Isn't it amazing when you're a faculty member of a university that the emails and the work don't actually stop when you're "off" for the summer? Sigh. (Somebody please tell the people who think we only work nine months a year.)
ANYwho...on to today's non-academically-related post (because my motivation for doing anything "work-related" has hit an all-time low...I'm still waiting for my "summer" and thus, my "break," to start):
What I learned from Paris Hilton.
1. When problems arise, run to Mom.
2. If you must make your own lunch, be a slob, make a mess, and wait for Mom or the maid to clean it up.
3. When someone else decides to help you out of a jam by letting you stay with them, redecorate their home without asking and be sure the walls are replete with your image so they know how much their help means to you.
4. No amount of danger or weirdness can prevent you from going out to dance and drink the night away.
I am 11 minutes into the first episode of The World According to Paris and I'm already dumber as a result. But the researcher in me insists that I stick with it and press on. There may be some other truly enlightening and life-altering facts buried in the remaining 33 minutes. After all, there must be some amazing intellectual gold here or Oxygen wouldn't have agreed to give Paris her own show, right?.......Right?!
5. Being spoiled, rich, and privileged means you can look down on everyone who isn't you and when you screw up, you have the right to expect other people to do your work for you.
6. Community service work is a joke.
7. Ill-behaved, spoiled, privileged chihuahuas are incredibly destructive dogs.
8. Being super-rich means never having to think, work, or apologize.
Twenty-one minutes into the episode and I'm beginning to realize that Paris has no redeeming qualities. I'm a fan of giving people a chance, so I thought it was possible that this show was designed to help the public see what a normal, relatable person Paris is. The opening tag line leads you to believe that she has a great life, but gosh-darn-it, it's not always easy for this poor little famous rich girl. At the halfway point of this first episode, I have yet to see anything in her life that isn't easy for her. She is almost 30 years old and has the maturity and intellectual depth of a 12 year old. How does anybody watch this on a regular basis??
9. If you are famous for being famous, you should complain that people follow you because you're famous...and then strike your most insincere and hypocritical pose while not doing anything to deflect that attention.
10. Art that you don't understand or appreciate should be mocked as "weird."
11. Sincerity is overrated and unnecessary.
This show is nothing but mindless drivel that is laced with negative messages and the people who take it seriously need to be careful that they don't internalize the above lessons. Or perhaps this show contributes to the unending volume of ill-behaved individuals roaming our streets and store aisles. I am certain that each episode contains similar gems of "wisdom" and the more impressionable among us are susceptible to the influence of such ideas.
Television can be quite useful and even educational while also being entertaining...however, this show has none of these qualities. What a complete waste of time. Shame on the Oxygen network for broadcasting this twaddle.
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Extreme Couponing: A Recession Sickness
Now that summer is here, I pause sometimes in my daily productivity to work at being a couch potato (usually after 7 or 8pm). Tonight I decided to flick around my many channels to see what stupid TV I've been missing this year, carefully avoiding the news because I know how worked up I tend to get and I'm trying to remain calm and relaxed for as many days as possible (noble goal, yes?).
As my title suggests, my channel surfing landed me on TLC's Extreme Couponing. "Anytime I can land a really big deal, it kinda feels like I'm on crack," says one extreme couponer in a room full of canned, packaged, preservative-laced, salt-packed food. A diet of sports drinks, noodles, and candy? Not a fresh veggie, fruit, meat, or egg in sight. There's the first problem. Fresh food can't be hoarded. No fresh food? No thanks.
Second problem: Extreme Couponers are just Hoarders with more organized shelf space. Hoarding is hoarding, regardless of how much money you save. Buying stuff you don't need, don't want, and aren't going to use is wasteful - one woman bought 60 bottles of hot sauce. NOBODY needs 60 bottles of hot sauce! Another woman's husband said he doesn't even eat mustard, but that didn't stop his insane spouse from buying hundreds of bottles of the stuff.
Third problem: Buying a bunch of products simply because they are on sale, not because you NEED that much of something is not sane or healthy. Saving money is an admirable goal, but anything taken to the extreme is wasteful and terribly selfish. In the case of extreme couponers, they end up with whole rooms full of food and product that they will never use up and they usually hang on to it instead of donating some of it to a food bank.
Even though much of the food these crazies are buying is unhealthy, some of it is good such as frozen vegetables, canned soups, and healthy breads. If you are buying $1500 worth of food and products for $50 and you DON'T donate some of your loot, then you are a selfish, addicted human being. (Aside: One featured extreme couponer on the TLC show DOES donate a majority of his haul, which does seem saner to me...hoarding the loot greedily does not seem sane by comparison.)
Fanatical, addictive behavior is a behavioral disorder, not something to be emulated. If you happen to be one of these people who thinks extreme couponing is cool or fun or useful, think again. Why would you want to give yourself a behavioral disorder? Just because we are in a recession does not give you carte blanche to become a hoarder of food and products that you will never use. It is NOT "being smart and saving money," no matter what the one woman's grandmother observed. Buying a 12-pack of toilet paper and a five-pack of toothpaste is sane bulk-buying...you will use these products within the next few months and can likely stash the items in a cabinet or closet. Buying 120 12-packs of toilet paper and 240 toothpaste tubes is wasteful, unnecessary, and reflective of a psychological disorder bordering on OCD that involves the acquiring and stockpiling of consumer products for the sake of it.
And evidently, I'm not the only one who holds this opinion of this mortifying recession sickness.
Just say no to extreme couponing. Go for a hike in a beautiful park or spend some time with friends or develop a hobby that doesn't involve addiction and might actually benefit your mental and physical health in particular and humanity in general. If this is what passes for "entertainment" now, I think I'll stick with books and movies.
As my title suggests, my channel surfing landed me on TLC's Extreme Couponing. "Anytime I can land a really big deal, it kinda feels like I'm on crack," says one extreme couponer in a room full of canned, packaged, preservative-laced, salt-packed food. A diet of sports drinks, noodles, and candy? Not a fresh veggie, fruit, meat, or egg in sight. There's the first problem. Fresh food can't be hoarded. No fresh food? No thanks.
