“A” is for actionable!

Assessment geeks like me refer to this as “closing the loop” — using our assessment findings (whether direct or indirect) to make improvements in our assignments, course design, instructional methodologies, programs, or our student services. Or, when appropriate, using our assessment findings to showcase what we are doing really well!

In the Assessment Program at my university, we constantly try to ask this question: What can we do with this data? We often all have the What? and we might even have the So What? But then …

NOW WHAT?

Simply put: How will what we learn here help us improve? What actions should we take accordingly?

So now we are writing about some of these assessment projects we’re working on making more actionable in my colleague’s Actionable Data blog. (By “we,” I mean “she.”)

(Oh – who is she? Her name is Kim Firth, and she’s an awesome data geek and a very cool colleague.)

Here’s part 1 of several posts to come about a project we are working on (again, by “we” I mean “she”): the revision of our Alumni Survey. Read it and weep. Ok, don’t weep – it’s not sad. If anything it should make you happy that we’re being so intentional about making this survey actionable.

Lessons from an attempt at action-focused survey revision

One of my colleagues is attending this ELI  conference that I’d really like to be at as well. Alas, I can’t be in four places at once this week (three will have to do), but thankfully, he’s using his blog to share his experiences and reflections with us at home. Here’s the link:

Consider This Out Loud

The conference has an online option, which I’d seriously considered registering for, but the reality is that things here on campus would get in the way and it wouldn’t be worth it.

His first post begins with “Assessment Assessment Assessment.” It’s like he packed me in his suitcase and took me with him.

My own Twitter Effect is characterized by some — no, all — of the following:

1. Like @injenuity, I sometimes forget I have a blog! I am not posting as often on this here blog, and the posts I have written seem less — well, less ________________.  Just less.
2. Because I receive Twitter feeds from people I am trying to learn from (I carefully select the people I follow to avoid Twitter Litter), I sometimes feel like I might miss out on something important if I don’t check Twitter at least three times a day. The sky could be falling and if I miss Chicken Little’s tweet at 3:01 informing me of this news, I might not otherwise find out! This is perhaps the only negative experience of my Twitter Effect, and, to be fair, it’s totally self-induced.
3. I no longer need to read many of my RSS feeds because I get them through Twitter; by the time I remember to check my RSS feeds, I’ve already seen most of the posts. However, because of #2 above, I am keeping my RSS feeds; they help control my anxiety about potentially missing something.
4. I am continually amazed by what a good source of learning Twitter can be, which is why I keep using it so diligently.  It helps me scan key publications easily (example, The Chronicle of Higher Ed); it keeps me connected to certain goings-on in conferences that I can’t attend in person; I get to hear multiple perspectives on any given topic that might otherwise not come together in any organized space; and I get to connect with people I might otherwise never have known.
5. I am also  continually amazed by what some of my good sources of learning will tweet on Twitter — many of my Twitter superstars are actually humans with sick kids, pear trees, and great recipes to share. That’s cool! I like that they are human and care about whether or not their favorite football team wins in addition to whether or not their students are learning or their university gets its needed funding.
6. Finally, as I’ve been diligently working at living an integrated life instead of a life in silos, I have found support with Twitter. I follow organizations and people who are in my professional realms, I follow my yoga studio, I follow my local farmer’s market, I follow friends, and I search and follow specific topics that are of interest to me.

My own Twitter Effect is neither bad, nor good. My own Twitter Effect just is, and I’m ok with it, even though I sometimes forget that I have a blog. (And a kid. And a husband. And a dog. And 2 cats. And a class to teach. And a paper to write. And dinner to cook. And  … ok, ok,  just kidding. Twitter humor, people. Twitter humor.)

"Day 202" from A Collection A Day, 2010

Indexed has posted a good one again:

"Zoom Out" from Indexed

How ’bout this for a problem-solving process?

1. Step back.
2. Get some perspective.
3. Let it “marinate” in your head for a little while. Maybe a big while.
4. Then tackle it again!

Does this work for you, or do you have another suggestion for solving the seemingly impossible problems?

(Yippee! I got to post pictures from 2 of my favorite visual blogs in one post: Indexed and A Collection a Day, 2010. Thanks to Harriet for pointing me to the latter! )

In any case, here is a sampling of the blogs I read every day (or when there are new posts; whichever comes first). That’s right! You read that correctly. Every. Day. Reading blogs is starting to become for me like reading the local newspaper used to be (before the newspaper became so uninteresting, before the new dog and cats came, and before the toddler insisted that he read the newspaper too).

