Sunday, December 22, 2013

Final Thoughts from 2013

I collect quotations the way people collect coins, stamps, and matchbook covers. I collect them from Internet sites, from books and magazines, and from miscellaneous social and unsocial media -- T-shirts are an under-utilized source of inspiration. At one time, early in my pre-computer career, I pasted address-sized stickers of sayings on interoffice mail envelopes until the mailroom stopped that practice after most of the envelopes of the school were cluttered with my little bits of wisdom.

Now, my life's work is to fill the digital capacity of the world's servers with witticisms. But rather than hoard them in digital folders buried many layers down, I recycle quotations on email messages, classroom whiteboards, assorted posters, and lesson PowerPoints.

Before I retire 2013 quotes from active use to inactive memory, I thought I would give a dozen favorites one more moment to digitally shine. Think of this post as a parting, end-of-the year gift for those just starting their collections of wisdom.

Many of my favorite quotations talk of journeys:

"It doesn't matter where you are coming from. All that matters is where you are going." Brian Tracy.

"The best sermons are lived, not preached." Cowboy saying.

"If it's both terrifying and amazing, then you should pursue it." Erada.

Some talk of overcoming problems along that journey:

"One cannot stumble upon an idea unless one is running." Vladimir Kosma Zworykin.

"A bird only flies. It does not turn to another bird and ask, "Am I doing this right?" Mary Ann Rademacher.

"No one would have crossed the ocean if he could have gotten off the ship in the middle of the storm." Paul Boese.

Some talk of persistence while overcoming problems along that journey:

"It's hard to beat a person who never gives up." Babe Ruth.

"Never make decisions while running up a hill." Christina Cox, runner.

"If Plan A didn't work, the alphabet has 25 other letters." Unknown.

And some talk of our most difficult journeys: those we take within ourselves:

"If you don't have confidence, you'll always find a way not to win." Carl Lewis.

"You become what you think about." Earl Nightingale.

"Be yourself. Everyone else is already taken." Oscar Wilde.






Sunday, December 15, 2013

Counting and Measuring in the Classroom

At the end of every month, I open up my old-school attendance notebook and total data points in columns and rows. This is a habit I started back seven years ago as an adjunct in the Basic Ed classroom when I first wanted to know how I was doing and how I could improve it.

Sure, the creative free-flowing part of my brain saw the results of daily lessons and thought that everything was brilliant, just brilliant, but my business, quantitative-numbers side wasn't so easily persuaded by colorful thoughts. It asked persistently, "Do you have the data to back that up?" I know from a variety of business experiences that almost everything can be measured or counted: it's just a matter of asking the right questions and tallying the data.

If you can't count or measure something, it probably doesn't exist.

At first though, I wasn't sure what data I needed. So I started to collect and organize what I had at hand: number of students per session, programs represented, hours attended, tests taken, results achieved, and so forth. After one semester collection, I had a baseline of data points. One semester of data still didn't answer the question of how I was doing since I had nothing else to compare it to. So I kept on.

After another semester, I started to notice trends by comparing the first semester to the next. I felt better, but two semesters of data didn't seem to be terrifically valid since I suspected that the fall semester differs from the spring or summer semesters (which it does by quite a bit). What I needed was a full academic year including the summer term.

In the meantime, I continued to collect and to ask questions of the data and pass the reports on to the center managers and my associate dean. Some of the information has been important for Basic Ed funding (student numbers, attendance, and entry and exit tests: all part of GED scorecards), some for center BE scheduling, and some information, while interesting, didn't have immediate practical importance. For example, at one time I tracked how many students signed into the center lab just for testing and how many were there for GED or pre-program instruction: since testing has moved to other desks, that data is now irrelevant.

And, my old notebooks and monthly reports have provided a hard record of the evolution of the Basic Ed program at my two sites. Initial data quantified the old system of open academic skills labs, while the 2012-2013 Academic Year data showed how the school-wide Pathways initiative changed the flow of students at my two sites. Now, this fall (AY 2013-2014), the data shows upward trends possibly due to changes we made in delivery of both the GED/HSED content and the college prep classes. I say "possibly due" since the increase might have more to do with the GED 2002 series Closeout Campaign, than any structural changes we have made. Time will tell. Data collection is an exercise in patience as well as persistence. Ask me about trends in May or next fall.

In the meantime, the monthly exercise of data collection, comparison, and trends satisfies my personal business numbers curiosity and helps me recommend the best BE strategy at the centers. And, the data comes in handy when my center managers or associate dean have specific questions of me. When you have the data, you have the basis for intelligent evidence-based answers. Without data, well, your guess is as good as mine.

Sunday, December 8, 2013

Mandela's Code of Respect

When students fill out paperwork to enter Basic Education classes, they have to read and sign a Code of Conduct form promising to behave themselves in the classroom. It's a shame we have to waste the paper on the obvious, but there have been incidents and lawyers must make a living too. But when a student seems overly intimidated by the two-column legalese, I say, "Look, just respect the other students who are working alongside you. That's all this code means: respect one another."

I thought of that Code as I watched and read of memorials this past week to the late President of South Africa, Nelson Mandela. Surrounded by a world-wide celebration of his life, I reflected on the qualities of a Code of Respect, the basis for the Mandela legend.

One network correspondent summed his life saying Mandela believed that no one was above him. He would not acknowledge the power that others had over him, even as a prisoner for twenty-seven long years. Stories said he respected his jailers as fellow human beings, but would not bow to the system of apartheid that they represented. It takes an amazing inner reserve to respect your opponents without agreeing with them and then, in turn, to earn their respect by your strength of convictions.

Left unsaid by the reporter but equally true is just as Mandela believed no one was above him, he also believed no one was below him. He offered equal respect for people from all social and economic, racial and ethnic levels. This is what gave him his generous spirit that was loved by his countrymen and admired by the world. So many of the tributes during the past week spoke of vignettes that showed Mandela's humor and common touch when he walked among his people and focused on their individual stories. 

But respect, it seems to me, needs to crystalize within us before we can project it into the world. We need to begin our personal Mandela transformation by really, honestly, and openly accepting who we are. Self-respect may be the hardest part of the personal Code to form, because we all are too aware of our faults, gifts, and gaffes. Even Mandela. He once asked his followers, "Do not judge me by my successes, but judge me by how many times I fell down and got back up again."

A life lived in a Code of Respect is an ideal that few of us can achieve on a consistent basis, which is why, I suppose, we need to be reminded of it as we sign classroom Codes of Conduct. It is also why we are attracted like moths to shining examples, like Mandela, who show us that we have the power to rise above daily pettiness and indecision that mires us to baser instincts. As Mandela once said, "A good head and a good heart are always a formidable combination."

Sunday, December 1, 2013

Post-Graduation is like Shepherd's Pie

Of course I like Thanksgiving. Who wouldn't like slow-roasted turkey infusing the house with sage-spiced memories; or pumpkin pie bars, or a legendary green bean casserole; or gossiping with the latest in-laws, out-laws and new family additions; or, of course, NFL football -- well, maybe not NFL football this time around.

Of course I like Thanksgiving. It's a holiday that seems uniquely shaped around the American psyche.

What I like almost as much as Thanksgiving are the three days following Turkey Day: additional family gatherings (congrats to Hannah and Brandon), college football rivalries (cheers to Auburn, Penn State, and nice try, Michigan), and the start of the Christmas season (on Black Friday, mind you, not Thursday). But what I like most is our family's leftover culinary tradition, Shepherd's Pie, which can only be made after Thanksgiving because it is built on layers of stuffing filled with turkey meat and topped by carrots, gravy, and mashed potatoes. All Thanksgiving leftovers.

So, why the change of blog theme from mostly education to holiday recipes? Am I now underwritten by the Food Channel? I wish, but no. It occurred to me, as I watched my wife spoon in the stuffing crust for this weekend's Shepherd's Pie that things built off a main event are sometimes as tasty as the main event itself. Let me explain.

In a little more than a month, on Dec. 20th, NWTC students will graduate in mid-year ceremonies at the Resch Center in Green Bay. This is a single central celebration that hundreds have been working toward. You might call it our school's Academic Thanksgiving Day.

Yet, what happens the day after the graduation gown is folded up and put away? Just as we need to guard against post-holiday blues, a newly-hatched alumni needs to guard against a post-graduation let down. Somehow the student needs to collect all the blessings and benefits he or she has accumulated from their work and mix these academic ingredients layer by layer to create a new wonderful concoction.

For example: if you are a student you shouldn't think of graduation as an end point, but as a beginning. You should stay in contact with the school, the instructors and staff. We would love to be able to help you as you move forward. Next, don't just up and sell texts, workbooks or manuals: there might be ideas, activities, inspiration that will be handy in the future -- who can say? That will be worth more than the 50% or less cash back. And, stay in touch with classmates, with employer mentors, and with professional organizations. Exchange contact information before, during, and after the Resch ceremony -- this will be the beginning of your professional network and probably one of the most important layers of your future academic feast.

So, by all means celebrate the holidays and the December graduation. Make time for family, for parties, and even for more football (there's always time for football). But, at the same time, don't forget to package, label, store, repurpose all the "leftovers" from your academic career. These may be as important, as nutritious, and as tasty as the main event.







