Faculty Off The Clock - Featuring Chris Korey

What happens when faculty step away from the classroom and the lab? In this episode of Faculty Off the Clock, we sit down with Associate Provost Chris Korey to explore the passions, pursuits, and pastimes that shape their life beyond academia. From unexpected hobbies to meaningful side projects, discover a different side of the faculty you thought you knew. Produced by Michael Overholt.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:07

We would like to welcome you to this inaugural episode of Faculty Off the Clock, a podcast series hosted by the College of Charleston's Office of the Provost that highlights the personal and later sides of our campuses professors.

SPEAKER_01 0:19

I'm Mark Del Manastro, and I'm of course Corey, Society of Provost, and your host of Faculty Off the Clock.

SPEAKER_02 0:53

So I'll start off, Dr. Corey, with uh interviewing you and getting some perspective on uh your off-the-clock life. And to begin, could you tell us how you got to your current faculty possession position at the College of Charleston?

SPEAKER_01 1:08

Sure. Yeah, it really has to do with where my parents retired. Um when I was a postdoc, I applied for a whole variety of um teaching positions, primarily in the Midwest, where my wife's family's from, in the Northeast, where we were currently living. And my parents bought some property in Beaufort and uh looked for uh positions around here, so the College of Charleston had never been to South Carolina, um, applied, liked it. Um was bigger than most places I had looked at, um, which was attractive. Um thankfully they offered me the job. I've been here for 22 years. Wow, time flies. And you were originally from where you were born and raised? All over. So I was born in Rochester. My dad worked for Eastman Kodak um when films still existed. Yeah. Um they didn't go bankrupt. Um, and we moved around every two or three years. So I was born in Rochester, um, which is where the headquarters of So I have to ask this question.

SPEAKER_02 2:05

Did you have, of course, given this uh connection, one of those uh insta cameras, you know, that you take the picture of the code.

SPEAKER_01 2:13

That would be Polaroid. Oh, oh, yeah, okay, which we weren't allowed to say. Nor Fuji. Fuji was the F-word in our family. I see. Only Kodak products were allowed. All right. Yeah. So the headquarters in Rochester. We moved to London. My wife was, I mean, my not my wife, my sister was born in London. We moved back to Rochester and we moved to Washington, D.C. and then to Chicago. Um, that's where I met my wife, and um, then they moved back to Rochester. And so uh they moved back to Rochester after I was um graduated from high school. So um I don't really have a hometown. My parents live in Buford and they've lived there for 22 years as well. Um but I would say Chicago is my hometown based. That's where I met my wife. I went to college outside there. Um most of my sports memories, most of my life is uh revolves around sports. So Jordan's Bulls, 85 Bears, Harry Carey and the Cubs, all Chicago.

SPEAKER_02 3:06

So that that gives us a little insight into um your uh interests, I guess, as as a youth. Um are there other specific interests or activities that uh are noteworthy during your time as a kid?

SPEAKER_01 3:20

I don't know. I I mostly played soccer growing up um from a young age. Uh not that I was great, but I played through high school. Um that was probably what I did most of the time.

SPEAKER_02 3:31

Um does that explain a little bit your interest now in triathlons and running or any connection there? Maybe just the running around.

SPEAKER_01 3:40

I gotcha, yes. Okay. Yeah, there was a deep period of doing nothing before I started doing the triathlons. Yeah. Um you know, I think growing up we moved a lot. So I, you know, we would go on vacations, like some of those um like long road trips like through revolutionary war sites, so we'd go out west. Um, but I I wouldn't say that we had any sort of regular place we went. Um I'm gonna talk more about my most some memorable summer job later. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 4:06

So so so there wasn't a particular vacation trek that stands out as being very memorable. I say, oh, that was great.

SPEAKER_01 4:15

No, I don't I don't think so. I I'd say the the place that I I think I most associate with my childhood is Niagara Falls, New York. Both my parents are from Niagara Falls. All my grandparents live there, everyone in my family lives there. Um and so it's the US side of the Niagara Falls, which isn't as nice as the Canadian side. So we spent most of our like holidays in Niagara Falls. Okay. Um huge Polish community. Um both sides of my family are from Poland and the Ukraine, so we spent uh a lot of time up there.

SPEAKER_02 4:42

So I do know that you're a dog person because you have a um retired greyhound, correct? Yes. And so as a kid, what was your first pet that you remembered?

