Survive the Oregon Trail, Part Two

*This week concludes with a wrap-up to the contest posted on Monday. No score submissions, but I finished another ridiculous physical chemistry midterm, so blogging will again continue*

There’s a lot of history behind the game, hailed as one of the greatest games of all time by some gaming websites, which says a lot for something educational. Whether you used to play it in elementary school or if you recently tried it out for the first time for an easy $40 some good ol'-fashioned fun, there are a few interesting ideas to ponder, such as:

Why is there such overwhelming systematic bias toward white males? You have the choice to do many things on your trails, but one choice preselected for you by the game developers is the fact that you, the player, are a white male. And as a white male, your job is to do the hunting, fixing, and bartering. Traditional female roles during the expedition are ignored and virtually non-existent, maybe because they weren’t entertaining enough to children? And why not?

Was it warranted by the developers to leave out details of the interactions with Native Americans during the migration? The game was definitely intended for younger audiences, but be honest: how much do you remember of the Oregon Trail from any social studies classes you took earlier in your life? If you hadn’t taken any classes on the subject recently at Cal, what would you remember most? Do you remember the “Indian Removal Act”? Buffalo extermination? Genocide? If pretty pictures make up our primary education system here, when then should children learn truth?

The power of social class on levels of opportunity. Let’s take our two professions, the Carpenter and the Farmer, as examples. The Carpenter and the Farmer, being the White Males that they are required to be at the onset, decide to take their boring and unnecessary families with them to Oregon City. They have choices. The Carpenter has the advantage of being a part of a wealthier family than the Farmer. He can thus afford to buy more clothes and oxen for his wagon than the Farmer. The Carpenter's family arrives in Oregon City faster and healthier than the Farmer’s family, and with more left-over money to boot. The Carpenter builds and starts his own restaurant, and succeeds in life.

The Farmer's family arrives later in the year, with little food and less money. With few options for survival, the Farmer works long, grueling hours at the Carpenter’s restaurant, and for very little pay. There is never improvement in the Farmer's family’s condition.

The game disclaimer states that, with respect to picking professions, “The harder you have to try, the more points you deserve!” Most of us would agree with that statement, because as Americans we value equality of opportunity and the freedom to advance based on perseverance. But is that the case in real life? In the game, the Farmer had to try harder to get his family safely across America, with less money to be used for necessities for survival. Extrapolating from that, did he have the same opportunities available to him as the Carpenter did when he reached Oregon?

I think you saw it coming, but now pull back your perspective and look at life today: which family would be more likely to succeed in moving to Oregon? Which family has more options when it comes to housing, clothing, transportation, etc.? Which family has more opportunities for career advancement, for educational advancement, for a less stressful life? Which family “deserves more points” but is still fated to succeed less?

Survive the Oregon Trail, Part One

*This week is turning out to be a stressful one, so expect fresh content no earlier than this weekend. In the meantime, I'd like to let readers try their hands at a little contest I offered my residents last year. There were cash prizes involved when I last attempted this, but I can't really subsidize blog doings, so winners will instead receive my sincerest gratitude. I'll post any results readers have submitted plus a follow-up piece I wrote last year on Thursday/Friday.*


The Oregon Trail, a popular computer game during the 1980’s and early 90’s about 19th century American pioneer life, is a relic of childhood to many of our generation who grew up here. In it, players take the role of a party of people, of a selected profession, and attempt to survive the long, dangerous trip from Independence, Missouri to Oregon City.

Herein lies the challenge: I want to see how many of you can survive the trip in the game, and with the most points (translating to how healthy your party is, and how many possessions you still have). There are 3 professions that start off with the highest to the lowest amount of cash (Banker, Carpenter, and Farmer, respectively).

Simple, yes? Download the programs using the below protocol:


TO PLAY OREGON TRAIL:
1.) First, download the emulator
2.) Then extract it and run "APPLEWIN"
3.) Finally, download the game


After this you’re ready to play the game! When (or if..) you make it to Oregon City, and the results screen is displayed with the tally of your points (this results screen is absolutely necessary), just copy the screen, make it an image file, and send it to me via email.