Second problem: Extreme Couponers are just Hoarders with more organized shelf space. Hoarding is hoarding, regardless of how much money you save. Buying stuff you don't need, don't want, and aren't going to use is wasteful - one woman bought 60 bottles of hot sauce. NOBODY needs 60 bottles of hot sauce! Another woman's husband said he doesn't even eat mustard, but that didn't stop his insane spouse from buying hundreds of bottles of the stuff.
Third problem: Buying a bunch of products simply because they are on sale, not because you NEED that much of something is not sane or healthy. Saving money is an admirable goal, but anything taken to the extreme is wasteful and terribly selfish. In the case of extreme couponers, they end up with whole rooms full of food and product that they will never use up and they usually hang on to it instead of donating some of it to a food bank.
Even though much of the food these crazies are buying is unhealthy, some of it is good such as frozen vegetables, canned soups, and healthy breads. If you are buying $1500 worth of food and products for $50 and you DON'T donate some of your loot, then you are a selfish, addicted human being. (Aside: One featured extreme couponer on the TLC show DOES donate a majority of his haul, which does seem saner to me...hoarding the loot greedily does not seem sane by comparison.)
Fanatical, addictive behavior is a behavioral disorder, not something to be emulated. If you happen to be one of these people who thinks extreme couponing is cool or fun or useful, think again. Why would you want to give yourself a behavioral disorder? Just because we are in a recession does not give you carte blanche to become a hoarder of food and products that you will never use. It is NOT "being smart and saving money," no matter what the one woman's grandmother observed. Buying a 12-pack of toilet paper and a five-pack of toothpaste is sane bulk-buying...you will use these products within the next few months and can likely stash the items in a cabinet or closet. Buying 120 12-packs of toilet paper and 240 toothpaste tubes is wasteful, unnecessary, and reflective of a psychological disorder bordering on OCD that involves the acquiring and stockpiling of consumer products for the sake of it.
And evidently, I'm not the only one who holds this opinion of this mortifying recession sickness.
Just say no to extreme couponing. Go for a hike in a beautiful park or spend some time with friends or develop a hobby that doesn't involve addiction and might actually benefit your mental and physical health in particular and humanity in general. If this is what passes for "entertainment" now, I think I'll stick with books and movies.
Friday, March 25, 2011
The value of creativity in the era of "accountability"
In a recent issue of the College Composition and Communication journal (Vol. 62: 3, Feb. 2011), English professor Chris Gallagher (Northeastern University) writes about “how neoliberalism undermines faculty assessment expertise and underwrites testing industry expertise in the current assessment scene” (450). Wow, Amanda, what an incredibly dull and ivory-tower-intellectual concern, you may say, can’t you write about something more interesting and incendiary?
Je proteste. And here’s why.
I read this article very differently because not only am I on my department’s assessment team this semester, charged with initiating and conducting the very first comprehensive assessment of our composition curriculum for Middle States accreditation requirements, but also because I am incredibly invested in the inherent value of creativity, a skill and concept that cannot be assessed with a standardized test that targets students and faculty, promotes mechanical skill over creative exploration, and instills fear and wrath instead of the joy and comfort that should accompany intellectual growth. And creativity is seemingly at odds with the neoliberal assessment agenda running rampant on college campuses today.
In the most simplistic terms, creativity and assessment are on opposite ends of the value spectrum.
Creativity-----------------------------------Writing Assessment
(internal, implicit value; (external, explicit
unassessable) value; assessable)
(internal, implicit value; (external, explicit
unassessable) value; assessable)
One key problem with this spectrum is that writing is not a scientific, quantifiable equation with a limited (and hence, assessable) number of “right” or “correct” approaches. Rather, writing for me (and anyone who has made a living as a writer) falls firmly on the left side of this spectrum into the realm of the creative and unassessable. When I wrote investigative reports for American Indian Report or feature spreads for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review or travel articles for Blue Mountain or web site content for Lifetime.com, I employed a wide range of different writing skills and strategies and styles to express the content. Was it consistently grammatically correct? Yes. Was the grammatical-correctness a legitimate assessment of the VALUE of the content and creatively expressive range of that content and my skill as a writer? Most assuredly, no.
My own personal intellectual challenge, one that gives me fits and anxiety, is figuring out how we (as faculty and students) can extricate ourselves from this current assessment scene attitude of “accountability” by numbers and results-based outcomes (an outgrowth of the free market economic theory of Adam Smith and those who followed, hence the “neo” in the liberal economic policy now dominating our Republican overlords in public office), but still provide those all-important numbers valued by administrators and state government bean counters.
That camp wants to see quantifiable results in the form of numbers and percentages; my camp wants to see students learn to express themselves in a wide variety of contexts with a wide variety of writing skills and strategies. Can these two sides ever agree? Is compromise even possible, given the diametrically opposed agendas?
If I wanted to be truly depressing, I would say no, we can never get along or compromise; therefore, all is lost. Either we diminish the creative impulse that is writing to a system of check marks where students write perfect, grammatically, and content-free sentences void of depth and thought (but that can easily be assessed by the numbers) or we fight for a new system that acknowledges the creative ebb and flow of students’ thoughts and professors’ unique pedagogical approaches.
Sigh. Just thinking about the enormity of this task makes me want to take a nap and wake up when someone else has figured it out.
But I’m no quitter. I’ve never been one to stick my head in the sand and hope that the other chickens have solved the problem when I deign to once again raise my head. I hate it when people do that – look the other way and hope that someone else raises their hand. To me, that is the coward’s move. I see it happen in my classes every day – the go-getters consistently participate and don’t shy away from my questions, while the others look down, look out the window, and pretend not to hear me. But they are not necessarily cowards; rather, they are young and inexperienced in the ways of the world, and therefore, unsure about what they think they know. Whereas I am older, experienced, more salty and fearless, and quite frankly, peeved at the hijacking of education by people who don’t consider creativity to have inherent value.
Creativity (and hence, writing) should be left alone to incubate and grow over time like the fragile thing that it is.
