2008 is turning out to be quite the year.

I’m loving myself sick in the lecturing job. Over 150 students at the edge of their seat, hanging on to every word I say. It’s bloody marvellous. I can even bore them to tears and they still won’t move. They just sit there, writing notes and crying quietly. Ah the power.

Actually I’ve been told by some students that I’m quite all right at this gig. I manage to get a few laughs out of them from time to time, and I offer them treats like YouTube videos and magazine advertisements with partial nudity. Bread and circuses. A couple have told me they like my lecturing style, that they don’t zone out like in other lectures.

And for most of them I believe that’s quite a feat. Over a hundred of them are PR students, whose university day begins with lectures at 930am, and doesn’t not finish until after 6pm. So they have two hours of listening to my voice right in the middle of the day. I have seen some doze off, but I can’t blame them. Many of my old uni friends would call me a hypocrite if I ever complained about it. I used to be quite famous for not only regularly falling into slumber during Church History or Theological Reflections on Ministry, but for letting everyone know what I was dreaming about at the time.

If anyone’s interested in seeing some of the entertaining and informative PPT slides I use in my lectures, I can post them. I won’t bother with it unless there are takers. I can even add some notes if you’d like to make sense of them.

… is the name of the course I’m teaching this semester. It’s a compulsory subject for students of professional communication, advertising, public relations and journalism (I think), so it has at least 100 students from all year levels. It’s one of the most hated subjects in the school, because it’s all theory. No making stuff, just reading and writing. It can be tough. I’m dealing with it by making the assessment tasks smaller and more frequent, so students can afford to bum out early and improve later on. I’ve also got a list of jokes to put in my pocket during lectures for when they start to get bored or antsy. I’m also sewing leather patches on an old tweed jacket and dying my hair grey.

Here is a run down of the topics to be taught. Makes me look super smart.

Week 1 - 5 March - Engaging with theories of communication

- Communication as a process: Shannon & Weaver, Schramm

Week 2 - 12 March - Effects tradition: Comstock, Gerbner, Katz

Week 3 - 19 March - Communication as text: Saussure, Volosinov, Barthes

Week 4 - 2 April - Media discourses: Foucault, Kress, Van Leeuwen, Fairclough

Week 5 - 9 April - Communication technologies: McLuhan, Innes, Ong

Week 6 - 16 April - Communication technologies: OldWeb vs NewWeb

Week 7 - 23 April - Media industry - ideals and ideology: Liberalism, Gramsci, Chomsky, Postman

Week 8 - 30 April - The art of mass persuasion: Hall, McRobbie

Week 9 - 7 May - Mass communication and popular culture: Williams, Hall, Adorno, Ang, Modleski, Althusser

Week 10 - 14 May - Postmodernism and popular culture: Jameson, Baudrillard, Fiske

Week 11 - 21 May - Audiences, interactivity & identity: Goffman, Giddens, Slevin

- Engaging theory and practice

I am amazed I’m alive.

In the first week of October, after I had been welcomed to the position of whatever it was for VicPol that had nothing to do with ministry, I was given the deadsheet: the list of project milestones with deadline dates on it. I was a little surprised that even though I was starting in October and not in July as was originally planned, that none of the dealine dates had been changed to reflect that. So I mentioned to various people that I only had two months to do the first project, which would take the average part-time worker about seven or eight months.

The common response was: “But we know you can do it. After all, it’s you, Paul”.

I couldn’t really argue with that. After all, I am Paul.

The last four weeks I had been working about 60-70 hours each week, which admittedly is a little steep for someone only paid to work 31 hours. But at the end of the year I have prepared five police stations for the new program, with trained and accredited volunteers, referral protocols, training a development procedures and information for young people.

In the meantime I managed to score for the agency about $287 000 for the agency minister position that I had left, from philathropies and the Uniting Church, which should keep the new minister happy for about three years.

On Friday I got a big public slap on the back by our CEO in front of other staff, and left work feeling tired, but ultimately rewarded.

I now have three weeks off. I plan to spend it getting back to study, going on drives to lonely places to read and doze, preparing lectures for next semester, and playing lots of games with AJ and Megan (the ones where AJ gets to learn the phrase “Dad’s a dickhead”).

And when I get back to work I have to prepare another eight police stations for the program. Fortunately I have until August to do it, so I’ll be keeping my hours down to the bare minimum.

If you’d like to find out what I’m doing in Victoria Police stations, go to www.yripp.org.au.

G’day everyone,

My name is Paul and I used to blog here.

So sorry I’ve been off the radar, and thank you to those who have noticed and have emailed me to check if I’m not dead. I am indeed alive and around, and working hard. There have been some changes around the traps.

Firstly, I have decided to take a leave of absence from ministry. As of 1 January, I will not be a minister but an ordinary bloke. I’ve relinquished my magic powers for the time being to “pursue secular employment” and focus on my PhD. I am staying at the agency, but under a new role, and a new minister-type person will be taking over my role. I have to say I am really looking forward to the break: though I love the ministry, I am tired, physically tired, of dealing with people who give lip service to community ministry but in reality expect me to turn back time to 1953.

But God and I are still cool. We’ve just decided to see other people for a while.

The new role at the agency is exciting and challenging and scary. A couple of years back I gave a day each week to pilot a program in Shepparton called the Youth Referral and Independent Person Program (YRIPP). Its aims were to recruit and train volunteers to assist young people who are being interviewed by police, and facilitate a referral to a local support agency should they need support. The program was a success, not just in Shepparton but in all pilot areas, and the Vic government agreed to roll out the program to 103 stations around the state.

So I’m taking on the job coordinating the arrival of the program in police stations in Northern Victoria, from Merbein to Wodonga and down as close to Melbourne as Gisborne. So I am doing a lot of driving. I’m presently suffering from a really sore throat (I can only manage a whisper) due to the constant bad singing I do at the wheel. I wonder if I can get WorkCover for that.

The PhD is surviving, and I’m helping my supervisor apply for a grant to the Australian Research Council for a research project that he would like me to lead when I’ve finished the thesis. So I better get cracking.

And on Monday I’m heading to Vancouver for AoIR 8.0. I’m giving two presentations and I’m bloody nervous. But I’m looking forward to catching up with people I met at last year’s do in Brisbane, who can give me the extra kick-up-the-bum that I need before I present my last semester’s work to RMIT (two days after I return - eek!).