Today was my first day of teaching in the Spring 2013 semester. In the spring I teach two of my favorite classes – Disaster Response and Business Continuity & Crisis Management (BCCM). These classes both require heavy student engagement, and as such, the class dynamic is very important. I always hold my breath a bit the first day of each semester hoping that the personality mix in the class will create the type of atmosphere that will fuel creative thinking, foster great discussion, and help build enduring relationships between the students.
With day one now behind me I can now make a fair assessment of the potential of the semester. Here is what I concluded – I am in for an E ticket semester. If you are unfamiliar with the terminology, please do allow me to explain.
An E ticket is the type of ticket folks used to use to get onto or into the most exciting Disneyland and Disney World attractions. E ticket attractions were the cream of the crop…the pinnacle of excitement…the top of the Disney game. E tickets were coveted tickets – they were the entry into the most magical parts of The Magic Kingdom.
Disney discontinued the ticket book system in the late 70s – around the time when I was graduating from high school. But the E ticket imprint has never left me. I still use the reference often to denote a wild, exciting, or top-notch experience. Which brings me back to today and my assessment that this will be an E Ticket semester. In the voices and personalities of my students today I saw my future and it is going to be one heck of a experience. Yippee!!! There is no better way to spend the spring than with a great group of students who are going to engage with me, the material, and their fellow students. It will be one helluva’ ride! 
Day one thousand two hundred and eighty-one of the new forty – obla di obla da
Ms. C