Gallagher refers to the Spellings Commission Report of 2006 on the Future of Higher Education, which could read like Governor Tom Corbett’s playbook for his current attack on education. While starting off with positive statements such as “higher education in the United States has become one of our greatest success stories,” the report fairly quickly devolves into a criticism of this “successful” system as an inefficient, inflexible system that churns out inferior “products,” that Gallagher calls “low-skilled graduates” (CCC 454). In fact, a close examination of the terminology in this Department of Education report (created by a commission loaded with corporate executives, interestingly enough – and creativity is essential to successful businesses) provides step by step instructions for any politician interested in dismantling public education and increasing the divide between the wealthy and the middle class and working poor.
To wit, the commission states in the preface, “We acknowledge that not everyone needs to go to college” (xii). One of the bullet points under this statement expands on this idea:
“Among high school graduates who do make it on to postsecondary education, a troubling number waste time—and taxpayer dollars—mastering English and math skills that they should have learned in high school. And some never complete their degrees at all, at least in part because most colleges and universities don’t accept responsibility for making sure that those they admit actually succeed”
A damning statement, if there ever was one. And it contains within it the foundation upon which Governors’ Corbett, Walker, Kasich and others are building a case against higher education by removing its funding, arguing that we aren’t doing our jobs and students don’t need to be there, anyway. Those who can afford college (now that public education will be priced out of reach for our middle class and working poor families), will achieve that success the Commission touted in their first paragraph by attending smaller, liberal arts, PRIVATE colleges capable of weeding out the undesirables who received inadequate attention and training in basic skills at the secondary level – these kids won’t even walk through a college’s door of future opportunity if Corbett, et al get their way. But those kids can just become auto mechanics, beauticians, and plumbers, after all.
A quick search of this 76-page report for the term “creativity” resulted in no matches. “Creative” appears just once in the following statement on page 21:
“For their part, state and federal policymakers have also failed to make supporting innovation a priority. Accreditation, along with federal and state regulation, can impede creative new approaches as well. We recommend that America’s colleges and universities embrace a culture of continuous innovation and quality improvement. We urge these institutions to develop new pedagogies, curricula and technologies to improve learning, particularly in the areas of science and mathematics. At the same time, we recommend the development of a national strategy for lifelong learning designed to keep our citizens and our nation at the forefront of the knowledge revolution.”
On its face, this seems like a very positive and encouraging statement. Supporting innovation and encouraging the development of “new pedagogies” is terrific – but will truly innovative pedagogical approaches (such as ones that rely on creativity and unconventional problem-solving, an approach that I employ) be valued and considered legitimate by the numbers-happy assessment camp? I’m not so jaded yet as to assume that all is lost, as I said before. But I am skeptical.
My faith actually rests with my university and, more specifically, my department and its open-minded, intellectually-flexible faculty, who see and understand value in much more than numbers. We ARE English professors, after all. ;) The problem remains, however, that when state accrediting bodies demand assessment, what they mean is numbers, while those of us who teach and write understand that the creative endeavor of writing anything (whether nonfiction or fiction, whether business proposal or opinion editorial) is ill-suited to the type of standardized test assessment that is regularly foisted upon us.
I wish I had the answer. Perhaps if I continue mulling it over and grappling with it and experimenting with approaches and ideas, I will strike upon something that will be worth trying on large-scale and may even have the potential to convince the unconvincible administrators and lawmakers who take great solace in numbers that creativity has inherent value and should be embraced, not tested out of existence. We, as faculty, administrators, and lawmakers need to stop running AWAY from creativity and creative approaches and start re-examining the inherent value and skills that open up in our students when we employ creative strategies and encourage creative thinking in the college classroom.
Until I puzzle out a tangible solution to this persistent assessment/creativity divide, I encourage you (if you teach), to resist the standardized approach valued by neoliberal thinkers and stay firmly on the creative side.
We need creative thinkers now more than ever to enhance, improve, and re-think old paradigms and failing systems.
If we truly believe what we say when we publicly state that our students come first, then our pedagogical approaches should value creativity in the classroom over and above “accountability” with numbers. Only then will our students have a necessary skill that will transcend the classroom and university and will serve them well as they seek and discover whatever career path they choose to traverse.
Friday, March 18, 2011
"That's the American way"
While my students, colleagues, and friends across Pennsylvania worry and lose sleep over Governor Coward’s Corbett’s potential 54% hack-job to the state public education allocation for 2011-12, some staunch and unbending Tea Party tax evaders complainers disapprovers are strangely silent over the increase in state money to prisons. The mantra, “don’t tax businesses” and “no new taxes” and “no increase to taxes” falls a little flat when this budget so clearly pits education against not only business, but the prison system (criminal > students?). No wonder he's getting booed everywhere he goes and PA voters have given him only a 31% approval rating.
A brief look at Corbett’s budget address
In his state budget address, Corbett said, “We must tax no more. Because the people have no more to give.” (And by “people” you mean…businesses? My students are people. My colleagues are people. Our custodians are people. They are being asked to give their jobs, salaries, benefits, and affordable tuition rates back to the state. So they aren't included in "the people" who "have no more to give," correct?)
As regards the future, he said, “If we find a way to reinvent ourselves. . .how we treat our citizens. . . we will – to borrow a phrase from William Faulkner – not only endure but prevail.” (And by reinventing “how we treat our citizens” in order to "prevail" privileges businesses and prisons over middle class students? Faulkner would be so proud. Not to mention unread, as he is much too unwieldy to help students achieve better test scores.)
But wait, “We need a new set of priorities: child, parent, and teacher – and in that order.”
Ah, ok. So, in order to “treat our citizens” better and focus more on the child first (realizing, of course, that teachers have absolutely NOTHING to do with how well a child or young adult succeeds in school, silly), Corbett wants to gut public education funding AND increase funding to prisons. Sure. Of course. Because that makes perfect sense. If we want an undereducated populace with less options and even less access to decent jobs and opportunities and less ability to question their leaders…ah…I see. I’m getting it now!
Furthermore, Corbett announced, “The substance of the budget. . . preserves the core functions of government while moving to take government out of places it has no business or is not needed or simply fails to perform compared to the efficiencies of the market.”
