Just say 'no' to companies that fail us

It's New Year's Eve Eve and many publications and websites are taking a look back at 2021 while making predictions about 2022. Just as with new year's resolutions, most of the predictions will never happen or certainly never become trends that last. 

But readers love them, partially because of the opportunity to argue with conclusions. Predictions are the extended logic of "cause and effect." If we can correctly predict the effect of whatever cause/event has recently occurred, we can make money or look smart or be prepared. 

Mostly we just foul things up, however, since there are rarely straight lines that connect simple causes and simple effects. 

You might have thought that Jan. 6 would produce some clear effect, perhaps with Americans coming together to set some boundaries to political action and speech -- stopping just before the "violence line," for instance -- but that didn't happen for a giant percentage (though still a minority) of the population.

You might have thought that the availability of vaccines and masks and experience might decrease the reach of the pandemic. You would have been wrong, and not by just a bit. 

Due to the large number of unvaccinated people across the globe, the pandemic will be entering its third year with a roar. I have friends who have been fully vaccinated (i.e. including a booster shot) and who mask up in public come down with uncomfortable Covid cases. None of those friends have been hospitalized, which is one of the predicted effects of being properly vaccinated. 

"Cause and effect" essays are quite common forms of argument since they promise some sort of progress or change. A problem is that it is much easier to work backwards from an effect and find causes that might have been obscured in the past.

I was thinking of the ongoing airline crisis of cancellations and delays and what the causes might be. Finding the causes is important if society hopes to avoid future flying chaos. Lack of transparency and the nation's fragmented health systems mean we may not know for some time just how important airline employee illness and absences have been, as opposed to weather issues (ice in Seattle, as an example). 

Digging a bit deeper leads us to the early days of the pandemic, when most airlines quickly encouraged employees to retire or simply move to another occupation. Airlines were able to get more efficiencies from their employees, with larger planes, fewer (but fuller) flights, and reductions in standby crews in case of emergencies. Executives bragged about how they were fattening profits while reducing staff by 10 percent or more. The federal government propped the airlines up with many millions of dollars in support.

So the true cause of the most recent spate of cancellations might really be simple human greed, and that is certainly one cause that never changes much.

Greed will likely also prompt whatever the fix might be for the problem, since no business enjoys the very bad publicity of not being able to deliver on whatever customers pay for. Customers eventually stop paying.

My family's experience with Alaska Airlines this past week (and continuing through Sunday at least) leads me to vow to never fly that airline in the future. I made a similar vow regarding Frontier some years ago after some similar let downs and disappointments (and horrible customer service). 

I have not noticed any negatives in my traveling life stemming from that decision. 

At some point, I may run out of airlines to boycott, but there's a little satisfaction in the simple act of saying "no" to a company or product. 

Nature reminds us that it always wins in the end

One week ago our Seattle family was scheduled to fly to Denver to celebrate Christmas with us, the first time in two years.

Little did anyone know that the five day, four night visit would double in length, at least. Yep, they got caught in the omicron/weather foul up that has affected thousands of travelers. Their initial Alaska Airlines flight was cancelled last Wednesday but they were able to get on a late flight that arrived in Denver about midnight.

Alaska Air claimed the cancellation was due to weather, but we all suspect that crew shortages were the real culprit at that points. That late flight was a hassle but other than not getting to bed until 2 a.m. last Thursday, crisis averted. Well, delayed.

Last Saturday came Seattle snow and cold, quite unusual and quite paralyzing for the Puget Sound area. Sara, Barry and the boys spent about seven hours in limbo on Monday in DIA, hoping their 1 p.m. flight would take off... though it was eventually delayed until 5:45. After all that teasing, the airline ended up cancelling the flight altogether, sending me back to the airport to pick them up and bring them back to Highlands Ranch.

The good news is that they have our house to stay in and we have space and food, etc. Plus there are no weather problems around here (though it might snow a bit on Friday), so we can get around.

The grandsons are 11 and 9 and need to get out and run and generally NOT hang around their grandparents' house. So there's that. The omicron/delta crisis means that some indoor activities that could be fun for them are not good options. Maybe some swimming (after going to Target for suits). Maybe a movie, if the theater is not crowded.

The good news: Barry's construction/home repair business is on autopilot, so to speak, since most customers can't leave home in Seattle -- few plows, steep, slippery hills, holidays, etc. -- and they have a renter who can watch the house and the dog they are dog-sitting (another concern). Sara loaded up her Seattle Times work to a server, worried that they might end up quarantined due to Covid while here. That turned out to work well for the worse-than-expected Seattle storm, as she is just finishing her section for the Sunday paper online.

Right now they are booked on a Sunday flight on the last four seats available -- all first class. That is not in the budget but what can they do? On the other hand, no one would be surprised to see THAT flight cancelled.

Alaska Airlines is clearly not covering itself with glory here, and their entire customer service system has melted down. No one knows anything. No one shares anything. No one is going to help customers who might be stuck away from home for a number of extra days. "Act of God" is the excuse, but we know that human incompetence is also at work here.

So their quick visit now extends into the new year. I have a couple bottles of sparkling wine in the frig and our only weather event coming is a chance of light snow Friday. 

Our guests are understandably anxious (not to mention hopeful that their vehicle battery will turn over after being parked at SEATAC for 10 days or more in record breaking cold).

Kathleen and I weren't going anywhere so we are now in the acceptance stage of the situation. Maybe this whole debacle will eventually become family lore, complete with heroes and villains and fun moments.

As several in the family have said, "It could be worse."

That may become America's new motto as we trudge, weary, into 2022.

Too many choices are an effective form of paralysis

Today's daily blog post from Seth Godin contrasted choice vs. convenience. Convenience tends to limit choices while choice is almost infinite (if you are willing to spend the time, money, or power to get what you want).

