Tag Archives: Globalization

Merkel’s Favorite English Language Curse Word

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From the BBC:

Germany’s standard dictionary has included a vulgar English term, used by Chancellor Angela Merkel among others, as an acceptable German word.

Duden, the equivalent of the Oxford English Dictionary in the UK, said it was reflecting the common use of the word “shitstorm” among Germans.

The word, which is used in German to denote a public outcry, seems to have caught on during the eurozone crisis.

German language experts voted it “Anglicism of the year” in 2012.

One of them, Michael Mann, explained in that the English word conveyed a “new kind of protest… clearly different in kind and degree from what could be expected in the past in response to a statement or action”.

In the past there have been controversies over German usage of words like “download”, “job-hopping” or “eye-catcher”.

The new word has crept into the language, imported by people who heard its use primarily in American English, he says.

It is used by the highest and lowest in the land and when Chancellor Merkel used it at a public meeting, nobody batted an eyelid, our correspondent adds.

Thanks Angela. I now feel freed up to use it liberally.

• I didn’t expect my suggestion that we have veggie burgers for dinner to cause such a shitstorm.

• Temps in the 90s always create a shitstorm in Washington State.

• “What a shitstorm of a season,” said dejected M fans after watching their team lose two of three to the Cubbies.

• “This year’s Wimbledon is a complete shitstorm of a tournament,” said the television executive.

• “All engineers. . . oh wait, I don’t want to cause another shitstorm.”

Bonus points for using it in a comment.

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How to Help Young Graduates Flourish

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High school and college graduation approaches. How will the graduates you know fare in the “real world”?

Historically, parents assumed their children would live more economically secure, comfortable, and enjoyable lives than themselves. Now, as a result of heightened global economic competition, the loss of manufacturing jobs, and higher education and health care inflation, many parents worry about whether their new graduates will live as well as them.

Apart from the vagaries of the national and global economy, and health care and higher education inflation, what will determine how the new graduates fare? Many believe people’s success is a result of their initiative, ability, and work ethic. Others highlight the importance of family background, gender, and ethnicity. I believe it’s both/and. 

But there’s one other indispensable variable—the vision young graduates have of their future. More specifically, how positive that vision is. Can they picture themselves educated, healthy, doing meaningful work, fulfilled? I wish I could interview all four hundred graduates at Olympia High School to discover patterns and themes in their personal visions. “Describe your 25 year old self,” I’d start. Initially at least, many would stare blankly at me, but with follow up questions and disciplined listening, I’d learn a lot.

Parents worry. Incessantly. Will their children be able to afford to continue their education and graduate college? Will they find a job that pays a livable wage? Will they have medical benefits? Are they going to manage money wisely? Will they avoid the pitfalls of addiction? Will they enjoy good mental and physical health? Will they make friends upon which they can depend? Will they be okay? Understandably, many young people internalize their parents’ anxiety.

One thing determines whether a young person enters the “real world” with a positive vision of their future—whether the adults they interact with on a daily basis transmit hope for the future. If young graduates are surrounded by people who live as if “things are getting better” the more likely they are to flourish.

This isn’t just positive thinking bullshit. What does it mean to live as if things are getting better? It means denying one self day-to-day in the interest of the future vision. People with positive visions get up and go to work and save money. They eat healthily. They exercise. Their careful with their money, meaning they spend most of it on essentials. They take care of their possessions. They care for the environment by picking up trash, recycling, and reducing their energy consumption. They volunteer their time to make others’ lives better. They live their day-to-day lives mindful of their children’s and grandchildren’s lives. And other people’s children and grandchildren.

Some young graduates are surrounded by adults—older siblings, parents, grandparents, teachers, coaches, youth pastors, neighbors—with positive visions of a better future. Adults who unwittingly teach delayed gratification. Those young grads can’t help but get caught up in the positive momentum. Their grades and test scores aren’t that important. Or how prestigious their college. They’ll be okay.

Others are surrounded by adults living day-to-day without any vision for a better future. They don’t have a feel for delayed gratification, and therefore, can’t help but get caught up in the negative momentum. They’ll struggle.

Give a graduate the best gift possible this year, model a positive vision of the future.

