Things I'm learning and also an introduction to Leonard

Bula and happy Saturday!
I'm happy to report that I'm starting to figure out how things work at FNU and what exactly it is that I am here to do.  The meeting with department heads yesterday was so helpful!  It's funny, a university is a university and there are more similarities than differences in the experiences of faculty.  They all helped provide important context for me about why this program is being created at this time and what challenges the College of Education faces at FNU.  There is also a close link between FNU and the Ministry of Education, which will have to approve anything we do. Basically, we have around 7 weeks to create an entire bachelor's degree program including the creation of somewhere around 16 courses (they call them units).  Once we have that written then they want me to visit committees (with the ECE faculty) at the college level, then university level, and then possible the Ministry of Education level to convince them to support the program.  Hopefully we get it written in my first month here and then do the "convincing" in my last month here.  Then somewhere in all of this I hope to find placement sites for our UW ECE students to complete an internship here in 2018.  I think we will be working 6 days a week, very long hours, to pull it off.  It will be challenging, but doable.  I'm excited about it actually.

Also, they had me change rooms in the guest house yesterday and I'm really happy about that.  My new room is quite a bit bigger and has a door to the porch which is where I know I will spend most of my time while at the guest house.  What I didn't realize until later last night was that my new room already had a guest (well, several, but I'll just tell you about the main one).  I've decided to call him Leonard.  He's a little lizard who lives behind the air conditioner.  I tried to take his picture, but he's a fast little fella.  Here's the thing about Leonard.  he's noisy!  At night he calls all of his lizard friends, and I think they party.  I've chosen to believe that they don't party in my room... just outside somewhere. I didn't know lizards could bark or screech, (I'm not sure how to describe the noise), but I've also never had the chance to hang out with one in such a small space before. I figured Leonard may have just stayed the night and left early this morning, but after a little scare getting dressed I realized he's still there.  So, we had a talk and have come to an agreement.  Leonard will let me stay in the room as long as I avoid his corner and don't mess with the air conditioner that's found there (meaning figure out how to actually make it work). And, in return, Leonard will eat spiders and cockroaches, and also not come on my bed or climb in my clothes... or invite any of his friends over.  I feel good about this arrangement. I'm determined to get a pic of him to share.  I'm pretty sure that my human neighbor in the guest house, a visiting faculty from Hong Kong, heard my conversation with Leonard this morning, so now he knows about me.

A couple of pics:

The campus ECE classroom

Sangeeta teaching a video-conference class with teachers from across the island.  I had the chance to sit in and also give a speech.