Ah, yes. Education is clearly NOT a “core function” of government. Except that all K-12 students MUST go to school according to…um…the GOVERNMENT. Wait, what?? How can this be? How can the state compel students to attend mandatory school when schooling is NOT a “core function” of government? Beyond this problematic disconnect between fantasy and reality (within one man’s head no less), his true pro-business colors come shining through when he claims that the “market” is somehow more “efficient” at producing results. Of course, if all the results he’s interested in are test scores, drop-out rates, and the length of time it takes a student to graduate college, then of course, if a corporation ran the school or college, it would churn out good little non-critical-thinking cogs with nary a skill beyond the ability to pass a test in a mandated time frame, which is oodles better than the current system that requires significantly more of students. I think I see what Corbett wants.
More mindless drones = good for business.
When it comes to increasing the corrections system’s allocation 18% over the 2010-11 allocation, Corbett said, “In 1993, Pennsylvania had 24,000 men and women in its prisons. Today that number is over 50,000. This number speaks to a failure. Sometimes it’s a failure in our schools, or in our society, but ultimately in the personal character of the criminal. We need to fund additional parole officers to help freed inmates make the transition from the prison yard to Main Street.” (Because those “freed prisoners” are more valuable to our communities than our students. And parole officers are ABSOLUTELY more critical to a functioning society than no-good, lazy, commie-pinko teachers who merely suck at the taxpayer teat without contributing anything valuable to society.)
And the truth comes out. The reason that prisons need more funding and public education requires gutting is because the increasing number of criminals is “a failure of our schools.” But of course. This makes perfect sense. Why on earth would anyone question the logic of this connection? Personally, I would classify it as a non sequitur, which is a form of fallacious reasoning meaning “it does not follow.” But fallacious reasoning seems to be running rampant in Republican-run state houses these days and their followers certainly don’t seem to mind the stream of non sequiturs, ad hominem attacks, and outright lies coming from their mouths, so why should we bother to question?
Why don’t we deserve a government that upholds criminals, blames education for their existence, and shoves gas-drenched water down our throats? Silly us.
Eventually, Corbett directly addresses Marcellus Shale and its drillers: “For every pipe running a mile underground we should have jobs at distribution centers, at refineries, at shipping ports, and the offices and companies that run them.” (Clearly, the people who will work in these positions do not need a college education – or even a good high school education. Quality is irrelevant. Rubber stamp all students in and out with diploma in hand, without having learned anything, and without the critical thinking skills necessary to question “authority” and then let these businesses TEACH them how to function in this new job environment.)
Because after all, “That’s the American way.”
A view of Corbett’s budget through the corporate campaign donor lens
In the category of “Workforce Investment,” Corbett’s budget takes the 2010-11 level of $832 million down to $552.7 million (page 629). Once again, why help people with job training when they can just pony up and pay to attend a state university community college…never mind…not only can the newly unemployed (at least 1,500 full time state workers will be axed – and that’s not including the lay-offs coming in education thanks to these cuts) NOT be retrained with help from the state that laid them off, they won’t be able to afford a new education for themselves either. Oddly enough, this fits quite perfectly into the underlying agenda as I’ve suggested it to be. Coincidence? I don’t believe in coincidences.
So who benefits from Corbett’s budget? Prisons. And Marcellus Shale drillers.
The natural gas industry contributed heavily to Corbett’s campaign in his run for governor – this is a well-documented and well-reported fact that no one (not even the Governor) disputes:
At the very least, Corbett’s claim to hold the line on taxing the Marcellus Shale drillers should be as transparent as he promised that his new approach to government would be. His drilling friends are reaping the benefits of having been his political contributors. And Corbett’s supporters don’t seem to care. After all, they will benefit with all of those new jobs, right? No need for education when you can work for a natural gas company.
When Corbett was sworn in, he promised to "dedicate each and every day over the next four years to fiscal discipline and a responsible, limited government," which just happens to include all of his biggest campaign donors who just happen to be in the natural gas industry, an industry Corbett has also promised NOT to tax. At all.
As Corbett stated in his budget address, “That’s the American way.”
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Battle Hymn of the Republicans: Attack Public Education!
In the wake of Governor Corbett's demand for "the biggest one-time percentage cut to state higher-education funds in history," Pennsylvania's shell-shocked university leaders and professors try to locate any solid footing on this shifting Marcellus-shale, gas-infused landscape of the ultimate pro-business/anti-education climate rolling across the U.S. one Republican governor at a time. Sitting here at Panera, blatantly ignoring the essays that need to be graded because I'm so depressed and in a bad mood that I don't want my students to suffer, I have other questions rising to mind.
Why do Republicans hate education? Specifically, public education? And in Corbett's case, state-supported higher education?
Before tackling some of the potential answers to this question, let's take a look at the mission statements and student body statistics of two tax-dollar-supported Pennsylvania higher education institutions to see if therein exist any clues to Republican disgust.
Kutztown University's Mission statement for 2009-14: "Kutztown University’s mission is to provide a high quality education at the undergraduate and graduate levels in order to prepare students to meet lifelong intellectual, ethical, social, and career challenges." Our student body consists of approximately 9,600 undergraduates, who are mostly PA residents, about 880 of whom are enrolled part-time, and who return for a second year at a respectable 78% rate (retention). The majority of our undergrads major in business and education, with the arts, psychology, and English following as the top majors. Over 80% of our students receive "some type of financial aid" to attend KU, despite having the low, state-supported yearly attendance cost of approximately $19,000.
Let's take a look at one of our 14 sister schools, Bloomsburg University, whose mission statement says, "Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania is an inclusive comprehensive public university that prepares students for personal and professional success in an increasingly complex global environment." Eighty-nine percent of BU's 8,900 undergraduates come from Pennsylvania, and who return for a sophomore year at the rate of 80.9 percent (retention). Major programs of study on this campus include education, the sciences, the arts and humanities, health care, and business and approximately 79% of BU students receive financial aid to offset the modest cost of attendance, another far cry from the $50,000+ price tags on our Republican "leaders'" undergraduate experiences (more on this in a moment).