 

Pressing Pause

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Periodically it’s nice to pop the hood or lift the curtain on the blog. Choose your own metaphor.

• Every self-respecting blog has a clear focus. For me, that’s a perpetual struggle. My interests are varied and I’m too easily distracted. If you’re a regular and attentive, you may have noticed I’m trying to improve the focus by posting an education-specific post at least weekly, usually first thing Monday morn.

• WordPress has upgraded the statistics they provide. They now show the nationality of readers. A few incoming links are even showing up with posts translated into Arabic and other languages. Very cool. Floored that about 25% of page views come from outside the U.S. A warm welcome to every international reader. I value your participation. Top ten countries over the last month—Philippines, Canada, Jamaica, United Kingdom, India, Netherlands, Norway, Bangladesh, Brazil, Malaysia. What a great mix. I’m going to try being more mindful of the international mix of readers when writing. What’s that mean? Not entirely sure, but I’ll try to avoid referring to the U.S. as “we”.

• I’ve saved the most important item for last. I have never asked you, my faithful readers, for anything. In fact, I’ve written about how bad I am at asking for help. But now I need your help. With apologies to international readers who may not be familiar with our very popular children’s public television show Sesame Street, and a segment that’s sometimes a part of the show, which one of these is not the same?

Person Following on Twitter Twitter Followers “ING” to “ERS” ratio
Walt Mossberg—tech reporter 266 318,250 1,196x
Ellen Degeneres—t.v. personality 47,609 9,938,951 208x
Ron Byrnes—famous blogger 20 11 .55x
Lance Armstrong—product pimp/triathlete 348 3,341,070 9,600x
Steve Carrell—actor/comedienne 0 87,805 87,805x

There are two types of people in the world—forward-looking ones on Twitter and hopelessly out-of-date ones not yet on Twitter. If you haven’t already, take your “cool quotient” into your hands and sign up for a Twitter account now. It’s easy and painless. And then follow me at pressingpause.com. And then, have your life changed.

It’s a shame that only eight of you and three aspiring porno stars are aware of how brilliant I am on Twitter. It’s the perfect format for me. On Twitter I’m funnier, more informative, and twice as charming as normal. It’s a shame more of you are not taking full advantage of more Ron at the same low cost!

Why clutter the blog with my triathlon training deets when there’s Twitter. Wonder what my world class eavesdropping self has overheard recently? Twitter. Curious about my most recent sports insight? Twitter. Wonder what tasty new meal I’ve cooked up for the fam? What, you didn’t even know I’ve taken over cooking duties? Well, that’s because you’re not following me on Twitter.

PLEASE accomplish two things simultaneously—radically transform your life for the better and help me get my “ING” to “ERS” ratio into positive territory.

Thank you in advance! Can’t wait for the ratio to blow up.

As always, thank you for reading and don’t hesitate to write me with questions or thoughts.

Peace out,

Ron

Schooling the World: The White Man’s Last Burden

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Last week I presented a paper at a “Globalization, Diversity, & Education” conference near Portland. It’s a small conference attended by equal numbers of liberals and radicals. An ideological oasis for lefties. At times it felt like I was on the set of Portlandia.

People enjoy like-minded company because it’s self-affirming, but at conferences it makes for less-interesting sessions because there’s little to no tension. When everyone is of the same mind, no one is pressed to rethink or refine their ideas. Conflict is exasperating, but after awhile, blanket likemindedness can be equally vexing.

I’ve never been too fond of professional conferences mostly because networking is a weakness of mine. Also, too much of the content is theoretical and directed only at other academics resulting in an echo chamber far too removed from families’, teachers’, and students’ day-to-day lives. And too often it’s a game—participants are simply padding their vitas with an eye toward promotion. I couldn’t help but think how differently people would have to write their papers if they were forced to present them in pubs or community centers to a mix of citizens from different walks of life.

The highlight of the conference was the film “Schooling the World: The White Man’s Last Burden” by Carol Black. Black created the Emmy award winning television series The Wonder Years with her husband Neal Marlens. TWY is one of my fav series of all time. After TWY, and the birth of her children, Black withdrew from Hollywood, got involved in the alternative education movement, and researched cross-cultural perspectives on education which lead to the making of the film. Black attended my paper presentation and helped in the discussion of it. I also talked to her right before the film screened. A lot of her thinking about alternative education resonants with me. Someone I wish I could get to know better.

