Christmas is only three weeks away and millions of Americans have packed stores nationwide, searching for those perfect gifts. Black Friday came and went, but the deals are still here. Prices have dropped and unbelievable deals are being offered to consumers.

This year, I had a few items on my wish list. I want to build my own communications studio at home. In other words,  I want nothing but electronics to add to my collection. I had my mind on a tape recorder for interviews, a more advanced digital camera, etc.  However, I paused and wondered if those were the things that I needed right this minute? My heart said, “no!” My mind immediately went on to graduate school.

I’ve been talking about graduate school for too long now. I graduated with my Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from the City University of New York-Brooklyn College in May 2007. Since that time, I’ve worked full-time and took a well-deserved break from school. Now it’s time to get back in the classroom and strive for a higher level. It’s time to get back in the books and prepare for my Master’s degree.

This week, I thank God because I was able to move past my procrastination and take my first step. I am back in school as a Kaplan student. In order to get into graduate school, well my targeted school, I need to ace my GRE exam. Lord, knows I can’t do it alone. So I enrolled for a course that will begin in January and end in March, a commitment of 9  Sunday consecutive mornings.  I’m not worried about it, because this has been a long time coming.

Like most people, I grew up thinking that history is extraneous to ‘real life.’  It’s just entertainment, right?  It’s something that certain smartish and/or nerdy people know stuff about, because they actually watch the ‘hitler’ (history) channel.  And, I was taught by my parents, and learned from people in high school, that ‘real’ education meant studying something vocational:  i.e., something that would allow you to get a job afterwards, and the higher-paying that job track was, the better.  But I was never a very practical person, so I majored in english, and remember promising to myself, that by the end of my 4 year degree, that i would be able to tell myself what was the point of studying the liberal arts.  By my second year, I had a pretty good answer.  So I’ll share it here, hoping that some of you, at least, won’ t have to go through so much soul searching and self-doubt; or at least, that what follows will help you marshal your inner forces against the naysayings of your ‘practically’ minded parents, friends, etc.

The first thing i’ve learned is that history is a science.  All of the liberal arts are in fact sciences.  So, to say ‘liberal arts and sciences’ is in fact, somewhat misleading.  The thing that makes a university subject a university subject, is that it is scientific.  Things which can be proven by science are studied in universities, and things which cannot be studied by science are, generally speaking, not studied in university (except perhaps Liberty University and its ilk).  Even theology, these days, busies itself with studying the proveable history of various religious texts, and of various religious beliefs.  Theology proper, then, is a branch of history.  So is english:  to study english is to study the history of the english language.  Thus, it is a branch of history.  And philosophy also, is studying the history of philosophy.  Ditto political thought:  a political philosopher is actually a historian of political thought.  This means that, as a professor of political thought, when you do research, you are going back, finding original documents in archives and old editions (just like an historian), and reconstructing the history of how people came to important conclusions about the nature of government (e.g., the invention of democracy, of checks and balances, of a split between executive, legislative, judiciary, the notion of human rights, etc.).

Why are these subjects studied in the university?  The university is a product of western thought, which invented science.  Well, the greeks, specifically the 6th and 5th century Athenians, invented science, and Europeans rediscovered it in the renaissance.  But a trickle of it was rediscovered earlier, during the middle ages, and during that time, universities were founded, in which people studied theology at first, but also, gradually, all of the other subjects which today we can study in a university, including the major vocational subjects of law and medicine.  But the basis of university study was always the ‘liberal arts and sciences.’

Originally, the sciences as we know them today were collectively called ‘natural philosophy.’  And this indicates that they were seen as a branch of philosophy.  Philosophy was the greek (and medieval) word for all things which can be studied through the use of reason:  i.e., what today we call science.  All else was a matter of faith, and even today, we do not study astrology in university, for example, becasue it cannot be proven through reason, and we don’t study subjects which have no theoretical basis, like hairdressing, because these are purely mechanical (though schools of hairdressing do do hairdressing theory, some at least, which is a version of art theory, but too far for anyone to have thought to put this under the umbrella of a university). 

Philosophy, then, aims to explain the world through reason.  Originally, the Greeks thought that what was most important was man, and so they put most of their effort into understanding human society:  philosophy proper includes ethics and metaphysics, scientifically attempting to address the questions of “how should a man properly act?” and “what happens to us when we die?” and “do we have souls?”  Nowadays we tend to think that metaphysics is impossible to discuss rationally, but there are still questions which science hasn’t entirely driven from the realm of proof.