Now let's examine some specific PA state representatives and senators to see if their backgrounds provide any clues to potential hatred of public education.
This man "represents" me. I put "represent" in quotes for a reason. Unless he comes out publicly against these asinine and unnecessary cuts to public and higher education in my state and for taxing the PA natural gas companies who are ruining our natural world (as just one potential revenue-generator), then he is not representing MY interests and is, therefore, not MY representative. He represents the interests of the people who elected him...who have the same anti-education mindset presumably. I frankly don't hear a lot of dissension over this proposed budget coming from regular voting Republicans. In fact, quite the opposite. My parents both think Corbett is doing just a delightful job and I haven't seen any right-leaning friend or colleague disputing the sensibility of his plan. That's pretty strong proof of acceptance to me.
Silence, in this case, speaks volumes of approval.
Back to PA representative Republican Douglas Reichley, attorney and father of two kids. Where did Doug get his undergraduate education? Lo and behold - not a state school. Rather, an expensive, small, private liberal arts college that costs over $50,000 a year to attend, which is more than I make in a year. This is also beyond the reach of my students, who get a liberal arts education from equivalent-quality faculty, but at publicly-supported state tuition rates. Maybe he dislikes public education because it doesn't fit with his private education values. Or maybe our kids just aren't good enough, so deserve to be outside looking in. Go work in a mine, kid. "The world needs ditch diggers, too."
Let's take a gander at "my" state senator, Patrick Browne. Did HE attend a state school? That would be no. He got his undergraduate degree at a large, private, Catholic college that costs over $55,000 a year to attend. I'm sensing a trend here. Both of my state "representatives" attended private colleges that cost more to attend per year than I make as a public educator. Perhaps their wrath against public education is because they have no experience with it or with the people who benefit from it. Perhaps their privileged view of the world is more akin to Scrooge than Crachit.
Finally, what about Pennsylvania's new governor? Where did he get his undergraduate degree? Not at a state school. He attended a small, private liberal arts college that costs about $39,000 a year to attend. Considering the heights to which he has risen, one would assume this man to be a champion of higher education, but clearly, the divide is public vs. private higher education and this man firmly stands on the anti-public-education side of the fence.
To call Corbett's budget and Scott Walker's anti-union agenda anything less than class warfare with a blunted weapon is to not be able to see the forest for the trees and to be so blind to reality that you get your perception of reality handed to you in a silver teacup paid for by Rupert Murdoch. In other words, if you don't see that this IS class warfare, you have your head firmly embedded up your ass (and maybe it's comfortable there), or perhaps you're retired and just don't give a shit anymore about the rest of us.
Perhaps the reason Republicans hate public education is because they are itching for a class warfare battle of Biblical proportions and see public education as the perfect battleground. Kill public education, win the favor of big business. Oddly enough, I don't agree with this attitude. Big businesses should be equally appalled and up in arms at the Governor's (and his ilk) attack on public education because businesses need educated workers...and most of these workers cannot afford to attend private colleges with $50,000 price tags each year.
According to Corbett's campaign promise, "Pennsylvania is home to 185 higher education institutions and nearly 5,000 philanthropic endowments and foundations. The next decade will be marked by significant technological changes – new materials, green energy sources and technologies, personalized medicines, telecom, information technology, new industrial processes and significant advances in computing. Tom Corbett will work with higher education and philanthropic organizations to ensure that Pennsylvania is prepared to not only capitalize and support these changes, but also to lead them." (emphasis added by me) Anyone else find it ironic that his answer to "working" with higher education is to gut our funding? Anyone else bothered by the bold, outright LIES that he should have been honest about when he was running for this office??
Maybe businesses in Pennsylvania ought to wake up and smell the gunfire.
In solidarity.
Why do Republicans hate education? Specifically, public education? And in Corbett's case, state-supported higher education?
Before tackling some of the potential answers to this question, let's take a look at the mission statements and student body statistics of two tax-dollar-supported Pennsylvania higher education institutions to see if therein exist any clues to Republican disgust.
Kutztown University's Mission statement for 2009-14: "Kutztown University’s mission is to provide a high quality education at the undergraduate and graduate levels in order to prepare students to meet lifelong intellectual, ethical, social, and career challenges." Our student body consists of approximately 9,600 undergraduates, who are mostly PA residents, about 880 of whom are enrolled part-time, and who return for a second year at a respectable 78% rate (retention). The majority of our undergrads major in business and education, with the arts, psychology, and English following as the top majors. Over 80% of our students receive "some type of financial aid" to attend KU, despite having the low, state-supported yearly attendance cost of approximately $19,000.
Let's take a look at one of our 14 sister schools, Bloomsburg University, whose mission statement says, "Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania is an inclusive comprehensive public university that prepares students for personal and professional success in an increasingly complex global environment." Eighty-nine percent of BU's 8,900 undergraduates come from Pennsylvania, and who return for a sophomore year at the rate of 80.9 percent (retention). Major programs of study on this campus include education, the sciences, the arts and humanities, health care, and business and approximately 79% of BU students receive financial aid to offset the modest cost of attendance, another far cry from the $50,000+ price tags on our Republican "leaders'" undergraduate experiences (more on this in a moment).
Now let's examine some specific PA state representatives and senators to see if their backgrounds provide any clues to potential hatred of public education.
This man "represents" me. I put "represent" in quotes for a reason. Unless he comes out publicly against these asinine and unnecessary cuts to public and higher education in my state and for taxing the PA natural gas companies who are ruining our natural world (as just one potential revenue-generator), then he is not representing MY interests and is, therefore, not MY representative. He represents the interests of the people who elected him...who have the same anti-education mindset presumably. I frankly don't hear a lot of dissension over this proposed budget coming from regular voting Republicans. In fact, quite the opposite. My parents both think Corbett is doing just a delightful job and I haven't seen any right-leaning friend or colleague disputing the sensibility of his plan. That's pretty strong proof of acceptance to me.
Silence, in this case, speaks volumes of approval.