Happy Trails,
Chris

Why I Joined Teach For America

My life has seen many changes in the past month. I researched my options with Teach For America and conversed with alumni about the program. I accepted an offer to teach secondary science in Los Angeles. I lost further interest in graduate school and research. I enrolled in “The Achievement Gap: Causes and Solutions” DeCal. I elected to be reassigned to teaching secondary biology in the South Bay Area, and I have been allowed to do so. In preparation for my approaching future, my recent past has oft been spent thinking critically about this next step in my life. I’ve never detailed the whys publicly, however.

Consider this a primer on my newly found desire for teaching in low-income public schools. I hope to persuade you to also consider committing 2 years of your life after college to joining the TFA corps.

Any standard Teach For America essay is required by imaginary laws of nature to start off with the following introduction:

“In America today, educational inequity persists along socioeconomic and racial lines.

Nine-year-olds growing up in low-income communities are already three grade levels behind their peers in high-income communities.

Half of them won't graduate from high school.

Those who do graduate will, on average, read and do math at the level of eighth graders in high-income communities.

These disparities severely limit the life prospects of the 13 million children growing up in poverty today. And, because African-American and Latino/Hispanic children are three times as likely to grow up in a low-income area, these disparities also prevent many children of color from truly having equal opportunities in life.”

These statistics constitute what is commonly called the Achievement Gap, or the discrepancy in successes of children from varying backgrounds. Studies show that the financial stability of a family is a direct determinant of the opportunities available to their children. Here are a few more figures that flesh out the disturbing realities of the Achievement Gap:

Children growing up in low-income areas are seven times less likely to graduate from college than children in high-income areas. (Source: Education Trust, 2002.)

While children from families making over $90,000 have a one in two chance of graduating from college by age 24, that number plummets to one in 17 for children from families making less than $35,000. (Source: Education Trust, 2004.)

In 2000, Caucasian students had a national public high school graduation rate of 78%. The graduation rate for African-American students during the same year was 56%, and for Latino/Hispanic students was 54%. (Source: The Manhattan Institute, 2001.)

Before they even begin school, kids in these areas are already fighting an uphill battle to ever be able to match the successes of students from more affluent areas. Reason number one for my interest in this program logically follows:

I Believe in Equality of Opportunity

America idealizes concepts of equal opportunity and liberty of outcome, yet we do not have that today. Racism, sexism, and similar isms detriment our society by favoring certain folks over others for reasons that preclude choice. We cannot choose our parents or our culture just as we cannot alter the way gravity works, yet characteristics like these still largely impact our daily lives. For example, being white privileges me in many ways that others do not experience. And that’s not right.

Similarly, for our children experiencing the world through the methodical journeys of education in the classroom, there are some choices already indefinitely made for them, like if they qualify for school subsidized free lunches. Or if their schools can afford books.

I’m dedicated to the ideas of social justice because I believe that folks all deserve the same chances in life to succeed and grow. Younger folks in our public schools are entitled to that same American ideal of equal opportunity. Being an engaged and motivated teacher in these neighborhoods will give kids the educational opportunities hitherto withheld from them.

Along with strong American ideals of opportunities for all, you may be surprised when I say

I Believe in Service to my Country and Global Community

Of course, there’s really no need to be all that surprised, for the word service entails more than just conscription. There are myriad paths available to the citizen looking to better his community and strengthen his country: He may enlist in the Marines to protect our borders and interests abroad; He may join the Peace Corps to safeguard human rights for all; He may become a Big Brother and mentor teenagers in a nearby district. Any one of these commitments would have a marked impact on our country and the community at large. Service to our communities means simply giving back to the society that made us who we are, to recognize its merits and to fix its faults.