Sunday, November 24, 2013

What I'm Thankful For


The world seems lit in a different kind of light this time of the year. The sun travels lower in the sky, the moon brighter in the cold dark night, but what is different is the star-stuff that glows about us. There are still moments, like now, in which I have the time to pause and consider everything I am thankful for.

As the end of the series approaches, I am thankful for GED 2002. The fabled, tested credential opened career and academic doors for hundreds of thousands of students. GED 2002 will be a hard act to follow.

I am thankful for the staff of our Assessment Center. They work behind the scenes with little acclaim but lead the state in preparing our school and students for the new GED 2014 credential. We are in very good shape because of their work.

I am thankful for clever quotations that inspire me each day from Facebook friends, Sunrise Inspirations, and Runner's World -- running, I have found, is a lot like working in a classroom. And, I am thankful for the supply of inspirational cards from The Attic Coffee and Books on Bodart Street in downtown Green Bay: next year, I promise to buy envelopes to go with them so I don't unbalance the stock.

I am thankful for Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and, my newfound article-source favorite, Zite: it's much easier keeping up with news, trends and ideas than it was in the past. In a busy world, one hundred forty-words updates are not a bad thing.

I am thankful for technology and for succinct, informative emails which allow me to stay in touch everyone all the time. For those emails that are not succinct and informative, I am thankful for the delete key.

I am thankful for whiteboards.

I am thankful for the STAR Reading Program and ANI (Adult Numeracy Instruction), both promulgated and promoted by the Wisconsin Technical College System. This instruction has changed the way I think about teaching adults.

And, while I am thanking those who have formed my teaching, I am thankful for the IPA (Instructor Preparation Academy); my mentor, Tom Bice-Allen; and the Talent Development folks of NWTC. I hope they like their new offices.

I am thankful for this blog. It helps me compare my craft against the lessons of others. I am thankful for the readers who point out my typos.

I am thankful for bosses who are patient with my impatience and for my PASS team members. We share the same passion for the success of our students, which is more important than sharing similar political views. And, some day, I will share a ride with the group.

I am thankful for my students. They may think that I am the instructor, but often our roles are reversed. I think I learn much deeper life lessons from them than the lessons in subject-verb agreement they get from me. Persistent gradual steps can change a life and can overcome any obstacle. 

And, I am humbly thankful for the teaching opportunity I have been given by the school. I am thankful for the dual assignments at Shawano and Oconto Falls. Two plus years in and I am still wowed by the talent, dedication and student service of both of those staffs. They don't realize how good they are.

A recent Prudential television commercial asks viewers what would you do with your life if money was not an object? What would I do? Exactly what I am doing right now and exactly where I am doing it. For that, I am truly thankful. Have a good holiday.

Sunday, November 17, 2013

Failing Forward

Uncomfortable and unprepared. That's understandable. The typical new GED student would rather be almost anywhere except in a classroom. Most of them are forced by circumstances -- and the reality of needing the credential to find a job today -- to reenter a place (the classroom) with bad memories. In their eyes, classroom work is a slog through an incomprehensible mire, lectures drone on far too long, PowerPoint projects seem pointless, and the idea of actually passing test, much less a course, a semester or a program, seems a fantasy just left of the turn toward Neverland.

Yet here they sit. Askew in the seats, rarely facing you head on, their body language screams "Let me out of here!" Yet, something directed them here and keeps them in their seats. I give them a world of credit for that kind of courage. As they sit, a little more attentive if you can get their attention and trust, the GED orientation moves deliberately, mixing information about the test sequence with guides for student success. Most of them can attain the GED and move on to better job opportunities or college courses. They can succeed if they believe in that success and put in the time and the effort.

However, I know everything is not suddenly changed in their lives as if by a sprinkle of pixie dust. Disappointments and mistakes of the past need to be addressed. We owe the students that bit of reality. Everyone, absolutely everyone, makes mistakes and suffers the consequences. What's important is what happens next.

A few years ago, a colleague recommended I read John C. Maxwell, best-selling author and motivator, who says even positive, upbeat, successful people, the kind of people we admire for their resoluteness, have "a tough time learning how to see failure positively." Even the best of us, he says, fail at what we do. In his 2000 book, Failing Forward: Turning Mistakes into Stepping Stones for Success, Maxwell prescribes a Cinderella-like transformation of discouragement, mistakes, and failure into success. He calls that process "failing forward."

During the GED orientation, I list the many successful people who failed before they succeeded (Edison, Disney, J.K.Rowling -- the list goes on and on): persistence not brilliance is the key to success. Then, I pass out a list of the book's 15 stepping stones and ask students to chose which of those steps seem to make the most sense to them. Maxwell's steps include "Learn a new definition of failure," "Change yourself and your world changes," and "Manage the weakness that manages you." I write the steps students choose on the board and we talk about why the particular steps seemed relevant to them. It's a valuable discussion. These students know about failure and disappointment. They need to know what they need to do to right their academic ship.

Every time I present this exercise, I notice many students favor the last of Maxwell's 15 steps: "Get up, get over it, get going." To my students this means they can't rely on their past, on others, or on best wishes to succeed. I think they know that. That's why they are sitting in front of me starting work on their GED. I can help guide them, but they need to provide the motive power themselves.

Maxwell's book was probably written for self-help and business audiences, but I think his ideas also line up well for students. I tell my GED students there will be times when they feel discouraged, disheartened and want to give up. These feelings are natural for anyone who wants to push the boundaries of where they are into new unknown challenges. They will make mistakes. They will be discouraged. They will fail. There is nothing wrong with that.

The key point is what do they do after they pick themselves up and brush themselves off? How do they turn mistakes into success? How will they decide to "fail forward?"




Sunday, November 10, 2013

Books Every Man Should Read

"These are the books the Internet says every man should read, and it's pretty disappointing," read the Huffington Post article title (Nov. 6, 2013). Aside from asking who exactly is Mr. Internet? (an unnamed conglomeration of digital sources), I wondered how many real guys voted for the list and if the vote was before or after their team's QB was injured: yes, that would make a difference. Huffington opined, "It's not that these are bad books individually... it's just that, taken together and put in these lists, they seem to showcase an infantile, reductive version of what our culture sees as 'masculinity.'"

Mr. Internet divided the thirty-some man books into five categories (war, brothers, politics, sex, and adventure). I didn't have a problem with the general divisions, though I would substitute science fiction/horror for sex because if a guy really wants to read about sex, he's not going to consult this list. I agreed with some of the books from Mr. Internet's list though not many. Others (such as Don Quixote by Cervantes) quietly should be allowed to quietly recede into English major optional reading lists. 

It's time to stand up, say I'm a man. I read, and I think I can do better. Here's my list.

1. Books about War. The Internet correctly chose two classic guy books to front this category: Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut and Catch 22 by Joseph Heller. Billy Pilgrim and Yossarian are atypical protagonists caught in the tragedy of their times as are most guys. Both novels are as chaotic as the conflict they describe, a perfect example of form following message. No problem there. I substituted the Internet's choice of War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (I really need to read that some day), with The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkein. LOTR combines a buddy trip along with a manly, magical struggle between light and dark, plus the character names are easier to remember even in Elvish. And then, to replace predictable Internet selections from Hemingway and Mailer that no one reads any more, I chose another book no one reads any more (but should), Instant Replay: The Green Bay Diary of Jerry Kramer by Jerry Kramer. If a guy wants to read about the modern equivalent of war, there is nothing better than a book about Lombardi and the NFL.

2. Books about Brothers. The Internet's category parameters are a little fuzzy here. Sure, Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyesky is an obvious choice, though I prefer Crime and Punishment. No to the collected stories of John Cheever and how did Corman McCarthy end here with The Road? Push that to another category. I'll agree to the Internet's choice of Hamlet by William Shakespeare, so long as I can add another play to modernize and fantacize the bard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead by Tom Stoppard. And, I would include two-non fiction books of brothers bonding through creation: The Making of the Atomic Bomb, by Richard Rhodes, and Soul of a New Machine by Tracy Kidder. Nothing binds guys together more than puttering with incomprehensilbe tools in a undisclosed workshop somewhere. Los Alamos and Data General are the ultimate man caves.

3. Books about Politics. Kudos to the Internet choices of The Autobiography of Malcom X by Malcom X, Lord of the Flies by William Golding (though why not George Orwell's Animal Farm -- guys like bacon), and All the King's Men by Robert Penn Warren. I'll pass on Phillip Roth and George Saunders. My substitute choices for the theme, "Politics are a Man's Business," are The Best and the Brightest by David Halberstam, the excellent, continuing Lyndon Johnson biography by Robert Caro, and Lincoln's masterful maneuvering chronicled in Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin. And, just for fun, I would add the politics of our souls in The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis.

4. Books about Horror and Science Fiction. I know that the genre has outstanding female authors such as Ursula LeGuin and James Tiptree, but go to a sci-fi con and 80-percent of the registrants are guys so I'll be guy-centric here. Start this list with the classics: The Tell Tale Heart by Edgar Allen Poe and Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (OK, yes, I did make an exception for this extraordinary fireside story). Horror doesn't get any better. Add Ray Bradbury's "I love to burn" Fahrenheit 451, Frank Herbert's Dune, and anything else by Harlan Ellison and Phillip K. Dick. The Road by Cormac McCarthy should have been here along with a dose of hard sci-fi; the three volume Mars series (Red Mars, Green Mars, Blue Mars) by Kim Stanley Robinson would work well. And the category could not be complete without Stephen King. For my taste, I would add The Stand and Pet Sematary, but you really can't make a wrong man-choice with King.

