Tag Archives: inspiration

Teaching to Excite

From our prompts, I found myself thinking about one of my favorite teachers. I thought my first favorite teacher would probably have a lot to do with discovering the fun of learning – and I was enthusiastic about learning right from the start. So, Mrs. Salter, my third grade teacher, came to mind, who introduced me to Brighty of the Grand Canyon, (whose shiny nose I have now seen and touched on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon – shiny because of all of the little kids and grown kids who have touched the wonderful nose that Marguerite Henry brought to life for so many) and Misty of Chincoteague Island, another of the many Henry books. But then I realized, I started with books much earlier than that, and I really should give credit to someone who taught me, but was not considered my teacher – my father’s roommate from college – Jim Jensen, who ultimately became a college professor in English.

I always enjoyed having Jim visit. He drove a Karmann Ghia, which I thought was very exotic, and to an extent, still do. Every time he came to our house and visited my parents, both of whom he knew from high school, if not earlier, he always brought me a book as a present. Nothing fancy but a Golden Book of some sort, and I ended up putting my name in all of my books even though I technically did not know how to write yet. I always started with the verticals and the slants and horizontal lines were added more creatively.

Yup, looking below, I knew I’d get mixed up from the first to the second N but after I had done it, I’d know it was wrong. Somehow, I couldn’t cross the vertical lines correctly twice in a row. I had no control or memory of how to do it at that age. And then the E had several lines across it, going down, but I never knew quite how many. More than two, but, in this example, obviously five was too many.

Anyway, Jim got to sleep on an air mattress in our attic, which I also thought was very exotic. I also noticed that when I looked at the air mattress in the morning it no longer had any air in it – so thinking back, it was probably the worst possible “bed” for comfort and little more than sleeping on the floor.

Learning What to and Not to Do

It wasn’t until I moved to Arizona that I heard the word Lifelong Learner, but knew that I was one, but had never heard the expression. It was something that I suggest to all of my students. You are not just learning in this class. You are always learning, and you will learn from every job or opportunity you have whether or not you like that job – so pay attention. Coming from so many different jobs over the years, retail sales, draftsman, receptionist, manager, editor, teacher, word processor, musician, and writer, among other jobs that I don’t even remember – I did know one thing – food service would be a disaster – so I never attempted that. The important thing was that I always paid attention, even if it meant that I would learn not to do something in a particular way because it didn’t make sense to do it the way “they” were doing it.

Favorite Authors

I appreciate some of our 6×6 authors mentioning Ray Bradbury. I went through as much of his stuff as I could find when I was younger, and loved being reminded of that journey, including “Fahrenheit 451,” among others. I’ve tried to read everyone’s work in 6×6 this spring because I’ve felt in previous years people weren’t trying to read each other’s works. I decided to make sure that I did. It’s the spirit of the thing.

I’ve mentioned a few of my favorite current authors, Louise Penny, a Canadian author, who created a wonderful arc between a number of books, to tell a much larger story, Mick Herron, of Slough Horses or Slough House fame, I’ve read even more arcs from his books, and the way he can create an introduction using a spirit is beyond inspirational. If I could write a book, I’d like to write like he writes, but I don’t think I have the talent. He also has short stories that are part of that very large arc, so I really have to pay attention when I read him because he uses so many word references to the back story of characters. My favorite line of his was when an individual was trying to dial a phone in an emergency and he created this beautiful play on words, “his fingers felt like thumbs, his thumbs like bananas.” Who hasn’t been there! Malcolm Gladwell can tell you why we can be “all thumbs” when the going gets tough – it’s psychological! John Camp (I mentioned his pen name in a different writing, but his Pulitzer is under this name), from the St. Paul Pioneer Press, whose works I simply devour – I can’t put them down. I have to re-read them later because I try to read to go to sleep, but find myself still reading at 3 a.m.! I’ve read ALL of his books. Michael Connelly is another fabulous writer. I started with the Bosch books, and have since read all of his books twice. That got me through a broken shoulder where I was in bed for the better part of three months.