Back to PA representative Republican Douglas Reichley, attorney and father of two kids. Where did Doug get his undergraduate education? Lo and behold - not a state school. Rather, an expensive, small, private liberal arts college that costs over $50,000 a year to attend, which is more than I make in a year. This is also beyond the reach of my students, who get a liberal arts education from equivalent-quality faculty, but at publicly-supported state tuition rates. Maybe he dislikes public education because it doesn't fit with his private education values. Or maybe our kids just aren't good enough, so deserve to be outside looking in. Go work in a mine, kid. "The world needs ditch diggers, too."
Let's take a gander at "my" state senator, Patrick Browne. Did HE attend a state school? That would be no. He got his undergraduate degree at a large, private, Catholic college that costs over $55,000 a year to attend. I'm sensing a trend here. Both of my state "representatives" attended private colleges that cost more to attend per year than I make as a public educator. Perhaps their wrath against public education is because they have no experience with it or with the people who benefit from it. Perhaps their privileged view of the world is more akin to Scrooge than Crachit.
Finally, what about Pennsylvania's new governor? Where did he get his undergraduate degree? Not at a state school. He attended a small, private liberal arts college that costs about $39,000 a year to attend. Considering the heights to which he has risen, one would assume this man to be a champion of higher education, but clearly, the divide is public vs. private higher education and this man firmly stands on the anti-public-education side of the fence.
To call Corbett's budget and Scott Walker's anti-union agenda anything less than class warfare with a blunted weapon is to not be able to see the forest for the trees and to be so blind to reality that you get your perception of reality handed to you in a silver teacup paid for by Rupert Murdoch. In other words, if you don't see that this IS class warfare, you have your head firmly embedded up your ass (and maybe it's comfortable there), or perhaps you're retired and just don't give a shit anymore about the rest of us.
Perhaps the reason Republicans hate public education is because they are itching for a class warfare battle of Biblical proportions and see public education as the perfect battleground. Kill public education, win the favor of big business. Oddly enough, I don't agree with this attitude. Big businesses should be equally appalled and up in arms at the Governor's (and his ilk) attack on public education because businesses need educated workers...and most of these workers cannot afford to attend private colleges with $50,000 price tags each year.
According to Corbett's campaign promise, "Pennsylvania is home to 185 higher education institutions and nearly 5,000 philanthropic endowments and foundations. The next decade will be marked by significant technological changes – new materials, green energy sources and technologies, personalized medicines, telecom, information technology, new industrial processes and significant advances in computing. Tom Corbett will work with higher education and philanthropic organizations to ensure that Pennsylvania is prepared to not only capitalize and support these changes, but also to lead them." (emphasis added by me) Anyone else find it ironic that his answer to "working" with higher education is to gut our funding? Anyone else bothered by the bold, outright LIES that he should have been honest about when he was running for this office??
Maybe businesses in Pennsylvania ought to wake up and smell the gunfire.
In solidarity.
Monday, March 7, 2011
One Professor's Counter-Attack
Let me just preface this post with an unfortunately necessary disclaimer: I am fully aware of how hard the non-union people in the middle class and working poor in the private sector work. But this isn't about them. This is about me and the people in my position (or similar) who are being attacked by a certain element of the Republican Party and their sympathizers in the general public. These are the people attacking me and my fellow teachers. And I have had it.
The attack:
Teachers' Unions 101: A is for Agitation
Wis. Teachers Ready to Help--But Not Forfeit Rights
President of largest PA faculty union calls Ohio bill 'poor governing'
Wisconsin Liberals Starve Children
Protecting bad teachers [note the last sentence...most teachers are incompetent]
Conservative groups rally behind anti-teachers union legislation
Tea Party Holds Counter Rally Downtown
Michele Bachmann weighs in on Wisconsin teacher sick-out: "It's a dereliction of duty"
And before you start to protest by saying, but wait, the conservatives and radical Tea Partiers are attacking teachers' unions, not teachers...consider this: An attack on the existence of my union IS an attack on ME.
I am angry at the Tea Party, conservative talk show hosts, and their conservative counterparts in the general public for thinking that I make a good target for fixing budget problems. Indulge me a moment and I will show you why this attack is unnecessary.
To set the record straight, I do pay taxes, I do vote, and I do work year-round. I do NOT have an easy job. I do make $50,000 a year/gross and I am represented by a union. I do have about 100 new students across four classes every semester, plus my department, university, and community service requirements, committee work, scholarly research, and assisting former students with recommendation letters and graduate school and job and scholarship applications.
I am not rich and never will be. I will never make over $100,000 a year. I may never make more than $75,000 a year. I do have $60,000 in student loan debt on top of all of my other bills, moving expenses, and other expenses associated with moving and starting all over in a new location.
I am not married, do not have kids, and cannot afford to buy property, so receive none of the tax benefits from being in this class.
If my governor and the Republican legislators in my state attack my union (and hence, attack me and my right to negotiate for health benefits, sick leave, grievance policies, classroom size, and control over curriculum design, in addition to my salary), you damn well better believe I would attend a sick-out with my fellow faculty, despite being a first-year junior faculty member. And that is NOT a dereliction of duty...it is PART of my duty as a faculty member in a unionized university system.
We are one. Together, we can protect our rights. Divided, we will be run over and decimated, reduced to mere cogs expected to do a lot more for much, much less. And yes, our students will suffer, almost as much as we will.
I do work hard and my job is made more complicated by both the administration and the students. For instance, imagine if a large percentage of your annual review came from your company's interns. And that carried equal weight to your supervisor's opinion of how effective you are at your job. That is equivalent to what we, as faculty members, must tolerate. Our students' opinions about how well we do our jobs (despite not being trained or qualified to make this judgment) are weighted heavily in our yearly reviews - and are included in our tenure files. Therefore, if I want to be a tough teacher with high standards and expectations, demanding more academic rigor and critical engagement from my students, I may well pay the consequence in bad student evaluations because many students don't want to work hard or be challenged in any serious way, which then affects my ability to KEEP MY JOB.
Still think my job is easy? Ok, let's continue then.
I do not plan on retiring. Ever. I fully anticipated this even before I became a professor (my third career, so trust me, I'm NOT incompetent), so the argument that union people all retire at 50 is a malicious LIE. And those who believe this are drinking the Tea wholesale without first thinking about or investigating the truth.
