Category Archives: Education

Religious Life and Leadership 1

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In the Torah it is written, “We see things not as they are, but as as we are.” What follows reveals more about me, my life experience, and my worldview than anything else. No one will agree with everything, but I hope something resonates with someone.

This will be a sporadic series and this post is all prelude. 

SOME CONTEXT

• My family wasn’t particularly religious, but my mom often took us to church and it was important to her that my sibs and I get confirmed. In the Lutheran church, confirmation involves a middle school religious education program that culminates in adult church membership.

• In SoCal, in high school, I got involved with a very dynamic church youth group. We spent time in Tijuana orphanages, we took turns leading high school bible studies, and our choir toured every summer. A few of my best friends from this time period are pastors in SoCal and one heads up the largest homeless organization in L.A. 

• I am a Christian, but as I age, I’m increasingly comfortable with questions and ambiguity. I’m more interested in spiritual vitality than religious orthodoxy.

• My education and international travel experiences have led me to conclude that Western Christianity doesn’t have a monopoly on religious truth.

• I identify more with Christians who emphasize social justice than ones who stress evangelism and one set of religious truths.

• Sometimes I feel alienated within the church as a result of literal interpretations of the bible, Republican politics, materialism, patriarchal language, and cultural sameness.

• Solitude, moving in nature (lake swimming, trail running, cycling), the arts, and close interpersonal relations are integral to my spiritual vitality.

CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY’S INFLUENCE

In 2003, I was living in Southwestern China for a few months. My family and I met some missionaries or “English teachers” including a Nigerian citizen. He was the most exuberant and zealous Christian I had ever met. I was intrigued by his story including his facility with the language. He explained to me that his Nigerian mother tongue was tonal and so Mandarin was a snap. Nigeria, like a lot of Central and Northern African countries, is divided by Muslims in the North and Christians in the South.

All I could think about was what would his life have been like if he had been born a few hundred kilometers farther north. My guess is he would have become an exuberant and zealous Muslim iman. That lead me to wonder how different my spiritual journey would have been if I had been born in a predominantly Hindu, Muslim, Jewish, or secular region of the world.

A FEW LIMITATIONS

My wide-angle lens view of teaching excellence informs the limits of my observations/thinking on religious life and leadership. If most people were asked where does excellent teaching take place, they’d said “the classroom, of course.” But I think of excellent teaching as consisting of at least five things most of which are not classroom-based: 1) creative and conscientious planning; 2) the classroom activities that most people focus on exclusively which we could flesh out but don’t need to for my purposes here; 3) thoughtful assessment of student work; 4) purposeful reflection and revision of the original plan; 5) caring and constructive outside of class interactions with students. 

In my faith tradition, leaders are most commonly referred to as pastors. When it comes to my pastors, I typically only see the equivalent of number two, the Sunday morning activities. I suspect the best pastors work especially effectively out of view building leadership teams, visiting people in hospitals, counseling people, conducting weddings and funerals, and doing service in the community among others things of which I’m ignorant. 

If my pastor friends were to come watch me teach, they’d only get a feel for a portion of my professional life. Similarly, on Sunday mornings, I’m only seeing a portion of pastoral life.

Also, I don’t know how religious leaders evaluate themselves. I’m sure there’s wide ranging differences from the easily measurable (e.g., increasing attendance figures, giving, etc.) to the more intangible (e.g., deepening faith and spiritual maturity, positive impact on the community, world, etc.)

RELEVANT EDUCATIONAL BELIEFS

• I believe the educative effect is greatest when students do something rather than when something is done to them. Sounds awfully basic, but is far more radical a notion than you might imagine. Far too often in K-12 schooling, things are done to students. Put differently, the best teachers promote active learning. I believe religious leaders should promote active learning/growth too.

• Teaching excellence takes many forms. Similarly, I suspect religious leadership excellence takes many forms. 

To be continued.

 

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Teaching War

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For all the excellent work social historians have done the last few decades, most social studies teachers still teach top-down history. This is history as experienced by presidents, generals, business chieftains, not ordinary citizens. Wars garner lots of attention and tend to be taught as too-sterile sequences of events.

