Category Archives: integrity

Help a little

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We have a new bike skills area in one of the local parks. I helped with this, at least a little. I attended half of 3 different work parties. I contributed some money to help buy a tree for landscaping. Of the two, the monetary contribution was the easiest, and it got my name on the sign in bigger typeface (name on the sign twice!), the irony of which is not lost on me.

The work parties ran from 8 to noon; I would arrive around 10, and stay to the end. There’s the little voice in my head saying I could do more. And I could have done more; you can always do more. It occurred to me when I was out there last that I also could have done less. Because if I stayed for 4 hours and really didn’t enjoy it, it would be easy to justify not coming the next time; heck, I went to a work party, what more can anyone demand? Showing up for half the time and putting a good effort meant coming back 3 times and putting in over 6 hours. Not only more than staying home, but more than just one work party.

And I don’t mean to boast here — I’m a slacker on this stuff and I know it. There are folks who put in 3 full work parties worth and gave larger sum of money to boot. All I’m trying to say is, I can see how easy it would have been to just skip it. Stay home. Read a book. Go hiking. Do something I find more rewarding. Showing up for half is sure-as-heck not showing up for the whole thing. But it is better, tons better, than doing nothing.

Figure out where you can help a little. Then help a little. Don’t give it up for not good enough.

Cecil the Lion; Hunting and Conservation

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“If we want wildlife to be around for future generations, we have to understand that that wildlife has to have a value. If it doesn’t have a value, especially in the continent of Africa, it is going to be gone.”

“Living next to a black rhino is a nightmare.”

When the whole Cecil the Lion thing blew up, I kept quiet, not wanting to have the Wrath of the Internet (or of even just my friends) come down on my head. But I thought the dentist was being demonized without good reason. Surely he shelled out $50,000 for a hunt because he wanted a legal hunt. If anyone is to blame here, surely primary blame should be on the professionals he hired.

Today I’m gathering my courage and posting about this, because yesterday I listened to a Radiolab episode on this. Twice.

You may find hunting detestable. You may think it is in conflict with conservation. But I want to ask you how much money you have given to conservation this year? In your lifetime?

The least you can do is listen. Listen to this.

Or download from Radiolab and listen later
The Rhino Hunter on Radiolab.

Are you okay?

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Yes. No. Yes. I learned a long time ago that when you don’t know the answer to that question, the answer is no. No, I’m not not okay in a way that requires you to do anything about it. But I’m not okay in the sense that I feel far from all right.

I dealt with my students today. I thought I was pretty light on them, all things considered. The first registered his protest but managed to be polite about it. The second, treated much more leniently, cursed at me. We were done at that point. He can talk to my department chair about it. I don’t have to take that from him. I don’t have to take that from anyone. And if he goes in with that to the chair, I’d be willing to bet that he’s going to land in more trouble than he was bargaining for.

Of course, little does he know that I consulted my chair every step of the way through this, from when I first saw it, to deciding what to do about it. I didn’t bother to tell him that.

Dealing with people is hard. Feeling their emotions (especially when they are being blasted at you) is hard. Having to make unpopular decisions is hard.

It’s also my job. To determine what grade a student earned. To determine when something looks fishy and requires a sanction. It doesn’t matter how much integrity or fairness is brought to that process; someone’s going to get angry at you for an outcome that they don’t like. Angry at me.

On the most part, I think I can deal with this, but lately, it’s been too much. Over and over. At something I used to feel like I was good at. And maybe I still am, but I no longer have my reputation preceeding me. The default expectation for female is often pushover, and when it isn’t, that quickly flips to rhymes-with-witch. If, especially as a young woman, you aren’t being called a certain name on occasion, you are probably being far too easy. Or you have a lot more finesse in dealing with people than I do.

It doesn’t feel good. Not one bit. Part of me wishes I could cry about it, but that’s not coming up and out of me. I just … don’t feel okay. No, there’s nothing you can do about it. I don’t need you to help. I don’t need rescuing. I just need to do my best to push through the rest of today, and then to get through tomorrow, and then get through the next day. I know that things come together, then things fall apart. That’s the natural cycle of being. Persevere through this stage, and things will get better again. They’ll get worse again after that, but no sense in worrying about that now. I have enough worries at the moment.

