http://beyond-school.org/2008/08/22/death-of-genius/

I won’t even pretend to touch the surface issue itself as I believe this is not the place for that discussion.

What irks me, though, is the thinking that every academic, political, social, humanitarian or religious inclination needs to fight to become an official “student club” of the university.  (And, I have a little experience in this area, as a former Director of Clubs and Services on the Glendon College Student Union’s executive.)

The university choir I founded was a “club” for one year, and I think we probably received $100 from the Student Union.  I felt that was justified; we were representing Glendon both in local singing competitions and at the local hospital when we’d sing for people at Christmas.  And, there was money to spare going out to clubs and no one questioned its use. But, once I became the person responsible for arbitrarily determining and dishing out club funding, I withdrew the choir as an official club.  Of course, I felt there was an inherent conflict of interest.

But also, my main concern in creating and running my organization wasn’t the money.  It wasn’t having Glendon’s name attached to us.  It was singing.  Glendon was pretty small and there weren’t a lot of ready-made performing arts activities for which you could just sign up.  If you wanted an experience, you had to create it.  And we did.

For money, we organized BRAVO! our annual “spectacle musicale” and invited anyone to get involved and perform.  The choir incurred all the expenses (venue rental fees, equipment rental, advertising, programs etc.), so we sold tickets and retained all the revenue, which also helped to offset the choir’s costs such as paying for sheet music, entering competitions and traveling to perform.  Another group approached us about organizing the for-sale refreshment table as a fundraiser for their own group, and we happily cooperated.

We didn’t need the school to tell us we could sing.  Furthermore, it never occurred to us that, without official club status and funding, we couldn’t get together and sing.

So, the Maclean’s article goes on to defend free speech, political activism, yadda yadda yadda.  (Did I just yadda yadda yadda student rights?)  That’s all well and good, but that’s not the real issue.  The real issue, I think, is below in my comment on Maclean’s website (which as I type is awaiting moderation):

Comment by Sarah Rainsberger on 28 May 2008:

Your comment is awaiting moderation.

I guess my only comment is, since when did anyone need a university-sanctioned “club” to be politically active and engaged? There’s nothing to stop any group of people who happen to attend the same university from finding each other and engaging in whatever form of activism they wish.

If the university doesn’t want to fund them (and, I can think of a lot of “clubs” that could be proposed to a university that they might not wish to fund) then surely there are larger community, provincial or national organizations supporting the same cause who might be able to provide financial support or other resources (such as pamphlets or speakers) to promote their activities.

Doesn’t this whole debate over official club status imply that it’s somehow up to the the university to determine which actions are or aren’t legitimate? Why give the institution that power? Why define your own legitimacy based on school designation? Does official designation make the group’s actions any more meaningful, relevant or important? Are they unable to meet, discuss, learn and teach if they are not an official club? Or, do people find themselves just not that “into” the cause if they have to pay for their own poster paper?

Part of the university experience is about developing one’s own independence. I would respect these groups if they believed so much in their actions that they formed their *own* group and spend their time actually furthering their cause. Instead, this mentality confers upon the university some sort of special powers to legitimize actions that a public educational institution seriously shouldn’t be given.

Go to university and, by all means, CHANGE THE WORLD!  Stand up for what you believe in.  Organize yourselves with like-minded (and perhaps not-so-likeminded) people to help make our communities and our country even better than it is now.  Don’t be afraid to hold a controversial or unconventional point of view.  Be true to yourself, do no harm to others and seek to learn from those around you.  Do ths on campus, off campus, on the way to campus, at the campus gates (even blocking them when appropriate) . . .

But don’t give your university the power to legitimize (or outlaw) your thoughts, your actions or your beliefs.  You don’t need the university’s permission to change the world, play chess, hold Bible studies or sing in a choir.

And when you ask for that permission – to be legitimized in the eyes of the university – you are really only legitimizing the university’s supposed hold over you.  Asking permission implies you never had the right in the first place.  You don’t need anyone’s permission to fight for your cause, self-organize or make a contribution to your society.  Don’t waste your time asking.

There are several ways to choose a university, and just as many sources of information with which to make your decision.  Students and parents stress over making the “right” decision, but chances are, if you have focused on the right sources of information, and made your choice for the right reason, you’ll make a good decision.

Student surveys are interesting sources of data, but of course, their usefulness can be somewhat limited.

It may be handy to know that most students are able to successfully register in their first choice of courses, but how good was that selection of courses in the first place?

