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Copyright © Louis Schmier and Atwood Publishing.
Date:Tue 8/19/2003 4:17 AM
Random Thought: I Want To Talk About Some Colleagues
They say that the first six weeks of the first semester of the
first year is generally a make it or break it time. It is the most
critical period for both students and an institution. It's the window of
found or lost opportunity when the students decide to choose you or loose
you. You want to retain students? Care. Don't just say it, live it.
Live it not in some bunch of quickie meetings, but be there every day
in every place. Yet, we're so careless about our supposed caring. Our
welcome can be so unwelcoming.
Most of the first year students are in a state of rapid
transformation. They're in a constant state of continuous adaptation.
They're being fired at from all directions. They're nervous, unsure,
frightened, emotional. Most of their mooring lines are being cut. Like
the molting process nearly every aspect of their outer lives is changing
in unexpected way and going in unprepared for directions. But, they're
still the same teenage high schoolers and home bodies they were a few
weeks earlier. Their DNA codes haven't mutated. They expect new
experiences, but they're not really ready for the impact of everything
they encounter all at once. As their dreams get hit with reality, they
feel tied up by the very ropes they're supposed to learn and hold on to
for safety. So, what do so many of us do? We're electric eels. We take
these "kids," and they are kids, who are struggling with the cultural
shock of often massive and unexpected sudden newness and shock them still
more into almost total numbness and paralysis. We throw them into such
impersonal, unsupportive, and uncaring situations. In barrages of
incessant meetings and reams of paper, they're peppered, showered,
inundated with all kinds of information, warnings, advice, regulations,
procedures, policies, so much of which runs off like water on the
proverbial duck's back. We so often throw them into the largest and most
faceless, uncaring, unwelcoming, and nameless "herd" classes. The first
year classes, those core courses to which we give Liberal Arts lip
service, appear to be the ones far too many academics and administrations
care the least about.
On the other hand, there are people on many campuses who are
involved in it probably are more aware of first year student needs, more
sensitive to their individuality, and more attuned to their confusion.
The First Year Experience Programs are committed to the belief that a new
student's growth and academic experience are enhanced when on-going
special attention and support are provided, when they are mentored in the
process of assimilating into the institution's culture. And yet, I have
to question the sincerity of most institutional support because on far too
many of our campuses these critical programs seem more tolerated than
respected, thrown off to the periphery rather than placed at the core, and
seen more as the solution of a temporary retention problem than as the
fostering of a committed, core educational value.
I bring this up for a couple of reasons. The first reason is some
comments made during an internet conversation I been having over the past
few weeks with a some faculty from institutions all over the country. I
had mentioned in passing that several years ago I had decided to forego
teaching senior and graduate course and teach only the first year history
classes. I had mentioned that I thought those first year classes were the
most important classes on our campus and yet treated so matter-of-factly.
And, I had mentioned that this semester all four of my classes are linked
to our First Year Experience Oasis program. Boy, did I get it. "Why
would a senior professor of your caliber 'lower' himself to teach only
freshmen surveys?" one disbelieving professor asked me. One sneering
comment followed another: "Those programs are such a waste of limited
academic resources." "They don't teach a real subject." "They're just
remedial curriculum by another name." "They don't belong on a university
campus." "They coddle students, hold their hand, and wipe their noses."
"They're an example of how we're dumbing down requirements and letting
anyone in." "Our administration ought to get real instead of patronizing
a fad." I smiled at the comment that "those in our First Year
Experience program are only teachers, not professors." But, the ones I
love the best fell into the category of "In my day......." God, you'd
think to get to classes some of them had walked unaided up steep hills
barefoot in deep snow--both ways!
I argue vigorously that our first year teachers deal more with
the reality of our campus than do most academics in the ivory towers of
their classroom. I answered all these snickerers by saying that these
servant teachers (most didn't like that description) teach the most
important and most demanding of subjects: students. I told them that not
only do they belong on our campus, they belong at the heart of our campus.
They do the truly important task that far too many of their colleagues
feel is of no importance. In fact, I went so far out on the limb to say
that in my personal and profession vantage point, they do some of the most
important work on campus, especially if you're interested in retention.
The second reason was a planning lunch I had last week and will
again in the coming weeks with a bunch of neat people in and involved with
our first year program with whom I'm working. These people aren't just
neat people. They're care givers. They're outstanding teachers.
They're underrated and at times I've heard them too often berated. To me,
they are, however, top rate. Too many faculty think what they do is at
best non-professional. For me, their professionalism is far beyond
question. These classy people certainly aren't second class.
They are the too often hidden, sometimes dismissed, sometimes
neglected, generally ignored "second son," often treated "second class",
"cellophane" teachers in the First Year Experience program. They run what
we call our "Oasis" program. In many respects, they are an oasis, a
nourishing water hole, for most first students in the program. They are
the right kind of people. They are the right knowing people. They are
always aware people. They are heavy investors. They know that they have
to know and understand each student; they don't wear blinders and are
acutely aware of others besides themselves; they are willing to invest as
much of their time and energy as it takes to help a student achieve; they
look beyond themselves; they look beyond their own needs and desires.