Cutting Corners

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I was grading papers and computer code earlier today. When students’ code doesn’t agree with mine, I wonder why. When it looks nothing like the pseudocode in our book, I wonder where it came from. First hit, Wikipedia. There’s the same code with a few names changed to disguise it.

I’m clear in course policies that copying code is against the rules. It’s printed on every assignment that involves code. Do not copy code. It’s in the syllabus, noting that the minimum sanction will be a zero on the assignment.

On the flip side, you can go from the pseudocode in the book to actual code, and I’ve got no issue with that. That’s what the pseudocode in the book is for.

The first case was so blatant, that it’s pretty obvious what I need to do.

Then there’s the second case. This time the code from Wikipedia was modified to fit in an alternative environment, but it’s still pretty clearly the Wikipedia code, and certainly not the pseudocode from our book.

I don’t know what to think. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to say. No, I don’t want to forbid students from looking at internet resources, I think you can learn a lot of valuable things that way. But, if you are assigned to code something we learned about in class, I expect your main resource to be either materials from class or from the book, not copying and pasting something off the internet.

It never occurred to me that I would have to spell that out. Maybe I need to spell that out.

I see an ugly situation in my future. I know I can handle it. But this year has been such a year of handling and struggling. Part of me just wants to hide.

Add to my mistakes: looking myself up on RateMyProfessor. Never got any feedback from Texas A&M. But the complainers are out from my new school. I give too much work and it is *so* hard. I don’t help enough in class, and I have a good teaching philosophy, but I just don’t use it.

Note to self: don’t look at that stuff. Haters gonna hate. Your job is to teach, and to ask hard questions. If you are only asking easy questions, something is wrong with what you are doing.

But another part of my job is to motivate students to want to try and do well. I wish I knew what I could do better at that. On that, I thought this was a good article. Rethinking Positive Thinking.

Painful truth

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Dear Students,

I know I upset one of you today, and goodness knows whether I will upset more of you tomorrow when I actually hand back homework.

The student I talked to today worked very hard and felt he got robbed on his score. Unfortunately, he just got the math wrong. Scores in general were lower than I would have liked them to be. I know I caught some students out — they were not thinking that 2 weeks to do homework means 2 weeks of homework to be done. I know others got caught thinking that if a few problems were easy then they all would be easy.

I don’t know if I’m harder or more conscientious than other instructors. I do know that I believe that all of you can master this material and get it right. I know that I am going to push you to get to that level.

If I tell you that you got something right when you really didn’t, I am leading you into complacency when you are capable of doing more and doing better. I would rather have you angry with me and have you figure out how to make a stronger, better effort to get things right and understand why you are right than have you satisfied with your grade and mediocre at solving problems.

Would you rather believe a pleasant lie or know a painful truth? I have always lived on the side of painful truths. Today feels like one.

Honestly? I want you to like me. I want you to enjoy my class. I want you to learn a lot. I want you to grow. I know that all those things go together. If you hate me, and you hate my class, learning a lot and growing are less likely to occur. But if I have to give you a false sense of the merit of your work to make you like me, that won’t work either.

So, if you get this homework back and you need to be angry with me, I encourage you to be angry with me. Anger at me that keeps you motivated and working is better than anger at yourself that is paralyzing and makes you think, “Why should I even try? Why should I even bother?” Or worse, fall into inaction because of those thoughts.

I am a grown woman, with a strong soul. I can handle your anger.

That said, I hope that I can bring honesty and encouragement and grace and motivation to you. I hope that I can be someone who helps you to believe in yourself. I hope that I can hold you to high standards, and motivate you to hold yourself to high standards and help you see that you are capable of meeting them. Even when the work is far, far from easy.

That’s what I want for you. That’s what I want for me. That’s what I want for this class, and every other class that I teach.