5. Books about Adventure. I kept five Internet selections here, after all what guy could argue with Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain, The Call of the Wild by Jack London, Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad and Moby Dick by Herman Melville. Most guys cut their reading teeth on these books in addition to stories about Arthur, Robin and the Arabian Nights. I did cull Internet picks from Cervantes, Hunter S. Thompson, Patrick O'Brien (though my wife disagreed with this one), Don Delillo, Jack Kerovac, Robert Pirsig, James Joyce (who would pick Ulysses as an adventure book -- no wonder the original list was criticized as a "reductive version" of masculinity), and another Cormac McCarthy (a Western would have been good, but, sorry, I don't read them and this is my list). If other books need to be added -- and I'm not sure they need to be -- I would add The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe, and something by Robert Ludlum and Tom Clancy.

Five categories and thirty-four books. Are there more? Indeed there are. Would others pick other books? Well, yeah, that's what guys do: we argue about inconsequential things (see category #3), but, I think, these selections up the macho level of Mr. Internet's list. From my man cave La-Z-Boy, these books provide more backbone to male literacy. Excuse my reach but pass the buffalo wings.

Sunday, November 3, 2013

Ardor Erase Dry

I like whiteboards quite a bit.

Let me restate that in Yoda-speak for artificial emphasis: whiteboards like I a lot lot.

I like their open, friendly looks a lot lot on classroom walls, how they border and organize the room. Their size, their oddly pleasing elongated shape, the sheen as the morning sun angles off their pearlescent surface. I like the brown cork tack-strip on the top of the board for poster presentations and the metal marker tray below. Sure, the markers on those trays are usually uncapped and dry but the prepared instructor brings his or her own markers -- just buy the dry erase kind. Permanent markers are really hard to get off -- a lot lot.

Some traditionalists dream of grade school blackboards, or greenboards, or grey boards or another color-never-found-in-nature boards, but I never warmed up to them. Their cold dark surfaces create gaps on classroom walls: blackholes of classroom disappointment. Not only that, but blackboards are messy and hard to read. Erasing them leave a residue that lasts practically the entire semester. Unlike the smooth arc of a chisel-head dry-erase, chalk makes an uneven, irregular line that flakes off, usually on your pants. You don't want to lean against a blackboard. And, don't even think about letting your untrimmed fingernails strike chalk board surface. Ewww.

I have never really warmed up to the Smartboards either. Nice techy try, but they are way too expensive and too small to be useful. My neighbor's Big Screen TV is larger than most classroom Smartboards. Write a just couple of lines and you have to move to the next virtual page. In comparison, writing on a whiteboard can go on, and on, and on, circling the room in ideas. Inspiration until the class files out. In contrast, the image on the Smartboard ends when the room times out.

Another problem with Smartboard is the photo marker is often off center so the writing suffers from a geographic lag. The ceiling projector image looks nice on the Smartboard, but a 1920s pull-down projector screen works just as well, and is larger and cheaper. OK yes, the touch screen feature is magical, so long as the center mark is, again, aligned. And, Smartboard graphics are nice though primitive, no better than those in found Microsoft Word. Need to advance the PowerPoint slide? Don't tap Morse Code on the board, use the laser pointer. You should unplug yourself from the front and move around the classroom anyway.

So box up the blackboards, stash the Smartboards, and spend the material budget on circling the school (classrooms, meeting rooms, hallways, cubicles, and coffee shop walls) with whiteboards. Better yet, follow the lead of the ultra-tech note-taking app company, Evernote, which painted almost every surface of their California headquarters with ideaPaint that accepts and encourages dry-erase marker inspiration. I vote for that: floor to ceiling whiteboards. Throw in a couple of pull-down screens, invent a wireless, all-in-one mobile smart-station that doesn't lumber about like a 19th-century Victorian sideboard and one happy puppy am I a lot lot. 




Sunday, October 27, 2013

Scholarship Good News and Bad News

"I have some good news, some bad news, and some good news."

Jeanne Stangel, interim Assistant Chancellor for University Advancement, spoke from a downstage lecturn at the Weidner Center on the UW-Green Bay campus. But instead of facing the three tiers of cloth-backed seats, she turned her back to the gorgeous auditorium and faced toward the stage, toward us.

The good news she teased us with was that the stage was filled elbow to elbow, seat back to seat back with UWGB scholarship donors and scholarship students. The bad news was there was no more room on the Broadway-sized Weidner stage. The cavernous stage had reached its capacity during this, the 17th-Annual Chancellor's Scholarship Reception. The good news was that was the kind of problem a university wants to have: more donors than space.

The annual fall reception brought together scholarship donors with the students who received those donations. It's a great idea to match up scholarships with real faces. My wife and I fund a small named scholarship and look forward to the chance to meet our student, who, to our delight this year, brought along his mother. Both of us were helped by scholarship money when we went to college, so our donation is just paying forward those donors who helped us in the past. Scholarship money, even our small grant, does make a difference. Stangel pointed out those who receive scholarships are more likely to continue than those students who do not.

The bad news is that the need for financial assistance continues to grow. The good news is that more and more college graduates are accepting the challenge to help current struggling college students. Students who receive scholarships know there are others out there who believe in them. At events like the Weidner reception, they meet and talk with us. And, once students turn that belief into an inner confidence, they take a big step toward their personal success.

The good news is in addition to alumni campaigns, staff and faculty are also helping as best they can. Individual faculty and department groups at UWGB funded a number of scholarships that were announced at the Weidner event. That seems to be a trend at other local colleges. At NWTC, my day job, colleagues achieved an amazing 93-percent donation rate during last fall's foundation campaign. That is money that goes directly to the students we see in the classroom each day.

So yes, bad news, there are growing needs among our students, but, good news, more and more community philanthropists, alumni, faculty and staff are stepping forward, answering the call to help students pursue their dreams of college success. Scholarship donors are not just investing in an individual student, but in the idea that supporting education is the keystone to university and community advancement. A motivated, dedicated, post-secondary graduate base from UWGB, from NWTC, and from other area colleges bodes well for the future of our area. That is the best good news of all.




Saturday, October 26, 2013

Pole Climber Class Picture

On September 20, 2013, I blogged about the best class I ever had: students from the Electrical Power Distribution program. This week, another "Pole Climber" class had their class picture taken in a most appropriate location on campus. I am posting it here as a followup to the earlier blog. This is a different group from my students, but it seems, by the photo, another class carries on with energy and enthusiasm.

Novelist Frederick Buechner said, "Find that place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet." The Pole Climbers have found it, about 40-feet up.


Sunday, September 22, 2013

The End is Near for GED 2002

The end is near. The end is near.

That has been the cry of 60-point text boxes over the past 18 months targeted to GED students who have just one, two or three GED tests left to take. There are just two months left in the current series. Those students who, for whatever reason, have not completed the 2002 test series will find that as of January 1, 2014, the old test series scores will expire and they will have to start their second chance all over again. The end of the GED 2002 test series is near. Very, very near.

Billboards, posters, handbills, stickers, buttons, and postcards about the GED 2002 Closeout have been printed, promoted, and promulgated since the summer of 2012. The message was always simple: those students who are close to finishing the 2002 series need to make this goal a priority and complete the work that they have started. College campuses and literacy councils across the state have sent letters to students foretelling the end of the 2002 series. Too many of those letters have been returned: Addressee Unknown. So to reach the unknown we have solicited news articles, broadcast reports and PSAs about the end of the series. Some campuses even recruited college staff and fellow students and offered bounties to find those who were close to finishing their tests.

Obviously, it would be best if those students who have started the 2002 test series immediately signed up at the various GED test centers across the state to complete the series. We have extra classes scheduled, focused instruction, and dedicated instructors who want to help as many students as possible finish the series. It doesn't help anyone, if these students don't complete the credential.

And, because of this national closeout campaign, many GED non-completers have returned and we celebrate that. But I have files of too many other students who remain unconcerned even though the GED is their best entree to future success. These students have been called, emailed and posted and have not responded. Yet, sometime after the first of the year, they will wander into the GED classroom and will discover that their previous work has been replaced with new curriculum and their test scores have expired. The end will not be near then; it will be there. That will be a sad, discouraging discovery.


Friday, September 20, 2013

The Pole Climber Cohort

A cohort is a group of students who have something in common and work together toward a common purpose. Education research shows, not surprisingly, that students in a close-knit cohort do better than students who are segregated, fearful, and uncertain. As I said, when you are taking Educational Psychology, this is not a surprise.

Seeing it transform a classroom is something else.

One spring semester I had a last-minute assignment for a group of Electrical Power Technicians, the workers who dig the trenches, climb the electric poles, string the cables, and restore our power during winter storms. The students needed to complete a one-credit interpersonal communications course called "Communicating Effectively" to finish off their degree. 

