All settled...mostly

So I've been back for a few weeks now and working to get my world in order for the new semester. And everything seems to be looking up for me. It's a bit frightening.

First, I've just finished editing an article on urban industry for the Korean Planning Association's journal. This acceptance fulfills my requirements for recontracting. So it looks like they won't be kicking me out in March (at least not due to my publications!). And it gets even better. Unless the new scoring or system for evaluating publishing changes (which is a distinct possibility!), the journals I have published in have a high enough impact factor to secure my position for some time to come. (The fact that impact factor does not necessarily represent journal quality or reputation will have to be discussed another time.) At any rate, I have gone from a high level of job insecurity to a high level of job security. And it feels fine!

I have two classes to which I am looking forward, and getting the syllabus together and on my website has taken up a good deal of time over the last couple of weeks. For the undergraduates, I am offering Introduction to International Development, which examines the history of the concept of "development" and some preceding economic theory. I've shifted a number of the readings from previous years to expand my own resources. I'm particularly excited to read Milton Friedman's Capitalism and Freedom, which in part jumpstarted neoliberalism as a philosophy. For the graduate students I'm offering a new seminar class I am calling "Development Alternatives", about which I am very excited. I want to look at how systems theory has evolved into resilience theory and how this evolution has changed the way we thing about alternative forms of development that might address our pressing environmental challenges. It's a huge topic, but I think very rewarding. Of course, it will probably only be rewarding to a few students as most are likely to shrink away at the realization that they have to read about 150 pages each week. But at least that way I will only have students who really want to engage the topic!

And I am slowly but surely organizing my files and spaces. I am in the process of synchronizing my home files with my work files so that I can automate this in the future. Then I'd like to update the school OS and change the home OS, among other things. I also need to do some office furniture reorganization, but I need to get some new furniture first. Realistically all this will probably take the whole semester and longer, but at least it's moving forward and I can distribute my attention to more than just survival.