A few folks that attended our graduation ceremony complimented me on the comments that I made to the graduates. While it is not a full-fledged address, I have copied it to this blog.
Principal’s Address
Today we celebrate the completion of this group of student’s first 13 years of formal education. More is on the way regardless of what their plans are. Each of them is going to enter into an economy much different than the one that previous generations faced when they graduated from high school. The reality is that they will not have one occupation for the rest of their life. Unlike my grandfathers, they must go on to school to continue their education so that they can get a good paying job. They must also have a solid foundation of knowledge and skills because after a few years, they will most likely be required to move on to a different occupation, and perhaps more training or school. I really hope that a lot of you will get solid training as either an apprentice or journeyman, or perhaps through a community college for the skilled jobs that are so high in demand right now. These jobs are going to pay you a lot! But, you have to get the training and you must be willing to adapt.
This isn’t the way it will be for just the skilled workers. The world is changing for those with four-year degrees who enter the white-collar world. You will most likely compete with other people looking for a job from around the world, not just Iowan. And, you have to realize that young men and women from other countries are going to be willing to work for far less than you will. Because of that, you must be prepared to move on to new occupations.
The biggest advantage you are going to have is your ability to create and to problem-solve. American ingenuity is still the biggest advantage we have in the world economy. All of those word problems and science labs you were put through, and perhaps some of the projects you did where you had to take something and make something new out of it are a taste of the things employers will want you to do.
In the big picture, your education must continue. You need to persevere and seek more knowledge and more skills.
I asked a question when I arrived here as to how many students wanted to live in rural Iowa and a number of hands went up. Others want the adventure of seeing other places and perhaps the experience of the excitement of cities or other regions of the country. With all of that said, I ask you to consider the following proposal. For a little while, you need to get away. You need to go to school, join the military, or do whatever, but get away from home. Too many young people today do not break the tie soon enough from home to learn to stand on their own and become a responsible adult. Second, after a few years of experiencing life beyond Fayette County, come back! We need well-educated, passionate, progressive people to come back to rural Iowa to help us energize our small towns. I venture to say that most people in this gym today really like to live right here, otherwise they would have taken opportunities to move elsewhere. I also know there are frustrations with what has happened to our small towns. I talked to a friend yesterday from a town I lived in 15 years ago and he said that it bothered him how “scummy” his town has become. Well, you can do something about it. Come back and help us sustain a high quality of life in northeast Iowa. When you look around, there are others who have walked across this stage in the last ten years or so that have done that. But, you have to bring something to the table. That’s why you need to get out an experience what life has to offer.
As a personal note to you, the Class of 2011, what will happen after you walk out of here is the best thing that you could possibly wish for, and I am not sure that many of you realize it. What will happen is that your class will break up and you will move on. Each and every one of you can break free of the perceptions some people have and make something of yourself on your own. There is no doubt that there is tremendous talent in this class. Some of you just don’t know it yet! Many of you are going to make your mark in life and it is going to be very exciting to see whom that will be. When you all come back together in 25 years to celebrate a reunion, my bet is that a lot of you are going to be surprised!
Congratulations to each and every one of you! Good luck! And I wish you good health and happiness in the rest of your life!
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Monday, April 11, 2011
Have We Thrown In the Towel?
Earlier in the school year, I had the opportunity to listen to Richard Longworth. A midwesterner by birth, he has shed a great deal of light on "our" place in the global economy. This blog entry from The Midwesterner, lends some perspective that I find interesting and to a large extent troubling. I encourage you to visit Mr. Longworth's blog regularly or add to your Google pages or dashboards. He has a lot to say about how our region fits into this big old world, and I am sure that he will challenge your thinking.
Friday, April 08, 2011
America Throws in the Towel
Everybody knows that the United States, and especially the Midwest, is in a competition with China and other emerging nations to survive and thrive in this new global economy.
Everybody's wrong.
Any race requires two rivals, each running flat out, each determined to win. Anybody who spends time in China -- as I have in the past month -- knows that the Chinese are treating this race like the economic Olympics, with their eye fixed on the finish line. But anybody who travels the Midwest -- as I do constantly -- knows we've stopped competing -- indeed, have made a policy decision to give up.
Basically, American has thrown in the towel. We owned the 20th century, but we've conceded the 21st century to China.
Granted, China has a bottomless bank account, including $1 trillion of our money, while both our federal and state governments are too strapped to find the cash for investment. In other words, we can't afford to compete, even if we wanted to.
But this debt is both cause and effect of our wayward ways. While China was joining the global economy and building the foundation of its current growth, the United States was cutting taxes, fighting two unfunded wars and promoting the mother of all housing bubbles. When the global recession began, the United States -- the world's biggest economy -- landed in a slump that continues to this day. China -- the second biggest economy -- kept the stimulus funds flowing and barely slowed up.
The comparisons between the world's two largest economies are stark -- and, for Americans, distressing.
China is rising, America declining. China is investing, America disinvesting. China is looking to the future, America unable to cope with the present. China is building a middle class, which embraces 300 million people and is growing: America's middle class, supported by the industries of the past, is vanishing. China is spending on the building blocks of that future, such as education and infrastructure. America -- both Washington and the state governments -- is focusing spending cuts specifically on these keys to future economic strength.
Beyond that is the psychological difference. China is simply an ambitious country. It's hungry and raw and scrapping, with its eye on the prize. How long has it been since those words applied to the United States?
China has woken from two centuries of sleep and is hard at work. America, having dominated the world economy for the past century, seems tired, out of ideas and out of energy.
America has no real game plan for the new economy. China has lots of plans. America seems to be betting that these Chinese plans will fail. Certainly, China faces many barriers -- corruption, pollution, population pressures, a dictatorial government. Americans assume that our system -- democracy and free markets -- is so obviously superior that we're bound to win.
Maybe we will, maybe we won't. But we're betting on somebody else's failure, not on an investment in our own success. What if we lose that bet?
