The Random Thoughts of Louis Schmier

For little over two months I’ve been e-chatting with Majorie (not her real name)who is attending another institution. I’ve resisted sharing her initial “smoking” message that started our conversation although she has urged me more than once or twice to send it out. Every time I read it I’m reminded that there may be more than a grain of truth to Parker Palmer’s assertion that there aren’t many places where people feel less respected, less sacred and less in community than they do in higher education. Maybe, as the fall semester approaches, now is the time to hurl her words into cyberspace. It should give each of us, whatever be our position, cause to pause and listen to this voice on the other side of the desk and podium. With Majorie’s expressed permission:

“Hey, Dr. Schmier. You don’t know me, but I know you and I’d like us to get to know each other. I started reading you for a ed-psych class assignment about a year ago and haven’t stopped yet. Mind if I vent on you and let off steam? I’ve got to let it out. Talking with my friends isn’t enough. It’s like complaining to a mirror. All I get is a bunch “yeah, I agree, but you can’t do anything.” And, my adviser thinks I’m too sensitive and unreasonable, is too afraid of his job to say or do anything. The same goes for a young prof I spoke to who won’t do a thing to threaten her race for tenure. No one here really wants to listen. Their advise is to do what they do: shut up, grin, and bear it. I feel like I’m being sacrificed at the altar so they don’t have to buck the system and protect their precious academic asses. That means keep their jobs.”

“And, you can share this with anyone you want. Just leave off my name and university. The s.o.b.s (my abbreviations) around here would probably take revenge on me–after denying or rationalizing everything–and I don’t believe anyone would stand up for me. Maybe it will get someone to think and knock some sense into someone higher up.”

“I’ve had it. I don’t mind being told I’m smart and going places, but I’ve had it with being treated as a smart nobody with no place to go. You know, here I am at ……… University. It’s written up in all those ‘you should go to’ school articles. I’ve been here three years. I’m what they call “a good student.” I’m “little Miss Honors Student.” My GPA is 3.77. But, that’s all I am around here, a walking GPA, someone to brag about to get a ranking in some magazine, but they don’t know who this someone is–or care to know. Boy, is that especially true in those huge, cattle-call classes. It’s even in my small classes that’s true. Hell, you don’t have to go on-line to have distance learning around here. Just walk into a regular classroom. All my professors talk about me like they know who I am. Hell, they don’t even know who “me” is. Some don’t even know my name. To most, I’m just a name in a roll book or a statistic to brag about. I don’t think they really care. I mean really care. They say they do, but they don’t mean it or it has a bunch of conditions strung to it. They don’t show it except by going through some motions. They don’t work at it. They don’t listen. They control by talking. Can you imagine how they think about and treat the students who aren’t honors? I’ve seen them treat those students as almost vermin and they are exterminators. I think sometimes they’re afraid to get to know me because then I’ll get to know them and get a peek behind their mask. They’ll slave over their precious research, but they won’t sweat one drop to make the effort to really know what I need as a person. They say they don’t have the time but they’ll find time for the lab or the archive without breaking a sweat or one complaint. I’ve got to fit into their precious, pinned-to-the-door schedule and they make no effort to fit into mine. They sure aren’t the kind of doctor you’d call in time of need. They think they’re God’s gift to mankind and we ought to be so damn appreciative that they allow us to sit in their presence while they go on and on and on and throw crumbs at us.”

“I mean how can so many supposedly deep thinkers be so shallow and thoughtless? They look for all sorts of clues in their experiments, and outside the lab are clueless. I think educating me should be a very personal thing. But, no, they have this image of me that has nothing to do with the real me. They don’t care if I have to work my ass off at a job to help pay for their huge salaries, which I do. They don’t care if I have to worry about paying bills, which I do. They could care less and don’t want to hear if I’m distracted at times because my mother is very sick and my little brother is having a hard time handling it. If someone happens to fit their image of being what they want and doing what they want, they have their arms around his shoulders and are patting them on his back. Otherwise, they couldn’t give a damn and give a bunch of reasons why they’re right. They push those student who they don’t think are students away and kick them in the ass. Or worse, they just plain ignore them. Ever been treated like a piece of cellophane? They read their precious books and don’t read one line about me. They just don’t want to work at knowing me because they’re too lazy or they think it’s not important.”