The course is usually a fun one to teach: lots of out-of-your-seat exercises, group work, games and puzzles all around the notion that we communicate verbally only a small part of the time and non-verbally the rest of the time. Most of the class lessons demonstrate to the students the non-verbal side of communications. I had successfully taught the course with a mixed program of students in earlier semesters and thought the class was a hoot. These students, however, had not, for whatever reason, completed this course. It was important, my Associate Dean explained, that this group complete this course this time so that they would graduate with the rest of their class.

The students dragged themselves to the first class still wearing the outdoor gear and boots splashed tan with clay from a muddy digging project from the morning. January in Wisconsin is not a good time to dig trenches. The class members were male, 20s to late 30s, dirty, tired, hungry (my class was scheduled tight against the outdoor lab, so most missed their midday meal), and had very little interest in this course. As they slumped into their seats, feet sprawled out beneath the table, the semester looked as bleak and long as a cold February night. Hoot indeed.

But then something interesting happened. Every class has a hierarchy among the students: some of the students are leaders, some are followers. If an instructor can catch the interest of the leaders, the rest often come along. An introductory exercise, nothing special really, caught the attention of a couple of the students and first session ended well. So did the second, third, fourth sessions and so on as each of the students found an area of interpersonal communications that seemed particularly interesting to them.

Six weeks in I noticed that the group had almost perfect attendance -- unusual in non-program Gen Ed courses -- and those who missed were harassed by classmates. "Where's Randy?" I asked. "He had a hard night and missed class today, but we'll get him his homework." And they did and he did. An instructor can tell if a student will be successful by his or her attendance: most of the cohort, I called them my Pole-Climbers (they liked the name), never missed a class. 

They almost always came at the first last moment -- my classroom was four buildings away from the trades building. One moment my class was empty but then it quickly filled with their active energy. I looked forward to the class, and feeding off their enthusiasm, heavily used group work and projects in each course, saving lecture for the reading in between classes and explanation of class experience.

The final assignment of the class was their choice: either an eight to ten page paper or a short project demonstrating one of the interpersonal skills discussed during the class. All of the students picked the project option. I should have videoed the final classes as one student after the other tried outdo classmates in creativity, application and energy. On the final day, though I had written a final exam, I put it to one side, talked with them about their future work, and wished them well.

Each semester I try to achieve the same kind of success and I've taught many other excellent classes, but none achieved the magic of my Pole Climbers.

It remains the only class in which I dismissed the final exam and aced the entire class. How much of their success was their own work and how much was the unifying power of the cohort? A little of both, I suspect. I certainly don't think it was instructional brilliance. Some class members would have been successful even if mixed with students in other programs and with other instructors, but others were pulled up by their classmates to achieve a level of student success that probably surprised all of them. A strong, vibrant cohort raises the student success bar beyond anyone's expectations.








Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Fifty Celebrity GED Graduates

OK. I try to be original in these posts. When I quote from a source, I use the information as an aide, not a crutch, but this bit of info was too good to pass up, so I am shamelessly sharing.

The Adult Literacy League of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida, posted this list yesterday on Facebook and it was shared today by the GED Testing Service where I saw it. The list of 50 celebrities who earned their GED, was headed in both posts by a photo of the late-great Peter Jennings of ABC News, a GED graduate. Here, uncut and with no additional comment from me (what more could I say), are 49 other students (alphabetical by first name) who are also, surprisingly to many, GED graduates. Recognize anyone?

50 Cent, Angelina Jolie, Bill Cosby, Bjorn Born, Bo Bice, Bo Derek, Carrie Fisher, Cary Grant, Cher, Chris Rock, Christian Slater, Christina Applegate, Cyndi Lauper, D.L. Hughley, Danica Patrick, Danny Aiello, Dave Thomas (founder of Wendy’s), David Bowie, Dean Martin, Ellen Burstyn, Eminem, Evel Knievel, F. Story Musgrave (NASA astronaut for 30 years), Flip Wilson, Fran Lebowitz (author), Frank Sinatra, Gene Hackman, George Harrison, Gerard Depardieu, Glen Campbell, Hilary Swank, Jackie Collins (New York Times Best Seller), James Garner, Jerry Garcia, Jerry Lewis, Jessica Simpson, John Chancellor (News journalist), John Travolta, Jon Huntsman (2012 Republican Presidential Candidate) , Judge Greg Mathis, Kweisi Mfume (NAACP President), Lindsay Lohan, Mark Wahlberg, Mary Lou Retton (Olympic gymnast), Merle Haggard, Michael Caine, Michael J. Fox, Michelle Rodriguez, Nicholas Cage, Olivia Newton John, Oscar de la Hoya, Paris Hilton, Peter Jennings, Peter O’Toole, Pink, Prince, Redd Foxx, Richard Pryor, Ringo Starr, Rob Thomas, Robert Wagner, Roger Daltrey (The Who), Sanjaya Malakar, Sean Connery, Sonny Bono, Steve McQueen, Tom Jones, Wally Amos (Famous Amos) and Waylon Jennings.

Sunday, September 1, 2013

When You Need to Reach Out and Touch Someone

Rather than type a text, send an email, or post a Facebook message, I picked up the telephone when I needed to contact some of my students this week about a new class that I was teaching. My goal was to reach as many continuing students as I could as quickly as I could so they had first choice of available seats. Telephone? you might ask thinking of all the other options I could have used. Sure, you remember that clunky, dusty thing that sits behind the computer monitor acting as a paperweight for the 2010 staff directory and last winter's pepperoni pizza coupons. The telephone.

I'll admit a land-line is probably not the first choice of the techno-savvy who have Schwarzenegger-sized thumbs from constant, frenetic texting, but I still find it an effective tool to make contact with students -- even my 20-somethings. I did not consider this choice unusual or dated until I read a Wall Street Journal article by Anita Hofschneider a few days later titled, "That Thing With the Buttons and Receiver? Pick It Up" (Wednesday, Aug. 28, D1). Hofschneider quotes young entrepreneurs who roll their eyes at the phone as an old-fashioned nuisance, "burdensome" one said, and another complained that phone interruptions "hinder creativity and delay projects."

Some of these enlightened ban the phone from their office space. I suppose a non-phone environment makes sense in a sleep lab, a yoga center, or religious retreat house -- or if you were very, very annoyed during political campaign season -- but removing it entirely seems as productive as taking away the letter "R" from the keyboard. The _esult is _eadable but ve_y dist_acting. And, after reading the WSJ article, I wondered if the quoted anti-phone people were also as annoyed by the ping of instant messaging or the lure of the latest Tweet by a 15-minute-of-fame celebrity. Perhaps anti-phone sentiment is just revenge for this summer's sold-out rock concert tours by septuagenarians.

As a w_ite_, sorry, I meant "writer," I understand the power of the printed word through texts, emails and social media, but I don't think the human voice should be a casual second or third-hand communication choice.  Relationships in sales, in business, and in education are built through voice and gestures, interpersonal human contact, not emoticons. The sound of the human voice communicates nuances and meaning that goes much deeper than the flat, convoluted prose of written language, especially the pseudo-proper business grammar in most offices. The draw of human contact is why, for example, students prefer face-to-face classrooms as opposed to online or video courses, especially when they struggle with a topic. Working beside a real person, not a white screen with words, makes all the difference.

I agree with the sales manager interviewed in the article who said in professions "where personal rapport matters ... email (exclusivity) won't cut it." Having done a little sales work myself, I appreciate the effectiveness and place of the phone in the business world, and I do feel for the office manager at the end of the WSJ article who had to teach a new employee "what a dial tone was and explain that desktop phones don't require you to press 'Send'." I wonder what that new employee's thumbs looked like?

Wednesday, August 14, 2013

What's Missing from Teacher Training

Let's say you've just hired a shiny new group of instructors for your technical college. The newbies are excellent: top certification in their field, years of doing the work that they're just about to teach, and maybe, if you are lucky, actual teaching experience as an adjunct for you or another college. Congratulations. You've done a good job. Now, what do they need to know in the next couple of weeks?

Well, they need to know how to write a syllabus; they need to know the competencies and objectives of their classes and how to find them; they need to know their way around the school; they need to know internal software and processes; they need to know their colleagues. And, in addition to other "need to knows", they will need to know brain-based education theory (Bloom's Taxonomy is always helpful) just as soon as the HR paperwork is filed.

All that is well and good and important. But one bit of new teacher training (a crucial one in my humble opinion) is often overlooked on most need-to-know lists: the new instructors need to know the theater of teaching. What do I mean by that? I mean the new teachers need to know how to be effective communicators on the stage we call the classroom.

What, you might ask, does theater have to do with the technical college classroom? Sounds a little too liberal arty. And, the androgogg might say, doesn't this go against popular education training? Aren't we trying to move away from the "sage on the stage" and move toward a student-centered classroom? Certainly, but that doesn't dismiss the effectiveness and communicating power of gesture, voice, posture, pace, listening and response: the basics of stagecraft. Preparation, rehearsal, direction, performance, evaluation: all this and more are needed for effective teaching.

I'll admit my theater bias comes from training and performance on the stage in high school, college, and in a little over 20-years of community theater work. But, I also have no doubt that stage training prepared me for my current role in the classroom. Don't take my word for it. Think back to your own experience as a student: what kind of teacher was able to really hold your attention? What kind of teacher excited you, inspired you, made you want to jump up and begin your lab work? It was probably not the teacher (and we've all had these) who read in a sleepy monotone from yellowing 4x6 cards. I would bet your best teachers had a presence that you were not quite able to define: they had either a natural stage presence or one that was backed by training.