Few teachers and students purposefully and carefully examine the human costs of war and peace movements are usually ignored altogether.

Too often a hawkish teaching of war is wrapped in one dimensional patriotism that devalues the constitution and the commitments, courage, and contributions of conscientious objectors. 

Iraq and Afghanistan offer daily reminders of the human costs of war, whether it’s the loss of military and civilian lives, the ripple effects on loved ones at home, or the psychological legacy of post traumatic stress syndrome.

When I was in Victoria, B.C. last week, I read the Globe and Mail. I was riveted by a picture on the front page of Sergeant Gregory John Kruse and his 11 year old daughter, Kari, who looked a lot like my daughters at the same age. Sergeant Kruse died in Kandahar province a few days ago from an improvised explosive device. 

A week before Christmas a soldier knocked on his wife’s door bearing a gift from him. Jill, his wife, said that’s the kind of thoughtful guy he was. He’d picked out a precious stone two months earlier while he was home on leave from his mission. The paper explained, “He had arranged for a fellow soldier to pick up and deliver the rock so it would be under the tree at their home in Pembroke, Ont., on the 25th.”

“Another soldier knocked on the same family door yesterday,” the story continued, “this time bearing grim tidings that Sgt. Kruse was dead.” “It was a beautiful sapphire diamond necklace, and now I don’t want it,” Ms. Kruse said. “I want him. I just want him. I loved him so much. It seems so surreal that he’s gone.” 

More students will learn that war is incredibly destructive to both sides and represents huge failures in diplomacy when more social studies teachers incorporate the Jill and Katie Kruse’s of the world into the curriculum.

Winter Reprieve

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Happy 2009.

Tomorrow I’m ringing in the new year by flying southeast from one corner to the other to visit mother-dear in FL and thaw out. In addition to catching up with mother-dear, I look forward to reading, writing, and running on the “world’s longest continuous sidewalk.”

I always get a kick out of how the locals dress for their chilly, 60-something degree, early morning runs: hats, tights, gloves. If you’re in the hood, I’ll be the shirtless guy representing the PNW.

The new year is a natural time to plan so I’m curious what you’re interested in me writing about this year. Dean remembered I have thoughts on church life and leadership that I’ll get to sometime this year. Friday’s post, “Fitness Year in Review” is dedicated to Travis who has not been timid about his interest in fitness topics. Other 2009 education or related requests?

Peace.

Out and back, sans hills.

Out and back, sans hills.

Shirking Responsibility

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I wonder, is it within your nature and my nature to shirk responsibility?

Educators often complain that students don’t take sufficient responsibility for their mistakes. That shouldn’t come as a surprise because if we’re honest with ourselves, we’re slow to accept responsibility for some of our unflattering actions. Too often, instead of admitting fault and applying ourselves to resolve problems, we expend energy trying to pin mistakes on others.

Example one. A friend’s son’s team lost a close football game this season “because the ref threw the game” as a result of a “vendetta” against the firey head coach. As the poor calls built up, the other coaches and my friend went nuts, and no surprise, the players complained mightily about the outcome long after the final whistle. Youth learn more from what we do than what we say, but in this case is was a combination of what was said and done. I told my friend the coaching staff taught a powerful lesson that day. When things don’t go your way, pin it on others. 

What if they had said, “Refs are human and make mistakes. Usually they balance out. If we had played as well as we’re capable, the game wouldn’t have been that close. We will not be the type of team that pins losses on the refs. We will take responsibility for tough losses. Now go congratulate the other team and remember the lesson of this game: if you let the other team hang around, anything can happen.”

Example two. Recently some college presidents have made noise about suing the investment teams that are managing their shrinking endowments. Here’s what I’d like to ask each of these presidents. Are you kidding me? These are the same investment teams that the presidents were praising the last few years for their double digit returns. News flash, markets go down. The lesson of 2008, sometimes a lot. Unless some of the investment teams were from the Madoff school of investing, and guaranteed annual gains, the presidents need to accept endowment losses without blaming their once golden money managers. 

