“I’d Like To, But I Don’t Have Tenure.”

“I’d like to, but I don’t have tenure.”

I read that sorrowful sentence this morning in a message. I had heard that same, forlorn sentence last night at a public forum. These mournful, rationalizing words came from two friends and colleagues, accomplished Ph.D.s, talented professionals, edcucators, loving people whom I greatly admire and respect. That’s the tragedy.

Do you know what that cursed sentence really is about? Fear: ever-lurking, hesitating, constricting, restricting, distrusting, self-disrespecting, unloving, debilitating, equivocating, sitting down, hiding, paralyzing fear.

Do you know what and whom that sentence is really about? Themselves.

Do you know what that sentence seeks? Safety, comfort, convenience, security, guarantee.

Do you know on what road that sentence takes them? The well-traveled, easy road.

Do you know away from what road that sentence takes them? The less-traveled, right road.

Do you know what that sentence really says? “Push me around.”

Do you know what that sentence really does

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

Where Do You Get Your Energy

It 5:16 am by the computer clock. Here I am in front of the computer with my finger composing their own choreography, resting only to pick up the cup of hot, freshly brewed Kona coffee. Hit the streets almost as soon as I hit the floor. 4:04 am. It was a delightful walk. Getting in shape for trodding the himalyan streets of San Mateo doubtlessly accompanied by a local Yeti in two weeks. Mid 50s. Shirtless. Five miles–at last. Had Mercury’s wings on my New Balances. Less than an hour–finally. Alone, but never lonely. In myself with myself. Slowly in harmony with the silent world around me. I breathed slowly. I drew in deep breaths. My feet and lungs were in rhythm. No labor. No grimacing aches or pains. Just smiling joy. Inhaled the fresh early morning smells. I relished the rich, spring colors glowing in both the bright moonlight and the lamplight. Paid attention to the melodic whistle of the birds. Felt the cool air rushing around me. For five miles, I was conscious of and aware of and sensitive to every movement, the way my hips swayed, my thighs lifted, my knees bent, my ankles hinged, my hands swung, and my fingers clenched and wiggled. I was aware of what this rhythm of movement and flow was doing. I was exercising my mind, body, and spirit. I was in mobile meditation, mindfulness in motion, every time my foot hit the asphalt street or concrete sidewalk. It brought before me the whole mystery of existence. It’s so hard not to be thankful, not to appreciate the world in which I live, and not to be grateful to be alive and part of life. This physical exercise is my path to spiritual energy. It all brings a deep sense of oneness within me that gets me ready for and stays with me all the coming day.

Today, to the step by step cadence, I quickly found myself unexpectedly listing off a series of “I.” It was the full answer to a question posed by a colleague a few weeks ago as we met by chance in front of West Hall. I was going to class, bouncing along, carrying a heavy box filled with weekly journals, my boom box singing some Barry White, stopping to small talk to some students, laughing with them, arching my back to counterbalance the load. As I turned to enter the building, I bumped into a colleague who was coming out from the building with a dancing “Hey, ……. How are you doing today?

“Where do you get all the energy you spend?” he quickly asked.

I stopped even though the heavy box was ripping my arms out from my shoulder sockets. Knowing that he reads my stuff, I answered something like, “From living to the full letter and spirit of my Alphabet of Teaching.” “But,” I added, “the interesting thing is that my Alphabet of Teaching has to be also my Alphabet of Living. I get my energy from realizing each minute, each day, my life is what I choose to make of them. Life is too precious, teaching is too precious to waste it on annoyance or worse, and not have fun and just enjoy.”

He smiled. I smiled. We headed off in opposite directions.

I’ve thought about that brief exchange a lot lately. The last few weeks have been an interesting mix. They’ve been seismic to say the least. Heck, they’ve been a test: a relatively new roof with a serious leak coming through the hallway ceiling and the roofer having gone bankrupt and nowhere to be found, a few unexpected “deep” and personal conversations with struggling and troubled students, swarming honey bees in a wall of the house, the birth of our second grand-daughter, swarming termites in another wall of the house, the rising joy of the impending birth our our third grand-daughter, ripping out two outside walls and a ceiling of the den, a humbling letter from a student, dealing with the prospect of prostrate cancer, getting a cleam bill of heath from the biopsy and other tests, an exchange with whom I hope is a new-found e-colleague and friend, the prospect of having surgery to fuse a badly arthritic left big toe (maybe after getting a second and third opinion). Yeah, it’s been an “interesting” few weeks.