Financial convenience pushes most of us to invest in the short term, for example, so most people opt for something cheaper even if there are much better long-term options. Intellectual convenience encourages NOT taking risks or making even simple changes.

This is the time of year where I spend some time idly wondering about changes in what I teach and how I teach, in texts and sites that might connect better with students, and with entirely new lesson strategies. After all, there is no one way to teach or grade or motivate. There is no "cookbook recipe" to rely upon for success.

Today I am thinking about the proper balance between offering opportunities and mandating opportunities for online college students -- now my only regular teaching situation. Another way to think of this is juggling extrinsic motivation with intrinsic.

Intrinsic motivation is the ultimate goal for most education. It shouldn't take some ghostly presence somewhere south of Denver to get students writing clearly and stylishly. Producing strong prose can be its own reward and receiving a grade or rating on our writing shouldn't make a big difference in what we create.

But it does... for the vast majority of people and certainly college students. 

I am trying to incorporate some new essays into the Composing Arguments course I teach for Metro State, drawn from some open access textbooks recommended by a study committee at the university. They would complement the many essays and memoirs and reports I have gathered over the years that function as models of good writing and thinking.

When teaching an online course, some level of trust between instructor and student must be present. I will never converse with any of my online students in person, never sit down and engage in a back-and-forth conversation. I will never really know if a student read the text or watched the video or listened to the podcast.

As far as checking for understanding (in education talk), my only recourse is to require/mandate some sort of quiz or reaction to a specific paragraph or claim or figure of speech. Those checks must come with some sort of extrinsic "reward" -- like points -- or we are back simply hoping that students find the time to do the reading and thinking we believe will be helpful.

At some point I will need to decide how extensive my checks for understanding must be (a quick and superficial quiz or an in-depth analysis or something in between). 

But what slows me down is making choices about what to require. After all, it is much more convenient (for me) to stick with articles and essays that I have used before. I am "expert" in those, and the documents are already formatted. 

There are countless potential models of good writing and thinking I could share. No one can be expert in them all.

In the next couple weeks I will be sorting readily available choices and devising checks for understanding that add information (as opposed to drain the students of all motivation). 

If you happen to be a Metro student this spring in my section, you will get to be the judge of how it works out. 

Feeling a little blue after Christmas

The Monday after Christmas is bound to be a bit sad. A trip to the airport to drop off family at least keeps your mind off missing everyone, but Covid and weather and who the heck knows what else has caused two of the three Alaska Air flights to be cancelled. Our daughter's family is still at the airport, hoping that the flight they are on, the one still scheduled, takes off.

About five hours late.

As with a certain percentage of life's challenges, there is nothing to be done. The systems are too complex and the decisions of large corporations are too opaque. I am home cleaning a bit and putting some decorations away and feeling a bit guilty that I am home while family members are stuck in America's purgatory: a large, impersonal airport.

New Year's celebrations are on the horizon but you would need to be quite fatalistic about the virus to seriously contemplate some sort of crowded party, filled with wine and dance and laughter and germs.

Yet millions likely will put themselves and others at risk this weekend, though not us. No going out to a restaurant, though we may order a nice takeout meal. No going to the theater to see "West Side Story" or any other intriguing film, though there are plenty of great options from our many streaming services. 

The new year is likely going to begin just like the old year in terms of the country and the world finding some sort of  "normal," which is depressing. But perhaps this omicron variant will burn through the population quite quickly and February could see some respite. 

One of my favorite Simon and Garfunkel albums includes the song, "Old Friends." It contains this memorable line: "How terribly strange to be seventy."

Seventy-one is just as strange.

Kathleen and I don't need to go to work and we happen to live in a sane corner of a rather insane county, so we are as confident as we can be that we will be OK.

At this point in history, that is as much as we can ask.

Omicron is at the wheel of a nation without clear defenses

In the chaos of family at our house I missed posting yesterday, but I am giving myself absolution. Everyone needs some grace from time to time.

There was some angst a couple days ago when our Seattle daughter found out that their scheduled flight on Wednesday had been cancelled. She toyed with cancelling the whole thing, but eventually got a night flight to Denver and they arrived about midnight. 

Her worries now are split between Covid and cancelled flights (they are scheduled to fly back to SEATAC on Monday, one of the busiest travel days of the year). And today I see that airlines have cancelled at least 3,000 flights today and tomorrow (Christmas). I am avoiding bringing this up in conversation but assume she knows.

I think I overheard her this morning asking her husband if he could rearrange his schedule in case of a cancelled or delayed flight, so she is already planning her options.

She and family got stuck last time they were here for Christmas, in 2019, due to a snowstorm, and they ended up staying an extra day. This year we are expecting highs in the 50s for Christmas and we haven't had much precipitation around here since September (and none in sight). 

This year's uncertainty stems from lots of airline employees being sick or quarantined due to the rapidly spreading virus and the newish omicron strain. The good news is that this newest variation doesn't seem as nasty as some earlier variations, with the tradeoff being that it spreads WAY faster.

The new year promises to bring more chaos in staffing and hospital overcrowding and general worry and despair... though we may be on to the next crisis by later January (if the experience of South Africa is any indicator). The faster the virus spreads, the faster it burns out (or moves on to a new mutation).

As far as airline disruption is concerned, there are some weather challenges this week but the key factor appears to be staffing. We certainly don't want people who are not feeling well to be welcoming us onto crowded flights or (maybe more crucial) piloting complex planes.

Hospitals and nursing homes are experiencing the same phenomenon, leaving patients with non-Covid needs to hold off procedures and away from normal testing and preventive care. Is there any doubt that we will see all sorts of teachers come down with (I hope) at least mild cases of Covid once kids return to classrooms in another week or so? 