“Well, I wish I had the guts to stand up and shout that it’s damn important. I’m important. I know no one else will. They think this school is theirs. Well, someone ought to clue them in that without me there’s no university. Without me, they’d be on the unemployment line. Without me this place would be a ghost town. Don’t tell me that I’m not important enough to get to know, to at least listen to!! All they want to think about is how frustrating we students are to them, how our needs inconvenient them, and how much time we take them away from their precious books that are usually unreadable if anyone cares to open them. How about them to us? God, If they were on the radio, I wouldn’t have one reason to tune them in. If they were salesmen, I wouldn’t buy a thing from them. Most of them couldn’t sell a heater in the dead of winter.”

“You know I’ve heard profs bitch that they have to do things that have nothing to do with the classroom. They don’t have time. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, la-de-dah. It’s part of their job. They talk to us about excellence when it comes to academics and then are mediocre to poor when it comes to relationships. They don’t create a positive connection with us or give us a positive connection to their classes. You know, a lot of them don’t have a hook to be in the classroom. They call me an adult when it suits them and at the same time treat me as a child when it suits them. They always want to have it both ways. I have lots of friends at other places and I’ve met a lot of other students at conventions. Let me tell you something. It’s not much different from here. Respect is not really a going word in these places. And if anyone thinks I’m the only student thinking this way, they’ve got another think coming. Of course, I don’t think they want to think about that. They may have to admit they have to change and come down from Olympus and walk among us common students. God forbid they would have to admit that they just might have to change a tad.”

“I want to go on and get my Ph.D. to teach at the college level. But if teaching at the college level means I have to become like most of them, I’m not sure. Grrrrrr!!!! #$%*&%@!!!!! I know I’m rambling, but I am spitting mad. It’s been building up subtly, but after yesterday it all came to a head and I got to explode like Mount St. Helens. Let me tell you what happened……”

That’s all I’m comfortable sharing. I know that our knee-jerk reaction is to say, “not on my campus.” Nevertheless, what I shared should be enough to give each of us cause to pause and be mindful. I know it was for me.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

Like an opened good bottle of aged champagne, there’s a lot of stuff bubbling inside me. Maybe it’s just that the beginnings of the fall semester is only a few weeks away (I’m never wild about those going-through-the-motions meetings), I’m starting to put this challenging summer behind me, I miss the classroom, I miss being with the students, I’m looking forward to the inevitably challenging coming semester, and I’m starting to gear up emotionally, spiritually, physically, and intellectually for that very exciting first day.

Anyway, there’s a little madness in anyone who goes out power walking before dawn at five in the morning. There’s even more madness if he is blending together reflections on a recent trip through the Napa Valley, a recent conversation with a colleague about the validity of grades, and a recent NPR (National Public Radio) show on “shelf talkers.”

Do you know what a “shelf talker” is? Don’t feel bad if you don’t. I didn’t know until I was driving along on the highway several weeks ago listening to the Morning Edition on NPR. John McChesney was doing a piece on wine ratings. That’s how I learned about shelf talkers. Next time you go to buy a bottle of wine, notice that little piece of paper neatly hanging on the shelf beneath the bottle. That’s the shelf talker. On it, in microscopic print, is a description of the wine. It might read: “While the appearance says youth the bouquet says development. Deep, thick, opaque ruby in color with spicy scents on the nose with plummy fruit aromas. On the palate the impression continues with ripe, integrated, full body oak and fruit flavors interlaced with supple tanins dripping with typically, earthy, gamy character. For serious wine lovers.” Above that description is the emboldened numerical evaluation of the wine on a 100 point scale used by the tasters of the two leading wine magazines, WINE SPECTATOR and WINE ADVOCATE. That numerical rating has become a convenient and easy wine merchandiser. The higher the point value of the wine, supposedly the finer is the wine, the “more serious wine lover” would be the buyer, the more the wine is touted, and, of course, the more it usually costs.

And yet, there is trouble in Napa Valley that has been fermenting for the past decade. As wine drinking has become “democratized” and the ranks of the novices to wine swell, the ratings have become more and more important. Most people think the ratings are as scientifically accurate as taking someone’s temperature with a thermometer. The ratings suggest precision; they suggest objectivity; they suggest a common standard; they suggest a particular quality of taste; they suggest that the art of wine-making can be reduce to quantification.

