It's that time of the year when one sits in retrospection and wonders how fast time flies by every single year! The autonomy seems to be working well, both for the students and the teachers. 

For students, because there is better organisation of schedules and time bound announcements from the COE's office, which is so easily accessible. Prof.Perumal and Prof.Sukumar have both moved from the chaos and clutter of the early days, to a smooth flow of work in the Controller's office. Prof.Balusamy, the Chief Superintendent carries out the conduct of the exams with hall arrangements, etc, handling the pressure with composure and goodwil.

For teachers,  there is freedom to experiment, vet, choose and implement the syllabus of their choice; along with it, is the added pleasure of co-ordinated vacation.

I, especially, loved the challenge in 2010 of designing the syllabus, channelising the classroom activities, preparing extra materials, thinking out relevant and enjoyable assignments for the third years and the first years, preparing an e-book to stimulate the reading habits of our third years, learning to manage the language lab resources and best of all,  the joy of giving learners confidence and belief in their own abilities, whether in language learning or in other extra-curricular activities. 

How can I forget the long hours the team of GCE newsletter spent from 4  to, sometimes, even six in the evenings, as we planned, experimented with software, web designing, collecting data and materials and resources. The team is absolutely fantastic. 

I have Arvind, the serious aciever, who comes up with his brilliant ideas, Uday, the laughter icon of the team, with his joyous ways, Navneethan, sincere and filled with a desire to keep learning, Prashant with his charming ways and relaxed attitude, Jinu, the result getter, calm, composed and laughingly accepting the teasing of the group, Krithika and Rabiya, the silent contributors. They are a good team, result oriented, they see the vision and are ready to work, but abvoe all, they are fabulous at working together in a straight, no-nonsense manner. There are no under-currents here, so, it's a pleasure working with them all. This has been one of my best piece of work of the year. They made my work enjoyable and made me see, once again, the best side of our GCE students.

Yes, the last two semesters have been particularly and extremely tough on my endurance, cos of the faculty shortage in the department and the academic and administrative responsibilities, but, I'm ready for the challenges this new year 2011. 

People have been kind and considerate...Prof. Srinivasan, who appreciated my efforts to handle my responsibilites as class advisor and on many occasions, extended a piece of advice that would help me out with the work, deserves a special mention for having made 2010, bearable. Thank God, for small mercies.

I love what I'm doing and hope to be able to continue to give GCE, Salem, all my passion for my profession. 

A few of our students have had personal losses in their lives. My heart goes out to them. Many have had success in their studies. I'm happy for them. We've lost a student to an illness...I'm sad, he did not live to enjoy the best part of his growing years. 

Work, chaos, challenges, friendships, team work, achievements, hopes, frustration, sadness...what a mix of emotions and experiences, it's been this year. 2010, farewell to thee.