Looking back on this Richter period, I’ve decided that it’s true. Each encounter is mine to make of it what I will. I control everything that goes on inside even if I can’t control what goes on outside. After thinking about it long and hard, after walking on it long and hard, I’ve decided that I want to enjoy life and want to make each day as full as I can; I am never really satisfied making excuses or rationalizations; I never really feel comfortable laying blame; I never feel comfortable settling for less than what I am capable of achieving–whatever that is; I always want to live up to my potential–whatever that is. I want to make a difference and use my abilities toward that transforming use. I don’t always do it, and I don’t like me when I don’t do it, but I never take a “no” from myself.

So, where do I get my energy? Here is where that list of “I” I drew up on the walk this morning comes in: I enjoy; I love; I play; I relax; I exercise; I imagine; I meditate; I create; I balance; I celebrate; I share:

I am excitedly aware
I am thankfully mindful
I always feel the wind in my face
I usually let go and don’t hold on
I don’t blame
I willingly attend to, to encourage, to support
I choose the positive over the negative
I keenly look for, hear out for, see, and listen to newness every day
I make sure that I learn something new every day
I treat each day with newness
I accept imperfection and pain as a part of life; I just don’t get mired
in them
I stand back so that I can revel in the moment, grin at the silly,
not be serious with myself
I see through the creative eye of an artist, the always something to toy
with, the always something to shape and reshape, the always
something to pull and stretch.
I loudly celebrate
I go to the movies
I live today; I have learned not to dig up and worry about what is coming;
I have learned how to throw the heavy “what has been” off my back and
bury it
I exercise my body regularly; I power walk four to five miles every other
day
I exercise my mind regularly; I do crossword puzzles every morning
I exercise my soul regularly; I enjoy silence by myself so that I can add
substance and subtract superficial stuff from my life
I never feel stuck in a rut of routine
I love what I do and do what I love
I sing in the rain
I blow on dandelions
I am a “nudge” with my angelic Susan
I have refused to “grow up” and see myself as an “experienced teenager.”
I seek help from fellow listeners and see-ers
I unconditionally believe and have faith simply because the person is
there
I unconditionally have hope simply because the person is there
I am religious, but not in a structural, ritual, and ceremonial way
I unconditionally give because the person is there
I love without expectation of return because the person is there
I don’t wait for the perfect moment
I don’t expect the perfect student or moment
I don’t “push it”
I am not consumed
I take things in stride and place them in perspective
I relish my cups of freshly brewed coffee
I am always in physical, intellectual, spiritual motion
I don’t apologize for my authenticity
I never feel I have to prove anything to anyone
I never feel I need to impress others
I don’t feel guilty about my uniqueness
I don’t feel self-conscious about my growing spirituality
I am not embarrassed by loving each student
I don’t hesitate to take risks because I learn from them
I don’t feel the lesser by making mistakes because I learn from them
I am respectful
I never offer advice because people need loving presence more than
solutions or judgement
I take on what others see as impossibility because I only see possibility
I look for the challenge because I see it as opportunity
I read a book
I watch a sports game, especially Tarheel basketball
I watch a television show
I garden
I sculpt
I imagine
I make mistakes
I design
I build
I do carpentry, plumbing, tiling, painting, plastering,
I write poetry
I remodel
I venture
I meditate
I experiment
I am comfortable with an “oops”
I stretch my body, my mind, my spirit so that my reach exceeds my grasp
I laugh and smile, laugh and smile, laugh and smile
I share my learning
I share my discoveries
I share my stories
I share myself

I enjoy; I love; I play; I relax; I exercise; I imagine; I create; I
celebrate;
I share.

I just sent this list to my colleague (yeah, he’ll get another copy) with this added note I’d like to share with you.
“Doing all of this requires a lot of preparation and being prepared. They each take a lot of struggle. They’re so commanding and demanding. They each demand attention, demand adventure, demand demanding self-reflection and self-examination, demand uncomfortable honesty, demand inconvenience and discomfort, demand I ask the big questions and not settle for the short term and comfortable answers, demand lots of both learning and discovery, and consume a lot–a lot–of commanding energy.