China's priorities are no secret and couldn't be more different from ours. The new five-year plan proposes more investment in scientific and technical education, affordable housing, water conservation, raising rural income, increasing energy efficiency by about 20 percent, building more cities, and focusing investment on key industries, such as petrochemicals, biotech, information technology, new energy vehicles, high-end equipment and environmental protection.
This isn't a wish list. Much of China's economy is privatized, but the Communist Party and the government still own the major industries -- the "commanding heights." When they want something to happen, it usually happens.
The medium-term goal is to achieve a "moderately prosperous" society. Officially, this is defined as a society "in which most people are moderately well off and live in harmony with each other as well as nature." This sounds modest enough, but the goal is to achieve this by 2020 -- a revolution in a country that, within living memory, was one of the world's poorest.
By these standards, the United States had a "moderately prosperous" society 30 or 40 years ago. We called it a "middle-class society." It's gone now, along with the industrial economy that supported it.
Individual projects are spectacular. There are too many to list, so let's pick an example or two.
China already has an experimental Maglev train from one of Shanghai's airports into the city center. It goes 266 miles per hour, and it works. A new longer-distance Maglev train is planned. In the meantime, a new "ordinary" high-speed rail line, running 800 miles from Beijing to Shanghai at speeds up to 186 miles per hour is to open in a month or two.
If most Americans have heard of the northeastern city of Qingdao, it's by its earlier name of Tsingtao and its eponymous beer. Qingdao is a city with a metro area of 8 million people -- bigger than Chicago but barely in China's top 20. It has just opened an industrial park (in cooperation with Akron, Ohio) devoted to the rubber industry, is building China's biggest seawater desalinization plant, has drawn in $592 million in foreign investment so far this year, is beefing up its port, and has long-range plans for $50 billion in other civic projects.
This is just one city, and not one of the biggest or more prominent. Similar projects are going on around the country.
The new Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River, the biggest hydroelectric and flood control project in world history, is now completed and in operation. It cost at least $60 billion. Both the benefits and the environmental damage, like so much else in the country, are unprecedented.
Shanghai just had its Expo, a giant world's fair, barely two years after the Beijing Olympics. Shanghai used this fair to add several new subway lines, build a new airport terminal and train stations, and repave every important street.
So it goes. This is a country building for the future. No one claims all the money is well spent. Some is wasted and more is stolen. Some lead to unintended consequences, like the environmental damage from the Three Gorges Dam.
But much of this spending, on education, industry and infrastructure, is preparing China to dominate the global economy.
In short, this is a serious country with serious ambitions. Whatever the merits of its individual projects, China is not fooling around.
Now look across the Pacific, to the country that, barely a decade ago, was the sole superpower -- the indispensible nation, the home of the Washington Consensus, numero uno, the hegemon. Now, 10 years later, check out the United States and what you see is a country that has simply stopped trying.
America is letting its infrastructure, like its highways and bridges, crumble. Compared to China's airports, its big terminals like O'Hare are dirty, overcrowded, inefficient. Cell phone and other digital coverage is years behind the swift and comprehensive service that the Chinese take for granted.
This is fixable, but we're not fixing it. Instead, we're cutting spending where it's needed most. Governors in Wisconsin, Ohio and Florida have turned down federal funding for the high-speed trains that China is using to tie its vast country together. The state of Michigan, which right now provides barely 5 percent of the funding for the University of Michigan, is proposing another 22 percent spending cut on higher education financing. Every American state is cutting back not only on health care but on early childhood education, which is key to creating an educated work force of the future.
It's a national problem, most visible in the Midwest where states like Wisconsin are cutting taxes for business and the wealthy while declaring war on their teachers.
China invests in Africa; America goes to war there.
Greater equality -- between rich and poor, between cities and the countryside -- is stated Chinese policy. Greater inequality, with virtually all the economic growth going into the pockets of the richest 10 percent, has been American policy for 40 years now.
Competing in the global economy requires not short-changing spending on necessities but raising the money -- including higher taxes -- to finance this spending. But as the economist Jeffry Sachs wrote in a recent Financial Times, we're "trying to do the impossible: run a modern, high-technology, prosperous 21st-century knowledge economy without the requisite tax base, largely to satisfy the upper classes and multinationals."
As Sachs says, we can't have both -- inadequate taxes and a modern economy. We've made our choice.
As I mentioned in a previous post, what's happening in China today echoes an America from an earlier era. In his book The Lost City, Alan Ehrenhalt wrote about post-World War II Chicago when Americans had fewer goods, lived in smaller houses, often had fewer choices in life, but had a confidence that is lacking today. Then, we assumed that life would get better: today, we assume our children will live meaner lives than we did.
Ehrenhalt quotes the optimism of a Chicago bank ad that proclaimed that "no people on earth ever had it so good as we have here and now, in Chicago. How thankful we should be." The point of this gushing prose, he says, is not its accuracy, but the fact that "nobody would dare say anything similar today."
The '50s in America were unfair in their own ways, especially for women and blacks. But the major themes, Ehrenhalt says, were "stability and confidence" which drove Americans into the good decades that followed.
"Stability and confidence." Not much of that here now. But a lot of it in China.
The Chinese try to be polite about this, but they clearly see their nation on the rise and America in decline. But as one Chinese scholar told me, America's decline "isn't because of China. It's because of America itself." Americans, he said, don't value education and aren't willing to sacrifice for the common good.
What he was saying was that China might or might not win. Either way, America is losing.
The Chinese have a phrase, "eating bitter." It means not only to work hard but to take life's worst hardships, to persevere, and to come back. China has "eaten bitter" in recent years. It wasn't fun. But it made them tough.
There's one other problem in America, the scholar said: "your democratic system is dysfunctional."
This is hard for an American to take from a citizen of a Communist dictatorship. And yet...........
If a political system is judged by its ability to deliver the goods, to encourage that "stability and confidence," to "promote the general Welfare," as the U.S. constitution says any government should do -- well, which government is doing the better job?