I no longer put my name on the inside of books, written correctly or not, and most of what I now read is in a Kindle because my hands and neck can’t tolerate holding large books anymore. We all make adjustments; some are just to allow us to continue reading more and more from those that first introduced us to the excitement of books and learning and where authors can take us on their journeys – Berlin, London, Toronto, Brittany – and I didn’t even mention that French author, or the English one, that put Provence on everyone’s map!

 

My Office Accoutrements

I was on a Zoom call recently when someone looked at my background and said “Is that real?” We were in the process of setting up, and getting our meeting started so I didn’t realize she was talking to me, so I didn’t answer. (“You talkin’ to me?!”) But I digress.

As a matter of fact, my Zoom background isn’t a background at all. It is my office. It took years to learn that others used something similar as a background. In my office I have books. Behind me (while I’m sitting here writing this) looms a large two-tier floor to ceiling bookcase, and that was what she was seeing. But that was only one wall. I have two more walls of bookcases. In fact, my home is filled with books, and books, and books. Outside my office I have more floor to ceiling bookcases, which house hundreds of my husband’s books. The ones in my office are textbooks, reference books, music scores, and books and anthologies of poetry (mostly public domain) of poems I use or have used in my music. Anything I’m currently reading in fiction, Mick Herron, Ann Cleeves, or John Sanford (you have to know that reference or you won’t get the fact that he’s a Pulitzer-prize winning reporter with over forty books); or non-fiction, Malcolm Gladwell, for example, is in my Kindle, quietly holding hundreds more books. I don’t read so much as devour. But again, I digress.

Where my office doesn’t have books I have artwork, mostly paintings by my mother, whose work I greatly admire, in oils, watercolors, or pastels. When we moved her out of her home recently, we had to deal with her office – her art room. I’ll never forget when I mentioned to my husband that my mother won “Best in Show,” he glibly shot back, “What breed did she register under?” because he knew she had a fistful of ribbons that she’d won in competitions over the years. Along with ribbons were paints, paint brushes, paintings, ideas for paintings, and books about painting. We soon realized this was part of a floating iceberg – there was more art and were more canvases squirreled away in other parts of the house! She is 91, and now living in an apartment. She went to an art class recently given at her facility but pretended not to know anything so as not to show anyone up. Very Minnesotan of her – not a surprise since she was born and raised there. But again, I digress.

I happen to be very visual – and visually pleasing things help me to write and think. Sometimes I’m not looking at something as much as staring, thinking of the words I’m trying to elicit from my sometimes-slow-as-molasses brain. On my desk is a two-foot-high sculpture which I lugged on a plane, stowed between my feet coming back from Houston. I love it and am happy I went to the trouble to get it to my very first office, and every subsequent office since.

Minnesota Nice

I have finally tucked my degrees on a wall next to the aforementioned large bookcase when I moved to Arizona, but you won’t see them front and center. They would only be slightly noticeable if you completely entered the room. So, if you just stick your head in you surely won’t see them. And on a Zoom call they’re just out of focus enough that you can’t read them either. (That’s so “Minnesota” of me. You work your buns off only to place your degrees in a spot that people “might” see, but again, they “might not.” So, that’s being very Minnesotan, understated, but still honest, a bit like my mother, an award-winning artist but not about to show up a budding volunteer art teacher who was providing the little art class to other ninety-year-olds.) Again, digressing…

Office Particulars

I, too, have a stack of legal pads – I love legal pads (but prefer other colors to yellow if I have the option) and love to write things down. It’s a mnemonic, a memory tool, and I’m an inveterate doodler as well. So, somehow between the computer, the occasionally working printer – which is virtually brand new – and my legal pads I get my work completed. They all sit happily or grumpily on my desk (depending on threatening deadlines) along with a calendar of course deadlines, which week we happen to be in, and what my students’ imminent deadlines are.