Teaching is a performance art whether that "performance" is a lecture, demonstration or discussion. Those who deny that statement are probably not teachers (or at least not very effective ones). An effective teacher is first of all an effective communicator and the basics of effective communications were first developed and refined on the stage. Any instructor, I believe, with even a rudimentary sense and practice of stagecraft, will outshine others who dismiss theatrics as being somehow beneath them.

A master teacher, one who has practiced the theatrics of teaching, possesses an honest, clear, dynamic, individual style that communicates both content and credibility. A master teacher makes each moment in the classroom look easy, effortless, even though that moment has taken hundreds of hours of practice and preparation. Somehow, someway, we need to include a heavy dose of the theater of teaching when we are training our new instructors (a refresher course for old hands wouldn't hurt either).




Thursday, August 8, 2013

Putting Your Billions Where Your Priorities Are

A recent weekend Wall Street Journal featured an essay from Amanda Ripley's new book, "The Smartest Kids in the World -- and How They Got That Way" (2013). Some of the world's smartest kids are trained in South Korea's hagwans-- think of them as tutoring labs on steroids. The WSJ story featured a rather satisfied looking Kim Ki-Hoon, "a rock-star" teaching entrepreneur, called the "Four-Million Dollar Teacher" because of his hagwan business revenue. I really don't have salary-envy. I give him credit for successfully and profitably creating an education business model that works. What worried me in the Ripley essay was the resulting comparison between South Korea and the US.

"In 2012, (Korean) parents spent more than $17-billion on (online hagwan) services. This is more than the $15-billion spent by Americans on video games that year, according to the NPD Group, a research firm."

Gulp. OK, let's try to put this in perspective. Granted American parents may be putting in a lot of time and dollars in their child's education which is not included in this statistic, granted putting money into an effort does not always guarantee success, granted out children have more interests than just school, granted South Korean students many also be buying video games (though I'm not sure when they are going to play them since they have long, long school days in addition to night and weekend hagwan duties), granted Kim Ki-Hoon's hagwans may be a little pricey and each unit of hagwan is more expensive than a single Call to Duty purchase. Granted, granted, granted.

Still. It's a basic concept of economics that when given a free choice, consumers spend their (usually) limited budget on those things that are most important to them. In South Korea, parent's choose their child's education: a $17-billion investment by those parents is hard to ignore. Those parents obviously feel that putting that kind of investment into a generation's education is worth it. So far, according to Ripley, the effort seems to be working:

"Thanks in part to such tutoring services, South Korea has dramatically improved its education system over the past several decades and now routinely outperforms the U.S. Sixty years ago, most South Koreans were illiterate; today, South Korean 15-year-olds rank No. 2 in the work in reading, behind Shanghai. The country now has a 93% high school graduation rate, compared with 77% in the U.S."

I could make some smart comment about spending our billions on high-tech athletic fields rather than in the classroom, but I don't have the heart. This link takes you to the rest of the essay (it's a short read) or buy the book, so, if you are interested, you can read up on where some of the smartest kids is in the world are -- and the parents who helped them along the way.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324635904578639780253571520.html?mod=e2tw




Wednesday, July 31, 2013

Snort, Snork, Shtick Shtuff

"What's a vegan smoothie?" asked my brother-in-law, reading the countertop menu at a favorite Sunday morning coffee shop. "I mean, what could you put into a smoothie that wouldn't be vegan?" The silliness started as we waited in line for coffee. Sometimes you need a break from weighty discussions of life, the universe and everything. Life can't always be serious.

"A tenderloin?" I suggested, "Blood sausage? Pig feet?" I pictured traumatized vegan kitchen workers splattered by a bloody manic food processor. My brother-in-law and I are not reincarnations of comedic word guru, George Carlin, but Sunday morning walks sometimes turn into word play sessions between us. Both of us find the disparity between denotation and connotation interesting. My wife usually stays out of our discussions when we are on a roll. Just as well at times.

Once seated with the vegan smoothies ("Tastes a little like chicken"), we talked about the many odd nonsense words that are made up of "S" plus a consonant, a single vowel, and one or two letter consonant combinations. What is the attraction between "S" and silly words? I don't know, but there seems to be a link. We agreed words with real meanings (swap, swim, smit, snuff) don't count. Alright, "snuff" might count because it leads to the logical past tense "snuft" as an irregular form or just "snuffed" as a regular verb. We might be silly, but we try to be grammatical.

"Snert" "What's that?" "I think it was the name of a comedy sketch character on the Milton Berle Show." "Before my time." Yeah, mine too."

"Smurf." Too easy we agreed. Not as old as the Milton Berle Show, but just as silly. Especially in blue. "How can they do a movie about them?" "Don't know and don't care. They're as creepy as garden gnomes."

"Snork." A sort of word, depicting a healthy appetite, emblematic of college days. Other college slang included "scuzz," "smat," and "schwip." Definitions? Don't ask. Frat house slang is not PG-13.

"Swup?" No reply. A word that has yet to find a popular meaning. Sad when you think about an orphan word peering up from an empty grammatical bowl. "Pleashh shur, may I have shome more?"

"S'up?" "Words with apostrophes are not acceptable." " Yeah, especially those from ad campaigns." "S'right you are." "Ha. Humor."

I pulled a napkin from beneath my smoothie and began making notes. "What are you doing?" "I could use these ideas for my blog if I run out of material during the summer break."

"Schmuck." Good idea. I'll add that too.









Thursday, July 25, 2013

360,000 Owners are Better Than One

The Packer Shareholder meeting on Wednesday was a good way to work on your tan on a gorgeous summer Wednesday afternoon. The program was as dry as you'd expect from any other business's shareholder meeting. We heard from Packer President Mark Murphy a few times, General Manager Ted Thompson, the treasurer, the foundation, marketing, investing, the auditor, and other departments and waited to see the real attraction of the day: self-guided tours of the new South End Zone seats.

While members of the team Executive Board were called up to speak, I and many others studied cloud formations and tested the new wireless capabilities of the stadium. My wife, who works with a lot of area CEOs, watched the presenters with more interest and pointed out that almost all of them were local. I knew that, but as a Green Bay native didn't really find it remarkable. It's what I grew-up expecting. The Packer organization has some Milwaukee, Madison, and Fox Valley names on the board to pretend this is a state team, but the drive behind the organization has always been Green Bay born and raised; Parins, Meng, Long, Chernick, Weyers, Bie, French, Olejniczak and dozens of board members are local names. They are organization leaders, but they are also neighbors.

I bring up this point because of a series of new signs that I saw later posted on walls in the south concourse hallways just under the new, plush South End Zone. The theme of the sepia-tinted wall-sized posters of old players and fans is "We Believe" followed by inspirational sayings. One poster in particular caught my attention: "We believe 360,000 owners are better than one." That refers to the 360,000 shareholders, like me, who have bought basically meaningless stock certificates in order to keep the professional team in Green Bay.

Other small markets, no bigger than Green Bay, had professional teams but gave up on their dreams. We haven't and, Lombardi-willing, we never will. The strength of the team draws on our cultural make-up: stubborn, loyal, faithful, dogged, and capable of amazing things when we are competing against out-of-towners. If the team lost the Green Bay connection, it would be just another sports team run by suits. We take care of our own, and the Packers are our own. As another poster in the concourse declares, "One city, one team."

The 360,000 number celebrates legends in sports history who have built a remarkable franchise. To Green Bay natives, however, these legends are just local folks who we see in the grocery store, the coffee shop and at high school football games. Yet, consider the results: the number one stadium experience according to ESPN magazine, the third largest professional football stadium (the new expansion tops 80,000 seats -- take that, Texas Stadium), and a 30-year season ticket waiting list. And, oh yes, 13 World Championships, 22+ members of the Pro Football Hall of Fame (congratulations to this year's inductee, linebacker Dave Robinson), and a playoff contender for 15 of the last 20 years.

Mark Murphy also pointed out during his presentation that the Green Bay Packers are the 18th most valuable sports franchise in the world. Notice I said world, not just in the NFL or in American professional sports, but the world. I'm not surprised though. If you introduce yourself as being from Green Bay in any major airport and you have instant recognition and credibility.

As a shareholder of the best team in football, it's what I expect.


Tuesday, July 9, 2013

The Joy of Beach Books

I just finished Dan Brown's latest, Inferno, and enjoyed the read. No, it's not great literature, it has no subtle layers of existential meaning (unless you count Dante's nine spirals of hell, though I would credit that metaphor to Dante more than Brown). The mystery is a series of international chase scenes, an evil plot of a mad scientist, and the heroics of the ever lovable, Harvard super-nerd, Robert Langdon. Chuck Leddy, of the Boston Globe, began his May 2013 review of Inferno by writing, "Assessing Dan Brown from a literary perspective seems almost beside the point." I agree. Inferno is pleasant summer diversion, nothing more. It's a beach book.