Most buyers do not know that the numerical ratings are far more subjective than they think or want to think. And so, many of us, especially those new to this nectar of the gods, allow ourselves to be seduced to buy wine by the numbers, allowing the numerical indicators to become our absolute dictators, and treat wine as if it is as mysterious as Coke. Why not. The rating creates the impression of a quick and easy and infallible way to make a quick and easy “good” selection of wine for that special dinner that night. After all, why hang around to waste your time reading the description under the rating number when it often reads like the gibberish winespeak of the connoisseur and expert vintner that reminds you of the wine amateur you are.

The ratings, on the other hand, offer a pseudo-expertise, maybe even a snob appeal. They certainly have become a security blanket for the “lazy” and insecure wine buyer who doesn’t know or want to know very much about bouquet, merlot, vintage, reserve, zinfindal, estate, full body, legs, shiraz, thin body, character, grenache, aroma, terroir, earthy, attractive, assertive, pinot noir, balanced, crisp, closed, chardonnay, etc, etc, etc.

A lot of people in the wine industry are uncomfortable with this suggested objectivity and precision. That there is a real difference between a wine rating of 89.6 and 90.4 they charitably say is a joke. They argue that the ratings do not talk of the taster’s preferences, that they don’t indicate his likes and dislikes, that the wine ratings are little more than the opinion of a very few people, that the ratings are totally subjective, that ratings don’t say a thing about the character of the wine, and that the ratings don’t say a thing about the taste of the wine. Now before you moan and groan, keep in mind that for whatever reason everyone has jumped on the short-hand ratings bandwagon: vintners, wholesalers, retailers, buyers.

I had a taste of that rating game when I was out in the Napa Valley last month on a touristy wine-tasting trip with my family. The numbers were thrown in our faces at every “move ‘em in, sell ‘em, and move ‘em out wine-tasting room (my son, Michael, was the designated driver). When I ask about the bouquet or aroma or body, there was a slight jerk of surprise across the counter. Too many sellers in the cellars didn’t want to take the time to discuss such matters; they preferred the short-hand approach as if the ratings said it all. And yet, there was more than one very high rated wine that neither Susan nor I were high on. They just did not suit our palates. And, when I told one person at a winery that her high rated, reserve wine just didn’t have the right “mouthfeel,” she gave me a “how dare you” look as if I was some Neanderthal.

Now, a lot of you are already asking, “what does this have to do with what we do in academia, with teaching, with administering, with advising, with whatever?” Good question. My quick answer is, “A lot. Just substitute ‘grade’ for ‘wine rating.’” You see, the more I listened to McChesney’s interview, the more I realized he could have been talking about education and grades. Grades and test scores and GPA’s are academic shelf talkers. Think about it. People want to believe grades are scientifically precise when they are not. They want to believe that there is some exact difference between an 89.6 and a 90.4 when there isn’t. They want to believe grades are void of subjective preference of the graders when they are not. They want to believe there is a common standard in grades when there is not. They want to believe they know how the grade was arrived at when they don’t. They want to believe that grades indicate what a student has learned when they don’t. They want to believe grades predict what a student will do with what he or she knows when they do not. They want to believe that there isn’t anything particularly mysterious in the process of teaching and learning when there is.

I do not have any sympathy for teachers or advisers or administrators or students or anyone else anymore than I have for vintners and wine retailers and wine buyers. For all the cries and moanings and groanings about the inadequacies of grades, the first thing anyone does is to pull out and wildly wave SAT and ACT scores, other standardized scores, grades and GPAs, and rate students–and themselves–accordingly.

Now if a grade is an indicator, a place to begin to understand a student, a place to begin to understand the extent of and nature of learning, a place to begin to understand the quality of teaching, one of many indicators, that’s fine. But, too often, most often, like the wine ratings, it is the place where most begin and where most end. It has become the absolute dictator. It has become the whole story. We are enthralled with a simpleton’s version of education. And, we have become simplistic bean counters. We believe the grade is the window into the student’s intelligence and ability and potential. We believe that the grade doth make the person. We don’t have to get to know the student because the grade says it all. We believe that all we have to do is open our roll/grade book and we have a complete biography of the student.