Technically I have two offices and three desks. Two desks at angles to each other, in beautiful cherry, a wood that is not currently in vogue, but I don’t care. A cherry drafting table sits downstairs and looks at me imploringly under heavy brows when I descend the staircase. It sits next to the grand piano. It used to scold me, but now we have an “understanding.” When I feel like using it – I do. First plan regarding moving in, do not dream of moving a grand piano upstairs! Very good plan. At least the piano doesn’t have an attitude.

I mentioned going through my mother’s artwork and her office. Unfortunately, there will come a time when someone has to do that for me – and my music. Hopefully I’ll get to it before then, but one never knows. There are copyrights involved so there is some consolation on getting something for their trouble. Some of my music is in the closet with extra shelving. Some of the music is in a computer on pdfs (which computer does that reside in is the real question), some hard copies in file folders based on a previous method of storage. We (my husband and I) are trying to decide the next best way to store scores, parts, and recordings that go with each piece when it needs to go out to performers or conductors. This decision came after spending Christmas Break frantically searching through several computers, other closets in other rooms which hold older pieces, not to mention downstairs near the piano, where it might have also been, in an effort to find my second string quartet and vocal chamber piece that had to be sent RIGHT NOW.

My office was better organized when I taught at Hamline University because I had a secretary and an honors student assistant. But that was many pieces ago and a different institution and state. I simply have more music, larger pieces, and need a new organizational system. But it’s the middle of the semester, I’m working on two CD projects, and helping my students with their deadlines. I’ve finally gotten a couple of these 6×6 writings under my belt, which I’ve been owing. My accoutrements are scowling a little less as I walk into the room. What I probably need for my office is an assistant or perhaps less judgmental furniture . . . but I digress.

 

Remember This

 I have always been a lover of words, and as I've grown older, I find myself relying more and more on them as reminders of things I've forgotten. 

orange spiral wire against black background
Photo by Kiarash Mansouri
I lean on words.

I let words encourage me.

Words inspire me.

Words can take me back to a place or time worth remembering.

Words remind me of things my mind and body too easily forget. 

And so my office space has become a place where words surround me. 

There are hand-scrawled messages--names of two students I don't want to forget, the CTLE values, names of mentees, and my section of the honors program alphabet for reviewing their work. 

There are short sayings, inspirational messages I've acquired over the last couple of years given to me or collected by me. They are mostly taped near me, so I can see them daily. 

"Setting goals is the first step toward making the invisible visible." Tony Robbins

"...it's never too late to be whoever you want to be." Eric Roth

"If it's both terrifying and amazing then you should definitely pursue it." Erada

There are small cards on the wall and around my desk that contain messages meant for me on a particular day, and I keep these around me:

"I choose to let go of fear."

"I know that focusing my attention on things I cannot control distracts me from my journey." 

"My ability to conquer my challenges is limitless." 

There is a December calendar image and saying--a cat with bells around its neck. The quote reads, "Jingle all the way, nobody likes a half-assed jingler." And this will stay up even though it's no longer December because.

Finally, there is a small poster, and it was the first put up in my office. It says, "Let that shit go," and it is in my direct line of vision. That is my most important reminder of all. 

Office Space as Reflective Space: Who Am I?

When setting up my office space I wrestled with what to put on the walls–what do I want people to see when they come in my office? I meet with numerous students and I wanted the space to be a warm and inviting space that would provide a sense of who I am for those meeting me for the first time. The pictures and items on my walls reveal the diverse sides of who I am.

First, there is a picture of my family taken at my son’s wedding a few years ago. I love my family and this is a reminder that the most important things in life are not found in my office but in the relationships outside of it.

The next set of pictures revolve around Francis Schaeffer–a philosophical thinker. (I am in the Philosophy & Religious Studies Department, after all!)