Let me let you in on a little secret I learned yesterday from being a listener for a tearful student. Give and you will receive. You’ll receive two-fold, five-fold, ten-fold, a hundred-fold. When you live your life as your prayer, when you transform everything into compassion for others, when you use everything in the service of others, when you use everything to be aware and mindful of others, when you use everything to understand and be sensitive to others, when you use everything to comfort others, when you use everything to lift up others, when you use everything to make a difference in the lives of others, when you use everything to be a “lidlifter,” a “life changer,” a “transformer,” you do all that for yourself as well. And so, to answer your question you threw at me in front of West, the curious thing is that while all this does consume a lot energy, there is nothing like them to create a heck of a lot more energy and energize me.”

It’s getting late. Gotta “run” to mediate for class.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

The Class

Good morning. Classes began yesterday again after too short of a week long Spring Break. It was a heck of a Spring Break week for me. Some break. No break. It nearly broke me. You know that television ad about swarming termites in the house? Well, that was my and Susan’s house!! In the spirit of Passover, I wish these angels of destruction has passed over our house. But, no. They treated the house like the first born of Egypt. They fed on our house like voters at politician’s barbecue. Those uninvited and voracious buggers had taken out large portions of two outside walls and a ceiling in the den. You just had to be there to appreciate it. After two weeks of contending with bonding exterminators and contractors, it was my turn to put on the finishing touches. They nearly finished me. I’ve spent the last seven days, from sunrise to sunset, in endless ripping out, plastering, sawing, hammering, hauling, measuring, designing, cursing, bandaging hammered thumbs, cleaning cuts, masoning in stone facades, laying tile floor, putting in a new ceiling, routing, mudding, painting, pilgriming to Home Depot and Lowe’s, and nursing aching muscles as I struggled to undo the ravages of termites. And it still isn’t finished. The only respite I’ve had was my pre-dawn walks and my planting strolls in my garden.

And then again, there was Nina, who put everything into perspective and made sure it had been a magnificent week. Our wait is over. Nina Danielle, our beautiful second grand-daughter, was born: 7lbs, 13 oz. We’ll soon be on a plane to California. She’s not yet in the grandma and grandpa stage to be spoiled, but her two year old sister, Natalie, is! Yummy!!

Anyway, in the midst of this chaos, I had come in from a refreshing pre-dawn walk in a refreshing drizzle to read a refreshing message from a new-found e-friend. She said that she really had gotten a lot out of the workshop I had offered at the Lily Conference last November on forging classroom community. What she wanted was to grasp the spirit of the entirety of the class. As soon as I finished reading her request, I thought of a mid-term evaluation I had received from self-avowed average students that was anything but average. It was reflective, insightful, and profound. So, to accommodate her, I think I’ll let these students offer a wisp of the spirit of the class through their eyes and with their words:

“Hey Schmier:

You wanted an honest mid-term evaluation of you and how the class is going from each of us. And, you said you really didn’t want a ‘golly, gee-whiz, quickie.’ You said you wanted each of us to think long and hard about what’s gone on because our evaluations are important to you and that most of how the class feels and operates came from suggestions and comments in these and the final evaluations. We figured out that if you read every word of our weekly journals, you’ll read this, respect our opinions, and listen to what we have to say.

Well, when you read this ‘Remember THE CHAIR!’ We did. So, our community had decided to write this together as our own special project instead of doing individual evaluations and then send it to you by e-mail instead of handing it in during class. Think about doing evaluations that way. It forced us to talk with each other, think about things, work together some more, and be honest with each other and you. This was not as easy a project as we thought it would be, but it was fun doing it over pizza and beer. Of course, none of the projects in this class are easy, although having fun doing them tricks you into thinking they are. We had different things each of us wanted to say and we had to put it all together like a quilt. We’re calling this project “The Editorial.” This is going to be a long one. So, sit back and relax. Here goes.

The class: how about a ‘golly, gee-whiz?’ Just kidding. But a ‘Wow’ and a ‘Wonderful’ and sometimes ‘Ugh,’ ‘Different’ and a ‘Challenge’ and especially ‘what a surprise’ will do!! There are more words we can use, and we will later on. At first, we thought this class would be a joke and a snap. We heard there’d be no lectures and no note taking and no papers and no tests and no grading. Heck, it’s anything but a snap. This class is a habit breaking class that sometimes throws you into aches and pains of withdrawal. We have had to rethink a lot of stuff. We had to learn to unlearn ourselves. You want us to learn to do stuff to learn not just to pass a test and get a grade. It demands that we depend on each other in a community for whatever we do. That’s something none of us was used to doing. As such, here are another set of words for this class, it’s a challenging, demanding, inconvenient, uncomfortable, and time consuming pain in the ass! But, to our surprise it has become such a nice pain. Turns out that so far this is the only class any of us three wouldn’t miss for anything. Remember that none of us have missed a class! None of us can say that for any of our other class now or before. And, it’s an eight in the morning class!!!!! We never know what is doing to be going down. Each day is a surprise that gets our curiosity going. Heck, it gets us going. It’s really better than a sugar kick. Even on Fridays!!!!!!!!!! Especially Fridays after Thursday Party Night. :-)) Yeah, it’s too bad, we don’t have it every day. It’s the best upper each of us has to get out of bed and get the day started.

