First Time in a While

“Hope is but the dream of those who wake.” – Matthew Prior

A few weeks ago, I went to training for work about the new science standards coming out next year. I realized that it was the first time I had been to an in-person training since before the pandemic. All of the workshops I had been to were either self-paced with videos or over Zoom. It’s weird to think that doing it over Zoom was normal for so long. To be honest it was exhausting doing in-person training. I had forgotten what it was like. Overall, it was a good experience. Most of the day was spent seeing question-based science instruction modeled, and being on the receiving end of that kind of instruction.

These photos represent somewhere I visited earlier this summer for the first time. This is the Strom Thurmond Dam. It was named about South Carolina’s longest serving senator. I used to camp in the area with my dad with I was younger. It is an impressive structure. The dam itself is a mile long. The dam was built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers between 1946 and 1954 for the purposes of flood control, hydroelectricity and downstream navigation. The day we visited it, it was a clear day. A little on the warm side, but there were very few people in the lake, so the water was calm. I was hoping they would have opened the spillway while I was there, but not such luck.