Schaeffer was a philosopher and public intellectual whose writings I read in high school. He was the motivating factor for me to pursue philosophy and the life of the mind. I keep this quotation from him right above my desk as an inspirational reminder to me….

Next, people will see an art project my daughter and I worked on a few years ago. It’s based on the famous Shroud of Turin and we sought to recreate the image in a unique manner.

I read an article by literature professor, Nathan Wilson, about how he created a replication of the image by painting on a piece of glass and letting the sun bleach out the negative space. In other words, the dark parts of the image are not a result of being put on a light cloth but, rather, the result of a dark cloth being bleached out except for the areas of the image. My daughter and I tried it in our backyard and it worked!

No GCC office would be complete without a Gauchos flag!

The next two pictures reflect a bit of the fun side of who I am. These are also some of the first items students see when they come into my office. The first is a quotation from the movie “Nacho Libre”–a truly great movie!

And, finally, for the superhero enthusiast there is Batman. My friend drew this for me back in 1989. Michael Keaton’s Batman had recently come out and I was a fanatic. I saw the movie twice on the opening day–one time was at 3 am!

Yes, there are the miscellaneous philosophy books and scattered files that accompany any office in our department but the pictures give a picture of who I am in my diversity of personality. They remind me of who I am and I hope give a glimpse of my manifold character to the students who enter.

 

Podcast Power: Happiness

Recently, I have started listening to podcasts by Dr. Laurie Santos titled The Happiness Lab. I have enjoyed learning how our brains are wired to remember negative experiences over positive ones and how we can find happiness in the smallest things. This podcast has not necessarily had a profound impact on my class instruction rather on myself and the kindness I have toward the human condition. 

The Happiness Lab with Dr. Laurie Santos

The Happiness Lab speaks to the stress we put on ourselves and how that stress affects our bodies and minds. I have taught future elementary educators for the past 5 years. They are some of the most dedicated learners I have ever taught. However, they are also some of the most overwhelmed and self-critical students I have encountered. 

By listening to The Happiness Lab I have learned how to create healthier habits within myself and I am sharing what I have learned with my students. My students exhibit the effects of stress and I have found myself suggesting and sharing information from the podcast. Through listening to The Happiness Lab, my desire to help my students has increased to areas outside of the course content.

 

Summer Stars

Songs to represent musical growth in teaching, performing, and composing

Starlight

Stars have represented decades of growth for me as a composer, a writer, and as an educator. I’ve written operas, string quartets, choral pieces, all including stars, but, of course, I couldn’t have done it without the poets who wrote about them first.

What Do You Listen To and How Will That Help You Grow?

Learning to choose notes, write music, is something I teach by example, just as I was taught. And to bring that full circle as educators, we grow when we listen. I’ve taught ear training; taken ear training; but I really began listening when I was very, very small — and paid attention to what composers were doing to connect to listeners. To be perfectly honest, I’m falling in love again. I love lots of styles of music, and teach all about them, but in this week’s work, I chose the more difficult road, talking about my music. It would have been a lot easier to just talk a bit about a song and its history…

A composer, at least the kind I am, representationally, has to know how to make words fit the voice because singers may change vowels to create a better sound. … Acoustical physics at its finest. So, taking into consideration the difficulties vocalists face, how the words will have to be sung in order to hit that very high note, and still bring out the beauty, success will be measured.

In that blink of an eye, and with pieces I haven’t heard in years, because of this first week’s prompt, I’m opening my soul to much of my past and listening to compositions that worked, that didn’t work, that really worked, and, well, some that needed to go back to the drawing board. It’s challenging and emotionally-charged. Why didn’t it work or what did work? Sometimes it’s the composer, the performer, or the recording – or, during a live recording, an audience member who coughed loudly throughout the entire piece. I got a little taller that day.