It's one thing to have a few students miss some class (and perhaps get some online help). It's another thing to have the teachers unable to function normally.

And still the country argues about, well, everything. 

"Elf" is loved by most Americans, right? Let's hope such small shared agreements can expand in 2022.

The four grandchildren and their parents will join Kathleen and me in watching that movie this afternoon. It should be fun.

And it is Christmas Eve, after all. Maybe this weekend will be a short truce in the ongoing culture wars.

Wouldn't THAT be a miracle?

Turns out, you CAN tell me what to do

I have often used the term "leverage" in discussing how a persuasive writer can effect changes in readers, and perhaps that term seems a bit cold and clinical. A bit more human term that may be a bit friendlier is "incentive." Leverage may imply finding some weak spot or perhaps applying physical force, while incentive connotes something motivational to the person we are trying to persuade.

We could also go with "nudge," which is even friendlier, since it is gentler and does not include force. A friend might nudge us when something is said that prompts a fun or silly memory. Some social scientists believe that nudges are more effective in changing behaviors since there is no confrontation and the actions are often hardly noticed.

In economic theory, a nudge must be easy and cheap. Nudges are not mandates. Putting fruit at eye level counts as a nudge. Banning junk food does not. No options are forbidden and no economic incentives are affected.

Nudges are clearly too subtle for today's health crisis.

I read a column in today's New York Times by two doctors working in an east coast hospital that boiled down to research showing people NOT responding clearly to MORE data. For instance, you would expect that the children of doctors would be more likely to have been vaccinated against chicken pox. But the actual data shows very little difference between children of doctors and everyone else's children.

There are mountains of data out there about how various vaccines (including the Covid shots) benefit the population, the economy, mental health, etc., but piling on more data is clearly NOT making a significant changes in behavior among people who now "believe" that vaccines are harmful or even evil.

So what do those two doctors recommend? Not surprisingly, they support vaccine mandates (and I have favored them in past posts, just to be clear). 

Vaccine mandates bring "negative incentives," since they always include some sort of sanction for those ignoring the mandates. You could lose your job. You could be denied entry into a sporting event or restaurant. You could pay more for health insurance. You could be banned from the big family reunion.

There are certainly positive incentives, such as remaining healthy, unhospitalized, and alive, but a lack of something is not a clear penalty.

Grades are an interesting situation in this regard. Most educators would say that grades are intended to help learners (and parents) know how they are doing (positive) but they are also often negative, as in cases where students are simply trying to avoid failing (or even earning something less than an A).

School assignments are rarely optional. Teachers mandate completion and failure to complete earns a failing mark on that assignment. Some students still fail due to not doing the work and their reasons can be quite complicated.

That's how mandates work. Effects of ignoring the mandate hurt the person doing the ignoring. Otherwise, what's the point? 

We live in a world where many argue against penalties and instead look for positive incentives. Those positives do encourage longer lasting behavioral change.

But when we want fast change? 

Mandates and related negative incentives are our best bet.

Most persuasive writing relies on finding effective leverage

One of the "light" news items from the past few days is a report on a Tennessee college professor who hid a $50 bill in a locker at the beginning of the fall semester. He included the location and the locker combination in the middle of the syllabus for a class he was teaching and even hinted that there were lots of good reasons to check out the syllabus when he began the course.

No one grabbed that $50 bill.

Since the semester is now ended, the story reminded me of how difficult it is to clearly communicate information to people. It also reminded me that college students don't read their course syllabus very carefully, in the same way most of us click quickly through product information online before finalizing our orders. 

A "trick" that can work is to require students to write a summary or simply answer some simple questions that can only be found in the syllabus... and give them points. 

It would be nice if syllabi were written more clearly and concisely, but finding the right leverage to induce more careful reading is likely to produce better results. Leverage is always the key in persuasive writing, which is the broader point here.

I saw a news report on Sarah Palin (yes, she is still around) saying she would get the vaccine "over my dead body." Classic and perhaps ironic, if the universe decides her hubris is worth punishing.

I saw another report that the former president told a rally crowd in Dallas last weekend that he had not only been fully vaccinated but had received the booster shot. And he encourage everyone to get vaccinated. After all, his administration got the ball rolling on the rapid research that gave us effective vaccines. 

And the crowd booed.

That's the thing about leverage. You would have thought that the Cult of Trump would hang on his every word and follow his directions, but it turns out that at least some percentage of the population has moved to even more extreme positions than their fearless leader.

What do those in authority do when the levers they count on simply don't work anymore?

Mandates are often the favored reaction. The "lever" is a fine or not being allowed to enter a restaurant if unvaccinated. Or paying more each month for insurance coverage. Or being dismissed from your job.

As far as college syllabi go, if we really want students to read them, we have to mandate that... and we have to check for their understanding. In a sense, giving a syllabus quiz is just the academic version of a mandate. Students can still opt to NOT read it or not take the quiz, but there is a clear sanction in the form of points lost. That still might not be enough incentive but for any student "on the fence," that is likely enough.

I am guilty of providing all sorts of readings in my online courses that I never really discuss later or ask students to respond to. I consider many readings as models and "extra" support to reinforce concepts. But if I consider a reading to be essential, I have to require some sort of quiz or essay or discussion post.

We all need some sort of nudge.

Hey, where did everybody go?

I wrote a post a few days ago asking about where all the workers have gone in the U.S. There have been lots of theories, particularly from the left, that workers have simply had it and are refusing to continue their dangerous, boring, and underpaid work (often all three).

Another theory, mostly from the right, is that the government has given out so much support that people can actually afford to quit their jobs and live on "relief" plus a few part-time gigs.

Both are likely not even close to the truth, which is that all the scare talk about what happens when the Baby Boomers retire -- too many retirees and too few workers, with social security and medicare facing insolvency -- was accurate. The unanticipated added factor is that lots of Americans have chosen to take some form of early retirement. 