SPEAKER_01 4:56

Uh hamsters. I had three hamsters, all of them were named Houdini uh after the magician. I don't know why, but that was their name. Uh and we didn't really have a dog until I was much older. So um it was just hamsters, those little clear balls running around.

SPEAKER_02 5:11

Uh I haven't had a lot of good experiences with hamsters. I don't can't say that I had either they tend to want to bite me and family members. Did you have that same experience? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:20

The the smell of cedar cedar chips in the yes, that's what I go. That's right. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 5:25

All right. Before we transition a little bit more into periods of your youth, um, was there a favorite board game or or game in general that that uh you had growing up?

SPEAKER_01 5:37

Risk. Played a lot of risk. Oh yeah. Yeah, against my sister. Yeah. And and what is the origin of risk?

SPEAKER_02 5:45

I don't know. You just has a gift or something?

SPEAKER_01 5:47

I don't know. It was just in the house. We didn't play many board games or card games, but I played a lot of risk and we play against my sister. They have all these strategies where you just like build up all your armies, you know, the little uh all the armies were um Roman numerals. I don't think I've ever played that game. Oh, it's so good. Yeah. Wow. My kids play a version of a game now called Hearts of Iron on the computer. Same sort of thing. Not familiar. Yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 6:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 6:22

He will tear your city down a lay a lile.

SPEAKER_02 6:27

Um, let's get a little bit more specific and talk about periods of your youth. Um your grammar school years. Is there a fun fact for Dr. Corey from his grammar school years that uh tell us?

SPEAKER_01 6:42

Yeah, I mean, we were walking over here. Really, like core memories uh are are more traumatic, I think, that early in my life. Just because that's all I can remember. Okay. Uh yeah. So we talked about throwing up on my desk in first grade. Yes. Yes, the only time I threw up in school. Was that related to a particular incident? Did you get in trouble with a teacher? I had a a friend visiting uh from out of state, came to school with me, and like right there on the had to go home. Wow. I think the only other thing I have uh there for I was in the spelling bee. I like, I like won the uh just the the grade. I was the first person to go. I got the word acrobat, misspelled it first person out.

unknown 7:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:21

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 7:21

I spelled it with a T. Still remember that. Spelling bee. You know, I have a spelling bee story also. You know, with the word I failed on, I actually went to outside the school. I competed more in the school elite all-stars. It was a big deal. And I was doing really good until the word computer came up. And I spelled it with an O instead of an E. And I'll never forget the judges. They all had dictionaries there, and it was like this consultation. Is it feasible that computer could be spelled with an O and not an E? Nope. So I was not recognized among the top tier. I came in fourth, actually, um, but I didn't get any recognition for that. So I did not know about your spelling. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:03

And when you lost, you didn't get to stay on the stage. You had to walk down off the stage out into the crowd.

SPEAKER_02 8:08

Sat next to my mom. Oh wow. First one out.

SPEAKER_01 8:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:11

Oh wow. Oh wow. Interesting. Um, high school years. Same fun fact question.

SPEAKER_01 8:17

Anything all right. Well, I mean, we talk about this a lot. Yeah. So uh when I was 15, I met my wife in high school. Um our first date was uh November 19th, 1990. Uh that was 34 years ago.

unknown 8:33

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 8:33

Yep. First date home alone uh in the movie theaters at a mall. Um yeah. So that's probably cool.

SPEAKER_02 8:42

Does your wife have as vivid of a memory of this event? Oh, you do. I mean, you've got the date, the place.

SPEAKER_01 8:48

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. For sure. I got her flowers after the first day. So we have the receipt. I have the receipt from 1990.

unknown 8:54

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 8:54

Yeah. Yeah, in like a scrapbook. You're a romantic, Dr. Cry. Okay. Yep. Yeah. That's impressive. Yeah. I mean, yeah. So there was this moment when we were turned 32 where we had known each other for an equal amount of time when we hadn't known each other. Okay. There's like, and and she we lived in Chicago from like the middle of middle school to the end of high school. And we lived, we were in different uh middle schools, but we both played the clarinet in high school. And there's a picture of us in the festival band in middle school.

SPEAKER_02 9:26

So I have to ask, are are there still clarinets in the house? No, we were both terrible. I mean, if we had a clarinet, could we maybe do a song? No, no, no, Betty Goodman.

