I’m scratching my head about this one, y’all.

 culture  No Responses »
Nov 172011
 

I’m supposed to be writing a lecture on Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, and I’m struggling.  I logged on to my Twitter account, and I see some tweets about Occupy Wall Street.  I start poking around and getting confused, as I’ve been for two months.  Confused because I feel like I should be completely behind this movement, yet I feel completely disconnected from it.  I’m trying to listen to voices coming out of the movement and also to colleagues and friends who I know are supporting the movement, but I’m still struggling to find the connection.  I’m not willing to give up trying, but I’m still not quite ready to drink the juice either.

So I check out The New York Times to see if there’s anything that will help me understand.  That’s after watching a video online that someone posted of a series of clips of police doing violence to occupiers as they cleared Zuccotti Park.  Pushing, shoving, milk in the eyes to deal with the Mace or something.  I don’t know.  Again, I felt disconnected.

On the Times site, I happen upon this video story that I’ve embedded below.  It’s about a guy from Connecticut, 35 years old, out of work for two years, gets a job, and then after six months he quits the job to join the Occupy Wall Street movement.  Then the park gets cleared, and he has nowhere to live.  Lots of education, working towards a PhD at some point.

As I watched the video, I couldn’t help but wonder why this guy quit his job.  After being out of work for two years, why would he quit a job after finally finding one?

I can imagine that maybe his job isn’t fulfilling.  He so much as said so in the video.  But given the moment that we’re living in, is it wise to quit a job?  I’m sitting here feeling confused.  Scratching my head.  Wanting to feel sympathy for this guy, but finding it very hard to understand the choices he’s made.

I think that some people might try to tell me that the Times (a loathed “mainstream media outlet”) somehow manipulated his story.  Made it into what they wanted it to be.  Fair enough argument.  I would just respond by saying that this guy chose to allow the cameras to follow him around for the past month.  If he’s 35 and has advanced education, he should have some understanding of media representation and its ramifications.

It’s moments like these, when I question a choice like the one that this guy has made, that I know that I’m my father’s son.

My dad and I don’t always agree politically or socially.  I know he’s scratched his head about some of the choices that I’ve made in my life, but my father has worked for about 40 years for 50-60 hours a week selling auto parts.  He has worked in the same store for all of those years.  I worked with him as a part time parts boy and delivery boy off and on from the summer before 8th grade until I was 22 years old.  I watched how hard he worked, and I experienced firsthand his expectations for his co-workers and employees.  I don’t know many other people who have the work ethic that my dad has.  Except maybe my Uncle Bill, who my dad worked for many years.

My dad used to tell me that I better learn some common sense.  I had a lot of academic gifts, but the common sense took awhile to kick in.  The first time he said it to me, I got really mad.  But it’s some of the best advice he ever gave me.

My dad never had time to quit his job and occupy a park.  He had the huge responsibility, along with my mom, of raising five kids.  My dad never sat down at work, unless it was to work with an adding machine or a computer terminal at a desk.  If I leaned against a shelf or sat on a ledge, he told me to stand up.  Replenish the Valvoline Oil.  Stock the air filters on the shelves.  Dust the products that haven’t moved in awhile.  Sweep the floors.  Don’t stand around.

My dad did not model quitting for me.  Nor did he model standing around.  And he also didn’t model idle chatter.

Maybe that’s why I’m having trouble connecting to Occupy Wall Street.  I know stuff is happening there.  People are marching, people are teaching, people are voicing their concerns, people are occupying things.  People are quitting their jobs.  People are getting arrested.  People are planning next steps now that they can’t sleep in the park.

But what’s really happening?  What’s actually changing?  What’s getting done?

This son of a hard working Baby Boomer would like to know.

Protesting in a world of “partial credit”

 culture  No Responses »
Oct 062011
 

So I had some responses to my last blog post which I appreciated.  I welcome the dialogue on my blog, even if the dialogue disagrees with what I have to say.

I googled the demands coming from Occupy Wall Street, as I wanted to get more information than what I had.  NYDailyNews.com published a piece by Nomi Prins, with the headline “Occupy Wall Street protest demands outline complete and complex reforms to our financial system.”  Take a read.  It’s a helpful piece,

I understand a bit more about what the protest wants to accomplish, but I can’t help but take issue with one of the main points in the article.  Prins writes the following:”Protesters want jobs and the financial security that comes with them.  As in countries like Greece, Spain, Ireland and Egypt, more than 25% of the youth in this country are unemployed – and that number is growing. Add that to the 16% to 17% of underemployed individuals, and it’s no wonder that desperation has reached this visible point.”