There are estimates that 90 percent of the "missing" are actually older workers, from 55 on up. Anyone who is predicting that those workers are coming back are deluded. 

Teachers are a great example of how retirement really works. Very few teachers who opt for retirement, and many are still in their 50s, seriously consider coming back to the grind. Yes, they were incredibly dedicated and they were incredibly under-compensated during their work lives, but their pensions and assorted options for all sorts of part-time and volunteer work dampen any romantic notions about returning to the classroom.

The pandemic makes it far worse, of course, with the associated political battles and continuing "thank you for your service" tributes to educators always revealed to be insincere and fleeting. 

America has thrived for many years on young parents paying exorbitant child care expenses and on women being willing to take less pay and take on more responsibility in K-8 education particularly. 

And as long as the rich could maintain a large pool of uneducated, poor workers, there were always takers for even the worst gigs.

But various trends have now come together to upend the formula for the rich. Reduce the number of new immigrants. Drop the birth rate. Increase robotics and AI in factories and stories. Add in very large numbers of over-55 retirees from the "prime labor pool." 

I know I sound quite cynical when I repeat this, but the world sorts into the very rich and everyone else. Political parties are dominated by the very rich. 

The very rich will always be fine, in case you were worried about those souls. And they will be fine whoever is in the White House in a few years and whichever party is in power in state and national legislatures.

I'm not suggesting that the 99 percent give up or ignore politics or stop caring about the future.

But I might be suggesting that everything is local.

Who is the reader you imagine?

Frank Bruni, formerly a regular columnist and reporter for the New York Times, maintains a weekly blog and one continuing feature is called, "For the love of sentences," where he shares snippets of great writing, often referred to him by readers.

Here is one that struck me from this week's blog: 

Coming up with new ways to express frustration about the crazily high number of Americans who refuse coronavirus vaccines is increasingly difficult, so I tip my hat to John Ficarra, in Air Mail, for this: “Yes, West Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. But with your measly 49 percent double-vaccinated rate, he will be skipping most of your state.”

A sentence like this seems simple if you possess a few pieces of information. One reference you need is to a famous editorial. Eight-year-old Virginia O’Hanlon wrote a letter to the editor of New York’s Sun, and the quick response was printed as an unsigned editorial Sept. 21, 1897. The work of veteran newsman Francis Pharcellus Church has since become history’s most reprinted newspaper editorial, appearing in part or whole in dozens of languages in books, movies, and other editorials, and on posters and stamps.

The context sentence above (after the editorial date) argues that you can anticipate that most of your readers should have some experience with seeing the editorial or simply hearing "Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus." I'm sure there are plenty of people who somehow missed learning anything about this, however. After all, surveys consistently show that a quarter of the adult population of the U.S. thinks the sun revolves around the earth.

When I first quickly read the Bruni post, the word "West" did not really register. Ficarra was going for a clever reference and I almost missed the entire thing. My first reading jumped right over "West." That is a danger when we make use of a cliché or something so widely quoted that most people give it almost no thought.

The second reference you need to be able to untangle is the "49 percent double-vaccinated rate" phrase, which requires you to know why "double" is good and that under half is not so good (we do get "measly" as a context clue, just in case).

A third assumption by the writer was that the reader would immediately get the idea that he is not arguing about literal delivery of gifts, but about a potential lack of joy and spirit due to an explosion of infections. 

All writers make assumptions about the majority of their readers. Otherwise we would end up with crushingly boring, fact-filled statements that obscure the more important points we are looking for.

As the semester ends -- today is the final day of the fall semester for my college courses -- it is smart to be reminded that we as writers simply need to examine our assumptions before we publish. 

Which readers are we not really interested in reaching? No one can guarantee universal appeal, so even attempting to connect with every reader is doomed. But we still need to have someone in mind.

Kurt Vonnegut once wrote that the reader he always imagined in his long career as a writer was his wife. His primary goal was to connect with her.

The good news for him and for us was that his wife turned out to be a fine representative for millions of other readers.

Choose your readers wisely.

Does the water in this beaker feel warm to you?

How could a rational person not be a bit worried about our nation's politics and our nation's direction when one man from West Virginia seems to have become the most important voice in the country.

Joe Manchin must be one of the most reviled people in America, particularly among progressives, as he continues to hold up multiple major bills and initiatives, all in the service of... ??? We aren't quite certain and he is not very transparent about his concerns. 

Perhaps he is more forthcoming with President Biden or with Senate colleagues, but mostly we just see daily headlines about his inflation worries or his agonizing over child credits or his immense wealth, which mostly comes from oil and gas.

In any "normal" period of time, Manchin probably would switch parties. After all, West Virginia has become overwhelming red and most voters just vote for the party affiliation. He is an anomaly.

There is an old saying that people get the government they deserve. Americans have split so wildly and (maybe) fatalistically that our evenly divided Senate and nearly even House, and an approval rating for Biden at low levels, and a general feeling of "we are pissed and we want to toss whoever is in charge" are where we are stuck.

I read a story today where various political scientists discussed whether we had reached a tipping point in the nation, where we may have passed some threshold to the new reality of autocratic, minority rule. Some thought we were sort of like the frog in the beaker, with the temperature slowly rising until the frog is boiled alive.

There was probably a point where the frog could hop out and save itself but it is difficult to discern exactly where that point is.

I wonder how close we are to that tipping point right now.

Teachers suspect that many older students have 'checked out'

I always knew that student engagement with most school curricula was quite low for older high school students. This disengagement was and is not universal, but I was right there, in the room. It's tough to miss not only boredom among students, but frustration and restlessness and outright opposition.

And that was true prior to the pandemic and all the damage the world's reactions to this new threat have produced.