China still has hundreds of millions of poor people, but that pool is shrinking. America has millions of poor people, but its pool is growing, and the rate of growth is speeding up.
China's regime is a top-down leadership, promoting a guided prosperity. It decrees that something will be done, and then does it. The United States right now is trapped in a sort of bipartisanship from hell, with know-nothing Republicans and do-nothing Democrats vying to see which party can most disserve the nation and its future.
In other words, not only our economy but our political system is being judged here.
To any American, this makes no sense. To us, it's obvious that China can't free up the economic part of its life and keep the political part controlled. It can't create a middle class that will demand more say in its own life and then deny it that say. It can't open itself to global communications and then police the message. It can't draw a line in the sand of a modern society and say, "this far and no further."
OK, it doesn't make any sense. The Chinese government may be kidding itself. But so far, the Chinese are making it work. All our assumptions about the relationship between capitalism and democracy are based on experience and history that are thoroughly Western. China is different and it's big -- perhaps big enough to define its own reality.
For myself, I'm willing to go down with the good ship Democracy. But I sure hope I don't have to.
Maybe China really will win. Or maybe not. But there's no question that, in this global economy, America and the Midwest will lose. This sounds like a rash prediction. It isn't, because it's already happening.
Part of China's success may be based on pure cheating -- on trade barriers and on intellectual property theft. This hurts American companies, and we should get tough. But we haven't and we won't because China, through its massive holding of American debt, essentially owns us. So the good jobs and the best part of the economy will continue to flow eastward, leaving behind a hollowed American economy inhabited by millions of people who wonder where the good life went.
As I said, this is already happening. So is the unevenness of the impact. It's a global economy, after all, so some Americans and their institutions will do just fine. This includes the major corporations that fill China's industrial parks. Americans can rail at unpatriotic companies that ship good American jobs overseas, but patriotism has nothing to do with it. These companies stopped being American companies 20 years ago. They're global companies now, loyal to shareholders but not to the workers and communities left behind.
A minority of Americans also will do well -- those with the education, skills or contacts to plug into the global economy. Business people, some lawyers, academics and global journalists will be part of this. Knowing Chinese will help, just like knowing English was a boost for non-Americans in the post-war years. At a guess, about one quarter of Americans will belong to this global economy.
So will parts of global cities, like Chicago or New York, and some university towns, like Madison or Ann Arbor. Already, about one-third of Chicagoans live now in this global city. The rest are being left behind, like so much of the Midwest and the country. This is a social problem, rooted in the reality that the American economy, today and in the future, will not be able to support most of its people at anything near a middle-class standard of living.
Already, the blame game has started. Depending on your politics, the blame goes to corporations, Washington, Wall Street, unions, schools, immigrants, whoever. But the real reason is that this country, faced with the need to compete, decided instead to call it a day.
Friday, April 08, 2011
America Throws in the Towel
Everybody knows that the United States, and especially the Midwest, is in a competition with China and other emerging nations to survive and thrive in this new global economy.
Everybody's wrong.
Any race requires two rivals, each running flat out, each determined to win. Anybody who spends time in China -- as I have in the past month -- knows that the Chinese are treating this race like the economic Olympics, with their eye fixed on the finish line. But anybody who travels the Midwest -- as I do constantly -- knows we've stopped competing -- indeed, have made a policy decision to give up.
Basically, American has thrown in the towel. We owned the 20th century, but we've conceded the 21st century to China.
Granted, China has a bottomless bank account, including $1 trillion of our money, while both our federal and state governments are too strapped to find the cash for investment. In other words, we can't afford to compete, even if we wanted to.
But this debt is both cause and effect of our wayward ways. While China was joining the global economy and building the foundation of its current growth, the United States was cutting taxes, fighting two unfunded wars and promoting the mother of all housing bubbles. When the global recession began, the United States -- the world's biggest economy -- landed in a slump that continues to this day. China -- the second biggest economy -- kept the stimulus funds flowing and barely slowed up.
The comparisons between the world's two largest economies are stark -- and, for Americans, distressing.
China is rising, America declining. China is investing, America disinvesting. China is looking to the future, America unable to cope with the present. China is building a middle class, which embraces 300 million people and is growing: America's middle class, supported by the industries of the past, is vanishing. China is spending on the building blocks of that future, such as education and infrastructure. America -- both Washington and the state governments -- is focusing spending cuts specifically on these keys to future economic strength.
Beyond that is the psychological difference. China is simply an ambitious country. It's hungry and raw and scrapping, with its eye on the prize. How long has it been since those words applied to the United States?
China has woken from two centuries of sleep and is hard at work. America, having dominated the world economy for the past century, seems tired, out of ideas and out of energy.
America has no real game plan for the new economy. China has lots of plans. America seems to be betting that these Chinese plans will fail. Certainly, China faces many barriers -- corruption, pollution, population pressures, a dictatorial government. Americans assume that our system -- democracy and free markets -- is so obviously superior that we're bound to win.
Maybe we will, maybe we won't. But we're betting on somebody else's failure, not on an investment in our own success. What if we lose that bet?
China's priorities are no secret and couldn't be more different from ours. The new five-year plan proposes more investment in scientific and technical education, affordable housing, water conservation, raising rural income, increasing energy efficiency by about 20 percent, building more cities, and focusing investment on key industries, such as petrochemicals, biotech, information technology, new energy vehicles, high-end equipment and environmental protection.
This isn't a wish list. Much of China's economy is privatized, but the Communist Party and the government still own the major industries -- the "commanding heights." When they want something to happen, it usually happens.
The medium-term goal is to achieve a "moderately prosperous" society. Officially, this is defined as a society "in which most people are moderately well off and live in harmony with each other as well as nature." This sounds modest enough, but the goal is to achieve this by 2020 -- a revolution in a country that, within living memory, was one of the world's poorest.
By these standards, the United States had a "moderately prosperous" society 30 or 40 years ago. We called it a "middle-class society." It's gone now, along with the industrial economy that supported it.
Individual projects are spectacular. There are too many to list, so let's pick an example or two.