If a large portion of students indicate that they are getting “personal attention” from their profs, does this mean that professors are accessible, or does it mean they’re swamped with superficial interactions about what’s on the exam and don’t have the time to explore your research interests in-depth with you?

Does the level of involvement in campus activities reflect more on the activities offered by the university, the socioeconomic level of the students (who may have to choose work over involvement) or even the city the university is located in (university-sanctioned activities might not be the social hub in a large city; in other cities, the university activities might be the only offerings)?

Just because the survey results could be interpreted in a variety of ways doesn’t mean you should ignore them.  More useful (and more fun, says the former math tutor) than simply taking the results at face value is to use surveys like to explore notions of statistical validity, significance and bias.  Asking what could be producing the observed results is often more interesting than the results themselves.

For example, one question asked in the 2007 survey was, “If you could start over again, would you still choose to go to this school?”  Would a high percentages of “yes” votes necessarily indicate that this school should be at the top of your list?

The implication of a “yes” vote is that the school is so good that I would choose it again.  But, there’s so much that goes into such a simple question.

For example, if I were asked that question, I would say absolutely yes.  I would choose Glendon again if I knew now what I knew then.  But, depending on why I say yes, you may find that a yes for me would be a no for you!  How do you know that someone is answering yes based on characteristics of the school that you would experience in a similar way?

There’s also a kind of response bias in that question.  How many people are so dissatisfied with their current situation that they would redo a significant portion of it differently?  Choose a different school?  That means you wouldn’t have met your university friends.  You wouldn’t have had those frosh experiences.  You wouldn’t have that local hangout.  That’s really a lot to give up.

Do you want to admit that your life is so messed up that you need a do-over?  Don’t some of our fondest memories also come from hugely stupid mistakes that we endured and lived to tell?

Remember, 90% of people at “school x” might be happy there, but many schools attract certain types of students in the first place.  If the school doesn’t seem like the place for you, then that high satisfaction ranking was probably given by people unlike you, and might actually signify that you’d be dissatisfied at that school.

A better way, then, to interpret student satisfaction rankings might be this: of the students who initially thought that was the best school for them, these questions confirm or refute their preconceptions of that university.

Perhaps then, high satisfaction rankings can best be seen as success of the university marketing departments.  After all, they sold their incoming students on a particular image of the school.  High satisfaction would probably mean that the experience was as promised.  And, that’s a good thing, because that helps you feel confident that what they promise is what they deliver.

So, examine the results but take them with a grain of salt.  Use the questions (not just the answers) to help refine for yourself exactly what you’re looking for in a university and find other sources of information (university literature, campus visits etc.) to present a more complete picture of the schools.

Congratulations to:
-   Mazorgata Dubiel, Simon Fraser University
-   Katherine Frego, University of New Brunswick (Saint John)
-   Sorel Friedman, Université de Montréal
-   Robert Lapp, Mount Allison University
-   TA Loeffler, Memorial University
-   Peter Mahaffy, King’s University College
-   Daniel Pratt, University of British Columbia
-   Patangi Rangachari, McMaster University
-   Mercedes Rowinsky-Geurts, Wilfrid Laurier University
-   James Silcox, University of Western Ontario

More than anything, it’s your professors who will make or break your university experience.  Be kind to your profs!  Recognize the good ones and give credit where credit is due! 

Today is a day for families to discuss fun things like government, legislation and public representation.

As some of you know, neither Joe nor I have a driver’s license. This is partly a political statement, but just as much a part of our attempt to be financially responsible. A few cabs a year hardly adds up to the expense of owning a car full-time.

With the developing technologies on this front, we have both resolved not to get our licenses until we can purchase a 100% electric vehicle. This doesn’t mean that we will automatically get our licenses once this day arrives, nor are we necessarily chomping at the bit to do so. Given that we’ve gone this long with out a car, our driving needs are obviously few and far between and it may never be necessary or even “worth it” in our minds to get a car. But, if we do, it will be an electric one.

That’s why we watch the news on this front with great interest. Many of you may have seen the company that manufactures the Zenn car featured on the Rick Mercer show, or in other mainstream news. The short story is this: there’s a Canadian (Quebec) manufactured car that is only sold in the U.S. because our federal transport laws weren’t up with the times.

I say “were” because the publicity that the Zenn car received last fall prompted transport Canada to give the low-speed electric vehicle the stamp of approval. Now, that still didn’t mean you could actually purchase or drive it here, because some of our road laws are provincial. But, it was a step.