It all started with us thinking you were some kind of a nut what with Barry White coming out of your boom box, you greeting us at the door, shaking our hands, introducing yourself, getting us to meet each other and talk with each other, putting us at ease, making us feel wanted and welcomed. The letters from the students of last semester that gave us the inside poop was awesome. That’s a real keeper. Probably second only to THE CHAIR. That takes guts and trust and respect to do! There was the creation of what you called Communities of Mutual Support and Encouragement. We thought at first it was just the same ole teamwork stuff. We were wrong, but we’re getting ahead of our story. There were the three unbreakable rules that you laid down: everyone had to face each other in a community, no one could say anything in class without first introducing himself, and no one could say anything negative about themselves. There are no strangers in this class. You have to work hard at it to be one. There were the ‘getting to know ya’ exercises, the “this is what I want you to know about me objects,” the ‘treasure hunts’ and interviews and portfolio image project that got us to give ourselves a community name, to help us feel comfortable with each other and get to know each other and learn to work and communicate with each other. We loved the “Communication, Communication, Communication” exercise. “The Story” was wild, but we haven’t used it enough afterwards. Somehow you got to use it more and tie it into what we’re doing and history more.

At first, we didn’t understand why we had to stand up and sing solo. Then, we saw your madness as we debriefed and use it almost every day. It’s true. If we sang, we can kick ass. We can’t hide behind our shyness as much. There’s a reason for all of your madness. And, of course, there was the ultimate reason and madness, there was the amazing ‘THE CHAIR.’ What would we do without ‘THE CHAIR?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?’ It’s everything. It’s at the center of everything we do. That’s a triple keeper. The those ‘what do you want to know about me’ stories where you told us about yourself connected with us is a close behind ‘The Chair.’ You came out from behind the lecture thing and showed us how human you were, just like us. Some us had tears in our eyes and goose-bumps all over as you told us about Kim and your pinky nail and the story of how you changed your attitude towards us and why this class is what this class is. You don’t know this, but one of our mothers (we won’t tell you who) had you about twenty years ago and she can’t believe the stuff we do. You really were really a demanding bastard back in those days who put the fear of god in the students. And now, you’re a demanding nice and caring guy who really loves– yes, loves–students. We know how you’re secretly giving ……. a special second chance. And, we heard you’re giving someone a special third chance in another class. You don’t know what it means to a lot of us when each Wednesday and Friday you send us off with a ‘don’t drink and drive and don’t drive with anyone who has been drinking.’ We’ll just say that one weekend one of us thought of what you said before we got into a car and it saved, really saved, one of our butts, legally and physically. Thanks for caring. That means a hell of lot to us. Too bad, we somehow feel embarrassed to say it openly.

The closing of our eyes to music at the beginning of class at first we thought was sappy, but after a week or two it got under our skin and we were looking forward to it each day. It really settled things down while we closed our eyes and got into the mood to do whatever we’re doing that day. It felt weird when you came in one day without the boom box because it had broken. Writing on the blackboard about how we’re feeling when we come into class we also thought was stupid and yet we got to see how each of us felt and we think it gave you a sense of what was going on with each of us. We remember, and you probably didn’t know a lot of us noticed, that when ……. wrote ‘really, really scared’ on the board, you quickly went over to her and started talking with her real quietly and brought out a nervous smile and then caringly tapped her shoulder. And the next couple of classes asked her how she was handling stuff and if there was anything you could do to help. That was tight!