China already has an experimental Maglev train from one of Shanghai's airports into the city center. It goes 266 miles per hour, and it works. A new longer-distance Maglev train is planned. In the meantime, a new "ordinary" high-speed rail line, running 800 miles from Beijing to Shanghai at speeds up to 186 miles per hour is to open in a month or two.
If most Americans have heard of the northeastern city of Qingdao, it's by its earlier name of Tsingtao and its eponymous beer. Qingdao is a city with a metro area of 8 million people -- bigger than Chicago but barely in China's top 20. It has just opened an industrial park (in cooperation with Akron, Ohio) devoted to the rubber industry, is building China's biggest seawater desalinization plant, has drawn in $592 million in foreign investment so far this year, is beefing up its port, and has long-range plans for $50 billion in other civic projects.
This is just one city, and not one of the biggest or more prominent. Similar projects are going on around the country.
The new Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River, the biggest hydroelectric and flood control project in world history, is now completed and in operation. It cost at least $60 billion. Both the benefits and the environmental damage, like so much else in the country, are unprecedented.
Shanghai just had its Expo, a giant world's fair, barely two years after the Beijing Olympics. Shanghai used this fair to add several new subway lines, build a new airport terminal and train stations, and repave every important street.
So it goes. This is a country building for the future. No one claims all the money is well spent. Some is wasted and more is stolen. Some lead to unintended consequences, like the environmental damage from the Three Gorges Dam.
But much of this spending, on education, industry and infrastructure, is preparing China to dominate the global economy.
In short, this is a serious country with serious ambitions. Whatever the merits of its individual projects, China is not fooling around.
Now look across the Pacific, to the country that, barely a decade ago, was the sole superpower -- the indispensible nation, the home of the Washington Consensus, numero uno, the hegemon. Now, 10 years later, check out the United States and what you see is a country that has simply stopped trying.
America is letting its infrastructure, like its highways and bridges, crumble. Compared to China's airports, its big terminals like O'Hare are dirty, overcrowded, inefficient. Cell phone and other digital coverage is years behind the swift and comprehensive service that the Chinese take for granted.
This is fixable, but we're not fixing it. Instead, we're cutting spending where it's needed most. Governors in Wisconsin, Ohio and Florida have turned down federal funding for the high-speed trains that China is using to tie its vast country together. The state of Michigan, which right now provides barely 5 percent of the funding for the University of Michigan, is proposing another 22 percent spending cut on higher education financing. Every American state is cutting back not only on health care but on early childhood education, which is key to creating an educated work force of the future.
It's a national problem, most visible in the Midwest where states like Wisconsin are cutting taxes for business and the wealthy while declaring war on their teachers.
China invests in Africa; America goes to war there.
Greater equality -- between rich and poor, between cities and the countryside -- is stated Chinese policy. Greater inequality, with virtually all the economic growth going into the pockets of the richest 10 percent, has been American policy for 40 years now.
Competing in the global economy requires not short-changing spending on necessities but raising the money -- including higher taxes -- to finance this spending. But as the economist Jeffry Sachs wrote in a recent Financial Times, we're "trying to do the impossible: run a modern, high-technology, prosperous 21st-century knowledge economy without the requisite tax base, largely to satisfy the upper classes and multinationals."
As Sachs says, we can't have both -- inadequate taxes and a modern economy. We've made our choice.
As I mentioned in a previous post, what's happening in China today echoes an America from an earlier era. In his book The Lost City, Alan Ehrenhalt wrote about post-World War II Chicago when Americans had fewer goods, lived in smaller houses, often had fewer choices in life, but had a confidence that is lacking today. Then, we assumed that life would get better: today, we assume our children will live meaner lives than we did.
Ehrenhalt quotes the optimism of a Chicago bank ad that proclaimed that "no people on earth ever had it so good as we have here and now, in Chicago. How thankful we should be." The point of this gushing prose, he says, is not its accuracy, but the fact that "nobody would dare say anything similar today."
The '50s in America were unfair in their own ways, especially for women and blacks. But the major themes, Ehrenhalt says, were "stability and confidence" which drove Americans into the good decades that followed.
"Stability and confidence." Not much of that here now. But a lot of it in China.
The Chinese try to be polite about this, but they clearly see their nation on the rise and America in decline. But as one Chinese scholar told me, America's decline "isn't because of China. It's because of America itself." Americans, he said, don't value education and aren't willing to sacrifice for the common good.
What he was saying was that China might or might not win. Either way, America is losing.
The Chinese have a phrase, "eating bitter." It means not only to work hard but to take life's worst hardships, to persevere, and to come back. China has "eaten bitter" in recent years. It wasn't fun. But it made them tough.
There's one other problem in America, the scholar said: "your democratic system is dysfunctional."
This is hard for an American to take from a citizen of a Communist dictatorship. And yet...........
If a political system is judged by its ability to deliver the goods, to encourage that "stability and confidence," to "promote the general Welfare," as the U.S. constitution says any government should do -- well, which government is doing the better job?
China still has hundreds of millions of poor people, but that pool is shrinking. America has millions of poor people, but its pool is growing, and the rate of growth is speeding up.
China's regime is a top-down leadership, promoting a guided prosperity. It decrees that something will be done, and then does it. The United States right now is trapped in a sort of bipartisanship from hell, with know-nothing Republicans and do-nothing Democrats vying to see which party can most disserve the nation and its future.
In other words, not only our economy but our political system is being judged here.
To any American, this makes no sense. To us, it's obvious that China can't free up the economic part of its life and keep the political part controlled. It can't create a middle class that will demand more say in its own life and then deny it that say. It can't open itself to global communications and then police the message. It can't draw a line in the sand of a modern society and say, "this far and no further."
OK, it doesn't make any sense. The Chinese government may be kidding itself. But so far, the Chinese are making it work. All our assumptions about the relationship between capitalism and democracy are based on experience and history that are thoroughly Western. China is different and it's big -- perhaps big enough to define its own reality.