The songs that make a listener fall in love with each word are the truest test of success. After all, the words are the most important elements. And, it’s not the applause that shows whether you truly connected with others’ ears, it’s the silence.

I chose to include a short piece, still about stars, from Songs of the Night Wind, with the Stockholm String Quartet and Olle Persson, baritone.

Summer Stars, Olle Persson, baritone, Stockholm String Quartet, text by Carl Sandburg
Summer Stars

Bend low again, night of summer stars,

So near you are, sky of summer stars,

So near, a long-arm man can pick off stars,

Pick off what he wants in the sky bowl,

So near you are, summer stars,

So near, strumming, strumming

           So lazy and hum-strumming.

                                                                                                              Carl Sandburg
 

Joy: An Evolution in Becoming a Teacher at Glendale Community College

written by Dr. Krysten Pampel

I have been teaching since Fall of 2009 and the lyrics in Joy by Andy Grammer are a good representation of my evolution in becoming a teacher at Glendale Community College.

Joy by Andy Grammer (official audio)

I vividly remember my first year teaching and the fear that sat with me on the daily. The weight of being a teacher cannot be articulated in a preservice teacher classroom. It is something you experience when you have students show up in your classroom on the first day of classes. 

Doubt was a constant in those first years of teaching since I was building and creating curriculum with the hope that students would gain the knowledge they needed in order to be successful in the next class. This was a huge challenge and the pressure felt very high to help my students who were looking to move into STEM careers after high school were given all the tools they needed to achieve their academic goals.

In the Fall of 2011, I was accepted into a doctorate program which was a great opportunity but stretched me too thin. I felt sorrow when leaving high school was the best option for me to complete my doctorate degree and have a better balance in my life.  

As a doctorate student I had very limited access to the classroom which kept me grieving the loss of leaving the high school classroom. The ways I connected with college students was significantly different than high school students. Over the years in my doctoral program, I started to change my perspective and found joy as I got closer to finishing my dissertation. 

Pressure entered my teaching evolution when I found out I was pregnant. My due date and my dissertation completion were around the day. I also felt pressure in determining what I wanted to do for work after finishing my degree.

My husband has asked me what job I would take that would make it where I no longer taught at the community college at night. I was so struck by this question because I never realized how much I liked teaching at the community college. I knew that if I got any other job I would be in a constant state of jealousy for those working at the community college inspiring college students in the classroom. 

As I applied for a full time position at Glendale Community College, I started to get excited but was told by many current residential faculty that it was normal not to get hired the first time you interview. I went into the interview still hopeful that I would be a strong candidate for the position. After making it through all three rounds, I started to let doubt creep back in which felt shameful since I had been warned that the first time you interview you rarely get hired. 

I found joy in the June of 2017 when I received a call for Dr. Chris Miller, the mathematics department chair, offered me the job. I continued to find joy when I had my son, Olyver, at the end of September 2017 and again on November 3rd, 2012 when I defended my dissertation, successfully earning my doctorate degree. 

I have been finding more joy ever since getting a position here at GCC, through the students I teach, the colleagues I collaborate with, and the opportunities for growth I have found. 

 

Embracing Diversity

The New Nursing Student 

Dr. Ingrid Simkins

As we always discuss the first day of nursing school, your first responsibility is to know yourself! Recognize your biases and leave them at the door. If you can’t acknowledge each person for their unique self, other career options are available. You need to treat every person as if they are your most adored member of your family and care for them as you would wish them to be cared for. None of us will be a diversity expert or culturally competent across all cultures, but we all have the capacity to be sensitive to each individual and their needs.

My name is Diversity (a poem)

Dr. Grace Paul

My Name is Diversity

I come in various forms

I come in various shapes

With unique physical attributes

Doesn’t matter, accept me for who I am!

Because I am who I am!

My gender is male, female, either, neither or fluid

I am a gay, lesbian, straight, bi, pan, or asexual

I am a veteran, differently abled, young or old

Doesn’t matter, accept me for who I am!