Example three. From a distance it appears as if the gay marriage backers who opposed Prop 8 in California didn’t like the outcome and want a do-over. I know this controversy is white-hot and complex. What I don’t understand is how can any state allow propositions of questionable constitutional quality onto the ballot in the first place? Didn’t the state election commission ask “If the proposition passes, will it run afoul of the constitution?” Assuming the election commission was competent, I believe the opponents of Prop 8 should accept the fact that 52% of voters supported it and focus their energies on reversing the decision in the next election.

Choosing a College 4

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In his “Choosing a College 3” comment, Dean was spot on in playing up the “real world” juice that’s often present at community colleges.

My teaching career has evolved to where I mostly teach at the graduate level. I like it a lot in large part because the students—many of whom are parents, retired military, former business people—bring so much to the table. The lack of “nontraditional” students is definitely an opportunity cost of attending a highly selective liberal arts college.

In simplest terms, Dean was describing the value of “age diversity,” and by extension, “life experience diversity.”

In my experience, even the most happy undergraduate students sometimes grow weary of spending nearly all of their time with people their age.

Of course there are ways for traditional undergrads to break out of their narrow age/life experience band. One simple inexpensive way to broaden one’s worldview is to read a daily newspaper. I could be wrong, but my sense is VERY few undergrads do that. Watching Jon Stewart doesn’t count.

Here are three other ways to broaden and deepen one’s college experience.

• do an internship or two in the community

• instead of joining a campus-based religious group, commit to a religious community off-campus

• study abroad

Gender Head Fake

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Truth in advertising. This is a “Plus” post that doesn’t have anything to do with education.

I was introduced to a website recently that analyzes blogs and then determines whether the author is male or female. Although I’m skeptical of the method, I couldn’t resist playing along. The verdict? “We are 57% sure that the author of ‘Education Plus’ is male. In general, ‘Education Plus’ is a ‘gender neutral’ blog.”

When I shared that info with the fam, J suggested I write more about “football and beer.” Instead, she will be disappointed that what I reveal here may single handedly erode the 7% male margin.

One of my favorite spots in the world is my bathtub.

My favorite times to soak are after Saturday morning winter runs, but some nights I imbibe before bed. Yes, TMI, but now that the water is out of the spigot, I have to provide the details. The water has to be HOT, not warm. I almost always read and on Saturdays I listen to CarTalk. Our house backs up to beautiful woods that have been saved by the recession. Talk about silver linings. From the tub, I have a killer view of a majestic 70′ tall pine. That tree means a lot to me.

Today, I alternated between reading the newspaper and watching snow fall against the pine. The last time we had this much snow. . . 1955.

I find the tub the perfect place to shave my legs. Just kidding, I fibbed on that to throw the gender website developers for a loop. And after the water drains, time permitting, I paint my toenails. Again, just playin’ with the web geniuses. 

Truthfully, I find the tub the perfect place to warm up, freshen up, relax, read, and think. While showering, the best I can do is three and a half or four of five.

Before you join J in thinking I’m too girly, you should know that Churchill took a nightly bath. While soaking, he dictated speeches to a series of stenographers from about 11p.m. to 3 or 4a.m. Yeah, that Churchill, the one who said “F” you to Hitler, chained smoked cigars, and beat back the Third Reich. Nothing girly about Churchill.

Churchill wouldn’t want me to appease the women in my house and surrender the tub. 

Rest assured Sir Winston, I will not appease them and I will not surrender the tub.

Manly by association.

Schooling versus Education

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I appreciate the fact that recent comments, like T’s “education is overrated” one from today, keep provoking additional thoughts.  

I’m guessing T was thinking more about schooling than education. If I’m right, I wholeheartedly agree that schooling is overrated, in part because of how little time we spend in school. K-12 students are in class for about 6 hours a day for 180 days a year. If you take the other 10 hours (allowing 8 for sleep) and multiply them by 180 and then add 185 times 16 hours, you discover students spend about 23% of their time in school. It would be less if we adjusted for time spent at lunch, between classes, at sports assemblies, and in classrooms where teachers struggle with classroom management. 

Let’s round down to 20%. The remaining 80% is sometimes referred to as the “societal curriculum” or the positive and negative things students learn from the media, travel, their families, their extracurricular activities, their part time jobs, their religious youth group activities, their summer activities, etc.  When I use the term “education” I’m referring to schooling and the societal curriculum. 