Teach For America is an opportunity to do that, to recognize the merits of a publicly-funded and readily-accessible education, and to strive to improve this education for those it neglects. Expanding educational opportunities? Just think of the impact one can have on society by doing this. Educated and motivated youths mature into a talented and inspired work force and return the favor for the next generation. Children are our most important investment and thus service toward their education needs to be our priority.

And hey, why not reinstitute the draft and incorporate this definition of service? I’d wager that a mandatory 2-year service stint for adults 18-25 years of age would bring about a major improvement in our urban and rural communities and in our international relations, not to mention empower the young generation with the skills to become successful leaders in any work sector they enter.

We approach a third and final self truth:

I Believe in Personal Betterment through Service

Many college students are opposed to this. Ask a Berkeley undergraduate to defer the working world for an additional 2 years upon graduation and you might be regarded as joking. Or flirtatious if you happen to be a cute girl and he an engineer.

Service should not be seen as an obstacle to professional development, but as another avenue for it. Service to my residents over the past 2 years has empowered me with the administrative and interpersonal skills necessary to be a leader in any future career. Service to my students over the next 2 years will continue to shape me in this regard, by setting educational goals and working diligently to achieve those goals through exciting and creative ways to teach and inspire.

Aside from further refinement of leadership skills, Teach For America offers a chance for college graduates to give back to society through service and dedication. The Achievement Gap is our generation’s civil rights movement, and Teach For America a channel through which we can create necessary change in our communities. I am teaching after college because I am proud of the ideal of equal opportunities for all that this nation is built on, and because I want to help make it a reality.

Do the same. The final deadline to apply for the 2007 corps is Sunday, February 18. Visit the website for application information.

ASUC + Residence Halls = ?

With few notable exceptions, the Berkeley Residence Halls and the ASUC, Cal's student government, are completely seperate entities with their own management, ideas, and goals. One could argue we also have unique student bodies that we represent (first-year residents versus student groups). The Halls and the ASUC mainly interact only when it involves campaign violations during ASUC election seasons or illegal solicitation by ASUC-funded student groups on Res Hall property-- not a great basis for a relationship.

Knowing this, one may feel a little uneasy to read the Daily Cal reporting today that this will be changing very, very soon:

Earlier this month, UC President Robert Dynes issued a clarification to UC policy on university property that will now allow nonpartisan student-government organizations access to residence halls and dining commons to pursue potential voters for registration.

The clarification will allow campus organizations such as the ASUC to pass out voter registration forms and encourage voting practices in campus residential areas without being subject to solicitation restrictions.

Previously, policy regarding voter registration activities in areas that are not generally open to the public- such as dining commons and residence halls-was unclear, and campuses could have classified voter registration activities as a type of solicitation, said Valery Oehler, associate director for undergraduate and graduate campus life in the UC Office of the President.

...

This year, ASUC officials plan to take full advantage of the policy changes by working with and educating resident assistants in the UC Berkeley residence halls on how to register students, said sophomore Andy Kelley, director of campus mobilizing within the ASUC Office of External Affairs.

My stomach turns a little when I hear that the ASUC plans to "work with RAs", but I'll set aside my assumptions and watch how this voting season unfolds.

Leaders and Language Use

Besides witnessing a glorious conquest of the Gophers led by the Golden Bears of Berkeley, today I participated and planned a training session for our new executive committees for hall association.

Just to define these terms for readers, Hall Association is the forum by which residents can use their voice and represent their interests, when it comes to doling out funding for programs (each resident puts in $45 of his or her housing fees to a hall government fund), deciding on which issues the community values participation in, and to coalesce in social harmony and shape the residence halls into something they can all call Home. The officers democratically elected as leaders of the hall association make up the Executive Committee. I just spent the last couple of weeks planning and implementing an extended elections production for these officers, teaming with publicity, paperwork and parleys, so you can perhaps understand where I was coming from with the previous post.