BEFORE? Cup of coffee; bowl of cereal; NPR; newspaper; good start to the morning.

NOW? Cup of coffee; bowl of cereal; NPR; toddler reading sports section upside down looking for “bik-e-sols” while pining for a piece of my shredded wheat… dog chasing cat/s under table …coffee spilling on front page of newspaper … iPhone on; Google Reader enabled:

GIMME MY BLOGS!

Enough about my morning routine. Alas, here are five of the blogs I read on a regular basis – a truly random sampling:

1. Carnegie Connections Daily News Roundup (“News You Can Use”): Keeps me apprised of most of the latest higher ed news.
2. The Encouragement Lounge: For one thing, Harriet has lovely photographs (almost all hers); for another, the blog is geared toward adult learners in higher education. I admire its style; I admire the “mentoring” I see within it; I admire the regular schedule on which Harriet posts.  Harriet is a nice person and a far-away colleague and I wish we worked together more. And, I usually learn something. So I read her blog.
3. RealDelia: Finding Yourself in Adulthood — This is a new one to my collection as I’ve only started reading it recently. Delia Lloyd tends to write on topics that are mostly relevant to me: getting older, parenting, work/life balance stuff. Her recent post The Private Language of Marriage captured my attention for some reason; I sent it to my husband with this note that none of you will understand: “We’re going to need a special marketing plan.” He laughed. You know why he laughed? We have a private language. And in our language, that’s funny.
4. Indexed: Smart. Visual. Nuff said.
5. ChrisBrogan: He keeps me informed about social media / Web 2.0 stuff.  He’s also, in my opinion, a master blogger. Why not read the master?

Of course I try to keep up with my Student Bloggers as often as I can as well.

So … there out have it:  a list of five blogs that I read regularly (I have spared you all of the cooking / food ones for now; there are at least 15 of those that I peruse). Want to share 5 that you read? Please do! I might find more to add to my collection!

Thanks to quinn.anya on Flickr for making this image available.

Brooks argues that studying the humanities will make a person more employable because they will be able to read and write well, will deeply understand human emotion, can think analogically, and can “befriend” what he calls “The Big Shaggy,” behaviors and phenomena that are difficult to explain. Of the latter, Brooks writes:

The observant person goes through life asking: Where did that come from? Why did he or she act that way? The answers are hard to come by because the behavior emanates from somewhere deep inside The Big Shaggy.

Technical knowledge stops at the outer edge. If you spend your life riding the links of the Internet, you probably won’t get too far into The Big Shaggy either, because the fast, effortless prose of blogging (and journalism) lacks the heft to get you deep below.

But over the centuries, there have been rare and strange people who possessed the skill of taking the upheavals of thought that emanate from The Big Shaggy and representing them in the form of story, music, myth, painting, liturgy, architecture, sculpture, landscape and speech. These men and women developed languages that help us understand these yearnings and also educate and mold them. They left rich veins of emotional knowledge that are the subjects of the humanities.

I object to his implication that blogs “lack the heft” of critical thought and inquiry, but I have to agree with almost every other proposition of his editorial. Let me tell you why.

My first major in college was journalism. I had spent the previous 3 years in high school tirelessly advocating for Freedom Of The Press and a separation of advertising and editorial (my main objective being to convince the school administrators that placing a Planned Parenthood ad in the student newspaper paper was not an endorsement for having sex). It made perfect sense that I would be a journalism major: I had prior experience on the newspaper and yearbook, passion, and it could be practical. I could get a job.

My second major was speech pathology and audiology. I changed it from journalism about a month into college because I decided I wanted to try to do something different from what I had been doing. It wasn’t an analytical decision at the time; it was more like wanderlust meets “I want to be employable after graduation.”

I liked this new major because I was learning in multiple disciplines: anatomy, language development and linguistics, psychology, neurology, etc. We also got to look at cadavers, which was scary and horrifying and amazing, all at the same time. However, in my first session in the speech clinic, when a distraught but forceful mother of a child with a bilateral lisp was insistent that we “FIX HIM!!!” in time for a speech he had to give at his church, my clinical supervisor turned to me and said, “Welcome to your future.” An off-the-cuff comment, but I listened.

My third and final major was English because I liked to write and I liked to read, and I didn’t want to spend time taking courses that I didn’t like. I temporarily set aside my pragmatic paycheck-oriented concerns and decided to focus on learning. And with that came great freedom and deep engagement and, as Brooks argues and I fully believe, marketability.