We’re not wild about journaling everyday, but they let you see what’s going with each of us that effects us in class. So, we guess they’re okay. But, we can’t really write. Oops, will that negative cost us each a dollar donation? :-)) or :-((

Anyway, the ‘Words of the Day’ on the board that you tie to the material with our personal lives, ‘work days,’ the birthday donuts, the late-to-class charity ‘donation’ fee of fifty cents for being disrespectful, the ‘consequence’ fee of donuts for everyone if our cell phone goes off (even you had to pay up with donuts for your screw up) for being disrespectful, the ‘no negatives’ charity ‘donation’ fee of one dollar if we say an ‘I can’t’ or some other negative about ourselves for being disrespectufl, all that helps, or, at least, can start to help us be respectful to other and ourselves if we want. Strange that whether we know it or not or want it or not, it creeps up on most of us. We all started as strangers to each other and a lot of time to ourselves, created what we at first called teams or groups, and amazingly almost all of us became communities–really families– and are now going beyond that to become a supporting family for each other. None of us would have believed that could happen when we first came in. We hope it’s happening in other communities. We know it’s not. There’s that one community that fights like cats and dogs. No one listens and everyone talks, and isn’t even a team. And, there’s another where one person never shows up or does anything. They don’t get it. Some don’t want to get it. Takes all kinds, doesn’t it. We can imagine their evaluations. It’s like the quote from Popeye the Sailor that you wrote on the board one day, ‘Youse gets out whats youse puts in.’ How you don’t let it annoy you is absolutely amazing. But, what we really like is that even if you you can’t get to everyone, you never stop trying. We guess you do because you know, like you wrote on the board, you only fail when you stop trying. So, please, don’t ever give up on anyone at any time for any reason. Let you in on a secret, as if anything in the class is a secret to you–it’s amazing what you see and hear–following your example, we’re helping two other communities that are having problems and telling them how we handle weird schedules and lots of outside stuff. That’s what it’s really all about isn’t it, embracing each other. We’re helping each other more than you dictating to us what to do. It’s that damn ‘CHAIR’ again.

As far as the “weird projects,”(just kidding), it’s really hard to get together to work on a project because we have such different class and work schedules. We really appreciate that you understand that and give us in-class work days for each project and it’s up to us to take advantage of the opportunity you give us. Some communities, at times us included, don’t take advantage of these work days and get annoyed when you don’t extend the due date for a project, especially when something, like paper is due in another class, comes up, but that is our choice whether we, as you say, choose wisely and use the time. We have to play, as you wrote on the blackboard, ‘the responsibility game instead of the blame game’ and ‘those who live by the last minute, die by the last minute.’

We decided we learn more about history from the projects and will remember more than from just sitting and taking notes from a usually boring lecture and studying (read memorizing) just to take a test and forgetting most of it. We figured out that these projects trick us into learning without us knowing it. Well, your secrets are out. We’re telling everyone. You know, the stuff from the first project still sticks with us. This class is nothing like any of us ever experienced or expected. We’re so much our own learners. We even teach each other. Every time we ask what do you want, like you promised at the beginning of the class, you answer something like ‘You heard the rules’ or ‘Remember the chair.’ We know we’re not allowed to say ‘it’s hard,’ only ‘its possible.’ We know we’re not allowed to say ‘can’t,’ only ‘can’–unless we want to donate a dollar to the charity fund. So, we’ll say that we’ve been surprised to find how much we thought was impossible is possible and how much we thought we couldn’t do we could if we, like you wrote on the board, let challenge be an opportunity instead of a roadblock. You know this is not only a history class it’s a class in getting along in life.

Because of ‘THE CHAIR’ the class has been one big free-spirit. It’s like an colorful invitation to be free to learn without fear. We think that the freedom you give us in doing the project is probably the best motivation we have. As you say, it’s our class. It’s up to each of us to take advantage of and use the freedom as we did our community building exercises, created our community portfolio, drew our abstract painting of the first two chapters about Reconstruction, wrote our Dr. Seuss book for the next two on big business and inventions, and just wrote the lyrics and sang our song about Progressivism. We heard we might have to do an advertising campaign, make a sculpture, go on a scavenger, make a Hollywood film, and write a feature piece for 60 Minutes after interviewing you about living during the 1940s and 1950s. It’s really a turn on. We decided that that’s because the way the class runs is based the fact that you respect and believe in us probably more than we do. We also decided one day over a pizza and beer at the Mellow Yellow as we worked on this project that this class operates by another bunch of words: challenge, imagination, freedom, creativity, community, focus, fun, encouragement, respect, care, and discover. It’s amazing. They all come from THE CHAIR. This time we want to explain what we mean with these words because they’re so important to us now.

