Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. It's 22 degrees!! Only mad dogs and I go out in the freezing
dawn. This time of the year always leaves me cold both outside and inside. It's at this
time of the year I feel like the Grinch that stole both Christmas and education. It's
that time of the year I feel like a bah, hum-bugging professorial Scrooge. It's that time
of the year there is no peace and joy at Valdosta State University. It's that time of the
year I nearly convince myself that I am a masochist. It's the end of the semester. It's
the very uneducational get-the-final-grade-in time. No mindless computer generated,
add-'em-up, bell curve, give extra points, take off a point here and there, drop the worse
grade, multiply or divide-by-whatever final grades for me. No, instead my eyes are
bloodshot; my brain is numb; my butt aches; my body is stiff. My teeth are worn from
gnashing. I am sleep deprived. During these past five days, I have been tossing and
turning and wrestling. I have been reading and rereading over 800 final week student
journal entries, 175 student self-evaluations, 350 community member evaluations, 175 class
evaluations. I have been going back to read a host of community project evaluations. I
have scoured my daily notations. And, that doesn't even count reading a bunch of the
literally thousands of journal entries students wrote during the semester. My angelic
Susan has been hearing me mutter, maybe "snarling" is a better word, less than angelic
words as I struggle with the need to come up some mythical "objectively arrived at" final
grade--as if that grade has any real and lasting meaning of deep, sticky, and lasting
learning--as if I had just descended from the summit of Sinai after having a schnapps with
the Almighty, proving my own divine calculating infallibility.
Like Christmas and Chanukah whose true meaning are often diluted and demeaned in a
commercialized fervor of giving and getting gifts, the true meaning of an education is
often demeaned in a credentialing fervor of giving final exams and getting final grades.
It's disgraceful when Santa and his bag of toys, when dredels and latkes and eights of
days of gifts play a more prominent role than the teachings of these holidays, just as
tests and grades play a more prominent role than the "educare" of an education. Like the
true gifts of these two December holidays, education's gift should be a spirit, a way of
feeling and thinking and living and being. An education should be more than getting a
better grade and a higher GPA. It should be more than being better informed, better
trained vocationally, and getting a better job. It should instill uplifting and inspiring
transcendent values to care for yourself, to care for others, and to live better lives.
Yet, this educational spirit, like the spirit of Christmas and Chanukah, ignoring
the prophetic admonitions in Micah 6:1-8, is hijacked in a misguided spiritless zeal for
worshipping the rituals. So, I can understand why so many students find so much of their
time in the classroom depressing, boring, offensive, demoralizing, cold, disengaging,
unfriendly, dehumanizing, demeaning, stressful, threatening, often frightening and
traumatic, and above all, disrespectful experiences. More often than most of us want to
admit, on the student side, the whole educational process creates more fearful, "what do
you want" dependence than "think for yourself," courageous independence. It manifests
itself more in anger, resignation, surrender, and resentment rather than in a responsible,
disciplined, imaginative, thoughtful, "playful," creative, innovative, reflective,
imaginative, and resilient way. So many of us don't give students the space to be the
kids--or, as I call them, "adults in training"--most are; we don't give them room to make
mistakes; we don't allow them their human fallibilities; we don't take into account their
outside-the-classroom lives. At the same time, I can understand why many
academics--having been there myself until fifteen years ago--generally pedagogically
untrained, uninformed, and inexperienced no matter how long they've been in the classroom
or how long their scholarly resume, keep their emotional, and often even their
intellectual, distance. But, when the intent of that man-made, professional chasm is
taken by students as uncaring or disrespectful or fearful or controlling, it's a form of
educational malpractice.
At the beginning of each semester, I ask the students in class what they want to
see more of in all their classes and specifically in "my" class. I always find their list
interesting since it's always nearly the same: respect, caring, kindness, patience,
honesty, understanding, consideration, sympathy, enjoyment, and fairness. They are more
concerned with who we academics are and how we behave towards them rather than what we
know. To live and model those words always becomes the end for me to reach each day from
the first day of the semester to the last. I'll put it another way. I'm going to add
something new to both my mid-term and end-of-semester student evaluations. I will have
each student, as part of his or her evaluation of me, choose five words to describe me.
For me, these five words will be the ultimate evaluation. It will be a challenge for me
to see if I have reached the end I had in mind at the beginning of each semester, if I
have any blind spots, and if I, to paraphrase Jack Nicholson as Colonel Nathan Jessep in A
FEW GOOD MEN, can "handle the truth."
It's easy to discount or dismiss student observations or complaints. It's hard
accepting criticism, especially if you don't truly value their judgment. It is even
harder being an effective self-critic. But, if we want to make things better for both
each student and ourselves, if we want to become the teachers and persons we each are
capable of becoming, we have to fight our inclination to defensively circle the wagons or
raise the drawbridge and man the battlements. Our "job" only becomes a lifework of
service to others when we realize our purpose is to serve others; that the purpose of us
academics in the classroom is not limited to transmitting information or to honing
"critical thinking skills" or to preparing a student for a place in the workplace. Maybe
equally, if not more, important, our purpose is to educate, to tend to and care for the
overall well-being of each student in a way that helps each help her/himself become both a
better informed and a better person.
Want to give students a lasting gift? Give them the gift of your time and
attention. Give them the gift your, not just of our mind. We don't have to be
educational grinches or Scrooges. We don't have to be "weeder-outers." We don't have to
engage in spurious and fearful "negative reinforcement." Above my computer is taped a
famous quote from Dickens to remind me that though my body may be sixty-six years old and
my hair graying and my wrinkles deepening, my spirit can remain young and vibrant; and
though my time on earth is limited, the result of what I do with that time can be
limitless: "Father Time often lays his hand lightly upon those who have used him well;
making them old men and women inexorably enough, but leaving their hearts and spirits
young and in full vigor. With such people the gray head is but the impression of the old
fellow's hand in giving them his blessing, and every wrinkle but a notch in the quiet
calendar of a well-spent life."
Do we have that kind of graying hair? Do we have such wrinkles? Teachers who do
their job best are those who capture the spirit of edcuation; who help each student feel
better about her/himself, believe in her/himself, and see who she or he is capable of
becoming; who uplift each student's spirits and expectations, who call forth each
student's potential talent and ability to be inquisitive and independent and ethical by
simple acts of human decency -- a smile, a kind word, a compassionate expression, a
empathetic tone, an encouraging touch -- that says, "I notice you; I believe in you; I
have high hopes for you; I have faith in you. I care. So should you."
Like peace on earth and joy to the world, true peace on campus and sincere joy to
academia from the feelings of living a worthy life in the company of students we respect
and love, and in the service of something bigger than ourselves
As Susan and I are about to depart Valdosta with a suitcase of Chanukah gifts for
a joyous time of grand-children spoiling on the West Coast, we'd like to wish each and
every one of you joy and happiness during this holiday season, as well as best wishes for
the coming new year.
Make it a good day.
--Louis--
Louis Schmier www.therandomthoughts.com
Department of History www.newforums.com/L_Schmier.htm
Valdosta State University
Valdosta, Georgia 31698 /\ /\ /\ /\
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