Notes from the underground professor
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Bring back wood shop and home ec! (plus orchestra, French, drama, history, literature and all that)

9/30/2015

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 The other day a friend of mine posted an article by Nicholas Wyman in Forbes (here): "Why we desperately need to bring back vocational training in schools."  

You might assume this is a strange article for me to be plugging, given that my blog is ostensibly about saving the arts and humanities in higher education—not a cause usually associated either with reading Forbes or with promoting vocational training.  But if you assume that, you assume wrong.   

I completely agree with Wyman that we should return shop classes to the school curriculum—and let’s extend that to include home economics as well (while untethering both endeavors from antiquated, gendered assumptions). That isn’t to say that we should minimize the humanities, or foreign languages, or the performing arts (nor does Wyman ever say that).   I say we need more of everything.

When you think about it, why wouldn’t a pro-arts and humanities person be in favor of vocational training?  After all, how are we going to enjoy concerts or literary readings or theatrical performances if nobody knows how to build the facilities that house them?  (For that matter, how are we going to go to the bathroom at such events if we don’t have janitors and plumbers?)  How are we going to store materials in archives and libraries if nobody is trained in the climate-control technology we need to keep materials from deteriorating? How are we going to live in houses if nobody knows how to build them? How will we even survive if nobody knows how to grow food?

On a practical level, it sounds like a no-brainer—of course we need all kinds of occupations and all kinds of people.  That seems obvious, right?  But I’ve met enough snobs in my lifetime to make me wonder if it really is all that obvious, and I’ve known more than a few panicky parents who would faint away at the thought of their own child growing up to be, say, an auto mechanic.  
We need everybody.  Snobbery is ugly.

Collectively, as a society we make a number of false and potentially harmful assumptions.  We assume that those who engage in physical, tangible work are incapable of and/or uninterested in the life of the mind.  We assume that the “voc-tech” track leads to a “lesser” life.  We assume it is both acceptable and necessary to label, classify, and qualitatively “rank” human beings based on how they earn their livings.  We assume that some means of making an honest living are more honorable than others (doctors, lawyers, professors or entertainers are considered more “valuable” than plumbers, carpenters, secretaries or hairdressers, for example). 

As if that weren’t enough, we extend our assumptions to include avocations—as if people’s interests outside the workplace should somehow “track” with their occupations. We assume that some hobbies are more worthy than others (classical music is “classier” than rock music, the ballet is morally superior to NASCAR, etc.); and we assume that one’s livelihood should dictate one’s leisure pursuits (retail clerks read Nora Robbins, not Virginia Woolf).  

Simply reversing the values assigned to these assumptions does not do much to change the status quo.  I’ve known many so-called “blue collar” folks who, understandably weary of feeling put down by those who wear whiter collars, reverse the values assigned to various pursuits: NASCAR may be considered “lower” than ballet, but hey, “at least it’s manly”; classical music and theatre are for “wusses,” and so forth.  (This kind of “reverse elitism” is often accompanied by the gendering of certain leisure preferences—what better way to diss something than by feminizing it?  But I digress.)  

Even Wyman falls into this same assumptions-and-classifications trap when he states:  “Not everyone is good at math, biology, history and other traditional subjects that characterize college-level work.  Not everyone is fascinated by Greek mythology, or enamored with Victorian literature, or enraptured by classical music.  Some students are mechanical; others are artistic.  Some focus best in a lecture hall or classroom; still others learn best by doing, and would thrive in the studio, workshop or shop floor.”  

On the one hand, I don’t disagree.   Who would argue that different people have different preferences, skill levels, interests and capabilities?   And who would claim that we shouldn’t try to meet the educational needs of the widest possible range of people?  (Don't answer that--I've met people who do seem to believe that.)  

On the other hand, I find this particular statement too reductive—too “either/or.”  Why is it not possible for a human being to be both mechanical and artistic?  