What's a beach book? Something you read just for the joy of escapism: think of the Bourne series, Stephen King, Michael Crichton, John Grisham, John Patterson. Summer is the time to read books not attached to curriculum and classrooms and assessments. It's the time for science fiction, for romance, for gothic tragedy, for mysteries. There are no multiple co-authors here, no Ph.D.-laden bibliographies. Footnotes are banned until September. A beach book is just a fun story with a little meat on the bones to keep your interest.

The meat is important to me. Ultra light-weight books, the kind that float away on the cross-winds of improbability and you've-got-to-be-kidding, bore me and are quickly set aside. These are donated to the library or deleted from my queue. Dan Brown usually does a nice job of seasoning his plot with exotic and archaic settings and detail. Because of my background, I like the quasi-religious sub-tones. The Boston Globe's Leddy wrote in appreciation, "(Brown) obviously researched the architecture of Florence (and Venice and Istanbul), the symbolism of Dante's great work, and the 'mad science' behind the villain's plot." All of these are interesting to Brown's fans, otherwise we would have stopped reading him after chapter one of The Da Vinci Code.

I may add Inferno to next fall's list of reading in the classroom. I try to develop student interest in reading by providing them a variety of new reading material. Popular books and magazines often work. We read them together and talk about the ideas of the authors. I don't really care what the book or article is about when I am working with my reading students so long as they find it interesting. What's important is conveying a shared excitement about the words, ideas, and discovery. The page-turning experience, especially from a beach book, is bonus.

OK, enough academic talk about adding reading to curriculum. That's the material for long, dark February conferences. This is summer. The beach awaits. Where's that Neil Gaiman book I've heard so much about?

Monday, June 10, 2013

The Future of Education goes MOOOOC!

MOOCs seem to be grabbing all the post-secondary headlines lately. Universities trumpet their introduction of Massive Online Open Courses and then, at the end of the course, excuse the poor attendance and completion statistics as being technological growing pains. I can hear the interview: "Well sure, only 5-percent of the students who signed up for the course completed the course, and only a fraction of those actually earned a passing grade, but this, my fellow citizens, is the future of education."

Please.

Don't get me wrong. I am not a academic troglodyte raging against online courses. I have been using BlackBoard, our school's online platform, to supplement face-to-face classes for the last five years. So, yes, I do believe that online platforms are as important as week-three class assessments, diffuse grade segments, and chunking lessons into little digestible bits (and students love the online GradeBook feature). At some point MOOCs might make sense. I'm not sure they do now.

I just don't see how an instructor can effectively engage, instruct, and assess a class of 40,000, which was the number of students who signed up in January for Georgia Tech's MOOC, Fundamentals of Online Education. Imagine trying to memorize that class list. If any traditional class had the same poor attendance and success ratios, it would be yanked from the schedule, no questions asked. Today's MOOC fad is what happens when populists try to direct education: stick an iPad (another shiny, promising tool) in every student's backpack, and call it a degree.

Not surprisingly, and ironically given the subject of the Georgia Tech MOOC, that course was suspended when the college's IT infra-structure could not support a really, really massive, Massive Online Open Course. The hardware, assessment strategy, and competencies for student success need to be firmly in place otherwise we are wasting everyone's time. We need to plan, not chase 60-point headlines.

Bigger is not necessarily better. Newer is not necessarily better. Tech is not necessarily better. We need to evaluate our tools, including MOOCs, against the measure of the stuff we teach and against our own resources. If our goal is not student success, then why are we spending all this time in meetings? As I said, the massive platform is a tool, a very powerful tool, but still just a tool. If the tool works, use it. If it doesn't, modify it or pick up another tool. Whether we are teaching in a tent, or teaching online, our goal is still to provide effective education to all our students.




Friday, May 31, 2013

Not Defending the Academic Summer

My last class of the semester was Wednesday, May 15... My next class will be Thursday, Sept. 5.

Do those sentences engender envy, longing, admiration, jealousy, anger, revolt or a simmering emotion somewhere in between? My non-teaching friends imagine my academic summer as three-months of Saturdays lounging on the back deck in a Grateful Dead Concert T-Shirt, eating chocolate bon-bons, and staring up at the sky creating fantasies from cloud shapes.

Now, I'm not going to try to defend an archaic school schedule based on our agrarian past. Everyone knows that students are not released, in most cases, to work on the family farm during the summer months. Though maligned, our current school schedule is an accepted tradition: sort of like hiding a pickle on the Christmas Tree. It doesn't make a lot of sense, but it's tradition and is not going to change.

Though I have long since retired my Grateful Dead T-Shirt, I'll admit I do look forward to the break and try to take advantage of the time off. Naturally, family vacations are planned during the summer. Our children are married during the summer, and births planned for June/July delivery -- just count back nine months. Honey-do lists checked off, and doctor and dentist appointments scheduled. We have three months to get our health back after having trashed it for nine. A caffeinated diet only goes so far.

Teachers who are still working on advanced degrees, squeeze in as many classes as possible, in addition to professional workshops and conferences. At my college, it is expected that faculty attend at least 40-hours of professional development each year. Summer is the best time to do that, because we just don't have the time during the school year. Conferences during the school year mean we have to find substitutes to teach our students. That's something most faculty would rather not do.

Summer is also the time for department planning meetings; for joining interview committees; for cleaning up, redesigning and remodeling classroom space; for preparing new lesson plans; and writing new curriculum. This is the time to crack open the bright and shiny textbooks that were shipped to us just before Easter and have sat unopened under the desk until now. This is the time to explore new software and Internet learning sites, and to wonder how the iPad could be added to the classroom?  And, some instructors do accept summer teaching assignments. I did that last year and enjoyed it.

But mostly, the academic summer is a time to recharge the batteries, to rediscover why we do what we do and prepare for the next school year. I'm not trying to make excuses here. This is not a hidden perk. The summer break is a well-known benefit of the academic job, like dental or eye care, or an executive wellness center. I just want to point out that our summers are as busy as neighbors in the private sector. Just like others, we find we rarely have the time to lounge on the back deck and wonder at the shape of the now flying quickly by.



Friday, May 24, 2013

OnCourse Affirmation

I was looking out the west-facing window at nothing in particular: gray rain skies moving quickly south to north, trees showing spring green over residential rooftops, and a construction crane looming over the Lambeau Field scoreboard. If there was a clock in the room, I would have been glancing at it. At times I miss a watch.

"Doug, you are a caring, creative, and enthusiastic man."

Did I really hear that, or was I just imagining things at the end of a long school year and three-day workshop? Sometimes the mind does wander during long seminars. I brought my focus back. I was one of half the group who was seated in chairs in an elongated semi-circle, our backs to the center of the circle. 

Move movement behind me; then, "Douglas, you are a reliable, efficient, and effective man."

About 45 staff members (support, advisors, and faculty) from the college were in the third day of a three-day workshop on student and personal success called OnCourse, created by academic visionary Skip Downing. The workshop's organization and focus repackaged proven classroom techniques in a fresh way to engage, inspire, and instruct. The workshop leader, Robyn, from OnCourse central, demonstrated the eight OnCourse principals in imaginative, interactive ways, such as the Affirmation Whisper. Two days ago we had written three personal affirmation for ourselves and, now, Robyn asked the class to anonymously whisper those affirmations to others who sat in the circle.

I could make out affirmations behind compatriots at my left and at my right. Words fell just below direct hearing, but occasionally ("funny," "helpful," "knowledgeable," "resilient") rose above the ambient music and the shuffling of people moving around behind us. Sound in the room rose and fell in random patterns like a gentle chant that twisted around then separated from the notes of the music. The exercise lasted for 45-seconds and then the seated and whisperers switched roles. Another 45-seconds and it was over. The exercise, though short, seemed cathartic. The repetitions of the whispers, the quiet movement of people behind, were a welcome and appreciated respite.

True, this exercise was hyper touchy-feely and way, way outside the usual comfort zone of a tech college instructor. And true, this exercise required a level of trust that might not be found in a casual classroom. A few of the ideas and some of exercises demonstrated during OnCourse were like that. But, most would work with our students. The ideas behind the OnCourse material were solid and persuasive. Most of the ideas would very definitely work with our students.







Sunday, May 19, 2013

Tears, Hugs, and End of Year Honors

The end of the school year breakfast is short on speeches and long on recognition. After brief remarks by the president of the college and presentation of a list of retirees and service certificates, the rest of the program focuses on a half-dozen awards given to staff members for service to the college, their colleagues, their students, and to the profession.

This year, I noticed that every award winner protested their recognition. Over and over again, they said, "I can't believe I'm getting this award. I'm just doing what I love to do. I'm just doing my job." They honestly did not believe their efforts merited this recognition because, in their minds, they were just doing what everyone else was doing. In their minds, they were doing nothing special. That, in my opinion, makes them even more deserving.

These folks quietly, effectively, and consistently do their job. They are colleagues, collaborators, and, on occasion, co-conspirators. They represent the best among us. They attend meetings, respond to emails, come to work early, stay late and bravely try to keep up with the latest version of Blackboard.

I suppose just "doing the job" may seem an old-fashioned idea in today's world. If you're not self-promoting on YouTube, you're not real, right? Getting up, going to work everyday is not sexy enough for some (not these) who mark their progress on a self-centered scorecard. Doing the job you were hired to do, doing it with pride and doing it to the best of your abilities, is a midwestern value. It's something most of us were raised to do. It's also something the comb-over egos who flit about either coast just don't understand.

