By: Waylon Jones and Christie Oneill <\/p>\n\n\n\n
What are the University of Maine at Presque Isle (UMPI) faculty and staff up to during the summer season? In this new series, Behind the Scenes with Campus Staff<\/em>, we explore what goes on behind the quiet halls and empty classrooms while most of us are away from campus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As we move further into the spring semester, we\u2019re continuing this series with a professor\u2019s reflection on their summer before the next one arrives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Paul Johnson Jr is an Associate Professor of Psychology at UMPI. During the school year he takes the reins of online classes, in-person classes, campus activities and events, but what happens after final grades are submitted?<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOne of the things I love about summer,\u201d he explains, \u201cis that I can actually engineer my time. It\u2019s calm.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n His summer memories are not only calm. One of his favorite memories from the summer was full of energy and came with a twist of bittersweet pride.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Johnson has always run competitively and runs almost every day. This summer, that routine turned into friendly competition with his daughter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis was the year my daughter beat me more than I beat her,\u201d he says with a laugh. \u201cIt broke my soul a little bit. It was bittersweet, though. I’m happy\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While the results stung a bit, Johnson admits he was proud.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Of course, no \u201cbehind the scenes\u201d chat would be complete without mentioning his iconic hats. As Johnson comes back to campus for the 2025 fall semester, returning students have noticed a change in his iconic persona. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey\u2019re still around!\u201d he says with a chuckle and holding up the orange cap. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Between winding down, family runs, and changing up his signature look, Professor Johnson\u2019s summer of 2025 was perfect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSome people thrive in chaos,\u201d he says with a grin. \u201cI don\u2019t. I like to have my mojo the way I want it, and in the summer, I can.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n For Johnson, that sense of balance is what makes the season so rewarding.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By: Waylon Jones and Christie Oneill What are the University of Maine at Presque Isle (UMPI) faculty and staff up to during the summer season? In this new series, Behind the Scenes with Campus Staff, we explore what goes on behind the quiet halls and empty classrooms while most of us are away from campus. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":87,"featured_media":12099,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7376,7377,7378],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-opinion","category-sports","et-has-post-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/87"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12094"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12094\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12100,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12094\/revisions\/12100"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12099"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.umpi.edu\/utimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}