Consequently, all we ask is “how is that graded” (”assessed” in modern jargon) or “how will this affect my grade” or “how much does this count towards the grade” or “what is this or that worth” or “what grade did you get” or “what is your GPA.” We allow the grade to so influence our assumptions and presumptions and preconceptions about a particular student that we don’t feel it necessary to get to get to know the student for the person he or she is. Acceptance, honors, probation, awards, suspension, class ranking are almost always a quick and easy numbers game. And, it will remain so as long as the producers and retailers and buyers of an education want a quick and easy buy and sell, as long as they want to drink rather than savor an education, as long as they are unsure about the purpose of an education, as long as they are insecure about the mysterious nexi of nuances called the individual person, and as long as they don’t quite have a handle on the complex and complicated–and often mysterious–processes of meaningful teaching and learning.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

Friday morning I opened the front door and stepped out to get the mail. All the snail mail span was cooked to a crisp in this heat. It’s so hot down here in South Georgia Susan had to turn on the oven to cool the house down.

Anyway, among the useless pieces of mail was an innocuous envelope. The address was hand-written. I casually and unexpectantly opened it up. As I read the first couple of lines, my heart suddenly started pounding through my chest. I folded it up. I went out to the fishpond, sat on the swing, and listened to the soothing sound of the waterfalls. After a few minutes, I slowly unfolded the letter and finished reading it. To say that I was profoundly touched might appraoch describing the feeling that enveloped me as I carefully read each word.

I would love to let you to read the letter. It says so much about the deep impact each of us can have, but I cannot. Only my Susan’s loving eyes have seen it. So, I’m going to have to be a tad cryptical and “merely” say this:

I don’t care if you’re an adviser, a classroom teacher, a secretary, an administrator, or a staff person. Be mindful! Be attentive. Be alert. Be careful. You never know. You never know what you think won’t matter just might. You never know what you do in passing will forever remain to stir someone’s soul. You never know when you might innoculate someone with a dream. You never know when you might arouse someone’s faith. You never know when a small word will open the doorway to a new path . You never know when a slight gesture will open the window and let in some fresh air. You never know when a small touch will raise the shade and let some light enter. You never know what a little bit of sincere love will open someone’s heart let some grace reach in. I’ll say it again. Be aware. Be sensitive. You never know what you think you say or do does not matter just might.

For me, this student’s letter says that each and every student comes bearing a short but resounding joyous message of hope. And this is the message: Don’t be discouraged. Don’t give up. You can surely alter the future!

And, when you heed that message and carry that belief with you, it becomes a part of all you see, listen to, think, feel, and do. And, when you carry the faith that your teaching or advising or administering or whatever you do is filled with possibilty, opportunity, meaning, and purpose, then you will know how vital, precious, enriching, and abundantly wonderful it is to be an educator.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

After four miles on the flat, sweaty south Georgia streets I almost long for the cool, Himalayan streets of San Mateo. Actually, I long for my fifteen month old Natalie.

Susan and I have been in the deep throes of “Natalie withdrawal.” It hasn’t even been two weeks since we held our grandbaby in our arms or fed her a sinful muffin or watched her dip her hands into a bowl of some Cheerios and milk to feed herself or heard her say “yesh” or changed her diaper or dressed her or put her to bed or held her hands as she struggled to take a few steps. It seems like months. She has Susan and me wrapped around her stubby little finger.

You know they say that grandchildren are God’s gift for not having strangled the kids. It’s true! We spent two weeks in the San Francisco area doing what grandparents are supposed to do. As we were spoiling Natalie rotten, I noticed something. Whatever our precious and most beautiful Natalie did, we thought it was cute. When she had a “blow out” diaper, we kidded around though we tightly wrinkled our noses; when she was tired and cranky, we compassionately cuddled her; when she “spit up” and splattered me, I just non-chalantly shrugged my shoulders and changed my shirt without a gag; when she dove into a icing-ladened cupcake, we laughed at the mess–and took pictures; when she opened her mouth to receive each morsel of a sinful blueberry muffin in the coffee shop, we smiled deliciously; when she hit a button on the TV remote that she was “eating” and turned off the show we were intently watching, we chuckled.