Here’s the film summary from the DVD cover:

Schooling the World takes a challenging, sometimes funny, ultimately deeply disturbing look at the effects of modern education on the world’s last sustainable indigenous cultures. If you wanted to change an ancient culture in a generation, how would you do it? You would change the way it educates its children. The U.S. government knew this in the 19th century when it forced Native American children into government boarding schools. Today, volunteers build schools in traditional societies around the world, convinced that school is the only way to a ‘better’ life for indigenous children. But is this true? What really happens when we replace a traditional culture’s way of learning and understanding the world with our own?

It’s as well made and provocative an educational documentary as you’re going to see. Many viewers will resist the message and leave upset. After watching the film, one person did ask Black why she drew such a sharp dichotomy between the “negatives of western education and consumer culture” and the “positives of non-western cultures and people”. Black acknowledged the dichotomy and said it was intentional because no one ever questions the premise that western education is a positive force for all of the world’s children. It was a thoughtful explanation for the film’s one-sidedness. I couldn’t help but think of how when I’m arguing with my Better Half, frustration clouds my thinking and I take more extreme stands than I normally would.

I could write a few week’s worth of posts on the film’s content. One thought. Few in the audience probably thought to use the film as a mirror for evaluating their teaching. Every educator enters the classroom with biases, privileging some cultural practices, disregarding others. Put differently, every educator sometimes slights the significance of their students’ backgrounds. While watching the film, I couldn’t help but wonder, “How do my preservice teachers and how do I impose our worldview on students?”

Another thought in the form of a premise. Even if we could close every boarding school in traditional societies around the world, indigenous cultures would still face the same challenges imposed on them by western education as a result of global media including television, music, film, and advertising. I’ve written in the past about the societal curriculum‘s effect on students. Sam Wineburg and friends have shown that modern film is the single most influential resource in shaping high schoolers historical understanding. Here’s their paper titled, “Forest Gump and the Future of Teaching the Past.”

Beginning in the late 80’s and early 90’s, I was blown away by how pervasive western popular culture was in my travels through East Africa and China. In African markets, endless posters of the three Mikes—Jackson, Tyson, Jordan. Hiking up a steep trail to the Great Wall, I was subjected to Lionel Ritchie whose music was being piped in through cheap speakers tied to tree branches.  Immediately after a Chinese teacher talked teaching with some colleagues and me as required, she turned far more animated and excitedly asked if we had seen the Bridges of Madison County. My favorite Michael Jordan poster in China, like all English in China, had a wonderful typo. Under his picture it said, “Michael Jordan, MBA.” Tru dat.

So given global satellites, coaxial cables, the internet, and smart phones, the central question, “How can we avoid imposing our worldview on the world’s last sustainable indigenous cultures?” is even more challenging than the film suggests. Maybe Black’s film will inspire someone else to make a companion one on the global media. And maybe people much smarter than me will figure out how to manage globalization so that indigenous cultures aren’t completely overwhelmed to the detriment of us all.

Personal Economic Balance

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First Born (FB) likes her Starbucks and thinks nothing of dropping 4 bills at Schultz’s stores. Last summer she capitalized on her selective private liberal arts education to secure a part-time job weeding a neighbor’s yard. Late summer, on the way to a concert in Portland, I asked, “Would you keep drinking Starbucks if each time after your last sip you had to immediately walk outside the store and weed for thirty minutes?”

The “probably not” look on her face was a thing of beauty. Maybe there’s a glimmer of hope she’s learning the value of a dollar, or more specifically, four dollars.

Gears spinning in her head, and captive in the Japanese compact, I decided to launch into my “economic balance” talk which was so brilliant it deserves this larger audience.

The economic balance equation is a simple, three-parter: One’s hourly wage + one’s hours spent working – one’s purchases also known as expenses, overhead, or standard of living.

