Thank yous all around

It's 9:00 on the "morning after," and I've just finished grading the Calc I exams. Only one person failed! I don't think anyone will be failing the class, a success by any measure.

I wanted to check in briefly and send a quick thank you to the hundreds of wonderful students I've had at UNC Asheville, and to dozens of my wonderful colleagues, without whose hard work and support I would not have been able to have earned the honor bestowed on me yesterday. Any award for teaching excellence rightly belongs as much to the students whose dedication drives them to academic success day after day with intervening sleepless work-filled nights, and as much to the faculty members who reach out to their fellow teachers with new ideas for class activities, assessment techniques, and innovative learning experiences, as it does to the award's recipient himself, a single person who is the product of the environment in which he does his job.

Once again, thank you, all of you, my fellow-travelers on this neverending intellectual journey.

More soon, on what it's like saying farewell to "my class" of students as they prep themselves for graduation, and on this summer's coming wave of researchers from near and far, and on the dawning of Algebra al Fresco...all in due time, once I've got my head above water.

For now, it's on to 280!