Challenge is, as you wrote once on the board for the Words for the Day and each of us pinned on our wall in the dorm, a ‘supposed to be an always.’ We don’t learn anything from easy. Easy means we already know how to do it. It’s a not easy learning how to change. It’s not easy learning to depend on each other when we’ve been taught not to depend on anyone for our grade. But, as you told us, that’s the way it is, to depend on others and communicate with them for your success, in the real world. It’s also not easy to put grades in the background. We saw that if we can, as you wrote on the board, make barriers into opportunity and impossible into possible and take ourselves to amazing places a lot of us thought either never existed or couldn’t ever reach, there’s nothing we can’t do. Did we tell you we and a lot of us others love those guiding ‘Words for the Day?’

Imagination is like fatlighter.

Creativity is the spark.

“THE CHAIR” is like wind that fans the spark into a flame and then into a big bonfire and gets us cooking, and gives us confidence to take the chance to find and use what we have in us.

Community means we’re not alone. It gets us over the fear of being burnt by the fire. We started as strangers, became acquaintances, then friends, in our community we now family. We’re tight. We wouldn’t have met each other except in a class like this. We’re friends. We’re less fearful of being ourselves and how we come off to others. Sometimes we don’t even realize it like we’re doing right now. We really don’t care if this is what you wanted or not. This is the type of evaluation we want. REMEMBER THE CHAIR!!

Fun means loving to learn and enjoying it and going for it instead of being afraid to making mistakes, getting penalized, and failing.

Encouragement lets us know we can do it because you and each of us really care about each of us. We’re always appreciated. You re always there to help us along the way. Every one of us. You’re always listening and hearing and looking and seeing and talking with each of us. You more than care. You love each of us. We know you say it and thought it was nerdy. Now we say you live it and think it’s awesome. We saw it with …… and ……. and ……. You’re never negative about us or anything we do. You never let us be negative about ourselves. Sometimes you tell us what we don’t want to hear but have to hear. You get in our face because we have to face ourselves. You’re really fearless in a very kind way. Sometimes some us say we disappoint you and you tell us that we disappoint and disrespect ourselves, but you never give up on any of us and never walk away.

Experiment means ‘Remember THE CHAIR,’ ‘take a chance’ like this evaluation. Again, it’s like you wrote on the board–and you thought no one was reading them–‘no experiment is a failure if you’ve learned from it.’ So, you let us make mistakes, expect us to make mistakes, don’t penalize us, and help us learn from them. You know we’re no more perfect than you are. We’re allowed to screw up, to make mistakes because you’re a man of many second chances and you’ve said this class or any class is really practice for the ‘game of life–and followed through on those words with a ‘do it again.’

Discover means now more than just learning a bunch of facts, passing a test, and getting a grade. It means looking at ourselves. That is the biggest challenge. It’s like you wrote on the board, “everything we can be is already inside us.” We found that we’re not as shy as we thought, we shouldn’t be afraid as we thought, we are more creative than people said, and there’s nothing we can’t do if we use all the words we’ve learned so far in this class. You re always by our side helping us use these words. It’s a struggle, but like you and Popeye say, we get nothing from doing nothing. We are so far amazed at how much we’ve learned about history, ourselves, and life, and how much what we’ve learned we’ve used in other classes and outside classes, and are sure we will use long after we graduate. We can’t wait to see what’s coming in the rest of the semester and what we can do that we thought we couldn’t do.

So, how’d we do on this project?”

There’s the proverbial hitting nail on the head, the My Fair Lady “I think they’ve got it,” all in a nutshell: the spirit of the class. Not bad for supposedly average students, each of whom had written in their journals that they couldn’t write. And, I told them that, but this time I didn’t charge them a negative donation.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

On Student Evaluations

When I put together my post-tenure review book, at the beginning of the two inch thick tome were xeroxes of the latest student evaluations. Not some concocted statistical computation, but the hand-written or typed evaluations themselves, the long ones and the short ones, the good and bad and indifferent, the glowing ones and the damning one, the “what do you think” ones, the mid-term ones, the final ones. Every one of them. No culling out. Over five hundred in all!