SPEAKER_01 9:38

No, definitely not. Okay. But um, yeah, we didn't know each other, but we sat uh behind, you know, like she was about like we sat in the same band in middle school.

SPEAKER_02 9:47

Very interesting. I did not know that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:49

Okay, like when we graduated from college, we went to different schools, um, but in you know, that summer of 1996, we got married and graduated from college and moved like simultaneously within two months.

SPEAKER_02 10:02

This is a real remarkable love story. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Impressive. Yeah, yeah. All right, how about undergraduate years? What uh is there a fun fact, something that might amuse our listeners about Dr. Corey's undergraduate years at Notre Dame?

SPEAKER_01 10:18

Uh right, yeah, University of Notre Dame. Sorry about the loss, by the way, last week. Right, yeah, worst lost um ever is what I've been told. Um you get used to it, though he's high hopes. Um I'd say not at school, but my since my dad worked at Kodak, um, my worst summer job was I worked on an assembly line the summer after my freshman year. So we had moved away from where my high school was all the way back to New York. So I was home by myself and I didn't have a job um initially. And my father was like, Well, you need a job. And so he got me a job on the assembly line of disposable cameras that were Kodak cameras. Um, you had to come in and you they showed you how to put together the little disposable cameras, the little cardboard cameras. And you have to do each of the steps, uh, and then they decided which one you were good at.

SPEAKER_02 11:02

Um I was worse at your extensive training in there.

SPEAKER_01 11:05

No, no, they was just there it is, go for it. Uh Wow. Yeah. And uh the one I was worst at is putting the the um the lens in that required like a little tiny spring. They had to use tweezers. I couldn't do it. So I said at the very end.

SPEAKER_02 11:19

What was the the time of day? I mean, was it even? I was doing it.

SPEAKER_01 11:22

No, no, it was like seven to three every day.

SPEAKER_02 11:25

Okay. So at least it wasn't the graveyard shift.

SPEAKER_01 11:27

No, I tape my fingers up because I would get blisters, because you were just sitting on the assembly line. My job was to snap the last piece in and then make sure that how many people were you accompanied by on the other side. There were two of us on each side, and I think there's probably seven stations. Oh, yeah, no. Okay. No, no. I don't know what kind of relationship were fostered during that time. All right. Yeah. So I made those little disposable cameras. I think you can still buy them. Wow. Awesome. That's all I did.

SPEAKER_02 11:53

All right. Let's uh how about graduate school years? Uh what fun fact from your graduate school years might you share? Other than I want to forget it. No, I'm just uh I mean we know the grind of graduate school, but there's got to be some type of diversion activity.

SPEAKER_01 12:07

Oh well, I would say three years in, I considered switching for so I was in a uh graduate program for biology, biomedical sciences. Uh and about three years in, I had considered um transferring over to the History of Science program. Oh. Um I don't know. I always had an interest in history of science. I went, I took the intro course to their graduate program while I was still doing my thesis work. Um I met a couple of advisors over there, and they they basically told me that it was a bad idea that I shouldn't do that. It would be easier for me to find a faculty tradition in in my current space, and that there'd be other ways to scratch that itch, which turned out to be true.

SPEAKER_02 12:45

Wow. Okay, that's a that's a detail I was not familiar with. So let's change gears a little bit and talk about uh Dr. Corey and the present. Um and we're gonna focus a little bit uh more directly on the theme of of this podcast, which is faculty off the clock. Could you tell us a little bit about a current pastime or hobby or activity that you that you enjoy, right, regularly? Not not like that summer job. Yeah, yeah, right. Tell us how it first started.

SPEAKER_01 13:13

I'd say all I spend almost most of my time uh uh exercising. So I do endurance racing probably since 2009. So I do not exercise at all between 1996 and 2009. Not much. Yeah, very little.

SPEAKER_02 13:28

Yeah. Did not and what was the what was the factor that prompted you to say, okay, I need to get I need to get into it?

SPEAKER_01 13:35

Oh yeah. Well, I was uh I got tenure and then uh I was a hot mess afterwards and I was like, well, you do this. And when I was working in the lab, I always had joked with the undergraduates that I was gonna do like a long triathlon, and they were like, now you're full of it. Um and so in 2009, yeah, I started just you know like printing off something from the internet for training. I borrowed a bike from our interim dean, Seth Pritchard. Yeah. Uh I borrowed a bike and I did a triathlon off of Sullivan's Island. And you liked it. Loved it. Um and then you've been doing them ever since. Started running long triathlons.