I’m pleased with the outcome, both of the officer turnout and of their initial training. Training today consisted of the standard introduction and icebreaker, followed by specific job training for each of the different Ex-Comm positions. I and another staff member led the training for RHA Reps. Again, some clarification: the officers of the Ex-Comm all have different roles, and these include president, executive vice president, secretary, treasurer, and so forth. Another important position is the Residence Hall Assembly (RHA) Representative. A common analogy employed is that of the levels of government in America: RHA is the federal government, namely the senate, where representatives from every Ex-Comm in the Berkeley Res. Hall system (the state governments) can congregate and discuss issues that are important to their constituents, whom are the residents of their respective hall communities. Very swank indeed.

So, right, the RHA Rep training. We discussed some basic duties of the position, time commitments, all in all a very broad overview because they would be getting more specific training next week that I am not a part of. I’m proud to say that the last section we included was one on addressing diversity, specifically related with language use and abuse and why it matters to leaders who want to effectively lead. I’m going to include the flyer we helped put together with some additional analysis.

In one sense, this information is key in understanding those that one wants to lead, and we were explicitly promoting these tenets from the sole perspective of including others as one leads. However, I think readers will know that I’m also a fan of social justice for the sake of it itself, and I want to make it clear that these ideas should be given credit regardless of one’s job or, say, position on an executive committee.

We as a diverse people accept language norms from society and assume they are natural, but only because it is so ingrained in our culture and daily life. We accept this and other arms of socialization in different aspects of our lives, but only because we may not have made an effort to really see what is going on. That is, we’re allowing others to think for us. Us! College students! This simple truth can be hard to swallow but it is an immediate consequence of interacting with a society corrupted by fears and generalizations. It’s up to anyone who is a free-thinking individual, particularly those of us who are quickly moving ahead in the world with higher education, to step up to the challenge of instituting change, and recognize that just because society says it is ok does not make it right.

One does not need to consider oneself a leader to act as a conduit for change. Nay, the very act of pushing for change is what defines you as a leader, so take from this what you will and know that your actions, no matter how trivial you assume them to be, are what make you a leader in the eyes of others.

Including Others: Language

As leaders in the halls, you play the dual role of representing your peers and acting as role models before them. Listed below are some examples of offensive phrases and perceptions that affect different areas of diversity. Make a conscious effort to avoid language abuse and encourage your peers to do the same. Many of these statements may not have ever occurred to you as being offensive, but please read with an open mind, and remember that intent is not always the same as impact.

Intent vs. Impact
• What you mean isn’t necessarily how it is perceived
• You must take responsibility for what you say; just because you didn’t mean it doesn’t invalidate the emotional response of the person you offended

Bottled-up Effect
• You don’t know what experiences people go through
• You might think someone is overreacting to a situation
• You might say something and the person will pretend to not be offended or hold it in and then explode later
• People’s physical reactions don’t necessarily reflect how they are really feeling

One of my favorite analogies to this (as I indeed used it today and will continue doing so) follows: suppose I reached over my friend to pick up a book, but in doing so, I absolutely crushed my friend's foot in the process with accidental misplaced footing. My intent was pure and righteous, seeing as how I only wanted the book and didn't want to cause trouble, but the impact manifested itself as a few bruised toes, and a probably irate friend. Knowing this, it would be foolish to justify my actions by saying, 'Whoops! Mah' bad, but it's only your foot, you'll live," or to similarly move on with my life without taking responsibility for my action. I would be invalidating his response and not recognizing that the impact of my actions was tremendously different than just what I intended.

We can make the connections from this analogy to any of the below statements used in our society, and how what we intend to mean does not necessarily correspond with an intended impact.

Sexuality
• “Oh that’s so gay”

An all-too-common adjective describing anything negative. Why do we use this? Why is gay given a negative description? How is anything other than people gay? How do you think a person who identifies as being gay will respond to such a statement?

Gender
• “Hey guys”
• “First Years” instead of “Freshmen”

Why do you only address the guys in the room when you address your friends with this? How awkward for you would it be, if you are a man or a woman, to hear someone welcome a group of people with "Hey ladies how's it going"?

