Wednesday early dismissal and we meet with our staff. It’s the end of the year. Everyone is exhausted. This is the activity I cooked up, which is aimed at the frustrations that studentshumans feel as they come to the end of a project. After describing a project successfully completed, I want folks to write about the dumb things they said and did as they finished as well as the supports they leaned on as they concluded. Then we’ll describe some of the crazy things students we’ve seen lately, and, most importantly, the ways we can support our students as we finish the year (and the big projects) together. There’s also a “let it go” box for the stuff the battles that simply can’t be fought at the end of the year.

I think about various projects where I’ve struggled mightily at the end; the night before I defended my dissertation I declared that I had nothing, that it was all shit. I had all sorts of supports to get things done. Many of my students have never had an emotion they can’t handle inappropriately. For better or worse, we are modeling and providing the support systems one needs to finish strong.