is tracking how you spend your time. But what does that even mean? Most of what I’ve read explains it in a few brief sentences, which I find dissatisfying. There are so many ways to track your time, after all! [ Also posted on medium. ] So, here is how I track my time. And I’ll frame this blog post as a case study to help you think about what would work for you. I do not recommend starting by doing what I do because my process is the evolution of 10+ years of tracking. Moreover, I’m a data geek who loves to play with data. A simple piece of paper where you jot down start and end times can be good enough. This blog post is more for those who want something a bit more technical, like a spreadsheet that you can use to do some math for you and more easily analyze the results. Why do I track my time? Knowing why you are tracking your time is valuable framing to help you decide how you will do it. I track my time for three reasons: accoun...
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Shared Inboxes for Teaching and Committees

A shared inbox was a tool I started using when I was the hybrid chair of the SIGCSE Technical Symposium. It was extremely useful then, and I have since incorporated it into my teaching processes. So, this blog post covers why I use a shared inbox, considerations when using one, and two case studies of how those considerations played out. [ Also posted on medium. ] Why use a shared inbox? In short, efficiency! If more than one person in a group can respond to an email, the speed of response goes up while no one repeats work. I’ve lost count of how often I’ve seen multiple people get an email and respond simultaneously. Or I’ve been that person who started writing and thankfully didn’t send it before the other person hit send! But there are more efficiency gains than just that! There’s clarity on the context, on who is responsible, and in the email responses themselves. If the entire email thread is in the shared inbox, everyone has access to that context, and no one has to find an...
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