Other branches of philosophy addressed human society:  things which today we call the ’social sciences.’  And the university subjects of literature, art history, and theatre, for example, study the history of these subjects, i.e., they attempt to reconstruct what happened in these genres, and how these interacted with, and were products of, their age, and what the artefacts of each genre can tell us, scientifically about the socieites which created them.   Psychology aimed and still aims to scientifically understand the composition and workings of the individual human mind.   

Finally, the sciences addressed the non-human, the dumb, unthinking, material, part of our universe.  This was inherently much less interesting to the greeks, and indeed, it’s much more straightforward, no matter how complex the formula may seem, than studying anything which has to do with human society:  humans being so varied, so complex, and language itself having so many shades of meaning.  At least with science, most of the time, what you study is what you study.  It is material, and it can be broken down into component parts (at least until you get to the quantum frontier – where things get interesting again, in my view).  Even here, scientists work by studying the history of thought in their subject;  i.e., biologists learn the history of what biologists before them have been studying, and from there, the best of them go on to make new additions to the scientific literature. 

This is what historians do:  they study the scientific literature, written by historians who have gone before them.  Thus, they are scientists.  Of what?  Of all human society.  If we have any chance of improving society, then we have to study it.  Otherwise, we contninue to reinvent the wheel.  But don’t take my word for it.  Following are proofs.       

So point 1) is that, all university subjects, when viewed this way, are history.  They are all branches of history, subgenres, and no science can be done without doing history.  This in itself should cause us to realize that history is pretty important. 

Point 2)  This is besides the fact that, if you had no history, you would be like a goldfish, who loses his memory every few seconds.  Our memories, our experiences, what makes us wiser as we age, is that, hopefully, even the dullest of us have learned from our personal histories.  It should be only natural then to conclude that, as a species, if we learn history, we will be wiser.  It’s easy to dismiss this as a platitude, but in fact, it’s made all the difference. 

3)  Most human societies did not do history.  We as a species don’t do history by default, because we are naturally largely irrational.  And history requires sustained use of reason to investigate the past.  Thus, most societies were religious, rather than historical.  The greeks were absolutely unique for inventing the notion of scientific history, which consciously rejected religious explanations for events;  i.e., supernatural explanations.  Only thucydides, and herodotus, followed by the latin historians such as livy, maintained a sustained skepticism.  All else is mere chronicle; usually interspersed with credulity which accepts supernatural explanations.  Even the best chinese and indian ‘historians’ were not so rigorous in their desire to understand scientific explanations for social events .  so the point is that only greeks, and europeans since the renaissance, and those who have followed in their wake, actually study history.

4)  Thus, history is a highly specialized, highly scientific discipline, and a relatively rare one in human history.  But we in the english-speaking world take it for granted, because in many ways, the english were the first to bring it to the level of a generally socially accepted science, beginning with Gibbon in the c18th (after the renaissance italians passed on the torch).  

Perhaps the best way to see the value of history, then, is to travel to societies which do not have a strong historical profession. 

If you go to spain today, where they have a much weaker historical tradition, you realize that most of the ruins you see, no one knows anything about them.  If you go to morocco, people know even less.  But that is not all:  muslims have not been studying the history of islam, and are only starting to do so:  thus, we know far far less about the history of islam, and of islamic countries, than we know about christianity.  Scholars know full well, that the christian bible was a product of its day, because we have dissected every detail of the text.  But the koran has been shielded from this criticism, and thus, many more muslims can believe absolutely that it is an ahistorical text, and thus from god;  if historians studied the history of this text, its historical nature would be revealed, and thus, it would be seen in smilar light to the christian and jewish texts.  The point being, is that history is a very powerful antidote to fundamentalism: 

In short, history was a major stepping stone towards the enlightenment, the scientific revolution , the industrial revolution, the microcomputer revolution, and all of the modern advancements in equality for minorities, women, etc., which has ever happened.  When there is no historical establishment to debunk the myths of a given society, that society is free to live wrapped in its own primal mythologies, which are inevitably pro-patriarchy, and pro-ruling class.  In other words, having a strong historical profession is essential to having a democracy.  it has been historically, and the proof for this is taht the english discovered how to debunk their own national myths, and how to kick out the superstitions of catholicism, at the same time as they discovered how to look critically at their own past.  England is the most historically-advanced country, and it has also been the one which has almost singlehandedly invented all of the things mentioned above;  enlightenment, industrial revolution, universal sufferage (and other anglophone countries have been party to this, through anglophone dialogue).