If a person make’s $10/hour and chooses to spend $4 for a Starbucks drink, then the cost was 30 minutes of work time (rounding and after taxes). For a therapist, plumber, or attorney making $100/hour, the same Starbucks costs 3 minutes of work time. I would not weed for 30 minutes for a extra hot, nonfat, grande green tea latte, but I would for three.

Let’s zoom in on each part.

1) Hourly wage. The challenge here is that in the U.S. in the last ten to twenty years the average person’s wages have fallen relative to (very low) inflation mostly as a result of amped up global economic competition. U.S. consumers buy inexpensive goods from China; to try to stay competitive, companies shift their manufacturing operations to distant places where their labor costs are greatly reduced; a lot of workers lose their jobs; margins shrink; and then new workers are offered some of the previous jobs at much less than their predecessors made.

Or the domestic version. States experience massive budget debts as a result of recession, increased unemployment outlays, accelerating health care and higher education inflation, and unsustainable pension promises to public employees. Educators in Washington State get their pay reduced and the state is still $2b in the hole. Few people make $100/hour, most are much closer to $10.

2) Hours spent working. Unemployment is high as is underemployment and economists expect that to remain the case for the foreseeable future. Record numbers of unemployed have quit looking for work and don’t show up in the 9.1%, and for 20-24 year olds, unemployment is 15+%. The double whammy income challenge—how to increase one’s average hourly wage and hour’s spent working in a sputtering economy? Add in the 2007-2008 bursting of the housing bubble and it’s a triple whammy since many people owe tens of thousands more on their homes than they’re now worth.

Which leads to, 3) take your pick—expenses, overhead, or standard of living—the key variable in many, many people falling even further out of economic balance. Workers can’t throw a switch and increase their pay or their opportunities to work additional hours because the changes in the global and national economy are beyond their individual control. Those changes are not temporal either, they’re long-term and systemic. We live in a new economic reality of intensified competition from all over the globe. Don’t listen to politicians who want you to believe we’re special. We’re not.

Often there’s a debilitating time lag between workers’ lower wages, reduced hours, and accustomed standard of living.

Seneca said, “. . . the man who adapts himself to his slender means and makes himself wealthy on a little sum, is the truly rich man.” My 21st Century adaptation, “The person who adapts to making less money and learns to enjoy a less materialistic life, is the truly rich person.” Our expenses are the part of the equation we have the most control over. Worth repeating. Our expenses are the part of the equation we have the most control over. That means we have to do a better job of distinguishing between the few things we need and the neverending number of things we want.

One example. While it’s increasingly vogue to argue otherwise, many contend a college education is a necessity, but attending one that charges $50k+/year is obviously not. Due to a mix of factors—including off-the-charts economic anxiety, age-old social status concerns, and slick higher education marketing campaigns—too many high school seniors enroll in colleges that are more expensive than their families can realistically afford. As a result, many twenty-two year olds, whether they make it to graduation or not, end up deeply in debt. Some authors, comparing them to indentured slaves, are referring to them as “indentured students”.

If a young person’s scholarships, merit aid, personal and family savings, and part-time work can’t cover the cost of their preferred college, they should choose a more affordable path. If you’re a parent being asked to extend yourself beyond what’s possible, it’s okay to say, “Can’t afford it.” The double economic whammy will be challenging enough, why make it a debt-ridden triple one?

21st Century Commerce

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[I have a dream as a blogger. That someday my sissy will comment. Today’s post is written with that in mind.]

In the 20th century, when someone said, “I’m going shopping,” it usually meant they were driving to a nearby store. As a pipsqueak, I’d routinely shout to my mom as she hurried out the door, “Bring me something.”

Increasingly, we log onto to our lap or desktop computers to make purchases. I do a google search and then press “shopping” to see where it’s available and for what price.

Recently, I read a Wall Street Journal story about a young professional’s finances. He buys lots of things on Ebay that I wouldn’t have ever thought of buying on-line. Razor blades for example. So I ran the razor blade numbers and found they’re 50 cents cheaper per blade on Ebay than at Costco. Google shopping doesn’t seem to link to Ebay, so now I’m going to try to remember to search Ebay separately.

Last week I was shopping for mountain bike pedals. I decided I wanted these*. I had at least four choices on where to buy them: 1) in person at the local LBS. . . local bike shop; 2) in person or on-line at a chain/cooperative/club store like Performance Bicycle or REI; 3) on-line at the behemoth, Amazon.com; or 4) on-line at an independent bike store anywhere in the world.

