I thank some of you for missing me and asking after my health. I know. I haven’t shared a thought since the end of September. Susie and I have had a series of “distractions.” First, it was over three weeks in Boston caring for both her brother and his wife. Then, we came home for a few days to discover that Susie has a torn Achilles tendon from incessantly climbing the steps of the three story Victorian Boston house. And, then, it was a week in Nashville “babysitting” our tween grand-daughter while her parents go off into Atlantic with Susie bound in a boot and forbidden to climb any steps. And, finally, we come home to discover my computer is as dead as a dead cockroach: on its back, feet up. There went another week to get the new iMac.
After experiencing almost two days of unexpected travails struggling to set up the computer, this is my first Random Thought on my new iMac. To be sure, I used my iPhone while on the road and during the time the computer was down. I sifted through my email and text messages, but my stubby fingers made it unreasonably awkward to reply at length. One of the messages, I was biting at the bit to answer came from a professor at a prestigious northeast institution. Now, I can share my response in several parts. Here is the first. “You ask so many questions about Higher Education,” this professor professed in an admonishing tone. “If you didn’t like being a professor, why didn’t you go into another profession?” The first part of my answer was this: “My love of being an educator doesn’t preclude the asking of hard questions and considering even more uncomfortable answers; it doesn’t mean I have to accept ego and pride over aspiration and inspiration. It does mean being a “change agent” for each student. My mission is to stop the use of lazy, self-serving stereotypes and generalizations and categories and labels, to stop reducing and impersonalizing complex blood and flesh and bone students into simplistic inanimate and inhuman stick figures. We in Higher Education are awash in those chasms causing stereotypes, generalities, categories, and labels My mission is make each student, without judgment or conditions, seen and listened to, and to feel seen and valued; it is to be there to help each student to find ways to help herself and himself become the person she or he is capable of becoming; it is to establish the tight connection and forge the supporting and encouraging community of what Martin Buber called constant and compassionate and trusting “I-Thou” relationships by which I and each student learn, grow, and change for the better. That means I’m always on the hunt for better ways to be more open minded and open hearted as means to improve the life story of each. It means uncovering the means to have a profound and beautiful impact on each student that will last far beyond us.” “With our heavy emphasis on honors, recognitions, awards aren’t we missing and missing out on the vitality and liveliness of the ordinary student? It is as if we declare it is immoral to be average and ordinary; it is as if we brand those students with an “A” or “O” on their chests; and, in so doing we forget to hold the average, ordinary student as worthy of our time and effort. The irony is that we make people in both categories more stereotyped and labelled, and less human in our eyes. Teaching is not an ‘I’ endeavor. It is forged in the binding cords of those constant serving communal ’Thou’ moments. The teacher is Buber’s meaningful center of nurturing faith, hope, love, caring, kindness, trust, support, encouragement. Teaching should be an adoration, celebrating of each and every average student no less than the exceptional. No, I raise questions about the prevailing ‘I’ in Academia in order to set the table for an educational ’Thou”…. More later. Make it a good day -Louis- Louis Schmier http://www.therandomthoughts.edublogs.org 203 E. Brookwood Pl http://www.therandomthoughts.com Valdosta, Ga 31602 (C) 229-630-0821 /\ /\ /\ /\ /\ /^\\/ \/ \ /\/\__ / \ / \ / \/ \_ \/ / \/ /\/ / \ /\ \ //\/\/ /\ \__/__/_/\_\/ \_/__\ \ /\"If you want to climb mountains,\ /\ _ / \ don't practice on mole hills" - / \_ --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=49842 or send a blank email to leave-49842-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