Thus while most people see the trappings of history; the details, the fun facts about knights, kings, and ruins, and the footage of World War II:  in fact, this is mere stage dressing.  This is just the icing on the cake.  At the heart of history, lies the fact that, if someone did not do it, we would all be ruled by theocrats.  The historians, then, in greek times, in the renaissance and ever since, have been the torch bearers, those who have led the way against the would-be priests, the theologians, the soothsayers, and those who would enslave us all to do the bidding of the elite.  Humankind naturally loves myth:  historians have, very slowly, cleared places around the globe where reason can persist, dispelling the darkness of unreason and superstition while their researches construct, in actual detail, what actually happened, and how we have gotten to be how we are. 

A strong historical profession is prerequisite, therefore, to human rights themselves (and capitalism, for that matter).  This, then should be more than enough defense:  even if individual historians’ PhD theses may seem silly, the profession as a whole is an essential pillar of modern society, which would quickly atrophy without it.  And remember, there are very, very few professional historians.  That society contributes less than .00001% of its resources to professional history (most of which pays for itself, anyway) should be seen as a small price to pay for such an important service.

So, why study history?  Because you are becoming a scientist:  and learning empathy, and also, becoming a brain cell in the collective memory of humanity:  this, as we have tried to show, has many positive effects, and almost no negative ones.

On the 12th of November 2009, I John Jeremiah Twomey after attending the Crawford College of Art & Design at CIT has now officially a BACHELOR of Arts in Fine Art with Merit, Grade1. I am currently in my final year at Crawford College competing for a Honours Degree of the same course. The ceremony was a small affair but personal as we are a small course and with a student population of approx 400-500 on the city centre campus it was nice to see everyone from my 3 years at the college achieve their goals and to move on to better things

I John J Twomey before my graduation

After our rewarding of certs some of my college friends and myself….yes i am tall !

So I hope to work hard and achieve my goals in my path of becoming the next Da Vinci or Andy Warhol more preferable….watch this space people !

Fernstudium ja oder nein? Das ist hier die Frage…

ich surfe nun schon seit einigen Tagen durchs Netz auf der Suche nach geeigneten Fortbildungsmöglichkeiten. Warum? Weil ich Ziele habe. Ich möchte mich weiterentwickeln. Ich möchte neue Herausforderungen. Ich möchte nicht mein Leben lang im Einzelhandel tätig sein. Nicht das wir uns falsch verstehen, meine Arbeit macht mir Spaß. Aber da muss es noch mehr geben…

Angefangen hat alles mit der Überlegung einen IHK Lehrgang zu belegen. Hier fiel die engere Wahl auf den Fachkaufmann Marketing, Fachberater Vertrieb oder den klassischen Handelsfachwirten. Nach einigen Überlegungen und auch Nachfragen beispielsweise in XING, wurde mir jedoch immer wieder dazu geraten ein Studium zu absolvieren.

Ich könnte mir vorstellen später in folgenden Bereichen tätig zu werden:

- Vertriebsstrategien entwickeln
- Marketing
- Produktmanagement
- Consulting

Alles natürlich auf den Vertrieb ausgerichtet. Außerdem möchte ich kreativ tätig werden und mich täglich selbst bei der Arbeit einbringen können.

Was mich derzeit am Verkauf fasziniert, ist wie viel doch unterbewusst abläuft. Viele Prozesse und Faktoren, die die Kaufentscheidung beeinflussen. Welche Erfolge allein durch positives Denken erzielt werden. All das sind Dinge die ich besser verstehen lernen möchte.

Ich bin auf den neuen Studiengang der Euro-FH gestoßen: Bachelor of Arts Betriebswirtschaft und Wirtschaftspsychologie.

Ich bin sehr an diesem Studiengang interessiert, da er genau das abdeckt wofür ich mich interessiere. Allerdings zögere ich noch mich tatsächlich für ein Fernstudium zu entscheiden. Gerade im Einzelhandel hat man sehr lange Arbeitszeiten. Auch an den Wochenenden. Als Filialleiter fallen noch mal die ein’ oder anderen Überstunden mehr an. Wo soll hier noch Platz für ein Studium sein??

Vielleicht finden sich hier ja einige, die sich ebenfalls für diesen Studiengang interessieren. Für alle die noch genauso unentschlossen oder auf der Suche nach Informationen zu Studiengängen und deren Anbieter sind kann ich folgende Links empfehlen:

- Ein sehr umfangreiches Forum mit vielen Blogs und Erfahrungsberichten von Fernstudenten
- die Gruppe von fernstudium-infos.de auf XING
- VWA.de / für alle die evtl. ein duales Studium in Betracht ziehen
- die Möglichkeit auf ein staatliches Stipendium

Über Kommentare / eigene Erfahrungen würde ich mich sehr freuen.

