The Recovering Teacher

Strapped or Not?

The other day I was reading a commentary about a book entitled Strapped by Tamara Draut.  Ms. Draut is the Director of the Economic Opportunity Program at Demos, which is a public policy center in New York City.  In her book she talks about the difficulty that young people have in getting started today, and gives suggestions about how the government can help – for example banning credit card companies from promoting on college campuses.  Now I will admit that I have only read the posted excerpt of the introductory chapter, and most of my thoughts are based on the commentary I read.  But then, when has that ever stopped a blogger from posting his or her thoughts?  In my defense, though, I have tried to do some research to get a better idea of the topic as it is covered and the feelings of the sides involved.

One thing that I noticed in looking at the excerpt and the commentary is the different background of the two writers.  Draut is a liberally-educated director of a liberal think-tank in New York.  The commentary I read was by a man called Michael Masterson (an admitted pseudonym), who is a millionaire businessman.  Obviously these two are not going to see eye-to-eye.  I consider myself to be a relatively moderate conservative, former teacher, and entrepreneur with some experience in a number of areas (which in some circles would make me an expert on multiple subjects).  So with this out of the way, let’s begin.

Strapped presents the idea that the world has gotten so hard for the 20- and 30-somethings that by-and-large they cannot succeed in life.  They are weighed down with debt and can’t find jobs that will get them out of the situation.  The working world has gotten to the point that a college degree is now the entry level education, but those degrees are now so expensive that many young people cannot afford them without going seriously into debt.  This debt then makes it impossible to get ahead because the wages paid are not enough to allow them to get out from under their debts and live a normal life at the same time.  Along with the aforementioned ban on credit card promotions, she also advocates more government grants for education and a more equal pay scale.

I could not help but feel for the individuals presented in the intro of Strapped, but I also couldn’t help but wonder about the stories that were not told.  How well do these stories represent the plight – or condition – of the great mass of 20- and 30-somethings who are discussed in the book?  I know people in that age group who are struggling, and others who are quite successful.  I also know Baby Boomers who are on the verge of disaster.  So were these people chosen because they represented the majority, or because they were visceral and tear-provoking?  I suppose only the author would know for sure.

On the other hand, the commentator only gave as an example his own experience of developing a successful above-ground pool installation business with two friends from college.  He describes in his piece how they busted their tails to develop a business that was eventually brought each an average of $300 a day, allowing them to pay off college debts and be able to move forward – all in a matter of about 10 weeks.  However, having written two books, Automatic Wealth and Automatic Wealth for Grads, both successful sellers, he must have some idea of what he is talking about.

I think one thing that bothers me most about Draut’s book is her insistence that it’s “not my fault.”  In the intro she complains “Far too often, social critics place the blame squarely on our shoulders, maligning everything from our work ethic to our spending habits.”  But what do you call it when (as mentioned in other reviews) some young people are insisting on having the iPod, the X-Box, and a host of other cash-heavy and future-poor items?  As Jim Rohn, one of the leaders of the self- and business-improvement industry says, we get paid for the benefits we bring to our employer.  No benefits, no pay.

What I see in this book is part of what has gotten us to the situation that Draut complains about – an attitude of entitlement.  The feeling among too many young people that they don’t have to earn what they have, they should just be given it.  It takes its form in the child who “has” to have the newest iPod or iPhone, the student who doesn’t understand why the teacher insists on seeing effort in exchange for a passing grade, the young person who wants good pay just for showing up to work, or the author who insists that the government should solve the problems of expensive college costs and debt.  All of which really ignore – or in Draut’s case argue against – the idea of personal responsibility.  It’s the politics of victimology – “It’s all their fault.”

I’ll end here for now, although I could probably go on…and I will on another day.

Legal vs Ethical

A few weeks back I read an article in BusinessWeek Online that seemed to call for a blog.  So, being a man who believes in doing what needs to be done, I hereby present my thoughts.