The most recent statistics are from 2016, in a Gallup Poll survey, so things could be much worse today (or better, but really?). The survey found 76 percent of fifth graders were engaged (the details on how this was measured are complex), while 18 percent were not engaged and 8 percent were actively disengaged (acting out, disruptive, angry).

The engagement decreases each year after fifth grade, eventually producing these figures: 34 percent engaged, 34 percent not engaged, and 32 percent actively disengaged. Think about that. Two-thirds of high school seniors are not engaged with school at some level.

Of course, those numbers are averages and we should expect some high schools might differ in their splits quite dramatically. But my sense, even back in 2010, when I retired from the high school classroom, was that the Gallup splits were certainly in the ballpark, at least in "regular" English classes and even many electives. 

There are various ways to increase engagement in learning and school, but the one strategy that seems most appealing is "experiential learning." That is a broad term, but it boils down to providing opportunities for students to engage in projects and the community and one another. More "hands on" and less yawning through lectures. 

You are likely thinking that we don't need a survey or breathless news stories to see the truth of the importance of experiential learning. I would bet serious money that what most people remember from their own high school days are tales from being in marching band, or on an athletic team, or part of the robotics club. 

Those thousands of minutes spent in a series of math classes often dominated by teachers going over homework that was copied from one another and explaining concepts that seemed divorced from real life (maybe not YOUR experience, but I hope you see some truth in this exaggerated description) would be Exhibit A in a case pointing out deficiencies in education.

Whew! The above is a 60-word sentence. Not easy to read aloud in one breath. It just sort of kept growing -- and that parenthetical certainly didn't help). And somehow the sentence culminated in a weird courtroom analogy that assumes we are prosecuting... students, teachers, the system, ignorance?

Perhaps it was unfair singling out math classes. Boring classes are not all that unusual, not matter the level. Think about many university courses that consist mostly of intense lectures and lots of independent reading. Not MY classes, of course.

Here's an edit of that 60-word behemoth:  Most high school graduates have experienced those boring, teacher-directed lessons.

Or is that too brutal an edit? Or too slanted? It certainly demands some sort of follow up examples to support that provocative claim.

I am happy to spend my last teaching years engaged in encouraging better writing. Most of the energy of a writing course comes from students and what they put on paper/the screen. 

That's my idea of engagement.

If only more writing students took a moment to look over their work

I saw yet another post saying, "Revision is your friend" as key writing advice, and I couldn't agree more.

I just don't know how to motivate student writers to actually revise (as opposed to spellcheck and adjust a font). Online college writing courses are a challenge in many ways, but the lack of revision is what stands out as the problem that never seems to budge.

The first step in revision is quite simple: take a minute or two to reread what you THOUGHT you typed prior to hitting send. The world moves fast but slowing down enough to at least read through a 100-word discussion post, just for instance, is a time-investment that can really pay off.

Me, a whiner? Heaven forbid! But failing to even glance over something written for an online course is quite common. One explanation might be that writing is such an onerous and hated task that the student simply wants to complete the assignment and send it off ASAP, thus lessening the pain.

This is related to the failure of many students to even right click on an underlined word or phrase that Microsoft Word has flagged as misspelled or otherwise not correct. How much more help can software offer? How much easier can it be? Perhaps some AI additions will simply correct the errors for them?

A friend who taught a college writing class some years ago wanted to emphasize accuracy as the very least readers should expect from the writing they see, so he built a system of grading where ONE error resulted in one letter grade reduction. The university eventually asked him to not do that, as the complaints were just so overwhelming. 

His response was to simply stop teaching at that school.

Was he too harsh? I will simply note that even ONE error on a cover letter accompanying a job application is likely enough to get that application tossed, depending on the reader and the job. During my many years as an English department chair at a couple schools, I appreciated the ease of this "first cut" when dozens of applications would arrive for one teaching job.

If a prospective English teacher could not manage an error-free cover letter, I felt quite justified in placing that application in the "round file," so to speak.

University writing courses ask that mechanics NOT be more than 10-15 percent of a student's grade on any assignment, and I have tried to follow that. But the damage a typo can do when it occurs in the first line of an essay is considerable.

After all, if the writer can't be bothered to run spell check or even read over that essay before sending, how much can we trust the information, description and analysis in the argument itself?

So I continue to urge students to slow down and re-read their writing. To go into a restroom and read their prose aloud. To ask a friend to give their writing a quick look. Anything to increase the odds that the essay is at least "correct."

After that, we can get into logic and compelling evidence and strong syntax and diction choices.

The stats on deaths from Covid are not comforting for seniors

Today's startling statistic: one in every one hundred Americans over 65 has died from Covid.

Think of that. We are now up to 800,000 deaths in the country due to the pandemic and three-quarters of American deaths were people 65 and older. 

Bonus factoid: people over 65 are the most vaccinated age group in the country -- 87 percent -- yet still the virus kills. If you are under 65, the chances of dying of Covid (since the beginning of the plague) are about 1 in 1,400. 

It turns out that if you are old, in poor health, with underlying conditions and excess weight, even a booster shot may not be enough to save you.

This is a bit startling, since most of the country has grown tired of the pandemic and has decided to basically go back to "normal" and accept the slim chances of infection, hospitalization and death. 

How we look at a pandemic that mostly kills grandpa and grandma depends a bit on your quality of life and on your income and ability to avoid being breathed on by younger people shedding the virus. After all, being human means we are all doomed to die at some point, and that muddies our reactions a bit.

Aren't you sadder to hear about a seven-year-old dying than about an eighty-year-old? 

I will be 72 next July and accept that most of my best work is behind me. But I am relatively healthy and mobile and still do a bit of teaching and writing and critiquing and singing... you get the idea. 