For myself, I'm willing to go down with the good ship Democracy. But I sure hope I don't have to.
Maybe China really will win. Or maybe not. But there's no question that, in this global economy, America and the Midwest will lose. This sounds like a rash prediction. It isn't, because it's already happening.
Part of China's success may be based on pure cheating -- on trade barriers and on intellectual property theft. This hurts American companies, and we should get tough. But we haven't and we won't because China, through its massive holding of American debt, essentially owns us. So the good jobs and the best part of the economy will continue to flow eastward, leaving behind a hollowed American economy inhabited by millions of people who wonder where the good life went.
As I said, this is already happening. So is the unevenness of the impact. It's a global economy, after all, so some Americans and their institutions will do just fine. This includes the major corporations that fill China's industrial parks. Americans can rail at unpatriotic companies that ship good American jobs overseas, but patriotism has nothing to do with it. These companies stopped being American companies 20 years ago. They're global companies now, loyal to shareholders but not to the workers and communities left behind.
A minority of Americans also will do well -- those with the education, skills or contacts to plug into the global economy. Business people, some lawyers, academics and global journalists will be part of this. Knowing Chinese will help, just like knowing English was a boost for non-Americans in the post-war years. At a guess, about one quarter of Americans will belong to this global economy.
So will parts of global cities, like Chicago or New York, and some university towns, like Madison or Ann Arbor. Already, about one-third of Chicagoans live now in this global city. The rest are being left behind, like so much of the Midwest and the country. This is a social problem, rooted in the reality that the American economy, today and in the future, will not be able to support most of its people at anything near a middle-class standard of living.
Already, the blame game has started. Depending on your politics, the blame goes to corporations, Washington, Wall Street, unions, schools, immigrants, whoever. But the real reason is that this country, faced with the need to compete, decided instead to call it a day.
Monday, March 28, 2011
Strength Training at North Fayette
The following article also will appear in the April district newsletter:
Since the start of the school year, the coaching staff at North Fayette High School has engaged in conversation and research into strength and conditioning programs with the goal of improving those areas for the student-athletes they work with. College and private strength and conditioning coaches have visited with us at North Fayette, and others have also been consulted. Our belief is that we need to do a better job of preparing our student-athletes physically and in turn mentally to compete at their highest levels. High school athletics have changed a great deal in the past ten years to the point that strength training, flexibility, core work, and agility work are no longer considered supplemental. They cannot be extras. In order for our athletes to compete at their highest level, and to compete at the level of expectations for our coaching staff and community, this training must be part of all of our athletic programs. This also will result in lifelong health benefits.
Four of the head coaches, along with Activities Directors Todd Wolverton, met with the female athletes in early March to talk to them about the program and to dispel myths about females and strength training. A meeting with all of the male athletes is forthcoming. At the meeting with the girls, a general overview of the program was provided as well as the expectations. At this point, all of our students are lifting weights in PE. Once that unit is over, it is our expectation that our student-athletes will engage in the program either before or after school. Those currently out for a sport will take time during practice. Those who are in their “off-season” are expected to come in three mornings or afternoons a week. A new cycle will begin during the summer that is much more comprehensive in nature.
Since that meeting, a number of things have emerged that have been distorted from what was actually said. The most common question has been “Is it mandatory?” The word “mandatory” was not used. Coach Hanson stated to the girls “You’re participation will not decide where you play or start, but it will help determine whether you do.” Coach Lape shared that if someone is so much better of an athlete than everyone else and doesn’t have to lift weights and do the other things, then they will probably still play. But there are two things to consider with that. First, even if they are that much better, those who choose not to improve themselves are not helping the team because they could get even better. And, Coach Lape even said that in a school our size, there are very, very few of those kinds of kids. Stronger, more flexibility, more agile athletes will contribute to better play for a team. That is indisputable. There are also the benefits of working together with fellow athletes in the off-season, such as camaraderie, confidence, and a share sense of purpose that we hope develops.
Our goal is not to build college athletes. Our mission is to do every thing in our power to help all our student-athletes reach their potential on the floor, mat, field, and track. Very rarely in the past few years has North Fayette had the best athletes on the field. Success has come because of hard work at practice, skill development, and mental toughness. Think of what is possible when stronger, faster, and more agile young people can harness that same work ethic and skills that are already being taught?
The commitment being asked is a realignment of priorities, not more time. We know how teens allocate their time. Coaches are willing to take time during practice to get into the weight room and add other types of exercises to build bodies. So there is compromise. For those that want to see our students and teams excel, your support is appreciated. If you have questions or concerns, feel free to contact Todd Wolverton or Ron Imoehl at the high school.
Since the start of the school year, the coaching staff at North Fayette High School has engaged in conversation and research into strength and conditioning programs with the goal of improving those areas for the student-athletes they work with. College and private strength and conditioning coaches have visited with us at North Fayette, and others have also been consulted. Our belief is that we need to do a better job of preparing our student-athletes physically and in turn mentally to compete at their highest levels. High school athletics have changed a great deal in the past ten years to the point that strength training, flexibility, core work, and agility work are no longer considered supplemental. They cannot be extras. In order for our athletes to compete at their highest level, and to compete at the level of expectations for our coaching staff and community, this training must be part of all of our athletic programs. This also will result in lifelong health benefits.
Four of the head coaches, along with Activities Directors Todd Wolverton, met with the female athletes in early March to talk to them about the program and to dispel myths about females and strength training. A meeting with all of the male athletes is forthcoming. At the meeting with the girls, a general overview of the program was provided as well as the expectations. At this point, all of our students are lifting weights in PE. Once that unit is over, it is our expectation that our student-athletes will engage in the program either before or after school. Those currently out for a sport will take time during practice. Those who are in their “off-season” are expected to come in three mornings or afternoons a week. A new cycle will begin during the summer that is much more comprehensive in nature.