Because I am who I am!

I come from one race, or a mixture of races

My ethnicity is varied, from any part of the world

Native to the land, or an immigrant

Doesn’t matter, accept me for who I am!

Because I am who I am!

My culture, my food, my customs

My religion, my language, my rituals

Rich, poor, lower, middle, or upper class

Doesn’t matter, accept me for who I am!

Because I am who I am!

Take the time to know me

I am awesome and beautiful

Just the way I am

With uniqueness abound!

Talk to me, listen to me

Look at me, and include me

Respect me for what I am

Because, I am who I am!

I may look and sound different to you

But we can learn from each other

I am not a statistic

To represent diversity

Or inclusion

But an individual no matter

With so much to offer

I matter! Accept me for who I am!

Because I am who I am!

When you accept me for who I am

There is empathy in the world

Prejudices are removed

There is more tolerance

And therefore, less violence

Accept me for who I am!

Because I am who I am!

There is peace, love and understanding

Inspiration, Motivation and Hope

Better decision making all around

A better world for all of us

Do accept me for who I am!

Because I am who I am!

I am understood

I am valued

I am cherished

I am embraced

Because

I am ubiquitous

Because I am who I am!

And my name is Diversity!

 

Can We Live Without Risks?

A statement someone made recently jumped out at me. They said they rarely take risks. I was amazed. I consider myself a very careful person, but I often feel like my risks are the challenges I take on. Of course, I’m not talking about doing anything like this!

Perhaps it’s the definition of the word risk [enter student’s clichéd discovery of dictionary definition to make written assignment longer]. Wink

I see risk as a transition and an opportunity. Now, if the risk doesn’t have that element, I won’t do it. In some ways, we all take risks every day. There are certain risks I simply won’t consider, the consequences are just too costly.

Professionally, I was always taught to say ‘yes,’ if you want to work. People want to know that you will say ‘yes,’ when they ask. It saves time for those hiring. That’s a musician’s point of view. It’s the way you keep getting more opportunities – or, for those who prefer less formal constructs – How you get more gigs. Regrets, yes, certainly. I said ‘no’ to a really good opportunity, which was a risk, because I was just getting married (hence, already in the midst of a transition) and didn’t want to spend my honeymoon thinking about the project and risking the beginnings of our marriage… I’ll always think about where that job might have led. But see, once again, I keep going back to the positive-negative balance of risks.

And I’ll admit to some positive/negative possibilities. I’ve walked into a classroom and spoken completely ‘off the cuff,’ which is definitely a risk. It’s not that I hadn’t thought about it. I had. I know my subject deeply. Some of those have been my most inspired lectures, but occasionally, they have not. It’s a risk.

How about classroom management? I had a student who sat in the front row of class and never took a note. (This is a room that is set up as a lecture/recital hall, so down in front is noticeable.) In fact, he came in without anything – no books, no notebook, no pen/pencil or computer. Nothing. An instructor would assume he didn’t come prepared for class. And we’ve all had those students who obviously weren’t. Did I mention this was a long lecture format? The class was two hours and twenty minutes long. Should I say anything to him? He wasn’t disruptive, and he did well in the subject. One day he came in with a Rubik’s cube. I saw it, but chose not to say anything. As the lecture was finishing I just happened to look over at him. He subtly showed me his work by merely opening his hand. It was finished, and it was perfect. He hadn’t been disruptive to anyone, he didn’t show anyone else, I hadn’t been interrupted by what he was doing, but it allowed him to concentrate on what we were talking about. A risk, and a reward.

Deeper Risks

I could stop there, because it would be a great place to end – but I’m going to “risk” it and go heavy. As I mentioned earlier, we take risks every day. Driving, flying, walking down a set of stairs, saying something that you wish you hadn’t. I never discuss politics. I’ve gotten to where I rarely offer comments – especially to the entire world on any of those fronts.