So, what’s all the fuss now? I just received an email notification today that Transport Canada is attempting to redefine “Low Speed Vehicles” so that now NONE of them will be allowed on the roads! They are trying to change the definition of a low speed vehicle from one that is allowed to operate on roads with posted speed limits of 50 km/h or less (meaning most of your city streets) to one that is only allowed to operate on essentially “private” roads: university campuses, parks military bases etc.

Since most of the electric cars now in production (or prototype) are meant to be small, casual driving vehicles to accomplish tasks such as grocery shopping and zipping around town, many of them are classified as low speed vehicles.

You don’t have to be an environmental activist to appreciate that low speed vehicles like the Zenn car (which actually exceeds mandated safety requirements, so that’s not the issue) on our city streets makes a lot of sense for everyone.

These cars take up less room on the streets and in parking lots, use no gas (conserving it for others who do need it) and are a symbol of our willingness to explore and accept alternatives as well as individuals’ right to choose how much (or how little) of a “car” they really need.

We know firsthand the huge effects that something as trivial as a definition can have on a situation. Remember when Ontario universities used to be funding based on the number of students who had acquired a high school diploma? Think about what happened when that funding definition was amended to include “or equivalent.”

Below is the email I received, and of course, I’d love it if others got involved in the cause and made their feelings known via the methods described at the end. It’s one I feel is worthy, and affects me personally. But, that’s not the only reason to participate.

I support several causes that don’t affect me personally because I feel it’s my responsibility to advocate for personal choice and freedoms.

I don’t have children, but I feel very strongly about homeschoolers’ right to choose their own education. If I do have children in the future, I would want the freedom to homeschool them to be available to me.

I don’t drive, but if I ever choose to do so, I would like the option of an electric car so that it can in theory be powered by any form of energy I choose.

That’s it. I have no ulterior motive, no veiled attempt to force everyone else to give up their cars. I simply hope that perhaps this issue can be a springboard for your family to discuss issues of legislation and governance. And if you feel so moved, participate in your government to increase the options available to us all.

Here’s the email I received:

Transport Canada is trying to ban the ZENN and other Low Speed Vehicles from public roads!

On December 22, 2007, only 50 days after granting the ZENN the National Safety Mark (clearing the way for ZENN to sell in the provinces that enact low-speed vehicle legislation) Transport Canada announced plans to REVISE THE DEFINITION OF LOW-SPEED VEHICLES.

The (paraphrased) existing Low-Speed Vehicle (LSV) definition is as follows:

“Low Speed Vehicles are designed for on road use, have a regulated top speed of 40 KPH and are restricted to roads with a posted speed limit of 50KPH.”

This type of vehicle is legal in more than 40 of the 50 States and throughout Europe, Asia and South America in mixed-use environments and has an exemplary safety record when operated in its defined operating environments!

The proposed revision to definition of Low-Speed Vehicles (LSVs) is as follows:

“low-speed vehicle” means a vehicle, other than a restricted-use motorcycle or a vehicle imported temporarily for special purposes, that is designed for use primarily on streets and roads where access and the use of other classes of vehicles are controlled by law or agreement”

There are other recommendations, including the addition of small trucks to the definition and improvements for increased visibility of LSVs that ZENN Motor Company agrees are reasonable and we support.

Reference: Canada Gazette Vol. 141, No. 51 — December 22, 2007, Regulations Amending the Motor Vehicle Safety Regulations (Low-speed Vehicles)

What does this mean?
Essentially, the ZENN would be UNABLE to operate on 50 KPH and slower public roads such as downtown Victoria, Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto. The ZENN, and vehicles like it would be forced to only operate on closed, private roads such as parks, university campuses and military bases.

What are the consequences to such a revision?
§ The ZENN, and green vehicles like it will not enter the Canadian market
§ Consumer choice for alternative, zero emission green vehicles will remain limited to bicycles
§ Those provinces who wish to promote alternative forms of transportation (such as a Low-Speed Vehicle) will have to legislate in direct opposition to Transport Canada’s revised definition of limited on road use

Concerned? Outraged? Here’s what you can do:
All comments regarding the proposed changes must be submitted by February 20, 2008 to:

Matthew Coons, Senior Regulatory Development
Engineer, Road Safety and Motor Vehicle Regulation
Directorate, Department of Transport, Place de Ville, Tower C,
8th Floor, 330 Sparks Street, Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0N5
tel.:613-998-1961; e-mail: coonsm@tc.gc.ca

I came home to a small backlog of local newspapers, and have just finished writing a letter to the editor I thought I’d share with you.