Nominations for the awards had been quietly collected months before the ceremony, so the actual announcement is often a surprise to those who receive the honor. Usually, it is not a surprise to the rest of us: we know who are the hard workers. As the honorees come forward, sometimes teary-eyed, their families, who were in on the secret, are brought forward from a side room to share the standing ovation from the college. Tears, hugs, and honors are a good way to end the school year. Recognizing our best, recognizes all of us.
   

Thursday, May 9, 2013

Happiness is a Clean Inbox

I have one email in my Inbox right now. Yep, just one. That feels pretty good.

That's not how it was a couple of hours ago. Yesterday and today, I was in a solid string of meetings and classes and did not have breaks to screen and process incoming email. By the time I started to seriously clear the file, there were three-plus screens of emails to process, which are quite a few after just two days. People seem to be tumbling over each other to post their thoughts. Screens and screens of emails make me almost physically uncomfortable. Panic sets in. Delay and procrastination freeze my fingers. I need to practice deep breathing exercises as I methodically answer, file or delete the emails.

My habit is to sort and store emails in a couple dozen folders in Outlook. Those folders house the archives of my colleagues and the organization of my thoughts. The Inbox, on the other hand, represents active business that either needs to be attended to or is waiting for a reply from others. It's better than sticky notes in a day-timer. What's a day-timer? That's another blog.

Early in my career, I remember that most mail was, what is now called, snail mail. Looking at mail, meant physically opening sealed envelopes to see what the postman brought. I have a really cool letter opener with a carved wooden handle from those days, though it's sitting in at the bottom of my desk drawer now. I now use it to break down cardboard boxes from Amazon. Your "Inbox" was an open box on the corner of your desk that was, well, a box. During busy days, the paper correspondence flipped off the top of the pile when someone passed too close to your desk. Tottering mountains of correspondence would fall and scatter across the floor. 

Email has eliminated almost all postal piles and has kept the office floor relatively free of paper. In fact, I don't recall the last time I received an outside letter at the office: interoffice mail with sign-up sheets for the golf league doesn't count. The metal, wooden, or wire cage in-box has been replaced by computer monitor, keyboard, and CPU. The electronics take up a lot more room.

Back in the day, getting to the bottom of the Inbox meant you were caught up. Nothing more would come until the next mail delivery at 10 a.m. You could go home content that you had done your paper-pushing best. Now, the good feeling lasts only a moment until you start receiving emails in reply to the emails that you replied to just moments ago.

At the moment, however, I have just one email in my Inbox. It won't last, but, for now, it feels pretty good. 

Tuesday, May 7, 2013

Finally Sleeping with the Windows Open

We've been able to sleep with the window open for the past couple of weeks. No snow, no sleet, no ice. No danger of waking up shivering in freezing temperatures and arguing about who should get up to shut the window. Just the song of birds in the morning and the rush of traffic outside.

This has been a too long winter that began sometime in November and didn't really break until two weeks ago: five and a half months of closed windows, of turning inward. At first, you don't notice it. When windows are first closed and latched, Thanksgiving and Christmas keep our attention on family and friends. We look past the browns and grays of dead things in the yard, and the subdued sun that barely clears the treetops of the horizon. 

January and February snows whitewash the sins of the past year and promise a new beginning to the next. The landscape sleeps quietly under a down of crystal that sparkles in the day and glows from moon light during long black winter nights. We try to work with the weather and keep busy with winter sports and the adventure of snow-days. But, that novelty wears thin by the end of February. March usually is the turning point from winter to spring, reducing snow banks to gray memories. But not this year. More snow, sleet and ice (unusual for the Northeast Wisconsin traveler), and low temperatures kept the windows shut 30 to 45 days longer than usual. Our 75-inches of snow is nowhere near a record, but the late and consistent buildup was unnerving.

Everyone seemed tired in April this year, exhausted by the daily battle with winter that overstayed its welcome. For both staff and students at the college, our main topic was the weather as we looked up at low blue-gray snow clouds, checked the weather app, and calculated another difficult commute. Wisconsinites are a tough bunch, but the relentlessness of winter had worn us down.

The last week in April, with temperatures finally in the 50s and 60s, our collective mood seemed to lighten. Windows opened and short-sleeves rather than parkas were the clothing of choice. Pickup basketball was played in the driveway again, skateboards kicked down the street, lawn furniture brushed off and polished up, and the smoke from grills wafted over the neighborhood. The NFL draft reminded us of summer training camp. Runners, training for the May marathon, worried less about black ice under the snow and more on their split times. I even heard the neighborhood 50-something rock band practicing with the garage door open once again.

The arrival of spring brings new energy to everyone. It's good to have the windows unlatched and open once again. It's good to have the outside world back in our lives.


Saturday, April 27, 2013

Cracks in the GED crown

In a little over seven months, on Dec. 31, 2013, the primacy of the GED test series will be no more. The GED itself will not end, mind you, but will morph into a new test form given on computers, rather than by test packets and computer-graded answer sheets. This update is not unusual. The test series has been periodically revamped over the years: the last time in 2002.

What is unusual is the amount of discontent that has accompanied this change.

In the past, when the GED was a non-profit business that worked with education publishers to produce supplemental materials for students, the updates caused some discomfort, but was still THE substitute for a high school credential. It had been that way since 1942 when the test was created. Everyone -- colleges, employers, the military, friends and relatives -- recognized the GED standard.

The non-profit status of the credential changed when the GED Test Service was purchased by one of its former partner publishers, Pearson/VUE. At first, according to old hands in the business, the 2014 update seemed no more difficult than past years. The GED brand remained strong.

But cracks in the single national credential seem to be forming. I am not concerned here about what caused the problems or who's to blame. I have read plenty of opinions on that written by others far above my pay grade. What I am concerned about is the loss of a uniform standardized national high school credential. That, it seems to this basic education instructor, is tragic. Wisconsin, including the GED team at NWTC, is planning for the new 2014 GED test series from Pearson/VUE, but other states, it seems, are planning to split off with separate publishers, competencies, assessment methods, and credentials. 

However, if we dethrone the GED brand, the country not only loses an educational standard that has been around since 1942, but we also lose the clear pathway for success for hundreds of thousands of students. Will a test that is accepted in Wisconsin be accepted in Illinois, Missouri, or Texas? Will one test emphasize algebra over geometry, and another literacy over science? Will students have to complete multiple credentials to get the same benefit as they do from the one GED today? How much will that cost in test-taking and time? Will students dreams be the fodder in a gotcha game between competing publishers and states? Facing a fractured standard, will students even try? And if they don't try, what is the cost of that to the rest of us?

Right now a student can complete the GED series knowing that the credential will accepted across the country. What will happen after Jan. 1, 2014, when there are two, three, four, or more high school credential assessments? As I said, I don't really care about the arguments between the feuding interests. What I care about most are my students. I wish I could be convinced that others did as well.

Sunday, April 14, 2013

Associate Dean: a thankless but necessary job

Associate Deans have to be one of the more thankless jobs in academia.

How do we find them? We pluck our best classroom instructors or stars from other areas of the college, give them an office with a shiny whiteboard, a public round of huzzahs, and then pigeonhole them into a black hole of institutional meetings, budget deadlines, questions from support staff, complaints from faculty, pressure from leadership, and, just to round things out, ask them to respond personably and in detail to a couple hundred emails a day.

Yet, we depend on this position. The college could not run without them. From the faculty point of view, the Associate Dean is where you go when you have student problems; when you are unsure if your curriculum matches your competencies; when you need sources for supplies; when you need a grant for a new initiative; or even a place to store the 20-foot, ultra-cool class project before the end of the semester open house. An effective Associate Dean can run interference through the IT department, curriculum development and student services, maintenance and human resources in addition to being an understanding ear to listen to you after a particularly bad day/ week/ semester.

Four year colleges realize the thanklessness of this tweener management position by taking it out of the dean structure, calling it Department Head, and rotating it among faculty, who dutifully accept the letterhead designation for a couple of years before they retreat back to their research, students, and predictable fall schedule. 

Technical college Associate Deans, on the other hand, knowingly leave the satisfaction of the classroom behind and take up pikes in the first line of leadership. Sometimes, future deans, vice-presidents, and even presidents are taken from its ranks. Most Associate Deans, however, stay at this level for the rest of their career supporting leadership and quietly influencing the direction of the college. I have seen some of the most successful initiatives at NWTC start as a dream of an Associate Dean. They know if they are willing to accept a low-wattage profile and work behind the scenes methodically and persistently, they can make the college a better place for students, staff, faculty, and the community.

They don't get the thanks for the job they do, but they should. Huzzah!

Sunday, April 7, 2013

Red Lobster or Bloom's Taxonomy?

At 5:00 p.m. crowd at the Red Lobster was steady. We were led to a table right away, but those who came in even five minutes later were held at the chairs that lined both sides of the entry hall. Our waitress, Wendy, was polite through the usual introductory routine: short welcome, drink order, deliver drinks, and then the main order. She was assigned three or four tables around us with two to six people at each. The restaurant was already busy, but Wendy buzzed with grace and easy humor from tables to serving area to bar to kitchen and back to the tables.