If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.

— Henry David Thoreau

In “The New Untouchables “, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman argues that in this downwardly mobile economy there is no room for average. Extraordinary is what it takes to survive and thrive in the modern workplace.

I get that.

Yet for all my appreciation for education — I hold two degrees so I do, in fact, lean in favor of Friedman’s premise that education is key to American competitiveness — his education-as-a-panacea argument oversteps its reach.

Most strikingly, Friedman’s description of a successful “untouchable” American worker isn’t a portrait of educational endowment at all. Friedman’s favorite descriptors, instead, refer to personality attributes: entrepreneur (risk taker), creative (visionary), analytical (critical thinker), and persuasive (charismatic). The obvious problem with Friedman’s pin-the-tail-on-the-wrong-donkey premise is that temperament is inborn — teachers, let alone parents, cannot instill personality characteristics that are not there to begin with.

Friedman’s eagerness to finger the usual suspects — schools — also ignores six reasons why Americans are at a competitive disadvantage in the global era. Here we examine those realities, and the future these changing times have in store.

First, there are more of us occupying this country — and this planet at large — than ever before. At some point, the mathematics of population growth have to matter. The sheer number of people in today’s workforce suggests more and more people are competing for the same jobs even as we adopt more and more technology to displace human hands. That’s not a sign of a lack of education; it’s a sign that business owners comprehend that productivity gadgets and gizmos don’t require breaks, a salary or workers’ compensation.

It comes down to the numbers.

Second, I would argue the inverse in response to Friedman’s suggestion that there just isn’t enough talent to be had here in the States. Over the past 50-some years there are more colleges turning out more graduates on an annual basis than employers of the past had access to. Many foreign nationals, in fact, come to the US for higher education opportunities. On the flip side, there are only so many engineers, M.B.A.s, lawyers, scientists and the like universities can churn out before higher-end fields become saturated in much the same way low-end jobs are chalk full of contenders.

It’s no longer merely a question of whether there are clear winners and losers on the academic front.

Job scarcity is a threat, in part, because of the decades-long trend of mergers, acquisitions and a globalized labor pool. Consider: There are generally fewer than a dozen heavyweights in a given industry — everything from mainstream media to appliance manufacturing. This trend does not bode well for domestic job expansion. And if jobs aren’t available to begin with, it is tough to gain a competitive advantage even with above-average potential. So what we are seeing, in this author’s opinion, is an over-supply of talent.

But that doesn’t mean the proponents of Friedman’s dire self-fulfilling prophecy won’t get their wish.

With less competition in a given industry there is less demand for the eager young grads institutions of higher learning infuse into the job market each year. With shrinking demand and a greater supply of contenders, salaries may also take a nosedive. America at large may become competitively disadvantaged in the years ahead precisely because the “good jobs” of today are no longer perceived as a source of steady employment or adequate pay thereby diminishing American college students’ willingness to pursue them.

Already, the very cure that causes the “employment insecurity” disease is well underway: Calls for immigration reform permitting more foreign grads to take up permanent residence in the U.S. as a form of “insourced talent” are originating from Google, Microsoft and Susan Hockfield, MIT president and author of an October 19, 2009 Wall Street Journal opinion piece ironically titled “Immigrants Create Jobs and Win Nobels“.

Sure there are a lot of average people who aren’t cut out for the highest levels of business, government and academia. Just the same, there is also an ample supply of bright, talented American citizens who, for all their desirable qualifications and qualities, will nevertheless find themselves competing toe-to-toe against peers who are just as capable and “deserving” of a career break as they are.

Somebody has to lose.

Third, failure to thrive in this Brave New Economy isn’t always linked to failing schools, as Friedman argues. Good health is arguably the number one prerequisite to productivity. Healthcare is such a hot topic precisely because we cannot remain competitive if, as a country, businesses and individuals are increasingly diverting money out of the real economy just to keep up with the skyrocketing cost of healthcare.

Beyond that, few esoteric explanations matter when perfectly down-to-earth explanations suffice. When an individual charged with hiring decisions has too many promising applicants to choose from among, what assets wins out on the last round of interviews? That extra year or two of experience? Those additional GPA points? Or would it be more honest to conclude that it comes down to how well an applicant clicks with his or her interviewers? Hands-on experience, even a social or physical attribute — whatever it may be that fits a manager’s self-styled view of the proper candidate — is just as likely to make the deciding difference.