SPEAKER_02 14:07

How many how many triathlons do you regularly do in a year, for example?

SPEAKER_01 14:11

Uh I'll do one long one. So they're like the Iron Man 70.3, 70.3 miles. Uh, and then I'll do the summer series uh at the Charleston Sprint triathlon at James Island County Park, which everyone knows has the dog park. So I'd say the fun fact about that triathlon is you do the swim in the pond next to the dog park, which both has where the dogs, you know, hang out, probably do their business. Um, but also it tends to have an alligator usually while you're in there.

SPEAKER_02 14:38

Um there's some there's some peril, risk. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:42

Oh, it just improves your immunity while you're in the pond. Okay, all right. Yeah, yeah. By the end of the summer, it's probably a hundred. It's so hot. Um, yeah, yeah, it's sort of gross. Um, there was one year it rained so much during the week that the pond inverted. So like all this cold water was on the top of the pond. Uh, and then it it when that happens, the density of the water causes it to flip upside down. And so all this water went to the bottom, and the water on the bottom came up to the top and it's low in oxygen. And so there was this huge fish kill in the pond, like two days before the race. Um, we swam in it, you know, you're getting ready to swim, and they were like seagulls diving down, picking up the fish. Are you like feeling the fish corpse as you're swimming? You're swimming through a couple people at the end, you know, we're getting changed and little fish fell out of their tri-suits. Yeah, it was good stuff. It was good stuff. Yeah. So I'd say, like, you know, marathons, triathlons, uh, and I I run with a group now for the past six years here called Without Limits. Chris Bailey, our cross-country coach, is the is the head of the group. Okay. It's based in Wilmington, but it's like adult, you know, uh endurance running.

SPEAKER_02 15:51

So that kind of brings the next question. I mean, it's a pretty time-consuming uh activity outside of the College of Charleston. But despite that, is there still some off the clock activity that you'd like to tackle that you haven't managed to do yet?

SPEAKER_01 16:09

Oh, yeah, I don't know. I I would say that it really is just another version of some racing. They have these races called swim runs um where you um they they're originate in Sweden. Um and it's you run and swim and run and swim like between these islands. So you have you wear a pair of shoes while you're running, and you have like a like a wetsuit on. But they also let you wear a like a buoy, it's something called a poo pole buoy between your legs, keep your feet up because you're wearing your running shoes. So you'll run like a couple miles through a an island and then get in the water and swim to the next one and then and then run uh. What prompted your interest now? Just because it's sounds like something we're doing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 16:50

Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:51

I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 16:53

So, you know, we we know how um consuming this profession is as a faculty member, but um what would you be doing if you weren't a faculty member?

SPEAKER_01 17:04

Well, my wife and I have this list of of jobs. Uh these and so it's like a dream list. Retirement jobs. Ah, I see. Okay. Got the clock. Uh so number one on the retirement job list um is groundskeeper at a baseball field. Oh. Yeah. Interesting. Painting the lines, raking the dirt, mowing the grass. Yeah. Like I literally I would love to work on the grounds crew at at um the River Dog Stadium.

SPEAKER_02 17:29

Very defined tasks that have a very completion. Yep, yep, yep. Satisfaction at the end of the day. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:37

Number two would probably be uh a subway driver, like driving a subway car, like train. Really? Different than a bus. I feel like you'd have to interact with the bus people.

SPEAKER_02 17:47

Are you a subway guy? Like when you visit a big city like I think I just like it, yeah. I'm only I'm only I'm only gonna move around in the subway.

SPEAKER_01 17:54

Yeah, we I I think uh the one I like the most probably we I taught study abroad in Germany and in Berlin, they have these trams uh that are above ground. They're like buses, but more like a subway. So you just like cruise through the through the city, just driving. You don't have to talk to anybody.

SPEAKER_02 18:10

You're just so the next round that uh we will have for all our guests is the lightning round. Uh brief questions. Uh uh we're gonna have a quick format here and uh we're gonna ask you a a couple of questions and um let us know your immediate impression. Favorite food?

SPEAKER_01 18:32

Oh, favorite food off the top of my uh it would be like pasta, like Italian food for sure. Pasta and red sauce. Oh red sauce. With with with meatballs. Yeah. My wife just jokes that like when she's out of town, all I do is eat pasta and red sauce over and over again. Yeah. So that would be it. Yeah. Spicy, mild? I mean, I'd like a spicy, but if we're gonna be honest, it's just straight out of the jar. You know. Out of the jar. That's pretty much all I ate. I was pretty pretty low-key. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 18:59

Activity that you most avoid.