The article, “If It’s Legal, It’s Ethical…Right?” by Bruce Weinstein, PhD, relates an incident that happened during the taping of an episode of an A&E program, Intervention.  The particular series was about dealing with alcoholism, and as part of the program a film crew was following one woman who was dealing with the disease.  It seems that one day during filming she had a shot (or perhaps more) of vodka and then went out to her car for a drive.  Someone from the crew (apparently the producer, but it isn’t completely clear) asked her if she wanted someone in the crew to take her, but she insisted she was alright.  Then instead of doing what most people would consider the “right” thing and keeping her from driving, the crew let her drive off.

Excuuuuuuuuse me????!!!!

Now, let’s let the lawyers put a topper on this story (you knew there had to be lawyers involved, didn’t you).  Michael J. O’Connor, an attorney who has worked with reality shows like Survivor and America’s Next Top Model, was quoted in The New York Times regarding this situation:

"Television producers are not policemen. On a moral level, you get to the point where stepping in seems like it would be something you'd want to do. But from a legal standpoint, third parties causing injuries to other third parties is not something a television program is really responsible for." ¹

This is legal double-speak for “We ain’t responsible.”  Apparently the film crew is considered as “witnesses” (or might that be “witlesses”) and so they do not have any responsibility to intervene, even when what they are filming is at best poor judgment and at worst potentially fatal.  This encourages Dr. Weinstein to posit the following question:

• Are our responsibilities limited to what the law requires of us?

• If we are legally allowed to do something, does that mean we ought to?

• If there is no relevant law to speak of with respect to a "What should I do?" problem we're facing, does that mean that anything goes? ²

His answers to the questions?  “No.  No.  No.”³

Weinstein goes on to discuss the implications of this question of legal vs. ethical.  He gives some very spot-on examples of things that were once legal, but were not ethical if we care about what happens to others – which we should.  As he puts it, “To be a member of the human race is to care for what transpires in the world around us.”⁴

I am in complete agreement with Dr. Weinstein that we need to make our decisions based on ethics more than law, although that doesn’t necessarily mean we break the law if we feel it is not ethical, rather we work to change the law (however, sometimes even that is negotiable, as Rosa Parks showed us).  But let’s take a look at this through another lens – the lens of the Law of Attraction.

The Law of Attraction (or LofA as I like to call it) basically says that we attract the things that are most like us, and we are in turn attracted to people and events that most match who and what we are.  There is more to it than this, but let’s just stick with it for simplicity’s sake.

So if we are willing to play fast and loose with ethics, explaining away our behavior with the “well, it’s legal” excuse, then we will attract others who tend to do the same.  Now I don’t know about you, but I’m not crazy about the idea of being surrounded by people who will stab me in the back to get ahead as long as it’s legal.  I would much rather be around people who believe that doing what’s right is more important than acting in the letter of the law.

I would be interested in what some of you think about this.  Check out the article and then post your thoughts.  Until next time…

Believe in Yourself.

Sources

1-4: Weinstein, Bruce, PhD, “If It’s Legal, It’s Ethical…Right?” BusinessWeek Online: October 15, 2007

Mentors and Mentoring

I was reading a post on a network site today about mentors and how important they are for our growth and success.  The author pointed out that mentors can be almost anyone in our lives who can help us to see our situation more clearly and discern a direction to go.  They encourage us, they support us, they challenge us.  They can give us direction when we need it.  Then someone else mentioned the idea that maybe mentors could be virtual, and if so maybe they didn’t even have to be living.

So that got me to thinking about the idea of non-living mentors.  If a mentor is someone who helps give us direction, then why not someone no longer living, or even someone who has never actually lived.  After all, haven’t most of us had the experience of getting a little boost from a quote from the past or even some song lyrics?  With this in mind, I thought I would take a look at some lyrics from the song “For Good” from the musical Wicked.