On the flip side of the coin, there is a perverse disincentive to hire the best qualified candidates. For one, they tend to be more experienced and/or highly educated, thereby commanding greater salaries. For another, few people in the position to do so hire individuals with the obvious capacity to perform so impressively that it will ultimately threaten their own job security. Friedman is right in the sense that education and talent ought to insulate Americans from the pitfalls of a failing global experiment.

Unfortunately, it does not.

Fourth, where one lives also figures largely into one’s ability to compete. Like the tough-luck stories that abound on the streets of Hollywood, those who flock to saturated markets — Los Angeles, New York, etc. — may, ironically, find fewer opportunities to leave a lasting, positive impression due to the sheer number of people in the area who are equally worthy of consideration. An over-supply of applicants for a given position, in turn, may make it more challenging for employers to select optimal talent vs. expedient talent. Translation? Being a big fish in a vast ocean still makes you a little fish. To argue, therefore, that education can somehow imbue success and that lack of it underlies a failure is a misnomer.

It’s impossible to underestimate the economics of supply and demand.

Fifth, it’s a mistake to assume that a Third World factory worker is more “competitive” as Todd Martin, former PepsiCo and Kraft Europe executive, suggests to Friedman. Third World workers come inexpensively, and that’s one competitive disadvantage that will only heighten the more educated the American workforce becomes. Why? Because talent doesn’t come cheaply — nor do the salaries of increasingly educated job seekers struggling to repay oppressive student loan debts as a direct result of their herculean efforts to rise head-and-shoulders above the crowd.

Getting noticed in an increasingly competitive job market only ups the ante — and the price tag of success.

Sixth, the assumption that Third World products are better made by virtue of their “efficiency” is also flawed. When frequent replacements and upgrades are factored into the cost of ownership, inexpensively manufactured Third World goods are, ironically, quite pricey. Case-in-point: In 2005 I replaced a 30-some-year-old GE refrigerator made in the US as well as an old but functioning washer and dryer. If I had to do it all over again, I wouldn’t trade anything old and working for something new, sleek and modern. Why? Because the major appliances I purchased new in 2005 — all have had repeated major breakdowns requiring multiple service calls, dozens of hours on the phone, weeks waiting for parts.

Even when consumers spend top dollar, the manufacturing source and quality of today’s big-ticket items are often quite similar — with merely a change of window dressing to imply otherwise. That’s what happens when there are so many market consolidations that an appearance of choice is just that: little more than a dozen or so name badges owned, in truth, by the same handful of Big Players. It is almost laughable the degree to which consumers on complaint websites proclaim that they will never buy brand “X” again, only to unwittingly state that they intend to replace such-and-such item with brand “Y” — yet another brand or subsidiary of the very same company who manufactures brand X!

Market concentration doesn’t grow jobs any more reliably than it promotes healthy competition.

Sparing one another the hassle and headaches of poor quality goods isn’t the only reason to care, however. The build-it-to-last ethic of decades past was, perhaps, the ultimate expression of “Green“. Why? Because durable goods were seemingly less likely to break down, destined for a landfill in an absurdly short timeframe. By contrast, “planned obsolescence” is the new norm, with a trend of shrinking manufacturer warranties to attest to the low vote of confidence manufacturers assign to their own products. Longevity isn’t a valued trait in a disposable society, but if we really want to go Green perhaps we should rethink the “dept-trap consumerism” cheaply designed and manufactured products facilitate. Sadly, modern rhetoric would have us believe that pride in one’s workmanship — a refusal to sell junk to unsuspecting consumers — is “uncompetitive”.

All talk of going Green aside, standardized manufacturing processes have made it difficult to make the case that company “A” is making a better product than “B” or “C”. Consequently, the maxim “You get what you pay for” has never been more suspect. True, you may get more for your money, but that does not necessarily translate into significantly better quality. What differs most dramatically is the amount of money corporations throw into slick ad campaigns, and the perception consumers have of branding and value.

It would be one thing if high-end boutiques were selling products made by First World craftspeople with higher price tags thanks to First World production costs. But when both low-end retailers and high-end retailers are selling inexpensively made foreign goods, who, exactly, are they fooling? Fairly or not, Third World origination suggests that income and human rights disparities favor corporate bottom lines. In the Third World, after all, it is not uncommon for workers to be denied bathroom breaks, sick days, maternity leave and most of the other benefits and protections Americans consider “civilized”. It is not surprising, then, that workers are more productive when they spend most of their lives in the confines of a factory, fearful that their only other option is a life of abject poverty and/or prostitution.

In short, the Third World is the modern-day economic equivalent of the pre-Civil War Old South: a place for slave-like child and adult labor, often conducted under sweatshop conditions. As if that weren’t questionable enough, outsourcing trends pose an unacceptable risk to national security as well.