I didn’t even check the local bike store because I was doubtful they’d have them in stock and they just can’t compete on price. In fact, now I stock up on chains, cassettes, and cables on-line, which cost considerably less than at the local LBS, and just pay the LBSers for labor.

They were listed as $269.99 at Performance, but on sale for $199.99 (before tax and shipping). REI, $269.00. Too expensive even factoring in the 10% or so I get back as credit as a “member”. (Of course “cooperative or club credit” is of no value if it prompts me to later purchase things I don’t need).

They were available at some independent associated with Amazon for $159.99, or $173.91 with tax. For some reason, the shipping date was late July, early August.

Finally, they were 87.17 euros or $126.39 at a Barcelona sporting goods store. No tax, but the only shipping option was DHL for $20.58, for a grand total of $146.97.

So they went from Barcelona, Spain; to Leipzig, Germany; to Cincinnati; to Seattle; to my door a few hours ago.

* yes weight weenies, 100g heavier than the normal, smaller 985s, but with these is I can more easily do short, tennis shoe-based rides around town

 

We’re all Tiger Woods Now

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Remember how the 1992 “Dream Team” waltzed through the Olympic basketball competition on their way to their gold medal? Fast forward to 2004 when the US lost three times and settled for bronze. Fast forward some more to today. A Sports Illustrated mock NBA draft shows five of the first eight teams taking international players.

What about golf? There are four U.S. players among the top ten, and with Woods dropping fast, that will probably be three soon.

Tennis? The top U.S. player, Mardy Fish, is ranked #10, Roddick is #11, and then you have to scroll down to #26 before finding another American.

Soccer? FIFA has the U.S. ranked 22nd in the world.

The marathon? The first 14 are East African and 65 of the top 100 are Kenyan.

Long distance triathlon? Linsey Corbin, from Montana, is ranked 7th, the only American woman in the top 10. Timothy O’Donnell is tied for tenth among the men.

The most recent international test scores (NAEP) were recently published. In math and reading, U.S. students are in the middle of the pack among students from OECD countries. In science, back of the pack.

People suffering from acute “greatestcountryintheworldhysteria” will look hard to find different competitions we’re winning (personal debt, football by default since hardly anyone else plays it, health care inflation, gun ownership, fossil fuel usage, military spending). While their parochial heads are buried in the sand, more and more of the world supersedes us in classrooms and on athletic fields.

We’re all Tiger Woods now. The rest of the world isn’t the least bit intimidated. All young international students and athletes want is the opportunity to go toe-to-toe with us.

Two Roads Diverge

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The first in a week-long, three-part series.

I’m doing some reorienting. Prioritizing my non-work identities and relationships. Mid-life crisis? Don’t think so, but time will tell. Check back in a year or two from now. Lao Tzu said, “The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” I’m taking the first steps of a journey whose outcome is unknown.

So what follows, like my identity more generally, is a work in progress. I don’t expect anyone to agree with everything. Or anything.

U.S. citizens are at a fork in the woods. A fork formed by a decline in manufacturing, technology-based automation, slower economic growth, and heightened economic scarcity.

More details here, although you don’t need Tyler Cowen or me to tell you about what you’re experiencing day-to-day.

We talk at length about the trees in the woods—fast rising gas prices, exorbitant health insurance premiums and college costs, and declining home values —but hardly at all about what lifestyles are most sustainable and meaningful.

The fork has prompted a radical shift in thinking. In the U.S., throughout the 20th century, parents thought, “I expect my children to live a better, more comfortable life than me.” Today the default is “I worry and wonder whether my children will be able to live as well and comfortably as me.”

Two roads diverged in a wood and I—I worried and wondered.

Economic security seems outside of our control. The economy is in constant flux and no job is secure. We can’t get politicians to think beyond their re-election and balance our state or national budgets. We can’t get them to stop fighting distant wars. We can’t slow China’s and India’s growth. We can’t reduce our dependence on oil. We can’t get consumers to stop shopping at Wal-Mart and other big boxes. We can’t stop companies from outsourcing jobs. And there’s seemingly no way to improve parenting, fix schools, or reduce inequality.