With sincerity, and encouragement, and even, yes, with love,

Dr. Jinx

Being the Bad Guy

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So I was the bad guy today. Last week’s bike ride was fun, but resulted in about a half hour or maybe even 40 minutes of five of us riding in the dark, where two of us had full sets of lights, two had taillights, and one had nothing. The time before that with this group, we had a flat and got back into the dusk, and I recall that I either turned on my lights or wished I had them with me.

My experience with the other group, the mountain bikers, has been that we haven’t yet gotten back before dark resulting in some fairly scary rides for me.

So for tonight’s ride, I commented that everyone should bring lights, or buy lights, or let me know and I can bring an extra set for them.

Reply: we’ll be back before dark.

My reply: yeah, but one flat tire or person not going fast enough and you are out after dark.

It was clear I stepped on some toes.

Part of me feels bad about that; we did get back before dark tonight. But part of me says hey, c’mon, bringing lights when we are quickly running out of daylight is just a sensible idea. People make mistakes. People get flats. And asking participants on a ride to wear a helmet or bring lights just in case is not an unreasonable burden, even if your plan is to be back in time.

I know I’m just the newbie here, and so I don’t get credit for 12 years experience of leading my own rides. No one knows or cares what a League Cycling Instructor is and using the credential to bolster the argument is arguing from authority, which isn’t right either. That frustrates me. It also frustrates me to see the rejection of sensibility in mitigating risk. We might get delayed beyond what we expect. So we prepare for the eventuality.

So internally there is the discomfort between not being the bad guy, and knowing that it is my belief that yes, I am willing to be the bad guy on this issue. It’s not a nice place to sit. While I hope I am constantly learning wisdom on how best to handle people in these situations, I hope I am also willing to state what someone or no one wants to hear when it is the truth, and it matters.

Identity

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Before I left Spokane, my friend said to me that he hadn’t realized how much of his identity was tied up with his wife. When she passed away, and as he’s dealt with his grief, he’s had to examine his concept of who he is and what he wants. This is no easy task.

I don’t know that I said much in reply aside from offering sympathy. I won’t claim to be an expert at this one, nor have I had a major grief, like his, to deal with.

Every time I’ve had a relationship end (my, I’ve had a lot more of these than I ever wanted to), I have had to adjust my sense of self. It is easier because I’ve spent a lot of time alone — then I know who I am when no one else is around, and I am mostly returning to this after a relationship ends.

What’s been harder for me is letting go of the things I wanted to be, but will never become. The one that hurts the most is that I will never be a parent. If I can’t find the husband, it makes it hard to have the child. I was never willing to go at that solo. Eventually, I got too old. 45 is pretty definitive. There are days when 45 is pretty hard to take.

There’s all the self-questioning that I can’t quite stop. I should have gone further into online dating. Sooner. Many boyfriends I should have broken up with sooner. I should have dropped the hard shell of defensiveness from my childhood sooner, and softened up. I should have been wiser about people, as if I could have just had the realization that when other people treated me poorly that this is not a reflection on my worth sooner.

We can regret, but we cannot change the past. We can only go on from here.

When we depart from the standard story, or any story we’ve told ourselves for a long time, it takes adjustment. I’m still trying to figure out who I am, as a 45 year old woman, aging more quickly than I’d like, without a family, without a significant other, with an anxiety problem that is fortunately not troubling me much at the moment, and, right now, in a new place without any friends or close friends to lean on.

We need more stories for women. More for men too, but I know less about that. I have female friends who are childless and happy with that, but I can’t think of many stories where that is the outcome for women. It never was an option in any of my happily ever afters. So I have no view of what this should be, even looking at my friends and trying to see through their eyes.

The only thing I’ve figured out is that you have to concentrate on the love you can give, not on the love you wished to receive. That is the path to happiness, but it is not easy to travel it.

One thing I hope is that I find honor and integrity, grace, generosity and kindness, warmth and caring, and lots of love freely given to others in who I am, whoever that may be.

Lost and Found

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I lost my phone this evening. Near as I can tell, it bounced out of my pocket as I ran to cross the street.

I have been lucky with lost phones. This is the third time I’ve misplaced a phone, unknowingly, and the third time the benevolence of strangers has brought it back to me.