So how does all of this tie in?

Unless Americans are willing to stoop to similar lows to compete with workers abroad, it’s not possible to rationally conclude that education, talent or entrepreneurship on the part of American workers will level the economic playing field anytime soon. America’s competitive disadvantage, rather, speaks to corporate opportunism — and to the politicians in recent decades who have crafted immigration, economic, trade and taxation policies that have enabled such heavily skewed commerce to become the norm.

Moreover, if being properly educated, creative or analytical adequately described, as Friedman suggests, the entirety of American competitiveness, I suspect we would see fewer reckless gambles on Wall Street and more evidence of long-range thinkers putting the brakes on short-term gain (scams) in the lead up to the Great Recession. In the real world, however, the “right reasons” are not always the cause for getting ahead — or, conversely, for falling behind.

THE WAKE UP CALL

So why care whether or not a newspaper columnists gets it so wrong? Because generalizations and simplifications aren’t a starting point for progress. Economists are projecting a ~10 percent national unemployment rate that’s here to stay for the foreseeable future. That can only mean more bankruptcies, more foreclosures and a greater amount of “dead weight” on America’s ability to compete. Only by taking a long, hard look at the unvarnished truth do we have any hope of fingering the right culprits, crafting the right solutions and ultimately reviving Main Street before the American Dream becomes a distant memory of a bygone era.

Doing nothing is not an option.

If Middle Class wages continue to decline as we move further into the 21st Century, who will consume the products and services entrepreneurs on both sides of the oceanic divide offer? Will young Americans, contemplating the grimness of their economic future and/or the need for ever-more costly and impressive academic résumés opt for traditional marriage and family life — the nation’s greatest driver of new purchases, everything from strollers and diapers to single family homes and minivans? Should Main Street’s economic House of Cards continue to crumble, will Third World workers have their own Friedmans urging them to blame themselves when factory orders dwindle and the newly affluent in Asia and India begin to see their own hopes and dreams falter? Or will they see it — we see it — for what it is: globalized economic forces beyond any single individual’s immediate control?

As kind-hearted as sweatshop proponents paint it — that throwing out more life preservers will rescue Third World residents from a life of “primitive agriculture” — building more life preservers than boats is a plausible scenario. Economic growth, after all, relies on expansion. For much of the world’s history markets were local, national, then regional. Globalization isn’t a sure-fire path to success: It’s an experiment that presupposes that natural resources will support endless growth. And it begs a simple but profound question: What happens when all markets are tapped out?

Working and Middle Class people — the majority of us — may not be the most educated, creative or adequately prepared lot, to hear Friedman and his corporate pal, Todd Martin, hash it out. But that doesn’t change the reality that the American Middle Class must earn a living wage in order for the economy — ours and theirs — to thrive. Yet it is telling that in Louisiana, a state with fewer college grads to begin with, Curt Eysink, director of the Louisiana Workforce Commission, indicates that there is an oversupply of degreed residents “we cannot employ” because job growth projections favor vocational trades and the service sector — primarily low-wage occupations such as ticket-takers, cashiers and customer service representatives that are not so prone to the insourcing/outsourcing phenomena.

Is this a sign of things to come?

Without the discretionary income Middle Class Joes and Janes inject into the marketplace, globalized economies may become relegated to a small percentage of elite income earners pitching their products and services to other elite individuals. This may be a recipe for modern-day feudalism, but it’s no way to protect and preserve the merits of free-market capitalism, let alone a profitable market share.

As dire as it all sounds, this isn’t about being pessimistic. Opening our collective eyes is the first step in defending what matters most: family, community, culture — the United States itself. If that means rethinking our definition of progress in the 21st Century sans the usual set of partisan blinders, so be it.

This is no time for subterfuge.

If Friedman wishes to talk about education, he ought to contemplate the wisdom no book learning apparently can impart in America’s best and brightest CEOs and newspaper columnists: The foresight to realize one’s employees/coworkers are also one’s customers/consumers. That means that success at the top of the economic pyramid is only as long-lived as the Middle Class foundation upon which it rests. Excuse it, deny it, defend it, ignore it: the race to the bottom is a very real risk when good intentions go too far.