There is a logic in not worrying as much about the elderly dying. In terms of cold facts, most seniors are not contributing as much to society as they once did, nor as much as a vibrant 40-year-old. I know I'm not.

I will note that these stats indicate to me that the nation/world needs to start recognizing and planning for this reality of the pandemic mostly targeting the elderly. I have no easy strategies in mind, but at least we could reduce the fear and anxiety level of most people under 65 and in good health. 

It is tempting to claim that younger Americans, suffering only mild Covid symptoms in most cases, are spreading the disease and killing the Baby Boomers we all like to make fun of. That wouldn't be fair, though, would it?

Or would it?

Theater of the absurd is all around us

Missed yesterday's post due to an extended shopping trip and mental exhaustion following our contributions to keeping the economy humming. 

Kathleen and I roused ourselves enough to attend granddaughter Grace's JV basketball home opener at Arapahoe HS, where we saw one of the silliest examples of "mask theater" I have come across.

By mask theater, I mean the idea (or at least suspicion) that the act of wearing or not wearing a mask has much more to do with state of mind than physical protection from the virus. It is similar to the theater we have come to see when we fly: shoes must come off to be carefully scanned... all tracing back to one hapless terrorist-wanna-be attempting to damage a plane with a shoe bomb.

Maybe I have not paid close enough attention, but I have never read or heard of any similar attempt in 15 years plus, but the ritual continues. 

We know it's mostly theater when we experience, as we did during Thanksgiving week travel, TSA agents treating everyone as if they were TSA Pre-approved. During Thanksgiving week, Denver TSA agents waved everyone through without having them remove their shoes or place electronics in a separate bin, etc. There had been too much bad publicity for the airport over the preceding months about incredibly long lines to get through security. So rules were bent.

Sorry about the short detour there, but all the athletes who played last night wore masks, but they were tucked under their chins. This included the referees. Many in the stands didn't even go that far, simply dispensing with masks altogether.

Evidently the players and coaches were ordered to wear masks, but were also informed that HOW they wore them was their choice. The masks ended up being weird additions to their uniforms and (I guess?) met the letter of the law, or recommendation, or policy, or... something. Maybe next game they will wear them as armbands?

The effect was clear. Rules and 'best practices' are flexible at Arapahoe (maybe throughout the state?) and those who (as we did) wore their masks correctly could be forgiven for wondering just how far behind the zeitgeist we were. 

The zeitgeist -- or defining spirit or mood of the times -- appears to be that everyone has had enough of the pandemic and that we simply need to figure out a way to live with yet another danger (like brain damage from motorcycle riding or fellow drivers clearly texting at stop lights). We're Americans, damn it, and our freedom cannot be abridged in any way (well, beyond seat belt laws and required immunizations for our children to attend school and speed limits and payroll taxes and... the list is quite long).

When we got home, we watched the Iowa-Iowa State basketball game (a debacle for the Hawks). Perhaps it's just Iowa, now dominated by rabid reactionaries and conspiracy theorists, but there wasn't a mask in sight in that crowded, sweaty arena of screaming fans.

Honestly, I prefer the blatant and public to the game playing and lip service. Live your truth, I guess.

Maybe everyone in Hilton had been fully vaccinated, so why bother with masks?

Ha! Ha! Ha!

Math continues to confound the media, not to mention our neighbors

I read today that a recent Colorado study concludes that if a person has been "boosted," that person is about 50 times LESS likely to be hospitalized with any form of the virus compared to an unvaccinated neighbor.

It sounds impressive while also being nearly incomprehensible. Multiplying normally indicates increases in quantity. "My new job doubled my income" seems more natural than "My new job makes me two times less poor." When journalists decide to go with a multiplier to signify something LESS we run into all sorts of trouble, and it all begins with where the comparison starts.

For instance, here it seems more persuasive to choose the flipside of that "50 times less" statement: An unvaccinated Coloradan is 50 times MORE likely to be hospitalized than a neighbor who has had a booster vaccine.

Even that doesn't provide a full picture, since that starting point is still undefined. I was thinking that if the chance of a boosted adult being hospitalized due to the virus is already very small (like 1 in 9,000). Fifty times that takes us to 50 out of 9,000 people, and that is still quite a small chance. Yes, it's a lot more but the overall chances are far less than what we risk in other behaviors.

Your chances of getting into a car accident during a 1,000-mile trip are 1 in 366, just as an illustration. The estimate is that Americans average 3-4 accidents (and most are not life-threatening) over a lifetime of driving. Those are much higher odds than the chances of being hospitalized with Covid, but most of us ignore the danger in favor of our mobility. In a sense, we have factored the danger into our daily lives and decided (quite logically) that the positives we get from driving our cars outweighs the negatives.

The data also reveal that the population group most at risk of being hospitalized due to Covid, whether vaccinated or not, is still the elderly -- and I mean past the early 70s... like 85-year-olds). Of course, obesity and asthma and other underlying conditions cause the odds to get much worse.

It is also apparent that no data, no odds, and no scientific advice will suffice to change our behaviors as a nation and world. Emotions are so much more powerful than a mere exchange of facts.

But journalists continue to try to report on those facts, though almost always without the clarity we need as readers and viewers to make sense of trends.

It's the same basic issue as we find in reporting on federal budgets and new spending and new tax income, etc. The raw numbers are huge and the human mind can't really grasp numbers in the millions, not to mention the trillions.

We lost our ability as a nation to grapple with all sorts of issues once we surrendered to tribal politics, to such an extent that we now have people in America who would rather die than NOT "own the libs." 

Think about that. Some of our neighbors prefer the (admittedly slim) chance of death to compromising or (gasp!) changing their minds and adding one more vaccine to the inoculations they have already received.

More exasperating is the fact that Trump and most high-ranking Republicans are fully vaccinated, though they don't make a public sharing of that status very often. They benefit from the unrest, at least in the short term.

