Blankenship looks through the box, occasionally lifting out an odd scroll or piece of paper. Ellison says, "We need to divide your classes, Dr. .."
You have two classes assigned this semester: Divination and Introduction to Library Services. It's always struck you as odd that you spend time in every other class trying to prevent students from using divination to cheat on tests, but then offer a class for them to get better at divination. But it's a required core class, and is viewed as a more prestigious class to teach than your fall semester class on summoning.
The Intro to Library Services class, however, is often viewed as a joke class. When you took it, Dr. Keith, the former head of the department, napped while your class tried to find things in the magical stacks. He gave so little guidance that Manish almost got lost in a scroll with a tricky pattern on its verso.
"My thought was that Bob can handle Divination, since it is both more demanding and a class he's taught often, while you can cover Intro to Library Services."
Ugh, that would be a blow to your standing, and boring to boot. You suspect rumors would fly about why you were pulled from teaching Divination and affect students' opinion of you and how they'd value you. On the other hand, you'd be supporting Dr. Ellison and the department.