T is a state trooper extraordinaire. My guess is his schooling at the academy was helpful, but his trooper education really began once he got behind the wheel with veteran co-workers.

I’m also guessing T’s critique of schooling would involve far more than how little time is spent in school. He might argue lots of people who learn how to “do school” well lack some combination of mechanical intelligence, interpersonal intelligence, financial discipline, real world with-it-ness, and integrity, and I would wholeheartedly agree.

One example among hundreds. Mid 90s and I’m observing a student teacher in a Greensboro, NC high school. Fifth period, standard or remedial English. A student from my intern’s first period Honors English class enters to deliver a note. While handing over the note he asks, “Mr. T, what are you guys studying?” My intern replies something like, “We’re just working our way through the third chapter of Catcher in the Rye.” To which “gifted” student brazenly replies, “Oh man, we finished Catcher in the Rye last week.”

I immediately thought to myself we refer to that student as “gifted” only if we use the narrowest of definitions. That student seemingly read texts much better than he read group dynamics. Of course we want young people to learn to do both, but one could argue reading people well is at least equally as important as conventional reading comprehension.

New and Improved

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But still the same price. Sorry for the inconvenience. Hope you’ll update your bookmark, forward links on occasion, and keep reading. The plan for 2009  is to focus more on schooling and education while sporadically reflecting on fitness, finance, and family life. My goal is to consistently, informally, and clearly pose questions and communicate insights gleaned from a life spent teaching and learning.

Choosing a College 3

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Thanks to one of my college roommates and my wife for their “Choosing a College 2” comments which inspired this post.  

My roommate wrote, “. . . my sense is that right from the beginning, that a small private school is more personal and less bureaucratic. You feel more looked after, e.g., you meet with your academic advisor and discuss what classes and teacher would be good for you to take and its done, and the effort to speak to a teacher is a lot easier when you have a freshman class of 25 rather than of 250. It (connecting with profs) can be done, but it takes more work inititative.”

My wife wrote, “I would like to remind people of the community college choice. For some, even public institutions mean getting into debt, while some community colleges offer a fine start to a four year education at a lower price and are often overlooked.”

I agree that students receive a lot more personal attention at small, private liberal arts colleges; however, sometimes personal attention compromises self initiative and personal responsibility. I think I was better off finding my way without any hand holding. And I developed what I think of as “bureaucracy literacy” or the ability to successfully negotiate a large, relatively impersonal institution. As just one example, in order to save time and energy, I learned to buy my books at the end of each term before leaving town instead of at the beginning after returning. 

Instead of having a conversation about different possibilities, too many of my advisees expect me to tell them what to take. In part, I suspect that’s the result of parents doing far too many things for their children for far too long (also known as helicopter parenting). Case in point. I had a call the other day from the parent of a prospective masters student. She was calling on behalf of her daughter. She was worried her grade point average might not be high enough. Here’s what I wanted to say, but didn’t, “Her g.p.a. is less problematic than the fact that you made this call on her behalf.” 

Granted I’m a sample of one, but at my large public I grew up quicker than I otherwise would have. It wasn’t easy, but that’s my point, the obstacles forced me to find my way and mature. My first quarter was especially tough because I didn’t get on campus housing. I lived in a university apartment building five miles from campus. One night during dead week, the shuttle didn’t run late enough for me to attend a review session so I rode my bike. The SoCal skies opened and I got literally drenched. I was proud of myself for gutting it out. It would have been easy to skip the review session, but truth be told, I was afraid of failing and knew I needed every edge possible.

Therein lies another insight, choose a college where initially you might be in over your head. Then spend the first year cycling through rainstorms to catch up to your peers.

Onto the community college suggestion. No doubt they are about to be inundated with students who are unable to afford four year colleges and universities. Here’s a quote from a recent Chronicle of Higher Education study of enrollment trends, “Mirroring trends in retail sales, students are trading down. Those who might have attended pricey private colleges are looking more seriously at public universities. Those who might have attended state universities or regional public universities are now going to community colleges.” Community college enrollment is up 8% in 2008. 