Race
• “Asian ghetto”

An affectionate term for a special southside hub of Berkeley delectable eats from a variety of cultures, several of them identifying as Asian. But why do we call it that? What are we implying about those that work there, or those that eat there? What about the Asian cultures that are represented there? Further, how does using the term ghetto for labeling a successful food court make those who are actually suffering in poverty-stricken areas of America feel? Aren't we then making a mockery of their plight?

A helpful note to Cal students: its name is the DURANT FOOD COURT. So use it!

Ability
• “That’s so retarded/that’s insane/that’s crazy”

Similar to the language involving gay.

Spirituality
• “Let’s all thank God…”
• “You’re going to hell”

Why assume that everyone identifies with a Christian belief system?

Class
• “This is so cheap!”

Not for some it isn't. Why assume that everyone has similar finances or similar financial stability?

Lingo
• "Residence Halls" instead of "Dorms"

Not so important for those living outside the residence halls, but still an important distinction to make. The word dormitory has Latin origin and comes from to sleep, but we don't want this to be a place just for sleep. We want interaction. We want communities to form. We want a sense of being at Home, with extended family. That's why they are residence halls.

Still Here

Janelle was thinking of me and my "recent" post when she bought her Frappuccino, and picked up a Starbucks pamphlet with a catchy title:

Starbucks Commitment to Social Responsibility

I'd wager this is more of an attempt to allay the sometimes violent opposition to their corporation and practices than anything, an intention that differs oh-so-slightly from a college dining hall's advertisement, but it's still good to see.

And, yeah, there's been a slight falling out between me and Blogger this last past week. I realize now that the beginning of the Fall semester as a Program Assistant is a bigger strain on my time, and consequently blog relations, than it was in past years as a Resident Assistant. This should not last too much longer, and I'll try to reach my goal of reasonable posting intervals in due time. Hell, I still haven't finished the Hall Staff Training posts. More to come!

Working

Time to update: I'm still alive, just swamped with work for welcome week and planning out this semester with my staff. I should have some time later today to write again, and so I will force myself to take initiative, instead of fall asleep or something else less productive but more desirable.

Move-In Day Tomorrow

(This is a collection of my experiences from training. Start at the beginning for more information.)

I have a couple more posts to add in wrapping up my training experience, but my time over the past couple of days has been dominated by preparing the halls for 1500 students moving into their new communities by tomorrow morning. I anticipate a post by the end of this weekend. Until then, I'm holding my breath.

Retreat 1 of 1

(This is a collection of my experiences from training. Start at the beginning for more information.)

Our Hall Staff retreat was phenomenal. We ventured up into the mountains near Petaluma—a camp site called the Walker Creek Ranch, after an early morning bus ride at 8am Sunday morning, and returned promptly by 5pm Monday. Interspersed between diversity sessions with our Unit 1 staff (30 staff members) and with the entire amalgam of Berkeley hall staffs (~150 students and directors) lay the coveted reward of free time, spent by most of us at a nearby lake called Turtle Pond, where swimming, canoeing, and sun bathing were well represented.

During the day, one could visually witness the lake, the hike leading up to the lake, and the creek that fed off from the lake, but a nighttime hike, without the distractions afforded by the sun, was required to fulfill this experience. At one point along the path to Turtle Pond, through descents and inclines, foliage and waterways, there lay a giant clearing of soft terrain granting unhindered movement, where in the dark you literally felt as if you could simply diffuse out into the great and wild nothingness that surrounded you, with one long exhale. Memories overcame me at this time, where I was reminded of the important exchanges I shared at the same training retreat of last year. I remembered the smell, the taste of the air, the subtle glow of the nightlights from camp that illuminated a distant part of the forest in front of us.