Yeah, I’ve heard all the resistant grumblings about student evaluations: they’re popularity contests; best evaluations go to the easiest graders; students aren’t mature enough to make mature judgements; students don’t know enough to comment on quality of teaching; they’re used by administrators to punish or reward. In the words of the King of Siam, “Etc., etc., etc.” Of all the unfounded rejecting, self-serving, and defensive reluctant mumblings about student evaluations, the one I find most interesting is the one that says student evaluations don’t improve teaching. Well, let me take that one on. I stand here to say that there’s a half truth to that. A student evaluation is not a magic wand or handful of pixie dust. It’s not the sure fire fix-it from “This Old Academic House.” It’s is not synonymous with “abracadabra.” It won’t automatically turn the pumpkin into a coach or the rat into a magnificant steed or the char girl into a beautiful princess.

Of course, a half truth is a disguised half lie. No, there’s nothing automatic in the effect of student evaluations. They won’t improve teaching if you won’t let them, if don’t want them to, if you don’t act on them. They will if you do. It’s your choice. You can be closed to them or you can be open. You can turn a blind eye and deaf ear to them or you can see and listen deeply and sincerely. It’s simply just a simple matter of how you choose to look at a student and choose to evaluate his or her evaluation.

I have used a variety of student evaluations long before it was officially required. Thanks to them, my desk floweth over with less-than-neat heaps of student evaluations. It is they which makes my desk top look like the annex to the county landfill and is one of the reasons why my angelic, though neat-picking, Susan won’t step foot into my office. Actually, the growing variety of student evaluations is the result of “why don’t you” comments and suggestions from student evaluations that have resulted in many a reflective “what if.” In fact, the concept, structure, operation, and spirit of the class over the years has developed out from my experimenting “let see what would happen” implementation of student recommendations.

I am constantly, incessantly, every day, pouring over sloppy, tottering stacks of them. I am opening folders, pulling sheets, looking for clues, leaning back and staring at the moldy ceiling, deeply imagining, intently reading and rereading, and listening to their words. Some evaluations are free written comments; some are responses to my own questionaire. There are page-long or more evaluations and short paragraph or one liners; there are seriously taken ones and the not-so-serious taken ones; there are the ones thought through and the ones quickly jotted down; there are the ones given lots of time and the ones not given any time. They are a diverse collection from a diverse gathering of people with diverse personalities and habits and experiences and attitudes. But, every evaluation has something to say and says something. If you know how to read an evaluation, each is an insightful and telling story that helps you to read each student’s story.

So, collected and stacked on my desk is a growing array of “so what do you think” evaluations written after we’ve completed the semester beginning week and a half, community building “getting to know ya” exercises. There are the community evaluations written after each of the five to seven projects. There are the intermittent “how are things going” evaluations. There are the mid-term evaluations. There are the end-of-semester evaluations. There are the notes I have taken from the comments in the daily student journals. And, of course, there are the ones I usually never see or hear, the confidential letters written by students at the end of one semester and read by the students on the first day of class of the next semester.

Often I look at the stacks of loose paper and manila folders, ponder both the time and effort I spend on them, and think. What good is a student evaluation if it isn’t resting on the irons bonds of mutual respect, trust, and honesty? What good is a student evaluation if the student feels he or she can’t be honest? What good is a student evaluation if in the back of the student’s lurks fear of recrimination? What good is a student evaluation if I don’t take it seriously? What good is a student evaluation if I don’t honestly respect his or her observations, feelings, attitudes, comment, suggestions, and recommendations? What good is a student evaluation if I don’t sincerely use it as a proverbial finger on a student’s pulse. What good is a student evaluation if I don’t use it to become more aware, more sensitive, more mindful. What good is a student evaluation if I don’t use it to see and listen more intently? What good is a student evaluation unless I let it truly inform, inspire, and energize me? What good is a student evaluation if it doesn’t give me pause? What good is a student evaluation if I can’t accept criticism as well as I accept applause? What good is a student evaluation unless it generates some rich inner dialogue, thoughtful reflection, and, if need be, an adjustment of my attitude and action?

If it doesn’t do all of that, if I dismiss it with a cavalier “what do they know,” if I ignore it with an arrogant “it’s a popularity contest,” if I reject it with a defensive “it doesn’t improve teaching,” if I if I find all sorts of reasons and rationalizations and explanations to reject its validity, if it reflects merely a reluctant compliance rather than a deep commitment, all that paperwork is meaningless; all it does is kill trees, fill a report, create a false image of concern, and collect dust.

No, student evaluations will help me help myself improve my teaching and become the teacher I am capable of becoming only if I choose to let them help me.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–