As we flew back on the red-eye, experiencing those first twinges of “Natalie withdrawal,” I thought about those messy diapers, cleaning the mess around Natalie’s high chair, running after this crawling dervish, the tired crankiness, and the spitting up. You know, if I had seen those things as inconveniences, irritants or annoyances, I would have made sure they would have inconvenienced, irritated, or annoyed me. And, I would have turned aside and have missed an awful lot. If I had seen them as blessings, I would have made sure they would have delighted me. It was my choice. It’s always my choice how I choose to look at things and people.

I remembered a story I had read of a Zen master. He had his first enlightened glimpse while walking through a marketplace. He overheard a customer tell the butcher, “Cut me only the good stuff”; the butcher replied, “Hey, take a look; it’s nothing but good stuff!” This was just the catalyst the master needed. He took a look at the ground, the sky, the people in their bustle of buying and selling, and from that moment on everywhere he saw nothing in them but the good stuff. It is just as I look at Natalie: nothing but the good stuff.

Maybe Natalie is now my special booster shot to continue to be acutely conscious of “the good stuff.” So, I wonder. What if we practiced our various teaching and advising and administrative and staff roles with the same attitude as both that Zen master and me when I played with, cared for, pampered, cleaned up after, spoiled, and loved Natalie? What if everything, conscious or otherwise, was, for each of us, a blessing of “the good stuff?” What if we each were enveloped only by a desiring and commited spirit of “wanting to” and never felt a compliant pressure of “had to?” What if we each I felt and expressed a constant appreciative “thank you” and never a mournful and beseeching “pleeeeease?” What if we each could not and did not say each day–as I say to my Natalie–anything other than “I love you today.”

The more I think about it, the more it hits me. I understand more something I read in one of my Michael’s books. It was an African shaman saying: “Give thanks for a little and you will find a lot.” It means I wouldn’t be changing a diaper or my soiled shirt if Natalie wasn’t there to be changed. It means be attentive and don’t treat anything as if it was made of transparent cellophane. It means see the importance of and experience a sense of abundance in each supposedly innocuous event and supposedly ordinary person. It means see the proverbial glass as half filled and not as half empty. It means the more I consider anything or anyone to be a reason for joy, the more joyful I will be and the more joyfully I will want to be with. It means the less I wallow in the difficulties, the shallower will any potential rut, and the easier and quicker it will be to get out of it. It means appreciation and gratitude is an attitude we can freely choose in order to create a better experience for ourselves and for others.

When we enter a class each day, when we walk down the hall each day, when we step on campus each day, do we, like the Zen master, work hard to see nothing but “the good stuff?” Do we say grace, offer a thank you, say “I love you” for the offering of challenge, opportunity, possibility of growing, changing, touching someone, and changing the world? Do we make an grateful heart a regular, natural, and buoyant part of our day?

If you do, I guarantee it will boost your spirits. It will be as with my Natalie. You will look forward to each moment; you won’t be able to wait for each moment; you will wonder in each moment; you will be awed at each moment; you will find your sense sharpened each moment; you will find yourself seeing and listening to so much more each moment; you will be delighted each moment; you will appreciate each moment; you will know each moment is a gift; you will feel each moment; you will find much to celebrate and be thankful for; you will hear the music each moment; you will dance each moment; you will refresh and be refreshed each moment.

If I have one updraft that keeps my spirit soaring about my Natalie, each of my two sons, my Susan, each student, my garden, teaching, and life in general, it is this: be a living text of thankfulness for “the good stuff.” I tell myself each day to take things and people with gratitude and not take them for granted; I tell myself that I must be grateful to them and be grateful for them. And each time I can successfully find and ride those rising currents, be it changing Natalie’s messy diaper, cleaning her messy hands and face, working on my own messes, helping each student help him/herself, or connecting with a colleague or friend, I find a calm contentment and a quiet joy in my belief that what I am doing is unsurpassable.

Have a safe and happy July 4th (and a belated happy Canada Day to my Canadian friends). Susan and I are off to the Atlantic coast in a few hours to pop a few firecrackers and down a few hamburgers with old friends of ours.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–