I do pay dues to a union that expects me to work hard, do my job, or pay the consequence by being fired - my union does NOT exist to guarantee the employment of unethical slackers - that's in our CONTRACT.
To demonstrate all of these abstract ideas, here is a brief rundown of two typical days for me as a junior faculty member...and it should be known that once I do achieve tenure (if my present university continues to reappoint me for five years and my student evaluations aren't too bad for five years and if the tenure committee decides to grant me tenure - not a guarantee), then my responsibilities INCREASE. Once a faculty member is tenured, she must do MORE, not less. She must become the barrier, the target, the protector of junior faculty, the person standing between unfair administrative expectations and the new faculty member's struggle with figuring out the landscape and realities of the job. She must also step up and participate in more difficult committees with more serious decision-making responsibilities.
What my first two days last week looked like:
Monday. Rise at 7:30, answer student emails, review documents and prep for observation of temporary faculty member. 10 - 11am, observe instructor, taking notes the entire time on netbook. 11-12 meet with students to discuss their project one progress. 12-1 department meeting to discuss which temporary faculty to roll over into tenure-track positions. 1-2 cover class for officemate. 2-3 meet with students, then begin assessment memo draft (I am one of the two "assessment experts" in the department because of my prior experiences - both of us are junior faculty). 3-5 teach my one class for the day. 5-6 casual conversation with fellow department faculty re: internal dept. issues, plus responding to several student emails. 6pm - leave campus. 6:30-7 dinner and reading student blogs. 7-9 various personal phone calls. 9-10 watch MSNBC and read student blogs. 10pm - go to bed/sleep.
Tuesday. Rise at 6am and prepare for day. 8-11 teach my two classes. 11-12 full department meeting. 12-1 meet with students, unable to eat lunch. 1-3 teach my class. 3-5 continue drafting assessment memo, email faculty in other departments for necessary information, respond to student emails, respond to fellow faculty emails, read student blogs, research and select readings to assign to my students in the next classes. 5pm- head home. 6-8 dinner, respond to student emails, continue research readings and TED talks for use in classes, read student blogs, read academic article on assessment. 8-9 personal phone calls. 9-10 watch MSNBC and read student blogs. 10pm - go to bed/sleep. (Sensing a pattern here?)
You get the point. Do other people work hard? Yes. Do other people have the variety and complexity of tasks and responsibilities that I have in the course of my job? No. Not in the same way.
Do any of us deserve to be vilified as people who don't work hard, who don't work enough, and who aren't worthy of a decent salary with benefits and the ability to negotiate (when we make an average of four to 11 percent less than people working in the private sector)? No. As a professor who has elected to "take the summer off" so that I can work on my other job responsibility of publishing an academic article as opposed to teaching, I condense 12 months of work into nine...and then work another three months at a more relaxed pace.
Does this make me worthy of vilification and scorn? Absolutely not.
Please think before you agree with the fallacious and untrue arguments coming from the political Right. Research and investigate (beyond Fox News). Ask a teacher what her days are like before you rain down your judgment and assumptions based on nothing more than weak-ass Tea delivered in a broken teacup.
In solidarity.
The attack:
Teachers' Unions 101: A is for Agitation
Wis. Teachers Ready to Help--But Not Forfeit Rights
President of largest PA faculty union calls Ohio bill 'poor governing'
Wisconsin Liberals Starve Children
Protecting bad teachers [note the last sentence...most teachers are incompetent]
Conservative groups rally behind anti-teachers union legislation
Tea Party Holds Counter Rally Downtown
Michele Bachmann weighs in on Wisconsin teacher sick-out: "It's a dereliction of duty"
And before you start to protest by saying, but wait, the conservatives and radical Tea Partiers are attacking teachers' unions, not teachers...consider this: An attack on the existence of my union IS an attack on ME.
I am angry at the Tea Party, conservative talk show hosts, and their conservative counterparts in the general public for thinking that I make a good target for fixing budget problems. Indulge me a moment and I will show you why this attack is unnecessary.
To set the record straight, I do pay taxes, I do vote, and I do work year-round. I do NOT have an easy job. I do make $50,000 a year/gross and I am represented by a union. I do have about 100 new students across four classes every semester, plus my department, university, and community service requirements, committee work, scholarly research, and assisting former students with recommendation letters and graduate school and job and scholarship applications.
I am not rich and never will be. I will never make over $100,000 a year. I may never make more than $75,000 a year. I do have $60,000 in student loan debt on top of all of my other bills, moving expenses, and other expenses associated with moving and starting all over in a new location.
I am not married, do not have kids, and cannot afford to buy property, so receive none of the tax benefits from being in this class.
If my governor and the Republican legislators in my state attack my union (and hence, attack me and my right to negotiate for health benefits, sick leave, grievance policies, classroom size, and control over curriculum design, in addition to my salary), you damn well better believe I would attend a sick-out with my fellow faculty, despite being a first-year junior faculty member. And that is NOT a dereliction of duty...it is PART of my duty as a faculty member in a unionized university system.
We are one. Together, we can protect our rights. Divided, we will be run over and decimated, reduced to mere cogs expected to do a lot more for much, much less. And yes, our students will suffer, almost as much as we will.
I do work hard and my job is made more complicated by both the administration and the students. For instance, imagine if a large percentage of your annual review came from your company's interns. And that carried equal weight to your supervisor's opinion of how effective you are at your job. That is equivalent to what we, as faculty members, must tolerate. Our students' opinions about how well we do our jobs (despite not being trained or qualified to make this judgment) are weighted heavily in our yearly reviews - and are included in our tenure files. Therefore, if I want to be a tough teacher with high standards and expectations, demanding more academic rigor and critical engagement from my students, I may well pay the consequence in bad student evaluations because many students don't want to work hard or be challenged in any serious way, which then affects my ability to KEEP MY JOB.
Still think my job is easy? Ok, let's continue then.
I do not plan on retiring. Ever. I fully anticipated this even before I became a professor (my third career, so trust me, I'm NOT incompetent), so the argument that union people all retire at 50 is a malicious LIE. And those who believe this are drinking the Tea wholesale without first thinking about or investigating the truth.
