(This Surprised me as well: I did not expect to go beyond 280 characters -thanks to Twitter’s generous conditioning on the parsimonious style of writing. Unfortunately, I violated this digital posting golden-rule on facebook. Just a kind alert!)
Today’s meeting began at 7:00 am. and ended at 8 am. So I had a full agenda: my next class began at 1 pm, followed by the office hours and then a night class from 6 to 9 pm. Faculty D and I chatted about implicit biases for sharing right after the meeting. Because this, I found an empty lab to send some relevant info to her from my last week’s lesson plan and partially intended for a break to reserve some energy for the rest of today’s activities. Who knows - the lesson plan elicited by such a short conversation between her and me brought up the following random thoughts. I found it might interest you. So I shared:
As a faculty teaching art and social science at a Technical College (sounds oxymoronic- even with a Learning Technology backgound?), and member of different Advisory Committees of CVTC, attending and contributing to the Advisory meetings become imperative to emphasize the importance of general education to the hands-on/occupational degree programs from the humanity, social/ behavioral science perspectives. After all, during a time when courses engaging with the mind are constantly subject to being eliminated or reduced, such an imperative deserves to be paid attention to.
This is not the news any more: University of Wisconsin at Stevens Point has proposed dropping 13 majors in the humanities and social sciences — including English, philosophy, history, sociology and Spanish — while adding programs with “clear career pathways” as a way to address declining enrollment and a multi-million-dollar deficit. So as University of Wisconsin-Superior officials have decided to drop similar to Stevens Point’s, nine majors, 15 minors and a graduate program due to lack of “interest", whereas, UW- Stout Math-Science department has the highest percentage of diversity of hiring non-Native born mathematicians, statisticians, and computer scientists.
The democratization process of using hands to substitute for the minds/brains has been transforming the edutaining-business-technological complex. Liberal art studies tend to be deemed with the positive labeling as the extra-curriculum of the arm-chaired learners, the leisure-class, aristocrats, the brainy, and are beneficial of being the transferable credits , saving credit cost, as well as being a good candidate for the MOOCs/online delivery. Surely, it never lacks the not-so-nice perceptions, such as the target and/or the lamentation of the math-science-phobic, the undecided, the moratorium, the job-market pragmatists , the digital nation, and the “required: otherwise-I won’t- graduate”.
Knowingly, the modern era of rapid economic and technological change has expanded the role of the dual education system in the labor force, in particular, the continuous vocational educational training. Countries such as Germany, Austria, and other similar countries, dual education may help them adapt more quickly to ongoing economic transformation. But the ideal model of hands-on and minds-on is not exactly like the aforementioned dual educational system. So the old question pops out again- - WHO and WHY should study liberal arts? How can liberal art studies enhance human material productivity? Or simply put, as one of my students “challenged” me in one of the early weeks of this semester, “ I just want to be a policeman. Why do I need to take Diversity Study which is nothing to do my future career?”
Indeed, to cultivate a well-rounded potential employee and citizen, both hands-on and minds-on programs should be "Equally" emphasized - ideally. Nevertheless, in reality, the learning outcomes of the hands-on programs tend to be tangible, measurable, and quantifiable, that earn much attention, success, and recognition for extra resources or rewards. Whereas, the minds-on subject matters (liberal art learning), face quite a challenge to see those intangible factors ingrained inside learners' mindset brought to the school (even some faculty members as well, including myself...) confounding the liberal art contents and pedagogy. This phenomenon is nothing new over centuries across the globe. Thus, you might question - To what extent can liberal art studies be taught/facilitated? What and how to authentically assess/evaluate the liberal art learning outcomes when so many confounding factors tied to learners’ upbringing (class, gender, race/ethnicity, the rest of identities/ideologies, and their intersectionalities), in addition to those of instructors'/facilitators', circumscribed in the Technical College environment?
The missions of most Tech Colleges are to provide applied education that supports the regional workforce in the fast changing economy, and empower students for life long learning to succeed in a global economy. This dual functions manifest in the integrated hands-on and minds-on educational and training curriculum and pedagogy - what a NICE TO HAVE idealism!! But do we have the luxury to HAVE TO HAVE? As so many Advisory committees that I have attended, this morning, no exception: the meeting began at 7:00 to 8 am. for the Dental Hygienist Advisory Committee. At the tech colleges, the partnership with local business is a big deal. On the agenda sheet, you see that 50% of the attendees are representatives of local businesses, in this case, such as Eau Claire Periodontics, Oakwood Hills Family Dental, Oral Surgery Associates, Masefield Dental Clinic, Clear water Dental, Menomine Street Dental, Pediatric Dentistry, and the rest are school administrators, department faculty, student representatives and the relevant body.
This type of serious collaboration has its symbiotic significance. Local taxpayers provide a great amount of support to the tech collages, and the big taxpayers' businesses need well-”trained” (vs. educated?) employees to provide community daily services and generate profits. The faculty body is based on the enrollment to offer quality education (often time, “Training”), while administrators rely on the needs of society and recruit capable faculty and adjuncts to engage in high quality pedagogy with the recruited learners, and the school Board manages the budgets and fulfills the needs of the community and development, briefly speaking.