“I've heard it said

That people come into our lives for a reason

Bringing something we must learn

And we are led

To those who help us most to grow

If we let them

And we help them in return

Well, I don't know if I believe that's true

But I know I'm who I am today

Because I knew you”

People do come into our lives all the time, but is it always “for a reason”?  Well, I guess that depends on how you look at the word “reason.”  (No, this isn’t like the infamous definition of what “is” is.)  Now, this is not a tangent, but I’m going to digress a moment from my main topic and look at the ideas of “reason,” “accident,” and “coincidence.”  If we think of “reason” as meaning something is done with a “purpose,” then that would make it the opposite of “accident.”  For example, if you break someone’s arm by accident, you will be in much less trouble than if you do it on purpose or for a specific reason.  But with the word “coincidence” we have a problem in that the word itself is opposite or contradictory.  “Say what?”

What do we usually mean by a “coincidence”?  Usually it refers to something unplanned (or made to look unplanned if used sarcastically).  The site Dictionary.com presents the main definition as “a striking occurrence of two or more events at one time apparently by mere chance.”  But the same site gives the definition of the root “coincide” as “to occupy the same place in space, the same point or period in time, or the same relative position.”  I have come to understand and believe that coincidences are not accidents.  I remember seeing this illustrated logically by the use of angles in mathematics.  Angles that “coincide” go together when overlapped – in other words, they match each other, despite apparent dissimilarities.

Now let’s get back to our example.  Do people come into our lives “for a reason”?  I believe they do, if we are willing to make the effort to learn from them.  Herein lies the main point in the song, as far as I’m concerned: “And we are led/To those who help us most to grow/If we let them/And we help them in return.”  Our lives coincide with those of people who will help us grow – in other words, our mentors.  But here is the rub, as Shakespeare would say – we have to “let them” help us grow.  The greatest mentor in the world is useless to someone who refuses to allow him/her to help.  On the other hand, sometimes the most ordinary-seeming person can have a great influence on our lives.  It all depends on our willingness to allow the “coincidence” to work its magic – on both sides.  When we do this, we just may find ourselves saying:

“Who can say if I've been changed for the better?
But because I knew you
I have been changed for good”

Watch for Bad Advice

I was reading a back article from USATODAY (Nov. 5 The Pitch/The Catch) about how some Baby Boomers are losing their retirement money because of questionable advice from financial representatives who seem to be more interested in making big commissions than doing what is best for their clients.  It seems that some so-called advisors have been trolling companies with large numbers of near-retirement workers and claiming that they can "guarantee" returns of as much as 15% on investments.  The article gives several examples of people who were told they could retire early, put their retirement into the rep's suggested portfolio, and live on the interest for as long as they wanted, never touching the principal.  Sadly, reality stepped in and the "unlimited" interest became extremely limited, forcing almost all of the retirees back into the job market - usually at much lower paying jobs than they had retired from.

Well, first of all, if you ever have someone "guarantee" any kind of returns, particularly anything as high as 15%, you need to kick that person out of your home or walk out of the presentation right away.  No honest, ethical representative will ever guarantee any return because, for one thing it's unethical and for another you can't predict what the markets will ever do.  The most any rep can really do is to give historical examples of how the market or particular funds have done in the past, and use this as an indicator of what could (but might not) do in the future.  So why, you might ask, would someone let a stranger talk them into taking an early retirement and putting all their money into a high-risk portfolio?  Because most people have no idea what they should do with their retirement money in order to make it last, and because most of these shyster (can I say that here?) "advisors" are very good at convincing people that they want to help them.  Sad to say, but the only ones they are interested in helping is themselves.

What do you do then?  Well, having had some experience in the financial field (I won't say which company, because that would not be ethical), I can tell you that an ethical, honest advisor will spend a great deal of time finding out what your current and future needs are, what your goals are, and how comfortable you might be with different levels of investment risk.  An ethical, honest advisor will NOT spend most of the time telling you how wonderful the investment is, how much you will make at the "guaranteed" rate, or blow off your questions or concerns.  You want someone who is committed to doing what's right for you, every time.

Well, that's my rant for now.  All of you remember to ask lots of questions of anyone who says he/she wants to invest your money.