Since that meeting, a number of things have emerged that have been distorted from what was actually said. The most common question has been “Is it mandatory?” The word “mandatory” was not used. Coach Hanson stated to the girls “You’re participation will not decide where you play or start, but it will help determine whether you do.” Coach Lape shared that if someone is so much better of an athlete than everyone else and doesn’t have to lift weights and do the other things, then they will probably still play. But there are two things to consider with that. First, even if they are that much better, those who choose not to improve themselves are not helping the team because they could get even better. And, Coach Lape even said that in a school our size, there are very, very few of those kinds of kids. Stronger, more flexibility, more agile athletes will contribute to better play for a team. That is indisputable. There are also the benefits of working together with fellow athletes in the off-season, such as camaraderie, confidence, and a share sense of purpose that we hope develops.
Our goal is not to build college athletes. Our mission is to do every thing in our power to help all our student-athletes reach their potential on the floor, mat, field, and track. Very rarely in the past few years has North Fayette had the best athletes on the field. Success has come because of hard work at practice, skill development, and mental toughness. Think of what is possible when stronger, faster, and more agile young people can harness that same work ethic and skills that are already being taught?
The commitment being asked is a realignment of priorities, not more time. We know how teens allocate their time. Coaches are willing to take time during practice to get into the weight room and add other types of exercises to build bodies. So there is compromise. For those that want to see our students and teams excel, your support is appreciated. If you have questions or concerns, feel free to contact Todd Wolverton or Ron Imoehl at the high school.
Monday, March 14, 2011
Pre-School for All
This is the entry that I have pondered for well over six months. Back then, it was becoming more evident that should Terry Branstad be elected governor of the Great State of Iowa, there was a very good chance that the best change in public education since the ruling of Brown vs. The Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, was going to be changed, and not for the better. At least that is my opinion. At first my intent was to write a scathing indictment of Mr. Branstad, but I thought better of it and not knowing how the election would turn out, figured I would just wait. Why waste time and energy, and work myself all up, when it was not necessarily a reality.
Once elected, I thought once more about ripping into the ridiculous idea of chopping up the very positive step that has been taken to help ALL kids in our state and to give them a solid start to their education. But then I thought, you know what, the Democrats are still in control of the Senate and with Mr. Gronstal in charge there, it won’t be a rubber stamp that any of these drastic cuts to education will take place.
As we sit waiting for something to happen, it appears that nothing will happen. If the Senate does not act, things stay the same, which is okay as far as I am concerned, though it is quite troubling to think what the future will bring. The pre-school program is in my opinion, the best thing that has happened in public education in at least the last twenty-five years. There is no question that youngsters will be better prepared for elementary school if they have access to quality pre-school. Those who can afford top-quality private pre-school can still send their children to those facilities, just like they can send them to private schools when they are older. Everyone else can send their children to quality pre-schools that have oversight by the Department of Education and higher standards for teachers and the curriculum that is taught.
Why is this so important? To put it bluntly, because of the current structure of the American family. Many young families are not raising children the same as we were raised. We have far too many young children being born to unwed mothers who have little education and little means to provide for their child. We see four and five year olds showing up at our schoolhouse doors having never been read to and not potty trained. Some cannot count to ten or have any idea what the first three letters of the alphabet are. We also have youngsters in two parent homes where both parents work. They don’t have that contact with a mom during the day when so much of that important nurturing happens. The bottom line is that we have a generation of children that need pre-school if they are going to have a chance. And, more important, the bar is being raised so that our nation can compete, making this a critical situation.
Another reason it is so important, and I am not singling out anyone with this, some of our private pre-schools are not very good. They just aren’t. In many respects they are no more than childcare. I have been to Head Start programs where I wonder who is in charge of the circus. The great thing about our voluntary program in Iowa right now is that those communities that have them have quality, regulated programs for their children. We cannot lose this.
Once elected, I thought once more about ripping into the ridiculous idea of chopping up the very positive step that has been taken to help ALL kids in our state and to give them a solid start to their education. But then I thought, you know what, the Democrats are still in control of the Senate and with Mr. Gronstal in charge there, it won’t be a rubber stamp that any of these drastic cuts to education will take place.
As we sit waiting for something to happen, it appears that nothing will happen. If the Senate does not act, things stay the same, which is okay as far as I am concerned, though it is quite troubling to think what the future will bring. The pre-school program is in my opinion, the best thing that has happened in public education in at least the last twenty-five years. There is no question that youngsters will be better prepared for elementary school if they have access to quality pre-school. Those who can afford top-quality private pre-school can still send their children to those facilities, just like they can send them to private schools when they are older. Everyone else can send their children to quality pre-schools that have oversight by the Department of Education and higher standards for teachers and the curriculum that is taught.
Why is this so important? To put it bluntly, because of the current structure of the American family. Many young families are not raising children the same as we were raised. We have far too many young children being born to unwed mothers who have little education and little means to provide for their child. We see four and five year olds showing up at our schoolhouse doors having never been read to and not potty trained. Some cannot count to ten or have any idea what the first three letters of the alphabet are. We also have youngsters in two parent homes where both parents work. They don’t have that contact with a mom during the day when so much of that important nurturing happens. The bottom line is that we have a generation of children that need pre-school if they are going to have a chance. And, more important, the bar is being raised so that our nation can compete, making this a critical situation.
Another reason it is so important, and I am not singling out anyone with this, some of our private pre-schools are not very good. They just aren’t. In many respects they are no more than childcare. I have been to Head Start programs where I wonder who is in charge of the circus. The great thing about our voluntary program in Iowa right now is that those communities that have them have quality, regulated programs for their children. We cannot lose this.
Monday, February 14, 2011
A Visit from Senator Grassley
More often than not, when a politician comes to your school, there is usually very short notice, giving us little time to make plans. Such was the case when aides of Senator Chuck Grassley asking if he could meet with our seniors contacted Jim Hanson, one of our social studies teachers. Once we received the request, Mr. Hanson alerted the media as best he could. With a weekly newspaper and without a radio station in the district, it is a bit difficult to notify everyone in the area that a visitor of such status will join us. However, the request was to speak with our seniors as part of the Senator’s educational tour to provide information about the workings of the federal government and provide insight into current issues.