My father was an engineer who dabbled in oil painting.   My mother trained and worked for years as a bookkeeper; she quit that job to teach piano.  My husband worked as a union carpenter in commercial high-rise construction before becoming a history professor (who can still fix almost anything and knows how to remodel our house).  I myself worked for many years as a stenographer before I returned to the university and developed my current professorial career.  We are fortunate to have developed both “vocational” skills and academic capabilities, and I’m fortunate to have known (and been raised by) people who refused to accept the kind of “either/or” trap that Wyman both points out and, paradoxically, falls into. 

I know many such examples of people who engage in creative and/or intellectual pursuits and know how to do so-called “practical” things.  Arguing that we must choose between two options is as short-sighted as arguing against learning new languages when studies show clearly that bilingualism confers many cognitive benefits.  Considering how the human brain operates, wouldn’t knowing how to do a multitude of things, some labeled “mechanical” and others labeled “artistic,” work in a similar way?  

Wyman points out, I believe correctly, that high school voc-tech classes were originally challenged because of concern over “tracking” students at an early age, which often straitjacketed those labeled “vocational.”  Yet, rather than getting at the roots of the issue—our society’s obsession with “status,” disrespect for physical labor, and limiting assumptions about where certain kinds of people “belong”—the powers-that-be decided to remove the voc-tech option from the curriculum altogether.  (This move, I would argue, actually had the ironic effect of reducing the status of technical workers even further.)
   
What should have happened is for voc-tech training to stay in place, but without the negative stigma and without a “tracking” approach that trapped people for life in a whole network of limiting assumptions.  Wood shop lovers could have been welcomed into the orchestra or drama programs, aspiring scholars could have learned how to craft objects in metal, and students of both genders, regardless of career aspiration, could have learned to cook and sew.  (Granted, nobody can do everything—there are so many hours in a day—but why can’t we envision an educational system that offers people a smorgasbord of options?)

In the future we may well experience a return of vocational training to secondary schools as the need for “practical” job training becomes more acute.  After all, if our climate keeps heading toward catastrophe, the day will come when those who know how to do hands-on things have a distinct advantage over those who do not. (For instance, lots of affluent people may discover the hard way that it takes far less skill to brandish an environmentally correct re-usable shopping bag than it does to grow organic vegetables yourself.)

But that doesn’t mean the arts and humanities are useless, either.  Nor does it mean they should be preserved only for an elite few.  After all, the humanities address and express what it means to be human—and that includes everybody.  All human beings must make a living somehow (unless we are born into wealth, which most of us are not), and like it or not, we might not all be able to make our livings in arts-and-humanities-related fields.  But that hardly means the arts and humanities should be done away with.  All people benefit in multiple ways when a society offers a robust arts and humanities infrastructure.

Why does it seem so hard for us to envision an ironworker who loves to attend—or even act in—the theatre?  Or an electrician who writes poetry?  Or an art history professor who knows how to fix a leaking sink?  Or a lawyer who tinkers with racecars?  Actually, many of us probably know a good many such people (because real people are always more interesting and multifaceted than stereotypes, thank goodness).  We just need to stop thinking those combinations are weird, open our minds, move past labels, and embrace all kinds of work and leisure pursuits as valid, valuable, and potentially enriching.

We lack collective imagination if we can’t envision an educational system that accounts for complexity in both human capabilities and human needs.  Why can’t we contemplate, and bring into being, an approach to education that teaches people the practical skills that will help them to make a living, and imparts the creative and intellectual attributes that will help them to make a life? 
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Just say no to academic rigor

9/12/2015

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A couple of weeks ago, we went to the open house at our son’s high school.  The principal—a decent guy with a stellar reputation—told us we’ll be pleased to know that this school has ranked second in the state for “rigor,” behind one of the prestigious private schools.  From what I could tell, most of the parents looked pleased.

You hear it everywhere nowadays.  Rigor, rigor, rigor.  Schools need to be rigorous.  Rigor is good.  Beef up academic rigor!

When it comes to learning, I think rigor is a terrible idea.

Okay.  Before you come after me with your torches and pitchforks, note what I’m not saying.  I’m not saying that holding high standards is a terrible idea. Nor did I say that slacking is a good idea.  I know the principal well enough to know he meant well, and I know the parents were pleased because they have high expectations for their kids—as well they should.  I have high expectations for my own kids, as well as for my students.