It’s foolhardy — and a threat to democracy itself — for a transnational conglomerate, an economy, a nation, to conduct business using the lowest common denominator as a competitive yardstick. And yet, globalization promises to outsource gain even as it insources pain. At best, this implies that if and when international economic and trade equilibrium is achieved Third World laborers will nevertheless be unable to sustain the lifestyle Americans have taken for granted — if only by virtue of how thin finite natural resources are stretched — whereas Americans should anticipate “economic insecurity” as a way of life. That’s why Friedman and friends argue so passionately that being wildly successful — untouchable thanks to one’s creativity, innovativeness and education — is the only position of safety (familiarity). The rest of us, apparently, are destined for a mediocre economic melting pot in a neocapitalist New World Order.

Cliché though it may sound, the proactive response to an uncertain future is civic engagement: voting wisely with one’s ballot and one’s pocketbook in support the kind of economy one wishes to see. For if there’s any silver lining to this Great Recession, it’s in bringing an abstract global issue close enough to home that we can reach out, touch it — and change it.

It’s not too late.

###

Resources:

America Out of Work: Is Double-Digit Unemployment Here to Stay?/TIME

Obama Adviser Summers Rejects ‘New Normal’ of Slow U.S. Growth/Bloomberg

U.S. Job Seekers Exceed Openings by Record Ratio/NYT

Are You Prepared for a Jobs Depression?/ere.net

How Long will America Lead the World?/Newsweek

Cap and Trade Dementia/The American Spectator

Schools As Scapegoats/The American Prospect

Is it Time to Retrain Business Schools?/NYT

Go Global, Young Manager!/Financial Post

Is a College Degree Worthless?/MSN Money

Don’t Get That College Degree!/NY Post

Cat Gets GED: Why GPAs, Degrees and Job Titles May Be Worthless/ITBusinessEdge

Too Many Doctorates Chase Too Few Jobs/San Francisco Chronical

The Three-Year Solution/Newsweek

Asking for Student Loan Forgiveness/Businessweek

Middle Class Facing Decline in Expectations, Economic Power/Retail Traffic

21st Century Skills, Education & Competitiveness/PDF

Jay Mathews: Why I don’t Like 21st Century Reports/Washington Post

Friedman: U.S. Education System Endangering Global Competitiveness/Education Futures

A New Look at American Competitiveness/Entrepreneurship

The World’s New Superpower/Salon

The Almighty Renminbi?/NYT

The End of the Dollar Spells the Rise of a New Order/The Independent (UK)

China will Overtake America, the Only Question is When/The Independent (UK)

China’s Economy/Brookings Institution

Lax Oversight, Globalization Erode Product Safety/CNN

Technology Made to be Broken/CSMonitor

Appliance Anxiety — Replace It or Fix It?/NYT

It shouldn’t news to anyone that the United States is in the middle of a horrible recession.  Nor should it be surprising that unemployment rates nationwide continue to rise.

Thousands of college students graduated this year without jobs, and most of those graduates are still searching for employment.  I happen to be one such individual.  I graduated this past May (May 2009) from a small, private liberal arts school with a Bachelor of Arts in English and a strong desire to work in the publishing industry.

Since graduating and coming to the realization that I am not immune to the effects of a national economic crisis, I have been working full-time to find a job and have been exploring paths quite different to those I had ever envisioned for myself.

It is my hope that others who are in my same situation will find this blog and comment or share some of their own experiences.  Recent college graduates like myself have left school at an extremely unfortuante time, but we do have youth and (hopefully) youthful optimism on our side so it’s not all bad…

Sustainche very much enjoys being a student ! He likes to search, to read, to review, to think, to compare, to observe, to survey and map, to analyse, to conclude, to draw and to write … in fact what every other student in the world should like as well.

Of course, studying is not depended on any particular place; Sustainche studies everywhere and at anytime. However, Sustainche knows that there are very special places where he enjoys his studies most, and one of these places is Bologna. Bologna University was founded 1088 and is the oldest University in Europe. What a cultural richness, beauty and inspiration Sustainche found in Bologna ! This is indeed a place TO BE and The Sustains™ fully share Sustainche’s love for Bologna.

Recently Sustainche stumbled upon something that is called ‘Bologna process’. The purpose of the Bologna process is to create the European higher education area by making academic degree standards and quality assurance standards more comparable and compatible throughout Europe. Sustainche agrees that such an effort can facilitate free movement of students from one University to another. However, and although Sustainche is only a Polar Bear and in the meantime knows Bologna University from inside, he is not sure whether the Bologna credit system is trying to make something equal that in fact can never be equal at all.