I have had opportunity to meet with Senator Grassley three times in the past four years as part of a four to six person group of Iowa educators that go to Washington, DC each summer to lobby on behalf public education. All three times that I have participated, the Senator has met personally with our delegation. Without being too political, we have also scheduled meetings with Senator Harkin’s office at the same time and not one time have we been able to talk personally with him, rather we get to speak with his aides. In elections I have supported both senators, obviously crossing over party lines to vote for one of them. But it says a lot to me that while both of these men are very busy, one of them has taken the time to meet with public educators from his home state. Kind of interesting when you think about the current political climate and the different perspectives on public education taken by Republicans and Democrats! Those that educators most often view as “friendly toward education” are not the ones represented by Senator Grassley’s party.
The Senator impressed me as to how well he answered the student’s questions. And, I was very impressed by our students and the questions they asked. This gentleman is 77-years old and he is still very sharp on issues and was able to provide solid information in his responses. I do remember a trip to Washington a couple of years ago when it seemed to me that he was “slipping” a little bit, but all of us can chalk up a bad day or two. Were some of his responses political? Yes, they were. He let the students know what he thought. Was he trying to influence them? I don’t believe so. And when I think about it, that is what I respect about Senator Grassley. For years he has reminded me of my grandfather in a number of ways, and while he has been gone for close to ten years, my grandfather was a very strong Grassley supported. While he was alive, we had some really intense political arguments, many of which had Grassley at the center. On Friday listening to the Senator talk, my mind wandered to my grandfather and it became clear why I respected him, and Grassley so much. You do not have to agree with them, but you must respect them for their convictions and their honesty. There is nothing phony about Chuck Grassley. What you see is what you get. In today’s world, maybe we can all take a lesson from that.
I have had opportunity to meet with Senator Grassley three times in the past four years as part of a four to six person group of Iowa educators that go to Washington, DC each summer to lobby on behalf public education. All three times that I have participated, the Senator has met personally with our delegation. Without being too political, we have also scheduled meetings with Senator Harkin’s office at the same time and not one time have we been able to talk personally with him, rather we get to speak with his aides. In elections I have supported both senators, obviously crossing over party lines to vote for one of them. But it says a lot to me that while both of these men are very busy, one of them has taken the time to meet with public educators from his home state. Kind of interesting when you think about the current political climate and the different perspectives on public education taken by Republicans and Democrats! Those that educators most often view as “friendly toward education” are not the ones represented by Senator Grassley’s party.
The Senator impressed me as to how well he answered the student’s questions. And, I was very impressed by our students and the questions they asked. This gentleman is 77-years old and he is still very sharp on issues and was able to provide solid information in his responses. I do remember a trip to Washington a couple of years ago when it seemed to me that he was “slipping” a little bit, but all of us can chalk up a bad day or two. Were some of his responses political? Yes, they were. He let the students know what he thought. Was he trying to influence them? I don’t believe so. And when I think about it, that is what I respect about Senator Grassley. For years he has reminded me of my grandfather in a number of ways, and while he has been gone for close to ten years, my grandfather was a very strong Grassley supported. While he was alive, we had some really intense political arguments, many of which had Grassley at the center. On Friday listening to the Senator talk, my mind wandered to my grandfather and it became clear why I respected him, and Grassley so much. You do not have to agree with them, but you must respect them for their convictions and their honesty. There is nothing phony about Chuck Grassley. What you see is what you get. In today’s world, maybe we can all take a lesson from that.
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
The 99ers
A while back, I caught an episode of 60 Minutes, and Scott Pelley began the segment with, “The economic jam we’re in has topped even the Great Depression in one respect: Never have we had a recession this deep with a recovery this flat. Unemployment has been at 9.5% or above for fourteen months. Congress did something it has never done before. It extended unemployment benefits to 99 weeks. That cost more than $100 billion. A huge expense for a government in debt.” During the episode they interviewed unemployed individuals from Silicon Valley in California, center of the high-tech universe in the United States. What struck me was that hundreds of highly educated, bright, driven individuals were unemployed for over two years. Financial analysts and fiber optic engineers living in trucks and with friends, unable to find work, were willing to do nearly anything to earn a paycheck. The competition is stiff – over a thousand applicants for four clerk positions in a county office – and people are still finding it tough going after nearly two years of looking for a job. People with doctorates and master degrees feeling desperate wonder what is next. Too young to retire and many have cashed out their 401K’s. Small family businesses were going broke because people don’t have enough money to buy their goods.
At that time the national unemployment rate was over 9%, but that did not take into account the under-employed and part-time workers. In reality it was about 17%. One-third of the unemployed were out of work for over a year, which hadn’t been seen since the great depression. 1.5 million Americans had exhausted their unemployment checks and have been trying to figure out what to do, some taking matters into their own hands, selling their homes, digging through garbage to collect recyclable items, and making other life altering decisions.
So how does this fit into an education blog? The vast majority of the individuals featured in the program were highly educated. In a room full of unemployed individuals, not one had less than a four-year degree, and as mentioned earlier, many with master degrees and a few PhD’s. This recession that still lingers – though some economic indicators do look promising – has spared few. Those out of work have not just been unskilled laborers. What it says to me is that this is the first warning shot across the bow about the changing world economy and America’s role. As individuals like Thomas Friedman and Daniel Pink have warned, our nation must shift our focus and thus our educational system to account for the fact that cheaper labor in other parts of the world coupled with faster communication and tied together with more aggressive countries in the world economy, we will experience more setbacks like this one. Computers can replicate what humans once did. The Chinese can produce goods cheaper than we can. Brazil is now the fourth most powerful economy in the world in an area rich with natural resources. We must understand that just as the 20th century factory system is a things of the past, so must be the educational system that was designed in the same template. We cannot educate our young people the same way we were educated. It is my opinion that the toughest people to convince are the general public. So, here is my request: you must let us change and understand that there will be growing pains. You must trust that we have the best interest of your children at heart. You need to let go of some of the things that really are not that important in the big picture. Help us with these changes and challenge us to do better.