The “offending” article concerned a local school who had discovered, a few days into hiring a new replacement teacher over the semester break, that the teacher had given a false certification number and was not in fact registered as a certified teacher.

Fine. I understand laws, regulations and such. And, contrary to most people’s opinions, I’m actually a pretty big stickler for them. (I simply believe in having as few as possible.)

But, the principal’s statement to the paper really irked me:

“So, it was kind of comical, but it’s serious all at the same time, because this person was in no way, shape or form, any kind of a teacher.”

I was going to add emphasis, but I don’t think my readership requires me to point out why I’m so disturbed.

Not that I expect this to be published in my local little paper, since I’m sure it’s not a community hot button issue, but this is what I was compelled to write:

re: Uncertified teacher discovered working at Ebb and Flow School

While I appreciate the unfortunate situation Principal Paul Monchka found himself in when he realized he’d hired a teacher under false pretenses, his statement, “. . . this person was in no way shape or form any kind of a teacher, ” clearly displays one of the serious flaws of our education system.

I suspect the tutors, piano teachers and driving instructors of this country (just to name a few) might take issue with that statement, not to mention the homeschooling community.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s fraudulent to claim certifications you clearly don’t have. Unfortunately, our school systems fail to recognize that our community has many “teachers” and reinforces the misguided notion that failing schools are the only sources of a meaningful education. We view “drop outs” as problems, instead of recognizing that some students simply need a different environment in which to thrive and develop their potential.

It is worth noting that in Ontario, teachers need not be certified in order to teach in private schools. This allows alternative options to flourish and attempts to meet a wider set of student needs.

Before moving to Dauphin this summer, I had 18 years of experience as mostly a high school/university math tutor (and owner of a successful tutoring business) in Toronto, but also as the co-founder/director of a private high school, as a guidance counselor and as a classroom teacher. I have no certification, but if you ask the thousands of students and families whose lives I touched, I’m pretty sure they will say I am in SOME “way shape or form” a “kind of a teacher.”

If you go looking for advice on how to prepare yourself for university, or how to be successful once you’re there, you’ll find no shortage of advice based on the premises that university is:

• difficult (or, a favourite phrase that Joe and I have adopted from a sushi take-out menu, “raw and challenging”)
• unlike anything you’ve experienced before
• requiring intense concentration, dedication and work ethic

The truth is though, that this isn’t the universal first-year experience. Some kids enter university extremely well-prepared academically with not only adequate study skills but also with a healthy curiosity and a solid knowledge-base. Gifted students and/or home schoolers who have studied particular subjects in depth may even find themselves somewhat disappointed at the general nature of introductory courses. They may similarly find themselves more than a little disenchanted by the interest level of not only their fellow classmates but also of the professors who have been given the “baby” classes. There aren’t many books out there about how to cope when university isn’t challenging enough for you.

It would be erroneous to assume that the problems these students face in high school magically disappear once they cross the threshold of a university campus. For some, they do. For others, there can be a profound disappointment when they realize that university life holds fewer changes from high school than they had expected.

Personally, I can only recall one “challenging” course in my five years at Glendon. For me, challenging meant that I had to sit with a text book for hours on end trying to make sense of it. I can’t recall a course that had too much reading for me to be comfortable with (including a women’s literature course in a 4 week summer session that included novels, plays, poems, essays and short stories), nor did I ever have so many assignments that I found it difficult to manage or meet deadlines.

Fortunately for my academic career, though, I wasn’t generally resentful or disillusioned. I took advantage of the opportunity to get involved socially and politically on campus. I didn’t skip any classes, although I easily could have gotten away with it academically, until my last year when I was extremely involved in extra-curricular activities. Even though my 100 person first year Intro to Psychology course had dwindled to more like 40 people during lectures, I continued to attend faithfully. I continued to attend even though:

• I did the lecture’s reading and made study notes before the lecture
• the lectures were overviews straight from the textbook
• the notes I had already made could have been the lecture

When people asked why, I told them that I liked the subject and I thought the repetition would be good for the learning process. It didn’t bother me that I had read it all before. In fact, it meant that instead of scrambling to take notes during the lecture, I could simply add annotations to the notes I already had and leave most of my brain free for listening. We like hearing the same stories over and over again, watching the same movies, listening to the same songs. . . I happened at the time to be fascinated by introductory psychology and I didn’t think this was any different. Besides, there might be something I’d miss if I didn’t go. There rarely was, but occasionally there were some gems to be had, like my professor slapping himself silly on the back of the head until he “saw stars” to demonstrate where the occipital lobe is, and how you can see things that aren’t really there when these neurons are adequately stimulated. (He proposed that this could explain “seeing ghosts” for example.) This I remember clearly 15 years later, and it wasn’t in the textbook.

