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?