The ignorant and misinformed and fanatical do the dying, as always.

Approaching the end of another semester that did not go as planned

One of my favorite statements about teaching and life comes from "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington," the 1939 Frank Capra movie that ends with an example of how the "standing, talking filibuster" really COULD produce something positive. The lost causes line comes much earlier in the film, when Jimmy Stewart's character, who had been appointed to replace a senator who had died suddenly, is commiserating with an old family friend.

That friend reminds him of what his father used to say: "Lost causes are the only ones worth fighting for."

Famous lawyer Clarence Darrow evidently said something like that long before the movie, but like most quotes from a less curated past, there is confusion about origins. The author is not nearly as important as the sentiment.

I am constantly reminded about this sentence, with the latest prompt being this column in the New York Times, written by a journalism teacher at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla. She asks the rhetorical question, "Will My Students Ever Know a World Without School Shootings?"

Her column is more descriptive than a direct answer to the question in the headline but we all know that the most logical response to her question is "no." That is both a bit depressing and a bit cynical, but it is difficult to see that answer changing any time soon in an America that prefers extreme positions.

The positive spin, for me, is that despite the unlikely chances of significant gun safety laws or more general compromises among the population, making schools safer is clearly a worthy goal. For our nation, this is as much of a reach as world peace. Still, increased gun safety is worth pursuing.

In teaching, a much less fearful lost cause is education itself. We will never get everyone up to the "proper" reading level and we will never even get all students to see the difference between "its" and "it's." We will never see the day when all deadlines are met, no matter how reasonable. We will never attend a truly worthwhile faculty meeting (sorry for that snarkiness, but any teacher knows what I mean). 

We all have our lost causes, of course, but they mostly produce humor and self-deprecating jokes, not depression and cynicism. Educators start each year thinking THIS will be the semester when lesson plans really click, when students become self-motivated learners, and we handle all the tricky situations bound to occur in a diverse classroom with perfect balance and wisdom.

By the end of first hour, those dreams are dimmed. 

But we go back second hour and try again. 

It's the ultimate form of idealism: the "cause" is too important to abandon, no matter how unlikely any changes are.

A holiday image that sticks with you

This post required an image, something I have tried not to do with this little blog since it began. My goal was to focus on the written word, purposely avoiding using many of the tools that online publishing has available. But this Christmas card photo from a Kentucky congressman has to be seen to be fully appreciated.

The photo was posted on Twitter by Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) last Saturday, along with the caption: “Merry Christmas! ps. Santa, please bring ammo.”

I am impressed by the sheer size of the congressman's weapon. Now there's a man's man. I assume his sons hope to some day be able to handle such a killing machine, but their current firearms look quite efficient (I suppose their users' skills determine some of that). Until then, dad still possesses the "big one."

The females clutch their own somewhat smaller guns, which launches an additional line of thinking. The younger daughter (middle) looks almost of pleased as did with her weapon (which she may not be old enough to own?).

This photo has produced a lot of criticism in Michigan in the past couple days. The Oxford HS massacre is quite recent and raw for those softies up north. The good news? Everyone will wring their hands and offer their prayers and soon move on to other, more important concerns. Like limiting the opportunity for some to vote... or policing the wombs of America.

Of course, the far right radicals praised the image, with Colorado's own online terrorist Lauren Boebert tweeting, "That’s my kind of Christmas card!”

Honestly, does that woman do anything in D.C. beyond avidly watching social media and responding with the most incendiary words she can muster? Her district will benefit greatly from both the recently passed infrastructure bill and the coming second part of Build Back Better, and she has zero input or interest in either of those. 

But are her constituents not entertained?!

As far as more progressive folks calling the card disgraceful so soon after the Michigan shootings, that seems like a stretch. I doubt that the Massie family rushed to gather for this portrait after last week's latest school shooting. It's Christmas, and images for cards are best taken long in advance. And no matter the time of year, this sort of image might remind us of frequent school shootings -- there have been at least 144 this calendar year, with 28 deaths and 86 injuries.

The timing is unfortunate, maybe, but the truly frightening thing is that many, many American families would love to share a similar image during this season of peace.

And if the family truly is in need of ammo, they can look forward to some nice after-Christmas sales.

When workers are desperately needed, how much are we willing to spend?

As the world deals (well, does NOT deal very well) with the omicron mutation and we look forward to finishing up the Greek alphabet with the omega variant in the coming year, life goes on and so does the economy.

Here's a little story I heard from a friend the other day, based on what her son learned while interviewing owners of an auto dealership/shop. He works in marketing and wanted tips on how to appeal to auto dealers to become sponsors or advertisers. I have no idea what he learned about that, but he did hear this (I am likely just summarizing):

There is a looming auto mechanics shortage, with an aging workforce and more people pushing their vehicles for a few extra years of service as inflation rises and the economy remains uneven. And there is a shortage of new cars available due to supply chain issues. 

This dealer claimed that he is willing to pay $250,000 salaries to qualified and certified mechanics... right now. He could care less about a college degree or even a high school diploma as long as the employee could pass the required training courses.

And he has five positions available today.

That same day I saw that about 30,000 public school teachers from across the country had quit in September and October. The job tends to attract people who value "mission" over money and accept the fact that they will never be well-paid. I have been one of those teachers since the mid-1970s who made the compromise and valued my contributions to the larger community. I'm no saint, of course, nor very unusual in this regard. 

In fact, it turned out that all those years of not making much money but being part of a mandatory retirement fund system pays off in the long run. 

But there is some sort of line, and teachers today seem to be right on it. Lack of money plus a surfeit of phony respect (much like "thank you for your service") plus radical citizens attacking them from all directions, plus a vague belief that anyone could teach, and the general discomfort from masks, stubborn children and parents and more have combined to make a number of educators rethink their choices. 