When I seek professional services, I want people who hold to high standards.  I want to be treated by doctors, nurses and pharmacists who are masters of their field.  I want a lawyer who‘s known for winning cases and negotiating workable solutions.  I want an auto mechanic who knows how to fix my car the first time, and an accountant who doesn’t take shortcuts, and a hairdresser who fusses over details, and a bus driver who follows traffic rules, and a plumber who repairs leaks the right way.  I want to listen to musicians who know how to keep time and play in tune with expression, and I want to read work by writers who know how to craft a sentence, a paragraph, a full story.  I have low tolerance for slackers.  I don’t like it when my students don’t show up.  I want more of everybody.

No matter what the field of endeavor—educational, occupational, creative—I want to work with people who have been well-trained by teachers with high standards, and who have internalized that high-quality teaching so that they now hold themselves to the highest standard possible.  If anything, I think our standards as a society need to be higher.  For too long, we’ve accepted the mediocre as “good enough,” and I for one am pretty fed up with that. 

Excellence, yes.  And we're falling far short.  But rigor?  No.

To explain, I’ll crib from some of my own work—an article I published in a peer-reviewed academic journal last year. (Because this blog is semi-anonymous for reasons elucidated elsewhere, I’m keeping my name, the title of the article, and the name of the journal out of here, but you’re welcome to message me privately if you’d like the reference.)  In that article I pointed out that the term “rigor” derives from the Latin “rig(ēre),” meaning “to be stiff” (hence the term rigor mortis, to mean “dead”).  Definitions include: 

(1) strictness, severity, or harshness, as in dealing with people;  (2) the full or extreme severity of laws, rules, etc.; (3) severity of living conditions; hardship; austerity;  (4) a severe or harsh act, circumstance, etc.”; “obsolete rigidity” . . . “the inertia assumed by some plants in conditions unfavorable to growth”; “rigidity or torpor of organs or tissue that prevents response to stimuli” (World English Dictionary; italics mine).

Severity, harshness, hardship, austerity?  Obsolete rigidity?  Inertia?  Conditions unfavorable to growth?  Rigidity that prevents response to stimuli?  Is this what we want in education?  Especially if we want people to be performing at higher standards?  If we’re truly going to foster excellence, aren’t growth and response to stimuli what we need, rather than what we want to prevent?   As I stated in my article: “If we make the ‘organs or tissue’ in living organisms so 'stiff' that they are incapable of responding to stimuli, and if we encourage conditions that are 'unfavorable to growth,' just how is learning supposed to happen?”

Incompetence, it seems, is rife everywhere.  As a society, we need to set the bar higher.  But then we also need an educational system that teaches people what they need to know to jump over that high bar, whatever their endeavor may be.  For that to happen, the educational environment needs to create the conditions that are most favorable to growth and response.  What we need is not rigor, but vigor. 

It’s a cute rhyme, but it works.  As defined by the WED, vigor is “an active strength or force; healthy physical or mental energy or power; vitality; energetic activity; intensity: force of healthy growth in any living matter or organism” (WED).  That sounds to me like the kind of environment more likely to lead to deep learning, mastery, and enthusiastic engagement with one’s field—and, I’d add that excellence rarely happens when people do not enjoy what they’re doing.  Enjoyment and excellence are companions, not opposites.

Of course moving from “rigor” to “vigor” would also mean moving away from unimaginative approaches to education, over-emphasis on that which can be quantitatively measured, and standardized tests where teachers are judged not on the basis of whether they create environments conducive to growth but on how many students fill in the right bubble with their number 2 pencil. 

That, in turn, would mean cutting into the yield of the for-profit testing-and-test-preparation behemoths that now have their tentacles into virtually every aspect of our educational system, and eschewing the dehumanizing corporate business model that places utility before humanity.

Enough with the so-called "rigor. "

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    ABOUT THE AUTHOR

    The Underground Professor teaches English at a small private university. This blog explores how we might revitalize the humanities in the twenty-first century--and why it's important that we do so, in light of the our culture's current over-emphasis on profitability, quantitative measurement, and corporate control.


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