It’s taken a while for this post to establish the link between university students and sales people, but here it finally is: little did I know that my tolerance for repetition in the hopes of finding just one new bit of information was an essential quality of successful salespeople. And as it turns out, being able to selectively tune in and tune out at will is just a handy self-improvement skill to have, whether you’re learning for credit, for professional advancement, or for interest.

Reg Braithwaite wrote about this on his website in response to people (computer programmers specifically) engaging in harsh criticism of each other’s ideas in an online discussion, but the point he makes has far greater implications than simply promoting tolerance. After reading his message, I think you’d be hard pressed not to look at education and training (especially the type that would normally make your eyes glaze over with boredom) in a new light.

The article is called What I’ve Learned From Sales, Part III: How to use a blunt instrument to sharpen your saw and isn’t entirely G-Rated, so I’m going to quote here more than I normally would of someone else’s post. Please don’t follow the link if a four-letter word is going to make you spit your morning coffee at the computer screen. The observation and analysis is brilliant, and I hope he doesn’t mind that I share a few paragraphs in their entirety with you here so that I can share the wisdom:

In sales, there is a very high, observable, and measurable correlation between attending sales training seminars and sales volume. One explanation for this is that the kind of people who take time off of selling to sharpen their own saw are the kind of people to be top salespeople.

The other possibility is that there is something abut the seminars themselves that make salespeople better. I have asked salespeople about it, and generally I get a variation on the exact same answer: If I can learn just one thing that improves my sales skills, the seminar will pay for itself.

Think about that. They go to an all day seminar, where they will probably hear twenty, thirty, or forty tips. They will probably sit through tip after tip thinking “Yawn, I knew that, tell me something new.” Or they hear something and think: “That is the worst suggestion I’ve ever heard.” But then, suddenly, they hear something new, and they profit from it.

In sales, you are used to making call after call, facing rejection after rejection, but you keep dialing because… the next one could be a winner. So the kind of person who can keep on dialing after rejection ought to be the kind of person who can sit through a seminar waiting to pounce on one new thing that can improve their income.

He goes on to point out that we non-salespeople often take a different approach to learning, or at the very least, others’ attempts to inform us. Here are some of the things we all do, to varying degrees and from time to time, instead of sticking it out waiting for that one idea that could be earth-shatteringly transformative:

• Feel annoyed that we are “wasting our time” with things we “already know”
• Hear one thing we disagree with, and as a result immediately discredit everything that person has to say
• Attempt to correct or argue with someone else to convince them of the error of their ways
• Make an overall judgment as to whether what we heard/read/saw as a whole was any good

Braithwaite recommends instead that computer programmers participate in online discussions with this mentality: most of what I hear won’t be new; a good portion of it I’ll completely disagree with; however, if I can find just one small thing that makes me a better programmer, the experience will have been worth it and I personally will profit from it.

I say, what a fantastic approach to learning! Think of what we open ourselves up to if we relax our natural tendencies for categorization and consistency and instead allow ourselves to learn from sources without embracing them in their entirety.

When we stop trying to evaluate our sources of information (books, websites, films, people) as “good” or “bad” we can turn the focus inwards on ourselves, and on how that information can be used for our own learning or self-improvement. This works equally well in a university lecture as it does in a training seminar, info session or online discussion.

This is a healthy attitude for all students, not just those wondering why they should attend a lecture to hear what they already know or those who feel their time is being wasted in class discussions with people stating the obvious. But, I think this idea can give real comfort to those who already feel “different” or “out of place” even in a university classroom. They don’t have to pass judgment on those around them; they simply recognize that good ideas can come at any place, at any time (even from bad ideas). And it’s not contradictory (or an embarrassment) to learn something from someone “not as smart” as they are, nor is it a betrayal of one’s principles to be enlightened by someone with a different religious, philosophical or political affiliation.

Did you know that direct mail campaigns (junk mail, envelopes filled with coupons etc.) are conducted with the knowledge that they have a 1% success rate in converting into purchases? Sales people understand that striking out comes with the territory. Ball players are considered star-caliber if they are successful at the plate a mere 30% of the time. Students, however, are indoctrinated with a much higher standard of success. The sooner they realize that “the real world” is all about the journey towards savouring the occasional sweet success, the easier it will be to relax the need for themselves and for others to conform to their expectations of perfection. And then, they just might learn something in places they never expected!