SPEAKER_01 19:03

Uh well, um I I would say like large social activities. Um, okay. This is kind of small scale. So there's three people here. Yeah, yeah. My wife uh despite the prospective huge listener pool out there. Yeah, yeah. Like my social battery it only runs to about 20%. Uh my wife will call me a pair of shoes at events because it's like I'm not there. It's just a pair of shoes. Yeah, she gets mad at me. No, no, no. There's this like there's this meme of Homer Simpson slowly moving into a bush, and that's pretty much that's pretty much what I like. Uh I've worked on it though.

SPEAKER_02 19:40

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 19:40

Hot dog or hamburger? Oh, hot dog at a park, boiled. A little ketchup from a ballpark. Certain brand? I mean, it doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_02 19:47

Really? Yeah. It has all the fillers, you're good with it. As long as it's boiled. Yep. Okay. French fries or potato chips.

SPEAKER_00 19:53

French fries.

SPEAKER_02 19:55

Any particular type? They have to be a certain shape.

SPEAKER_00 19:57

I mean, really, you know, the McDonald's ones are good, aren't they?

SPEAKER_02 20:01

I mean, they're just like, you know, they've been chemically created to be that good.

SPEAKER_01 20:04

But yeah, I'd eat that. Interesting taste.

SPEAKER_02 20:06

Sweet or unsweet tea? Oh, always unsweet, yeah. Unsweet. You know, you you're not a sugar guy? I mean, you know, all these calories you're burning with the triathlons and everything. I do take in a lot of sugar, but not in my tea. Not in the tea? Yeah. Okay. All right, we're in the south, so we've got to talk barbecue. Mustard, vinegar, tomato base sauce.

SPEAKER_01 20:25

You know, I started with the mustard because I liked it, but honestly, the North Carolina like vinegar with the pepper in it, I sort of like that. Oh. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Yeah, yeah. If I'm gonna go there.

SPEAKER_02 20:34

All right, we're gonna switch gears a little bit from uh consumption to, after all this food talk, teeth cleaning. Toothpaste tube dispensing method is really critical here. Wanna know how you're approaching it?

SPEAKER_01 20:45

This is uh this is a line in the sand. Hmm. I know you if I was you, if I I would say you'd want to pull it up from the bottom and always roll it up, but I'm really just probably just right in the middle, squeeze it out. Quickest way. Yeah. All right. There's no there's no Okay. Yeah.

unknown 21:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:02

Wife approaches it the same way? Do you share a toothpaste tube, or do you have your own?

SPEAKER_01 21:05

But we don't argue about that. So I guess whatever we do works. Okay. Yeah, yeah. Popcorn, yes or no? Oh, yeah, for sure. In the whirly pop, you know, we've already talked about it. Always whirly pop. We never deviate from the whirly pop. You want to try another method?

SPEAKER_02 21:18

Nope. Say, hey, to your wife, uh, tonight let's try uh in the pan. It's always perfect in the whirly pop.

SPEAKER_01 21:24

Uh and you know, my wife likes a little butter, but honestly, I would go either lemon pepper on it. I mean pepper. Celery salt. Celery salt. Yeah. And where does this come from? I don't know. Influence anyway? I just don't know. Tina's Tina's dad, I think, likes the lemon pepper. And I think I may have gotten it from both of those from him, but they look very good. All right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:43

All right. Last lightning round question. You're a celebrity event. Dr. Corey is the focus. What's your entrance song?

SPEAKER_01 21:51

Yeah, I thought about this. Uh, and that's popular right now in certain spaces, but um, I I think I'd go ACDC Thunderstruck. A C D C sort of, you know, back in the day, right? Yeah. My wife was uh when Roller Derby she had the TNT song, it was her rollout, Thunderstruck. It's also the theme song of our car. So we go Thunderstruck.

unknown 22:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:13

All right, that would be it.

SPEAKER_02 22:15

That's a good one. All right, Dr. Corey. Well, we really appreciate your sharing today about your time off the clock, and we're giving our listeners an alternate glimpse into your life outside the classroom. We really do appreciate it. Stay tuned for our next installment when we learn more about the life off the clock of another College of Charleston.