It reminded me of the dance of successful teaching. I had not thought of it before, but there's a lot of similarity between teaching and food service. I am finishing up a two-year new teacher training program at the college, graduating from newbie instructor to not-so newbie instructor -- we still have a lot to learn. During these two years there has been a lot of discussion about student-centered learning, but surprisingly little about customer service, which is really the same thing. I wonder if a regular stint on Friday nights at the Red Lobster might have been more productive than Friday mornings reviewing Bloom's Taxonomy for the fourth time. What, I wondered, could my classmates and I have learned from Wendy and Red Lobster?

We would learn how to work as team members to provide a service and product to a diverse and rapidly changing clientele.

We would learn how to keep smiling when the customer wants the dish of butter replaced -- again and again. The customer is always right, and when they are not, they still are. Keep the melted butter hot.

We would learn how to deftly pick up crayons tossed down by younger guests while still balancing three water glasses on a serving tray. Safety, service, and a smile at the same time.

We would learn how to keep orders separate, how to tally a bill, and how to try to up-sell products. Sales is as much a part of teaching as are assessments.

And, we would learn how to send guests on their way, how to quickly reset the table and how to greet the new incoming customers as if they were our first of the night, while at the same time, performing a physically demanding job that requires balance, strength, coordination, knowledge, and stamina.

By the time my wife and I left the Red Lobster, we had a doggy bag (or is it a lobsty bag?) of goodies for the next day, and admiration for our server who, at the end of the meal, seemed more like a long-time friend than a minimum wage worker surviving on tips. Wendy enhanced our experience, which, after all, was nothing more special than a quick Friday night meal at a franchise restaurant. We were one table among dozens she would work during the night, but she turned the ordinary experience into the extra-ordinary. That is the mark of a true service professional, food service or post-secondary education. I think Wendy should be giving lessons in customer service to new trainees at corporate, not bussing tables at a local eatery. I'm sure if she was given the chance she would do it with a smile and gracefully refill the water glasses at the same time.

Friday, March 29, 2013

You may be number 1001

Sometime this weekend, this blog, West by Northwest, will pass the 1,000 view mark. Will that be followed by Publisher's Clearinghouse prizes, neon animal balloons, phone calls from Spielberg seeking to buy the rights? I won't hold my breath. Even though the mark is a nice round number, it's probably less than Justin Bieber's doorman would pull before breakfast if he ever published a blog.

Yet, I am pleased by the mark. It has been a personal achievement to keep a semi-regular writing schedule over the past 15 months. At first, I wasn't sure how I would come up with ideas on what was supposed to be sort of related to my first years as a full-time faculty member at NWTC. Forty published posts later, ideas haven't been a problem. I add ideas to a smartphone note pad and am about a dozen blogs behind where I could be. What to write has never been a problem. When to write and how to write is another story.

I know my writing tends to be a little too formal, not nearly as fluid as some writers I admire. "Open up, expose yourself, be daring," advised my UW-O writing professor who thought my writing sounded like the narrative of a routine school board meeting. I'm not sure my style has changed much other than I no longer worry about style ever since I passed that class. I've never been comfortable exposing myself in writing and don't expect to start now. That would seem artificial to me and, somehow, dishonest. I try very hard not to be dishonest in my writing.

What has been important is that I am working at the keyboard on an almost weekly basis on subjects that interest me at the moment. I think it was western novelist, Louis L'Amour, who said, "The water does not flow until the faucet is turned on." The art of writing requires the discipline of craft first. Inspiration is a luxury that working journalists don't have time for, and I guess I still see myself as a working journalist more than any other kind of writer. I use this blog like a reporter's notebook to explore a world that is endlessly interesting. If I am able to tell a good story or make an interesting point which makes the events seem a little more clear to my readers, I am happy with the result. I hope they are too.


Sunday, March 24, 2013

Why are we math illiterate and proud of it?

The math instructor was a little hot: "Why are people so proud that they don't know math?"

"What do you mean?" I asked, always a little hesitant talking with math instructors about math instruction. I need to teach math to GED and Program Prep students, but am very aware that it is not my strong suit.

So, while I do understand the math-phobic, I also thought that the math instructor had a good point. She pointed out by contrast if people cannot read (another basic skill I teach), they don't brag about it to family and friends. Most of the time, they hide their illiteracy, embarrassed. But math illiteracy doesn't have the same societal shame. If people cannot tell a linear equation from a quart of machine oil, they brag about it to friends and family, "Look at me everyone: I'm a math idiot, and, I don't care." That braggadocio not only underplays the importance of math in society (try to think of an activity that doesn't use math), but, more worrisome, also sends a destructive excuse to children: "Don't worry about your math classes. It doesn't matter. My daddy told me so."

Yet it does matter. A great deal. When a student walks into the Basic Ed Open Lab, what subject do we have to remediate more often than any other? Not surprisingly, it is math. Without the basics in whole numbers (ie., multiplication tables), other work in decimals, fractions, ratios and percentages are beyond student's ability, much less work in intermediate algebra, geometry, trigonometry, measurement formulas, data statistics, accounting, and calculus. And, without a base in high school-level math, technical college course work in business, medicine, trades, and even police science is unrealistic. The much publicized and sought after STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) curriculum begins, continues, and ends, with math.

Yet, the math instructor said that she often hears parents wallow in their ignorance. They tell her with a laugh that they are so math-illiterate that they can't help their middle school student with math problems. "This is unacceptable," the math instructor said, shaking her head. How can you be a functioning person and find yourself stymied by "2x + 2 = 8"? 

I have to agree with her. This pride in math illiteracy doesn't add up: FYI x=3.

Sunday, March 17, 2013

Shaking things up once in a while

Every organization needs a good shake-up now and then. The creaky moorings that once held an organization firmly to its purpose need to be occasionally loosened or tossed off entirely. This is healthy and natural. Sometimes the shake-up is initiated by outside forces, but sometimes the organization itself has the sense to cast free of the past and trust to the future.

The Catholic Church seems to have shaken itself this past week. Time will tell if Pope Francis will be the change agent as was John XXIII or John Paul II, but initial reports show this pontiff is a right angle turn from the past papal prerogative. Early conclave reports from the Wall Street Journal, among other news sources, indicate that during a short four-minute speech that apparently clinched his election, Bergoglio warned the conclave cardinals against becoming a "self-referential" church, one that is so closed in on its internal problems that it has forgotten its true purpose: humility, dignity, and justice.

Please forgive the unusual, unsecular nature of this particular blog, but 12-years of inside perspective as a Catholic journalist are hard to shake. I do see in the Catholic Church a parallel challenge that faces any large, established organization. Projects that were once shiny, innovative, and daring are inevitably calcified by the salt spray of years. No amount of vigorous polishing can replace a sheen once time dulls the central idea. Those organizations that are in most danger, are those that are unwilling or unable to adapt to changes in the world. Change is hard for an individual set in his or her ways; it takes biblical labor to change a large organization.

When challenged, it is too easy for an organization to turn in upon itself, to become defensive, to become "self-referential" as Bergoglio said, justifying its existence by meaningless, time-consuming, self-serving, bureaucratic ritual. This can happen to a business who forgets to serve its customers, to a school who forgets to teach its students, to a non-profit who forgets its advocacy, and to a church who forgets its core mission. The core of the Catholic Church is not the Curia in Rome, nor the College of Cardinals, nor even the diocesan chanceries across the world. Its core is Gospel of the Good News. If Catholic Church seeks to regain relevance in the modern world, it will have to proclaim its Good News in the streets and neighborhoods of its local parishes.

I think Pope Francis understands that. I wonder if he will be able to persuade others.

Thursday, March 14, 2013

Habemus Spring Break

Blue sky days with temperatures finally in the 40s, coaxes me out for a run and makes me feel that spring may be just a few weeks away. Last year, in contrast to this year's severe diet of 19-degree nights, snow-covered lawns and icy-slick sidewalks, the high and low for the day was 74 and 36. It's not even 74 in my house right now.

But, such are the Wisconsin extremes during March Spring Break when classes are excused for the week, though the college offices do remain open. I remember when I worked as a member of the support staff, I looked forward to the week as a little extra time to get some work done without the interruptions of a typical school day. "This would be nice place to work," we would say, "if not for the instructors."

Instructors and students have various strategies for the mid-semester week off. Some schedule vacations with family or friends. Spring Break hijinks are not nearly as common as you might guess. Most students don't have the extra money, or freedom, to make a gulf coast break. When instructors travel, we are more likely to go to grandmother's house than to the Grand Caymans.

Instead, students spend the time getting extra hours at work, or logging in time with family who now look vaguely familiar. The semester is half over, and the second half is usually packed with the larger papers and projects. Instructors, especially new instructors who have been just keeping their heads above water, use the week to catch up on grading, lesson plans, emails, and the ever-present team projects. Sleep is also a treasure.

This past week, I've spent a lot of home time, attended a Literacy Green Bay benefit, completed a painting project that has been long promised, attended a couple school meetings, cleared out emails, and even spent the afternoon yesterday receiving a plenary indulgence for watching the announcement of the new pope from Rome and receiving his televised blessing. Lord knows, I need as many indulgences as I can gather.  The break is a time to take deep breath and get reading for the final eight week push: "Habemus the Rest of the School Year."