The guy who picked up my phone told me I should lock it. I didn’t laugh, but if I did, how would he have been able to find me to give it back?

There are more good people in this world than bad people. Yes, I risk a bad person doing bad things to me with my unlocked phone. But since I’m more worried about me losing the phone than someone stealing it, I leave it unlocked.

And trust.

My trust has been well placed, thus far at least.

I am grateful for that.

When is enough enough?

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I had a phone call with our Chief Diversity Officer, and I went and had a visit with the Dean of Faculties today about why I am leaving my current university.

I feel an obligation to do this and do this well. I know nothing is going to happen because of what I say. I just hope to make it easier for the next person. But dredging up all that stuff makes me sad. I never feel like I say the right things. It was a hard day.

This evening ended with a visit to my book club. One member is in human resources, and told me that the university will never change unless I file a complaint with the EEOC or another external enforcing agency. And I can see her point and logic, but forgive me if tonight this was just too much. I’m doing my best here to try to do right by everybody, to speak my truth, to tell the right people. And this is still not enough?

Truth is I think she’s right. Truth is I’m not enthused about what is asked of me. Truth is I worry about repercussions hurting me, even though I’m soon to be gone.

Maybe that’s all just excuses for not wanting to delve into things that bother me and make me sad again.

A friend tried to remind me of all the things that have gone right lately. But I’m not in the mood for that. Tonight I give myself permission to be sad. Tomorrow is another day, with a new set of challenges. I will have to buck up for them. Tomorrow, with renewed strength, I can think about this again.

Meanwhile I am sad that I am leaving. Sad that there wasn’t a better outcome here. Sad that I didn’t have the right words to say, the magic words, to make things right. Sad to leave my home and my friends behind.

If that seems ungrateful for all the good things that I have had happen, tonight, so be it. I am truly grateful for the good things. But I am also very very sad about a lot of things too.

Learned Behavior

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I was talking to a friend the other day about family, and about the trainwreck that is my immediate family. I don’t know if some of the siblings talk to each other, but I know a lot of us don’t. I’m not even sorry about that, at least not any more. I feel like I tried. I know some of the what went wrong and how, but I am also sure I don’t get all of it. One thing I know is that I don’t have to stay in the middle of this mess and let it keep hurting me. I have an obligation to do what I can for Dad, as best I can, until he passes, which means some limited interaction with the others, as required. Then it is time to move on.

I wonder sometimes what my parents and my Dad’s first wife were thinking. Surely you don’t go into it thinking you are going to have kids that are never going to care to speak to each other again when they grow up. I can remember my mother trying to micromanage my relationship with my younger brother. It never worked. She never stopped. I know she’s a lot of the reason for tension with the older kids, and with very good reason.

One thing I do know is that you cannot create relationships for other people. You can, if you are the authority figure, create an environment in which healthy relationships are possible. You do this by creating a community of respect for individuals and differences. You do this by leading by example. You do this by respecting and valuing the other members of the family or community, and trusting them, by and large, to figure things out and do what’s right. To want to do what’s right.

You have to love and respect yourself, with all your flaws and weaknesses. Everyone has these. If you can’t love your vulnerable, imperfect self, you will have a hard time teaching anyone else to love themselves. And if you don’t love yourself, it is mighty difficult to love someone else.

I wonder sometimes how it is for my siblings’ kids. I think it is better and healthier than it was for us, and I hope they have better relationships between siblings and cousins than I have had.

I am often sad that I never had a family. Sometimes a small voice whispers that maybe it is a good thing, looking at the past. Mostly I believe that it just is — nothing I chose, nothing I had real power over, a sign, if anything, of a changing world where often our values and what we want and expect for ourselves hasn’t quite caught up with modern day reality. Sometimes a louder voice whispers that if I had the chance, I could have done it, not perfect, but with a lot of right.

My realistic voice says to take this lesson into my classroom and my relationships with others. Love myself, create the environment where healthy relationships are possible. And hold on for the ride, because you never know what will happen next, who will come into your life. Give love freely, and accept it gratefully. You never know how people will change you, if you leave yourself open to love and change.