Giving and Getting

The other day I read an article in a national newspaper about the idea of giving and getting, and it got me thinking.  The author of the article was responding to a question about whether giving to a charity was part of the questioner’s business success.  The author suggested that the reason the business owner was so successful was that he was “giving” extra value to his customers and to his employees, and that this was the reason for his success.  The author gave an example of making referrals to a company that had done remodeling work several years before because the company had not only done an excellent job, but had also left the area cleaner than before.  This was contrasted with another company which had left pieces of debris scattered around after the job was finished.  The author’s point was that the first company, because it had given more value for its service, had earned the right to have referrals to future customers.  Obviously the second company had not.  Now I am not going to argue this point at all – after all, who wouldn’t prefer to recommend a quality company that goes beyond the letter of its contract?  What I am arguing with is the idea that this is the only reason for the success of the original questioner, and that his giving to charity was not a factor.

If you read much of the success literature out there, particularly the books that I read, you will find the idea of reciprocity.  In other words, we get what we give.  This is in line with the idea of the Law of Attraction, which as you know has become a huge topic thanks to the book The Secret.  I suggest that the reason the businessman here is so successful is because of the Law of Attraction – he has made it a part of his life to give to others, and so the world has seen fit to give back to him.  I have no doubt that this man gives more than is expected to his clients, and probably to his employees as well.  But I believe that it is his dedication to giving to others he doesn’t know through charity that provides the biggest boost to his life, personally, professionally, and possibly spiritually.  Think of it this way – if we all give to others, isn’t it logical that we will end up being the “others” that someone else is giving to?  Wouldn’t that be a nice way for the world to work?

Believe in Yourself

Responsibility

I recently read an article about changes in the methods of preparing teachers for the classroom.  Now, I’m not going to argue with these new methods – I agree that traditional programs do not prepare teachers to deal with the classroom and its myriad challenges.  I was a teacher for almost 2 decades (both full and part-time) and it took me some time to find a classroom management style that worked for me.  (The ability to perfect a Vulcan-like raised eyebrow – remember Mr. Spock? – was a great aid in my management style.)  So putting teaching candidates into the classroom right away with a dedicated mentor teacher (rather than one who leaves the student teacher on his/her own for the period) is a great step forward in the preparation of successful teachers.  But as for this being a solution for the massive exodus of teachers, I will argue against that claim.

As I said, I was a classroom teacher for almost 20 years (14 full-time and 3.5 as a substitute), and what finally drove me out – and many other teachers – was the increasing lack of discipline among students and the increasing unwillingness of administrators to back teachers and stand up to parents.  More and more frequently, administrators (from vice principals to district superintendents) seem to be more concerned with placating angry parents than with keeping the classrooms a safe and orderly place for education.  I’ve seen a principal rescind a suspension for one of three students seen smoking after school because the parents complained that no adult had seen them, even though several students reported it and the other two students’ parents allowed the suspensions.  In addition, this one student was an ongoing discipline problem for all of his teachers.

What we are doing is allowing a generation of students (and not the first one) to grow up with an attitude that they do not have to take responsibility for their behavior, and that there will always be someone they can blame for their actions.  This is completely contrary to what makes a country great.  Our system relies on the idea of freedom with responsibility, but we are loosing that second part – the idea of responsibility.  A woman puts a hot cup of coffee between her legs in a car, spills it, and blames the drive-through for serving coffee that was too hot.  Let’s see, the coffee is hot – does putting it between your legs in a moving car make sense?  And the list could go on and on.

We need a massive shift in attitudes, and soon.  We need to start teaching our children that life is made up of choices, and that they are the ones responsible for those choices.  Stop playing the victim and looking for a scapegoat.  Choose to do your work at school, and you have a much better chance of learning, getting acceptable (or better) grades, and eventually have a better chance of having a successful adult life.  Choose to goof off, and don’t expect mommy and daddy to run interference for you.  Choose to cause trouble in school, and plan to take the consequences.  And guess what, we will probably see more teachers stay in the classrooms, because teachers by and large love to work with children and would much rather be there than anything else.

I know some of my opinions here will be less than acceptable to some people, but I believe many others will agree.  Maybe we can start a movement to return to the idea of personal responsibility.

Until next time, Keep Believing