I have applied lessons from my English courses — from all of those Australian novels and Middle English Prologues and poems and essays and tree structures and Latin roots –  to every aspect of my work. From supervising and supporting employees, to preparing and monitoring budgets, to writing grants, to giving presentations to friendly and challenging audiences, to teaching and mentoring, to learning new computer programs or programming my voice mail, to communicating with various stakeholders and advocating with fierce grace, I call upon my English major skills and capacities of mind each and every day.

Brooks implies that there is money associated with a humanities education; I suspect that might be true (it has not been, for me). But what I DO have is compassion, creativity, energy, communication, and, in general, happiness with what I can and like to do.

My third and final major was English.  And as for The Big Shaggy? I’ll continue to nog on it, with heft (eh hem!), because, as Brooks asks:

…doesn’t it make sense to spend some time in the company of these languages — learning to feel different emotions, rehearsing different passions, experiencing different sacred rituals and learning to see in different ways?

Yes. Yes it does.

His post reminded me of a movie I love:

Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you. Just one word.
Benjamin: Yes, sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Benjamin: Yes, I am.
Mr. McGuire: Plastics.

Yesterday on Facebook my friend and colleague Jenny posted this brilliant observation as her status line:

It takes a village to raise a grown-up.

Isn’t that the truth?!?! I mean, seriously!!!

On July 5th this year, I will be 40.

FORTY!!!

(Gulp!)

Burk is noticing signs of becoming an adult in his mid-20′s. I want to let him know that if he’s paying attention (and he’d do well to do so), those signs will never go away, they will just change. Becoming an adult is a process — a lifelong process — with the only end in sight being THE end.

Right now the Top 3 signs in my life that I am becoming an adult are as follows:

• Wrinkles. (Can I just call them laugh lines, please?) I now own wrinkle cream, and I use it furiously! (And I am adult enough to know that it probably won’t work, but I am also an optimist.)
• A shift to taking care of my elders instead of them taking care of me, along with a terrified feeling that I am not qualified to do so.
• Getting ready for the big neighborhood garage sale so I can get rid of stuff I’ve acquired, instead of acquiring stuff I need.

I could have said gray hair, but I’ve had that since my late 20′s, so that was one of my signs about a decade ago.

At this point in your life, what are the Top 3 signs that you’re becoming an adult? Do you embrace them, or do they make you cringe?

Thanks to "psd" on Flickr for making this image available!

So yesterday I wrote a blog post.

And then I received this email:

Congrats! Your post ( http://prattlenog.com/2010/05/04/verb-to-blog/ ) has been promoted to Freshly Pressed on WordPress.com. Keep up the good work!

^-^-^-^-^-^
Joy
Editorial Czar
WordPress.com | Automattic
editor@wordpress.com

I chuckled at Joy’s title. “Czar.” Why not “queen?” I thought.

And then, I received several emails notifying me of comments on my post, and I logged in and checked my dashboard.

WOWZA! You people were reading my blog! Amazing! Who knew?

And THEN I saw this post from WordPress: Five Ways to Get Featured on Freshly Pressed

Who knew? This was a total accident on my part, but what a cool thing.

And, I learned that apparently you all want to talk about why you blog (as do I).  Who knew? So let’s do it!

My great thanks to all of you who have read and commented on my post. Each of you has added to my own reflections about my blogging practice, and I have learned a lot. I look forward to continuing the conversation; it’s a great one!

And I had to stop and think about that question.  I am not entirely sure!

• I think I am using it, in some cases, to extend my mentoring and teaching practice.
• I think I am using it, in some cases, to reach out to potential students/colleagues/friends.
• I think I am using it, in some cases, to share information and my perspectives on that information.
• And I think I am using it, in some cases, to share a bit of myself (with whomever cares enough to read my drivel).

Thanks to "inju" on Flickr for making this image available.

Speaking of blogging and wondering why I do it, I ran across this quote about blogging — from the famous Mr. Anonymous:

A blog is merely a tool that lets you do anything from change the world to share your shopping list.

I promise that in PrattleNog I will spare you my shopping list (though I will tell you that it always has Trader Joe’s whole wheat pizza dough on it.)

AND -  here are 50 more quotes from non-anonymous people about blogging that I’ve been thinking about.

What are your thoughts about “to blog?” Please share!

For another perspective on This Could Have Been At Marylhurst:

Stephanie’s Community is where you find it.

N-I-C-E!!!