At that time the national unemployment rate was over 9%, but that did not take into account the under-employed and part-time workers. In reality it was about 17%. One-third of the unemployed were out of work for over a year, which hadn’t been seen since the great depression. 1.5 million Americans had exhausted their unemployment checks and have been trying to figure out what to do, some taking matters into their own hands, selling their homes, digging through garbage to collect recyclable items, and making other life altering decisions.
So how does this fit into an education blog? The vast majority of the individuals featured in the program were highly educated. In a room full of unemployed individuals, not one had less than a four-year degree, and as mentioned earlier, many with master degrees and a few PhD’s. This recession that still lingers – though some economic indicators do look promising – has spared few. Those out of work have not just been unskilled laborers. What it says to me is that this is the first warning shot across the bow about the changing world economy and America’s role. As individuals like Thomas Friedman and Daniel Pink have warned, our nation must shift our focus and thus our educational system to account for the fact that cheaper labor in other parts of the world coupled with faster communication and tied together with more aggressive countries in the world economy, we will experience more setbacks like this one. Computers can replicate what humans once did. The Chinese can produce goods cheaper than we can. Brazil is now the fourth most powerful economy in the world in an area rich with natural resources. We must understand that just as the 20th century factory system is a things of the past, so must be the educational system that was designed in the same template. We cannot educate our young people the same way we were educated. It is my opinion that the toughest people to convince are the general public. So, here is my request: you must let us change and understand that there will be growing pains. You must trust that we have the best interest of your children at heart. You need to let go of some of the things that really are not that important in the big picture. Help us with these changes and challenge us to do better.
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
A New Direction for Iowa
On December 29, governor-elect Terry Branstad introduced all of us to our new director of the Department of Education, Jason Glass. Glass is a young man that has travelled on the express elevator to the top of educational leadership and brings with him a very interesting resume. I have always been skeptical of individuals who profess to have the answers to complex educational issues who have not spent years in the trenches, but then again, there are no criteria for leadership entitled Years Served. Glass has expressed ideas that are common among some folks involved in the school reform movement, and like anything that is as politically charged as education, he has those who agree and disagree with his positions. I for one have believed in a merit pay system for a long time. I agree that the best teachers should earn more than those who do not perform as well. My opinions differ from many, as I do not believe that the balance of that judgment should be based on the test scores of their students. Certainly student performance should be a factor, but until someone comes up with a better measure of that than what I have seen, I am not sold on the examples that have been floated out there.
I would encourage Mr. Glass to spend some time looking at what we have in Iowa. In one of the first interviews I read, he made some critical comments, and expressed some plans that I believe he should have held back so early on. Of course the politician that appointed him has given him background, but I have to believe that he is also smart enough to take a look at what is actually happening in Iowa schools. For instance, the teacher evaluation system we have is a lot more than a quick run through the classroom and a check form. He stated in his interview that is was something that an administrator only spent twenty to thirty minutes on. That changed about six years ago when Iowa adopted a new teacher evaluation system. Perhaps not all principals are doing it with integrity, but I can tell you that I spend hours each year on a teacher’s evaluation, not just twenty minutes. And, I have seen teachers improve because of evaluation.
The Iowa Core Curriculum is another matter that I hope he looks at closely. The Republicans right now have a bill drafted to cut funding for it and to get rid of all of the work that has been done. Talk about a waste of time! Thousands of Iowa educators have been working on this process the past few years and just when we are approaching implementation, the new folks in town want to dump it. Please Mr. Glass, take a look at what it is first. After all, in math and reading, the Iowa Core is the same as the national standards. In fact, it goes beyond the national standards! My hope is that the good that is in the Iowa Core will be saved, but more importantly, let us move forward!
Having not yet met Mr. Glass, I have not developed an opinion of how effectively he will lead our educational system. I do know that we must get better in Iowa. I myself have been frustrated at the glacial speed of some changes, but what we need is someone that is going to articulate the need for change to the individuals of this state. The is a strongly held believe among Iowans that “school was good enough for me when I was a kid, what’s wrong with it now?” The black and white television was good enough in the 1950’s, but it most certainly is not good enough now.
I would encourage Mr. Glass to spend some time looking at what we have in Iowa. In one of the first interviews I read, he made some critical comments, and expressed some plans that I believe he should have held back so early on. Of course the politician that appointed him has given him background, but I have to believe that he is also smart enough to take a look at what is actually happening in Iowa schools. For instance, the teacher evaluation system we have is a lot more than a quick run through the classroom and a check form. He stated in his interview that is was something that an administrator only spent twenty to thirty minutes on. That changed about six years ago when Iowa adopted a new teacher evaluation system. Perhaps not all principals are doing it with integrity, but I can tell you that I spend hours each year on a teacher’s evaluation, not just twenty minutes. And, I have seen teachers improve because of evaluation.
The Iowa Core Curriculum is another matter that I hope he looks at closely. The Republicans right now have a bill drafted to cut funding for it and to get rid of all of the work that has been done. Talk about a waste of time! Thousands of Iowa educators have been working on this process the past few years and just when we are approaching implementation, the new folks in town want to dump it. Please Mr. Glass, take a look at what it is first. After all, in math and reading, the Iowa Core is the same as the national standards. In fact, it goes beyond the national standards! My hope is that the good that is in the Iowa Core will be saved, but more importantly, let us move forward!
Having not yet met Mr. Glass, I have not developed an opinion of how effectively he will lead our educational system. I do know that we must get better in Iowa. I myself have been frustrated at the glacial speed of some changes, but what we need is someone that is going to articulate the need for change to the individuals of this state. The is a strongly held believe among Iowans that “school was good enough for me when I was a kid, what’s wrong with it now?” The black and white television was good enough in the 1950’s, but it most certainly is not good enough now.
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