These feelings flowed through my body like blood, pulsing a course that was designed to reinforce the trust I had built with this place a year ago; hall staff took much learning and self-discovery away from last year’s retreat and consequently this recent trip had a lot to live up to, which it did. This atmosphere, this developed sense of trust, solidified from experiences a year prior and over the last week with a new dedicated staff, engendered the perfect environment for further discovery and self-awareness.

We encountered a laundry list of activities that broadened our perspectives, the first being an open discussion about dominant and subordinated groups in society. A key aspect we addressed at training was furthering an understanding of our individual backgrounds and biases, an understanding of these groups salient to such a topic.

As members of the US society, we are categorized by society in the media, workplace, and government, within dominant (“normal”) or subordinate (targeted) groups of diversity including, but not limited to: ability, age, class, ethnicity, gender, race, religion, and sexuality. Our membership in these diversity groups is decided unconsciously by the system we live in and by our genetic material, which makes consciously becoming aware of these divisions a necessary task. However, consciously choosing to deny one’s identity and group membership does not make it so: as an example, a wheelchair-user who believes he or she is dominant, or “normal”, in terms of ability because of a prowess to take care of him/herself does not compensate for the fact that wheelchair-accessible routes are few and far to come by, that laws were required to build this paucity of routes and change access standards, and that roads and buildings typically have been and are currently designed to appeal to a public that can walk, i.e. the dominant, functioning group. Here, the perception of a dominant trait contrasts with the reality of the targeted group situation.

As a short breather and activity, attempt to define what groups you identify with in terms of each of the above eight features of diversity, both in the eyes of yourself and in light of the system. Compare your own perceptions versus the truth in relation to society: before and after this activity, how aware were you of your own dominance and subordination? What group are you most and least comfortable identifying with, both confidentially and to others? And did this activity elicit any particular response from you?

A Single Starfish

(This is a collection of my experiences from training. Start at the beginning for more information.)

Back from training, have lots to say, as you can imagine, but we'll first start with a story.

On one certain sporadic peregrination across the residential hall complex when I got back, I happened upon a small handful of papers, all spanning the color spectrum from roy through gbiv, and all settled gently and slightly in disarray on a folding chair inside a lounge. No one was nearby, and the multitude of hues and shades naturally interested me, so I furtively snuck in and stole a glance. On each paper was a copy of the story, "A Single Starfish" by Loren Eiseley, and it was entirely fitting for the occasion and the mood I was in upon arriving back in Berkeley, so I thought I'd post it here:

One day an old man was walking along the beach. It was low tide, and the sand was littered with thousands of stranded starfish that the water had carried in and then left behind. The man began walking very carefully so as not to step on any of the beautiful creatures. Since the animals still seemed to be alive, he considered picking some of them up and putting them back in the water, where they could resume their lives.

The man knew the starfish would die if left on the beach's dry sand but he reasoned that he could not possibly help them all, so he chose to do nothing and continued walking.

Soon afterward, the man came upon a small child on the beach who was frantically throwing one starfish after another back into the sea. The old man stopped and asked the child, "What are you doing?"

"I'm saving the starfish," the child replied.

"Why waste your time?... There are so many you can't save them all so what does it matter?" argued the man.

Without hesitation, the child picked up another starfish and tossed the starfish back into the water.... "It matters to this one," the child explained.

Retreat

(This is a collection of my experiences from training. Start at the beginning for more information.)

I promised to update every couple of days with something worth reading, but I'm actually on my way out for an overnight retreat, so expect something at the soonest by Monday night. Cheers!

Hall Staff Training I

The GREs will have to wait. And who really wanted to hear me gripe about them? They're outdated and inefficient, like many institutions our education system is structured upon (a later entry, perhaps).

I write this plea for respite from such a post because, one, I don't want to think about the implications of my low verbal score, and two, I've recently moved into a new room in the dorms, my home away from Home, meaning hall staff training at Unit 1 is definitely in session.