The fork is doubly tough for adults responsible for young people. They worry, what does their future hold? “I’m worried for myself and I’m worried for you.”

If we stop or even slow down, we may be overcome with fear for the future and overwhelmed with anxiety; therefore, we fill our days with work, shopping, entertainment, new apps, Facebook.

I wouldn’t be able to write this sentence if I weren’t extremely privileged, but I wonder if these tough economic times are an opportunity to slow down and think through more carefully how we want to live, to find ways to live more sustainable, meaningful lives. Or maybe, since lifestyle choices are intensely personal, I should say, how I want to live, to find ways for me to live a more sustainable, meaningful life.

Before fleshing out those concepts, consider the perspectives of the political left and right who have distinct opinions about the causes and consequences of the fork. Competing voices in the woods if you will. And yes, I’m conscious I’m overgeneralizing. Sometimes when you’re painting, you just grab the broad brush.

The right interprets economic history and life more generally through the lens of American exceptionalism. They’re more anxious about accelerating ethnic diversity than they are global economic restructuring. They refuse to acknowledge our relative decline and are nostalgic for the second half of the 20th century when the U.S.’s economic, military, and political advantages were much more obvious. They’re in serious denial, but if you tell them that they’ll label you anti-American, because in their worldview, American exceptionalism is self-evident.

Stagnant wages and high unemployment aren’t a result of technology-based automation, economic globalization, or our consumer choices. They’re temporary anomalies. Small bumps in the road. If the Kenyan-born, Muslim president (okay, that was uncalled for) would just embrace American exceptionalism, reduce the government to a fourth of its current size and lower taxes by half, we’d quickly reclaim our rightful role as the world’s unquestioned economic superpower. Then we could pick up living large again.

Wednesday—Part 2 of 3—The left, the President, and my evolving thoughts on the fork.

Private K-12 Tutoring Trends

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From an 8/21/10 New York Times article. Maybe I should have titled this post “The Globalization of Tutoring”. And maybe I should put out a shingle in Manhattan.

“People have been pulling back for tutors charging $250 to $400 an hour,” said Sandy Bass, editor and publisher of Private School Insider, an online newsletter. “They’re still using tutors, but they’re searching around for more reasonably priced help. In Manhattan, $85 to $150 is the acceptable range for reasonably priced.”

Mr. Pines of the Education Industry Association said he had seen the same reassessment in the rest of the country, where the average rate was $45 to $65 an hour. Parents who once would have had in-home tutors are going to tutoring centers, while some using the centers have cut back on hours or moved to online-only platforms. He said a rising player in this field is TutorVista, an online education company based in Bangalore, India, that charges $99.99 a month for help on an Internet platform.

300th Post

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Quite a few don’t you think. Thanks for reading and sometimes commenting whether online or in person.

You’ve probably noticed I’ve been switching templates lately. The problem is the best designs have the smallest, least legible fonts. Within wordpress, to get a larger, more readable font, you have to sacrifice on the design front. I’d like to customize things, but need someone more tech savvy than me to volunteer to help. Yeah, yeah, I know, why specify “more tech savvy” when that’s most everyone.

As always, I’m open to suggestions.

As I think about the topics I’ve written about, I’m struck by how wide-ranging my interests are. I’m sure blog consultants would say too wide-ranging. I could TRY to narrow my focus, but that would mean posting less often. Right now at least, I’m more inclined to accept the limitations of my decidedly generalist orientation.

Speaking of consulting, I would like to do more going forward and would appreciate any leads you might have. Primarily lectures and/or workshops on: 1) reinventing high school teaching and learning; 2) the high school to college transition; 3A) internationalizing curriculum; and 3B) teaching about globalization. In April, I enjoyed helping a university faculty at an Iowa college (on 3A&B) and I am looking forward to speaking at a college in Illinois next spring (3A).

I’m looking forward to being on sabbatical during the 2011-2012 academic year, although I may need to tweak that in light of other departmental colleagues on the same timeframe. I intend on using my sabbatical, whenever it occurs, to prep for and seek out more consulting opportunities.