But I’m going to include the world community and the risks people are facing today because we need to be talking about this in our classrooms. These are the ultimate risks because they are about basic human needs. This is not something that is happening somewhere else. It will ultimately affect us here. I was just reading an article about the fact that many Russians are also leaving their homeland, just as many Ukrainians are – except those who choose to fight. There is a general surge of people trying to survive with some semblance of their lives intact. In the article, the author referred to a family’s current residence, a shared room with three mattresses on the floor. The people had a roof, they had mattresses, a floor, running water, and they still had some money. They had been well-to-do so such living conditions would not have been acceptable in their previous life, but under the circumstances they knew they were lucky. They calculated the risk and felt they’d come out ahead considering the cost.

I first saw evidence of the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990s in Sweden. I ended up working with two Russian musicians as part of a Swedish quartet. There were interesting cultural flare-ups that surprised me. But like other recent mass emigrations, everyone was, and had been, fleeing for their lives. It’s amazing what we are willing to risk when we feel that we have little left to lose or too much to lose – our lives or our children’s lives.

In Estonia, ten years after the last Russian troops slowly left, I moved there, and in my research I learned more of Stalin’s ’round up’ of people. Sometimes there were lists, sometimes just numbers. ‘Take this number of people. I don’t care who.’ They disappeared or went to gulags. Often, no one ever knew whether they were killed outright or just never seen again. How can you live with that threat? I was part of an interview team to determine whether a young Estonian man would study in the U.S. when he talked about the importance of the NATO alliance to his country. I knew about NATO. It also meant, in couched terms, the U.S., from where funding came for this prestigious scholarship. I occasionally thought about NATO – but not to the extent that this young man understood it because the Estonians had few defenses against the Russians on their shared border. We, as Americans, have the luxury of a different point of view.

Before I sign off, I want to mention that moving people, their craft, their professions, their influences, and their cultures affects everything. It affects the arts, music, the humanities, science, technology, engineering, people, and even education. Would you stay or would you go? Ultimately, when we talk about risks, these are the most critical risks to discuss. I truly believe as educators everything we do counts, but we are also lucky that we can talk about risks that are so relatively ordinary when others face risks that are so tremendously devastating.

 

Three Positives of the Pandemic

The negatives of the pandemic are abundant so I am going to stick to three of the positives I identified from the pandemic. 

We are stronger than we know

During the pandemic we all had a hard time. I was reminded of a TED talk I watched with my Reimagine cohort. In this talk, Ash Beckham spoke about how everyone in their lifetime experiences hardship. This resonated with me since worldwide we were experiencing hardship. I know that not only am I stronger than I know but so are students, neighbors, colleagues, friends, and strangers. There is no doubt that the pandemic has altered all of us in some capacity but I am confident that we are stronger than we know. 

TED talk shown in Reimagine – Ash Beckham

We are more inventive than we know

March 2020 put us all in a “make-it-work” situation as we prepared to go fully online to support the education of our students. This event has propelled faculty and students to new heights of innovation. We have found ways to connect with one another, learn from each other, and be more flexible when things inevitably deviate from our intended outcome. I know that I am more inventive and flexible when things fall apart in my lessons and life. I have seen people around me doing the same thing. We are more inventive than we know. 

I am more empathetic that I know

I have always struggled with the ability to empathize with students. Most of it comes from the more pessimistic outlook that I have that students are constantly trying to get out of completing the work for my courses. The outlook is bleak and gets me and my students nowhere. I have found that the pandemic has made me more empathetic in the sense that I am able to imagine how the student is feeling and thinking during times of hardship. This has helped me to implement a grace period on assignments and I weigh the students perspective on the issue they are facing before responding to them. My communication has improved through the pandemic and I know I am more empathetic because of the pandemic. 

The pandemic has been unimaginable for all of us but I hope that you (all of you) can also see how amazing we have become by living through a pandemic.