I read that a school district in New Jersey doubled sub pay from $125 to $250 per day. No organization does that unless desperation is setting in, if not outright panic. It will be interesting if this radical increase reduces their sub problem. In our system, employers must always attempt to find the LEAST they can pay but still offer products and services (and retain workers).

In Colorado, the average public school teacher salary is $60,000, though there are wide disparities depending on the district. And there is a looming shortage of teachers coming.

What would change the dynamic? Would average pay of $120,000 be enough to attract more talented teachers? Or maybe bumping the average by just $10,000 a year could do it. 

I have no idea if the owner of that car dealership was entirely serious about his $250,000 offer, but it is clear that something needs to happen to attract our workforce to certain occupations.

Life is much more complex than simple cause and effect between high salary and interested job seekers. But some poor schmuck of an English teacher making $40,000 a year in a mountain town just might find motivation to switch jobs with the promise of $150,000 after a short (far shorter than obtaining a college degree) period of training.

The mountains are beautiful and the lifestyle may be just what a person wants.

But tripling or quadrupling your income is tough to resist. And who is to say if maintaining vehicles can't bring equal satisfaction to a person as teaching basic grammar and punctuation to ninth graders (or college students)?

Having trouble following the logic of current events?

I suppose the idea that the United States is a logical, law-based, democracy was never really true outside idealistic textbooks and high school classrooms, but current events make that notion seem like a quaint affectation.

Simultaneously, we are arguing about when or even if a woman may elect to have an abortion -- even in the case of rape or incest -- while many of the very same people passionately arguing that society has a duty to control personal health decisions are also fighting against society asking for community-based strategies to fight Covid -- vaccines and masks. 

As a nation, we have given up on any pragmatic attempts to curb gun violence, even in schools, while arguing angrily about esoteric historical theories that no K-12 teachers actually know much about or intend on weaving into their curriculum.

We love our children this much: we are willing to see a tiny percentage of them murdered to protect some vague sense of freedom. We value life this much: we are OK with thousands of suicides by gun each year.

Public school teachers are quitting in droves, according to new reports, many saying they are exhausted by the combination of constant political battles over schools, lack of parental and societal support, and depressingly low pay. But as long as OUR precious children are doing OK, we just frown and bring up old arguments about summers off and how "only those who can't, teach."

Of course, teachers in our children's schools are fine, and so are the schools themselves. It's everywhere else that needs regulation and prohibitions and interference.

College football coaches are now following the money in blatant ways, with some top jobs commanding over $10 million per year. Meanwhile, most college professors must be happy with a cost of living raise -- and those raises are often not nearly enough to stay even with inflation, much less boost net income.

One political party actively works to undermine the IRS, claiming illogically that the governmental agency charged with collecting taxes can't be trusted to do what we ask them to do. About half of Congress are millionaires, which ain't quite the distinction it used to be, but it is difficult to disagree with statements like, "We are a nation governed by the rich, for the rich."

Can we be shocked that rich people are reluctant to fully support an agency charged with asking them to pay their fair share of support for national government? 

I have claimed for decades that my feelings on abortion are these:

• I am against abortion.
• I am for a woman's right to choose.

Clearly, I am juggling some paradoxes here.

I also like to share a Robert Fulghum (Captain Kindergarten) story where he describes two buttons he wore on his smock during classes (teaching art in Seattle). One button said, "Trust me. I'm the teacher." The other said, "Question authority." He wrote that he believed in both positions quite passionately.

Americans claim to honor "front line workers" like the military, teachers, health care workers, trash collectors, and store clerks while tolerating or ignoring all the messages we send more directly about their value: mostly low pay, lousy conditions, and overwhelming responsibilities. 

Bottom line: attempting to find logic in our nation is a fool's errand. 

Finding amusement in watching others fight it out

There are few things more amusing than watching your teacher (or most any authority figure) losing it and berating someone else. Those last two words are key, as being the object of an outburst would rarely be called 'amusing.'

Most of America, therefore, must be amused to observe various legislators reduced to mostly unhinged name-calling... of one another. 

One of the requirements of a civilized society is that people NOT resort to name-calling instead of rational debate, and that leads me to wonder just how civilized the U.S. really is right now. There is a laziness that lies at the heart of ad hominem attacks, such as one of Colorado's representatives calling another representative a potential suicide bomber. Or when an Arizona rep shares a crude video of himself beheading yet another female legislator. And the list goes on.

I grew up with "sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me," and I am tempted to apply that to today's America. In my hazy memory there really was a time past when the "winning" approach was to not fire back with return insults... and citizens, voters, etc., would eventually come to respect that "rising above the mudslinging."

But as a writing teacher I must acknowledge that at my core I believe that logic and words and rhetorical choices actually matter. To rise above can't mean we just dispense with all the features of good writing and persuasive arguments, relying instead on mutual hatred and distrust to keep at least some people on our side.

My motivation to continue teaching writing and expecting accuracy, logic, and clarity has now become quite simple: help one student at a time explore how strong thinking looks and how language reflects strong thinking (or does not). 

I had an epiphany of sorts a number of years ago that all my most effective teaching happened one-on-one, no matter how many students I had per class. I may have entertained larger numbers if I put together a particularly interesting lesson plan, but all my best student writers progressed partly due to conversations we had, views we shared, ideas we kicked around.

People don't like to think of themselves as just one among millions. They want to be "seen." They want to be acknowledged as individuals who possess some worth.

So I stick with teaching writing, hoping that those short responses and suggestions I share with each of my students produces small changes... or perhaps just sets something in motion. Teachers and politicians, to name two professions, may want to create mechanisms to make courses and positions more successful. But mechanisms always depend on simple cause and effect levers.

It turns out that cause and effect is rarely simple.