During the meeting, I was quite quiet. Keep in mind, if there is nothing nice to say, then just keep your mouth shut. But these days I have been reading more in details about W. E. B. Du Bois, his philosophy, sociology, politics, activism, poems, writing, speeches...etc. in short, his soul, related to the domestic and global problems in an epitome of "racial line" existing long before his birth, and after his death, still to the present time. In this meeting, the dual goals of missions that I care so much seemingly fading into the secondary scene...
I thought about the deeply rooted, conditioned, and reinforced racial ideology presented in the various social institutions, unsurprisingly existing in the academic disciplines, not to mention in the mass society, reiterated by Du Bois all his life spotted on my heart when the program director was mentioning the soft skill issues during the middle of the meeting. I talked to my imaginary self: in this very white society, I shall never reveal any vulnerable part of me (not including my skin color and the “cute” accent) and pretend as well act out as tough and strong as possible for being a racial category beyond black and white. Then my thoughts switched back to the dual roles of the Tech College - regarding how Du Bois critiqued on Booker T. Washington's thoughts and practices that are still so vividly resonated in the contemporary society.
The meeting was going on. As usual, 99% of today's talking and discussion was about the technical training and relevant issues which, in fact, is the "Most Significant" component of the Technical education (or properly speaking “Training”), whether due to necessity, or the common practices. “How Booker T. Washingtoneaque it is !!!”- not just for the default black, but for the increasing working-class white and other colored population as well! (Having said so, I respect Washington’s assimilation ideology based his slavery background. But I respect Du Bois even more, ironically, for his not being the direct victim of slavery, and just because this, his great compassion, keen observations/sensitivities, perseverance, and emphatic capacity truly enlightens and inspires generations to come.)
I don’t like to think of myself as an arm-chaired faculty in many situations, but my thought was still lingering on the last night's read about a particular poem of Du Bois when the meeting was close to the end. I thought this would be a smooth and nice meeting, but then I felt like speaking for "Du Bois" as an "interrupting urge" to relate to the “soft skill” issues, if nothing else was important enough in my mind at that moment. For, suddenly, the light-ball hit the Starbucks' event regarding arresting 2 African-Americans.
So here is what happened in the meeting about sharing info regarding Starbucks CEO's proposal for an Implicit Bias training of his 8.000 franchised stores, when the Explicit Biases are still quite rampant! Now is a huge leap into the unconscious mindset which is targeted to be "Trained". Having said so, it is still a hope whether, a good will, a lip service, a business rhetoric, or piece of a long-overdue-need-to-be mended patchwork...
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From: Huang, Crystal
Sent: Wednesday, April 18, 2018 8:44 AM
To: S, Debbie
Subject: About Implicit Association Test (IAT) and Gladwell's Book Blink
Deb, nice to chat with you this morning.
In my diversity classes, we discussed the Roots of biases (various types of ideologies, in particular, the hegemonic ones), stereotypes (both positive and negative), prejudice, and discrimination via the book Blink - The Power of Thinking without Thinking (by Malcolm Gladwell
https://www.amazon.com/Blink-Power-Thinking-Without/dp/0316010669) and the IAT test, developed by the Social Psychology dept. of Harvard University
https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/takeatest.html.
In brief: our attitudes (various beliefs and value systems) are operated at least in 2 levels:
the conscious and unconscious conditions. The conscious part (awake conscious) is what we perform the best, but the unconscious, has different stories that we tend not to be aware of.
In most cases, we don’t deliberately choose our unconscious attitudes. Again, most of us may not even be aware of them.
The IAT can be a powerful predictor of how we act in certain kinds of Spontaneous Situations.
So, the test does not intend to cause people feel “uncomfortable” (like most of students-including myself, who took the test due to this assignment/worksheet) about our own hidden biases, but to realize that our attitudes have come from many sources which are taken for granted since we were young: family, religion, institutional practices, specific upbringing, media, peers, and the rest of invisible yet invincible socialization agents.
The more we are aware of our explicit and implicit attitudes, the better we can improve for the better business and society.
Have a nice day.
Crystal
**********************************************
Li-chin (Crystal) Huang
Faculty,
Sociology, Diversity Studies, Art Appreciation
Office: 11E ECB campus
Phone: 715-833-6283
Learning & Teaching Sharing:
http://ci8395.blogspot.com
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/CrystalLCHuang
Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/user/huangzena
LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/lichinhuang/
"Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are."
- Ben Franklin
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Huang, Crystal
Wed 4/18/2018 9:13 AM
To: K, Karen;
...
Good morning Karen,
This morning in the Dental advisory committee, Pam (program director) mentioned the soft skill issues. I shared Starbucks CEO's decision yesterday to close down 8,000 franchised stores for an Implicit Bias training to relate to my current lesson plan regarding Blink and IAT of my diversity classes.
Then Debbie and I had a small conversation after the meeting and she asked for more info (see below).
I share with you too.
Have a nice day.
Crystal
**********************************************
Li-chin (Crystal) Huang
Faculty,
Sociology, Diversity Studies, Art Appreciation
Office: 11E ECB campus
Phone: 715-833-6283
Learning & Teaching Sharing:
http://ci8395.blogspot.com
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/CrystalLCHuang
Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/user/huangzena
LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/lichinhuang/
"Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are."
- Ben Franklin