OK.  So what does the writer mean by “youth”?  How are we defining this today?  For me, “youth” implies under the age of 18, but my gut tells me that Prins is talking about young adults in their 20s, the new “late adolescents.”  Interesting.

As someone who teaches these late adolescents as graduate students, I have lots of questions about these unemployment numbers.  Prospective students often ask me if they’re going to have a job once they leave with their degree.  My response is that I have no way of predicting that.  The institution that I teach for has a reputable brand name in a lot of disciplines, so much so that I’m told that recruiters are beating the door down to get to our graduating students, taking over staff offices in our career center.  (So what’s all this about unemployment???)  I also tell my students that while the brand name may get them an interview, they, and they alone, will need to land the job.  I can’t make any guarantees.

After ten years of teaching of both undergraduates and masters candidates, I can say one thing.  There is a general attitude that partial credit, which I read as partial accomplishment or partial preparation, is an entitlement that belongs to all people.  Let me explain:

In a recent graduate course that I taught, I assigned a final paper worth 40% of the overall grade.  Students received a rubric of assessment, well in advance of the paper’s deadline, outlining the criteria of assessment and the point values.  The paper was worth a total of 40 points, 16 points of which were pretty cut and dry.  Take a look at these:

The paper includes appropriate citations that are formatted correctly.   (yes or no)

The paper includes a “works cited” page that is formatted correctly.   (yes or no)

The paper is within the 1500-2000 word range.  (yes or no)

The paper is submitted by the announced deadline.  (yes or no)

As I read the papers, if I checked off “yes” that the criteria was met, the student earned four points for that area.  A “no” meant zero points in that area.  As you can see, these areas are pretty straight forward.  I had provided students with guides to assist with proper citations and a “works cited” page, and since this was a graduate level course, I believed that the students should have mastered these skills through their undergraduate work.  I also believed that these 16 point out of 40, 40% of the paper grade, were “easy” points.”  Hence, I would not offer partial credit in these areas.  My beliefs were incorrect.

A large number of students lost points in these areas.  For many of them, it was the difference in a final letter grade.  I did not relish giving those grades, but I did feel it was my responsibility as a teacher of masters students, to assign them a grade that they had earned.  A student’s final point total for a course is always a starting point for me, and I reserve the right to adjust grades up or down, depending on class participation, improvement over time, or exceptional performance.  In most of these cases, I did not feel like lost points in such straight forward areas indicated exceptional performance.  As a result, most grades stayed as they had been earned.

Surprisingly, or not surprisingly, these final course grades prompted one student to tell me that they should at least get points for trying.  The citations in this particular student’s paper were incorrect and incomplete, but because the student had “tried,” they wanted partial credit.  I responded that there isn’t partial credit in a professional situation, and I have that level of expectation in my classes, particularly for graduate students.  I received no response back from the student.

Partial credit for trying?  Seriously…

Maybe part of the reason the unemployment numbers are so high among “youth” populations is that we’re giving people partial credit all over the place and doing them a disservice when it comes to performing in an employment setting.  What are we gaining by telling students–PEOPLE–that it’s ok to perform well only part of the time?  Or that it’s ok to do work that’s only partly correct?  Should we really be surprised that we’re in the mess that we’re in when this is the dominant attitude?

Students tell me that I’m a hard ass.  Students are “afraid” to take my classes.  I find it all very confusing.  I’m just trying to train students who will be successful on their chosen career path.  I don’t want them to have to spend time down on Wall Street in sleeping bags, behind police barriers, worrying about survival, and screaming themselves hoarse to get someone to pay attention.  I might not be able to stop that from happening, even if I train them well, as I have no control over the job market.  However, I’m certainly going to prepare students as best I can.  I have a responsibility to demand excellence so that students leave my classes feeling like experts in that particular area that we’ve studied over the course of our time together.

People are losing jobs even when they’re performing well.  Employers don’t wait around for partial credit assignments to be completed.  Life does not wait around for partial credit to catch up.    Now more than ever, people need to have their citations in order and the works cited page ready.

Survival of the fittest, everyone.  It’s how the world works.  That’s not changing any time soon.