One of the points I had touched on earlier is my interest in actually blogging this event, to consign these magnanimous events to incoming college student posterity, and to my future self as a way to remember these experiences and how they've had an impact on me. There are limitations to this adventure, namely from the long hours bestowed on us (13 hours today, 12 hours tomorrow), but more importantly for the sake of trust for my fellow staff; we've touched on several personal issues tonight that I will remain silent on, as is bound to happen again this week.

Maybe we should start off on a lighter note: what does training for hall staff imply and entail? Anytime I tell my friends outside of staff about this, they look at me like I’ve signed up for boot camp, start sizing me up and asking if I’m doing more push-ups lately. Really, it is a significant mental exercise more than anything, to prepare us for the enormous task of building up and caring for a community comprised of a handful of incoming freshmen (sprinkled with the occasional upper division student), to shape their experiences for the better and encourage development socially and academically both now and for the remainder of their early years. For two full weeks before residents even move in, we as a staff address key issues of diversity, of community development, and of addressing our own biases and proclivities, not to mention constructing a cohesive staff and simply getting to know other staffs from all around the Berkeley campus.

A typical day will begin with a few ice breakers and light activities to crank up the blood circulation to the brain-o, lead into classes detailing specific expectations that describe our job title, and be followed by discussions on practicing inclusion of diversity and private sessions to reflect on and digest what we have experienced as a group. Yes, that averages out to 12 hours a day, this fact alone being irrefutable proof that we work damn hard for this free housing.

Our first official day of training was today, and was blessed with all the afore mentioned hallmarks. One of the key points discussed that resonated with me was that, as hall staff, we are given all this responsibility and training to inspire growth within incoming high school graduates, and the biggest downer of this exchange is that we almost never see a visible, effected impact on our residents. We synthesize as much information as we can into bite-sized morsels, but seeing actual growth result from our efforts, on the scale of less than a year, is impossible; we plant all of these seeds of knowledge and don’t often witness blooming minds.

There are certainly exceptions to this, as no statement here can be absolutely definitive, but for the most part growth does not occur so quickly. It’s just too fast for expanding intellect.

To paraphrase a quote that was said, we cast our bread along the river so others who hunger downstream can feast. It is one of the reasons our job is so difficult: we are feeding a hunger that is not manifest immediately, a hunger for social awareness and education, and so over the years as that hunger grows, it can be sated with some of the guidance we provide. In effect, we’re basically public school teachers of the halls, except no one is expected to learn the stuff we teach while they are in our classroom. We’re simply expected to trust that our initial impact and interactions over a year will be enough to afford such a change at a later date, requiring inordinate amounts of confidence with the issues and with ourselves. I truly can’t think of another job that dictates such a dynamic.

And-it-is-breath-tak-ing. The rush we get—I get—from learning more about each other and outside perspectives, and from knowing our efforts possess the possibility to engender powerful change in growing minds, is amazing. The progress afforded can be so grand that it is simply worth the wait, so to speak.

I had some further thoughts but need to wrap this up to catch some winks. More later!

Moving On Up

Took the GRE yesterday. I'll write more about it later. Right now: it's time to PACK for the move back into the DORMS and for TRAINING!

Where do we go from here?

This will mark my last official week of my blessed summer, as I will be moving again from this summer apartment sublet of mine back into the dorms, where we'll start another intense 2 weeks of Hall Staff training followed by a welcome week with exceedingly younger freshmen (class of 2010!).

During that time I will be mostly preoccupied with all-day training sessions and meeting new staff, so I'm not betting on any long-winded posts, although I still will be checking in *hopefully* every other day. I'm going to try and say a few words about aspects of diversity that we touch on during training, about acknowledging their importance in facilitating a cohesive and supportive community. Last year's training was replete with lasting conversations and alternative perspectives, and if this year runs the same way, I will have a lot of information to distill into this blog.

In the meantime, I'll be continually working as an undergrad slave researcher, and studying for the GREs which happen to be coming up on Friday. I'll wager you'll see a post or two on these topics as well.