I wonder though whether the least expensive option is the best. Conventional wisdom suggests teacher quality is the key variable in educational excellence and I agree in part. What’s always overlooked though is student motivation and what might be referred to as “classroom juice or energy.”  Classrooms are organic and the more curious, engaged, and ambitious the students, the easier it is for the teacher to create positive intellectual momentum.

Put differently, the best teachers are orchestra conductors who create the conditions for students to thoughtfully interact so that they learn from one another and the sum equals more than individual parts. My college bound daughter just received a packet of information from Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota. I don’t know about her, but after reading it, I want to enroll. Smallish school with students from all 50 states and 92 countries. 

Cynics will say that stat is just a part of an ongoing, giant, selective liberal arts college public relations competition with little bearing on campus life. I’d beg to differ. What better way to infuse global perspectives throughout the curriculum than attract students from all over the world. Even better if you can attract enough to avoid the pitfalls of tokenism.

Some curious, engaged, and ambitious students choose community colleges with a plan to transfer to a four year college or university, and they follow through, and they should be applauded. I just don’t know what percentage. Also, those students commute, so the opportunity cost is the substantive learning that continues well after class in four year schools with vibrant extracurricular programs. 

In that context, here’s a paragraph from the website of another college A is interested in. 

The quality of campus discourse at X, formal and informal, is an extension of the academic quality of the students we attract and admit. Conversation here is usually challenging and thought-provoking, invariably civil and well-informed. Every X student is exceptionally strong academically. But nonacademic achievements—from crusading to save a local wetland to making music with a punk-funk band—make for a lively campus, too. That’s why, in selecting each incoming class, we look beyond the stereotypical “well-rounded student.” Instead, we look for those who bring a mix of passions, eccentricities, and ambitions to create a well-rounded campus community. If there is a single characteristic that sets X students apart from other highly talented students, it is their tendency to excel in more than one way.

I suggest A and her friends pick a college where the educative potential of the informal educational opportunities complement the formal. Put differently, look for  late night juice. I remember sitting up late with my college roommate sometimes watching Saturday Night Live, but at other times comparing and contrasting the lives of Jesus and Freud. I was studying the early Christian movement, he was studying psychology and psychohistory. We learned a lot from one another. 

Pick a college where a majority of people are sober, well rounded, intellectually alive both in and outside of class. The first of those three is not that easy and probably deserves a separate post.

The Limits of Self Interest

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The new Civil War. Foreign automakers based in southern states versus American automakers based mostly in Michigan. Southern Republican members of Congress were the key bloc that succeeded in defeating the proposed $14b loan to the OBT (Once Big Three).

The theoretical underpinnings of Congress seemingly parallel those that undergird free market capitalism.

Market fundamentalists like Milton Friedman believe that from a business and economic standpoint, it is only when each of us acts in our own self-interest that society advances. Applied to Congress this means the best interests of the United States are achieved when each member of Congress pursues his or her constituents’ self-interest. 

But is that true? Is individual self interest, absent some shared concern for the public commons and  some government involvement, a magic catalyst for the greater good? What if within our home, my wife, our two children, and I each pursue our own individual interests? Will our family advance without some agreed upon values, overlapping purpose, and common vision for the future?

A Congressman or woman would say they have to put their constituents first in order to get reelected. But isn’t that how we end up with bridges to nowhere and wasteful pork that benefits a few at the expense of the many. Is it completely unrealistic for me to think that someday citizens might pressure their members of Congress to also consider “What’s in the best interest of the country and world?” 

What does this mean in the context of  automobile manufacturing? Regionalism trumps nationalism. Given that reality, are we better or worse off? This saga also illustrates the subjective nature of patriotism. Some people are inspired by the history of the labor movement and take pride in the accomplishments of the United Auto Workers. Others are ahistorical and blame the UAW for the OBT’s lack of competitiveness. 

How do we get the officials we elected to take a longer, more national, and even international view? More specifically, how do we get the people of South Carolina to think not just about what’s best for BMW, and by extension, their job security, but also the job security of the Michigan autoworker? And how do we get the people of Michigan to think not just about government loans and their job security, but global environmental issues?