I do pay dues to a union that expects me to work hard, do my job, or pay the consequence by being fired - my union does NOT exist to guarantee the employment of unethical slackers - that's in our CONTRACT.
To demonstrate all of these abstract ideas, here is a brief rundown of two typical days for me as a junior faculty member...and it should be known that once I do achieve tenure (if my present university continues to reappoint me for five years and my student evaluations aren't too bad for five years and if the tenure committee decides to grant me tenure - not a guarantee), then my responsibilities INCREASE. Once a faculty member is tenured, she must do MORE, not less. She must become the barrier, the target, the protector of junior faculty, the person standing between unfair administrative expectations and the new faculty member's struggle with figuring out the landscape and realities of the job. She must also step up and participate in more difficult committees with more serious decision-making responsibilities.
What my first two days last week looked like:
Monday. Rise at 7:30, answer student emails, review documents and prep for observation of temporary faculty member. 10 - 11am, observe instructor, taking notes the entire time on netbook. 11-12 meet with students to discuss their project one progress. 12-1 department meeting to discuss which temporary faculty to roll over into tenure-track positions. 1-2 cover class for officemate. 2-3 meet with students, then begin assessment memo draft (I am one of the two "assessment experts" in the department because of my prior experiences - both of us are junior faculty). 3-5 teach my one class for the day. 5-6 casual conversation with fellow department faculty re: internal dept. issues, plus responding to several student emails. 6pm - leave campus. 6:30-7 dinner and reading student blogs. 7-9 various personal phone calls. 9-10 watch MSNBC and read student blogs. 10pm - go to bed/sleep.
Tuesday. Rise at 6am and prepare for day. 8-11 teach my two classes. 11-12 full department meeting. 12-1 meet with students, unable to eat lunch. 1-3 teach my class. 3-5 continue drafting assessment memo, email faculty in other departments for necessary information, respond to student emails, respond to fellow faculty emails, read student blogs, research and select readings to assign to my students in the next classes. 5pm- head home. 6-8 dinner, respond to student emails, continue research readings and TED talks for use in classes, read student blogs, read academic article on assessment. 8-9 personal phone calls. 9-10 watch MSNBC and read student blogs. 10pm - go to bed/sleep. (Sensing a pattern here?)
You get the point. Do other people work hard? Yes. Do other people have the variety and complexity of tasks and responsibilities that I have in the course of my job? No. Not in the same way.
Do any of us deserve to be vilified as people who don't work hard, who don't work enough, and who aren't worthy of a decent salary with benefits and the ability to negotiate (when we make an average of four to 11 percent less than people working in the private sector)? No. As a professor who has elected to "take the summer off" so that I can work on my other job responsibility of publishing an academic article as opposed to teaching, I condense 12 months of work into nine...and then work another three months at a more relaxed pace.
Does this make me worthy of vilification and scorn? Absolutely not.
Please think before you agree with the fallacious and untrue arguments coming from the political Right. Research and investigate (beyond Fox News). Ask a teacher what her days are like before you rain down your judgment and assumptions based on nothing more than weak-ass Tea delivered in a broken teacup.
In solidarity.
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Supporting Wisconsin's Democratic State Senators
If you, like me, enjoy making a decent wage, like having weekends off and sick days and a decent working day, work for a company that at least gives you access to health insurance, or if you are in a union and are concerned about the political bullying occurring right now in Wisconsin, there's frankly not much we can do from the outside but watch and hope.
But I've never been one to just sit back.
If, as Rachel Maddow reported, it's only going to take ONE Democratic state senator to fold and give in to the Republicans in that state to ruin unions nationwide (ultimately), I think sending a message of support to those 14 Democratic state senators might do some good. At the very least, it won't hurt. So that's what I did this morning.
I sent this simple message of support to all 14 Democratic state senators from Wisconsin:
Subject line: In solidarity for your stand from Pennsylvania
Message:
Good morning and thank you. Thank you for standing up to the political bullying in your state over union rights. Please don't give in. Many of us in other union states are watching very closely and are hoping and praying that you are strong enough to withstand this pressure.
Thank you for standing firm. Thank you for not giving in.
In solidarity.
- Amanda Morris
If you are of a similar mindset, I would encourage you to send a note of your own. If anything exemplifies the power of ONE person being able to make a NATIONAL difference, it is this one (if Maddow is correct). So that individual needs our emotional and psychological support. And you never know what difference our (collective) words could make.
Email addresses of the 14 Democratic state senators:
Sen.Carpenter@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.coggs@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.Cullen@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.erpenbach@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.hansen@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.Holperin@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.jauch@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.Larson@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.lassa@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.miller@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.risser@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.taylor@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.Vinehout@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.wirch@legis.wisconsin.gov
But I've never been one to just sit back.
If, as Rachel Maddow reported, it's only going to take ONE Democratic state senator to fold and give in to the Republicans in that state to ruin unions nationwide (ultimately), I think sending a message of support to those 14 Democratic state senators might do some good. At the very least, it won't hurt. So that's what I did this morning.
I sent this simple message of support to all 14 Democratic state senators from Wisconsin:
Subject line: In solidarity for your stand from Pennsylvania
Message:
Good morning and thank you. Thank you for standing up to the political bullying in your state over union rights. Please don't give in. Many of us in other union states are watching very closely and are hoping and praying that you are strong enough to withstand this pressure.
Thank you for standing firm. Thank you for not giving in.
In solidarity.
- Amanda Morris
If you are of a similar mindset, I would encourage you to send a note of your own. If anything exemplifies the power of ONE person being able to make a NATIONAL difference, it is this one (if Maddow is correct). So that individual needs our emotional and psychological support. And you never know what difference our (collective) words could make.
Email addresses of the 14 Democratic state senators:
Sen.Carpenter@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.coggs@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.Cullen@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.erpenbach@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.hansen@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.Holperin@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.jauch@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.Larson@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.lassa@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.miller@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.risser@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.taylor@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.Vinehout@legis.wisconsin.gov, Sen.wirch@legis.wisconsin.gov
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