So, a strange thing happened to me at work the other day. First day back after a long period of extended childcare (some folk call these “holidays” but they’re daft) and I’m straight into the office to fire up the computer so I can get a look at the GCSE results and spend a bit of time doing some question analysis (which, apart from maybe creating resources, is my teacher catnip - yeah, I know, I’m cool as).

After the inevitable call to IT to get them to tell me what my password is (those guys, they love me so much they have a picture of me in their office…they must be out of drawing pins because they’ve stuck it up there with darts - FE budget cuts right there for you). I settle down to a hot cup of spreadsheet to look for the names of last year’s students in the massively accessible WHOLE COLLEGE list that was in no visible order whatsoever.

And I couldn’t remember a single one.

I had their faces; their faces were front and centre in my mind. But the names were locked away in a back room someplace dusty and unused. Students who had sat in front of me for hours upon hours the previous academic year were just…gone. Names that I’d written on countless pieces of admin were lost in the mist. The titles of the people who were my entire focus for so long had all gone and done a flit, just like my password.

Minor neurological hiccup

This lasted for a fairly disturbing 30 seconds or so, right up until my brain rebooted itself with a hiss and a whirr and I was able to get on. Or the closest I ever get to getting on.

This minor neurological hiccup (don’t worry, it was nothing more than that) got me thinking about information. I think what might have happened in my case is that my brain was reaching capacity and was in the process of archiving all unnecessary data from last year. It was just a little early, that’s all. But it did make me ponder about how much information lecturers in colleges have to deal with and how much mental strain it takes to keep on top of it. The weight of data, as it were. And not just the spreadsheet-based stuff.

Names, dates, specs, meetings, lessons, millions of tiny little admin tasks, deadlines for exams, EHCP info, connections and all the rest of it (I would list it in its entirety but I don’t think it’d make massively interesting reading). It’s no wonder my brain decided to check out for a little morning stroll as soon as I got back to work.

There are things that help to shoulder the weight. Decent planners (and a decent system for using them), IT systems that are functional and easy to access, timetabling that’s sensible. All of these can help with the heavy mental lifting, and act as a way to funnel and filter everything that comes at you. Selective prioritisation also helps. But having said that, don’t be surprised if something important up there gets deleted for no reason every now and then: even the largest hard drives get full eventually.

Tom Starkey teaches English at a college in the North of England