You know, only two of the eleven of these professionals have a
Ph.D. I guess that explains by they're just not smart enough to know that
struggling to help each and every student is impossible. I guess that
explains why they rely more on their common sense rather than follow
common academic thinking. I guess that explains why they doubt the doubts
of the doubters and are not discouraged by the discouragers. I know
they're told they have to be out of their minds to be stirred by such
unattainable dreams. They're smart enough, however, that they listen to
and accept such naysaying advice. They have gone out of their minds!
They've gone deep into their hearts and souls, and they wind up being
where all the naysayers and doubters and discouragers never have been.
Talking with the likes of Pat, Sherry, Diana, Wonny, John, Jim,
Calvin, I think I know what makes and what does not make an outstanding
teacher. Know-what does not solely make for an outstanding teacher,
although that is important. Know-how does not solely make for an
outstanding teacher, although that, too, is important. Know-why does.
Outstanding teachers have a purpose; they have a "WHY" branded on their
soul; they have an absolute sense of mission. They know what an education
is all about. For them, it's purpose is to spread arete. It is their
compass, their true north, for whatever direction they take. Arete, their
"why," their purpose, is the blueprint for the application of their
know-what and know-how. They are what I'll call "areters" (I've got a
Ph.D. and I can "jargonize" with the best of them). If "arete" is the
word the Greek philosophers had for the process of self-actualization and
striving to reach your highest potential, if it is the highest of values,
these people struggle to get students into the spirit of arete, to help
them thinkarete and feelarete and doareete. And if, as Aristotle argued,
arete is the way to achieve true happiness, publishing that book doesn't
rule their happiness; getting that research grant doesn't rule their
happiness; even getting that degree doesn't rule their happiness;
touching that student does.
We're told somewhere in Proverbs, "as he thinks in his heart, so
he is." They think in their hearts what I once called those four little
big words: belief, faith, hope, love. That's all the see and, as Deepak
Chopra reminds us, that unswerving perception of each student makes them
who they are. They are go-the-extra-milers, for they know that the magic
and the miracle are in the extra mile. They leave the comfort zone behind
for the breakthrough. They render more and better service than is
expected of them without complaint of "workload." These teachers are
nurturers. They are mentors. They're safety nets. They're always there
for a student in need. For them, everyone has potential. Everyone
belongs in their classes. No one is a loser. No one is worthless. No
one goes nameless. No one is left behind in the shadows. Their classes
are cluttered with creativity, vision, and imagination. Their classes are
loving and nurturing worlds of adventure, worlds of adaptation, worlds of
growth, worlds of transformation, and worlds of discovery. Boredom and
routine are not their companions. They are a classroom dose of NoDoze,
not of Nytol. They get up excited each morning and can't wait to get into
the classroom. For them teaching is a calling.
They come closer to each and every student than most faculty,
treat each students with respect as individuals, and talk about them as
human beings. They add to the stature of the student as a thinking,
feeling, contemplating person. They embark students on unending voyage of
discovering new interests and powers within themselves. They belt them
down during the up and down and jolting roller coaster ride of that first
year. They understand that education is not just a preparation for a
career, but preparation for a meaningful life as well.
You know, there's a lot of smarts out there in academia, but
outstanding teachers such as the ones with whom I have lunch have
something that is regrettably too often in short supply and is not
automatically provided by a Ph.D.: the courage to do things differently,
the courage not to fit in, the courage to stand up and stand out, the
courage to lead rather than follow. It's their courage that make
difficulties lessen or disappear and obstacles weaken or vanish. They are
not afraid to look like fools because they know they're not doing anything
foolish. This is not to say they don't have fears; this is to say their
fears don't have them. This is not to say they don't have pain when
things don't go right; this is to say they don't imposed suffering on
themselves. This is not to say they don't worry; this is to say they
worry about students, not about their worries, their fears, their pains.
This is not to say they wouldn't like to be sincerely appreciated as more
than a solution to a temporary retention problem; this is to say that in
the interest of the students they are willing to brave patronizing,
disinterest, and disapproval. They themselves are the makers of
themselves.
Damn, I'm proud to call them colleagues. I'm prouder still if
they'd call me one of their colleagues. Of all the faculty on this
campus, they have the most right to have what I call a "healthy pride."
They have a pride that's rooted in the knowledge and feeling that they're
doing and accomplishing something good for someone else. Their form of
daily, numberless acts of courage is rarer than that found in the heat of
battle. And yet, it is only that kind of vital character that is
essential to change in an academic culture that yields so slowly
and painfully to change.
I wish my Dean, Vice-President for Academic Affairs, and President
would give these noble, dedicated, committed, courageous, persevering,
hard-working academics much more public acclaim, acknowledgement, and
recognition than the little they have received. They truly deserve it.
Their work is that important, and everyone should stand up and take
notice. They are the ones who make the most lasting impression and the
most lasting difference in both students' lives and the life of the
institution. We ought to recognize these unsung teachers who impact lives
in the trenches with everyday caring. They are our silent heroes more
than most on campus. And, for what it's worth. I appreciate and salute
them. Surely, we can learn, at least, to see them as equals, to stop
merely tolerating them and to start respecting them.
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