Sustainche might be a bit old fashioned. For Sustainche a University is a place where he can enjoy academic research (or let’s better say ‘search’), exchange of new ideas among students and find the best Professors of their science to learn more than he knows already. Yet, he enjoys studying with The Sustains™. In this respect, studying for Sustainche is something individual and he can only imagine that he couldn’t study in the same manner when he would join … let’s say … a University in Germany. Hmmm … probably a German University would not even allow a small Polar Bear like him to enter the building …

For Sustainche the word Professor is something very precious. Referring to the Latin meaning a professor for him is a person who professes to be an expert in an art or science, confesses his/her scientific results in public and is a teacher of highest rank. Interesting enough in Macedonia each and every teacher – also in Primary Schools – is allowed to call him-/herself Professor. Consequently, it is very difficult not to find a Professor among the 2.2 Million citizens; everybody is a Professor. Being in such a countrywide Professor movie – of course – all pupils somehow need to become Professors or – if this is not feasible – Directors in an ‘institutija’. What is most important is an academic career. Sustainche wonders how it is possible that nearly every kindergarten pupil finally passes what is called ‘matura’, which is the entrance document to arrive at a University. The American style matura prom night is an outstanding social event with doctor hats, speeches, eating, drinking, and dancing in extremely nice evening dresses. Parents pay a fortune for this event. 

Even more interesting is the fact that the vast majority of pupils whom become students during their University time also finalize their studies. Sustainche has heard rumours that this is not necessarily due to their excellent knowledge, but rather due to some moneyski that parents pay to some ‘professors’ to ‘help’ their kids pass some exams. Sustainche was also surprised when he became aware that for example students of Economy until the final examination only need to read and memorize a few books. Sustainche enjoys reading scientific articles – in fact everything that falls in front of his small feet, but most important he very much appreciates practical field work and projects. 

When Sustainche saw this type of Economy students in a local Bank, he wasn’t sure whether this kind of profession really needs scientists. It could be good enough to tell these people how to fill in some specific templates. Reading, writing and calculating is what they anyway should have learnt when they received their doctor hat with matura … . Never mind, if these people like to waste their time and moneyski, and finally earn Euro 100 per month in a Bank this is ok for Sustainche. However, what is not ok for Sustainche is if students receive some academic degree that they in fact bought. Professors who support and benefit from such a fraud are simply criminals and need to be sending to jail. 

Sustainche also doesn’t like this Anglo-Saxon Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) and Bachelor of Science (BSc.) movie that with the newly introduced Bologna process is now floating around Europe. For Sustainche these degrees can only be the first step towards a Diploma or Master of Science (M.Sc.) but can never stand alone. This is only something to satisfy the Matrix dream world and to show some piece of paper that in no way qualifies anybody for anything, neither for a professional job, nor for being recognized as a ‘light scientist’. Not to be misunderstood: Sustainche by no means is against equal opportunities and rights. He is indeed in favour ! However, by nature not everybody is equal what he can finally achieve. Some people are simply better in working with their hands, rather than with their brain. This is nothing to underestimate and judge. Yet, Universities are meant to educate students to become scientists. This is their original purpose. Therefore, Sustainche is always surprised seeing more and more new private ‘Universities’ and ‘Faculties’ growing like mushrooms in Skopje. But this is another story …

Let’s enjoy listening to Andrea Bocelli – Nessun Dorma … how nice …
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbGKQ8YASCY

The Maui Police Department announced the promotion of Captain Danny Matsuura to the rank of Assistant Chief.

Assistant Chief Danny Matsuura. Photo Courtesy Maui Police Department.

Matsuura will serve as Commander of the Support Services Bureau in his capacity as Assistant Chief.  He fills the void created by the recent promotion of Deputy Chief Clayton Tom with the new administration.

Assistant Chief Matsuura is a 24 year veteran of the Maui Police Department, starting his career on April 16, 1985.  During his police career, he worked in the Vice Division for 7 years and in the Criminal Investigation Division as a detective.   He served as a commander with the Kihei Patrol District, Plans & Training Section and Molokai Patrol District.  His last assignment was as commander of the Internal Affairs Section.

In 2004 Matsuura was selected as the department and County of Maui’s Manager of the Year.  Additionally, he attended and graduated from the FBI National Academy and was a member of the 229^th Session, which graduated in 2007.

Matsuura graduated from Maui High School in 1979.   He later attended and graduated from the University of Hawaii-Hilo with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Liberal Studies in Criminal Justice.

He is married to Carmen, a teacher at Kamehameha Schools Maui and they have one daughter, Aubrey who will be attending.  Aubrey will be a sophomore at the University of Hawaii-Manoa campus.

The promotion took effect on Thursday, July 16, 2009.

(By Wendy Osher © 2009)

Central Saint Martins once again put on a BA show that demonstrated a range of talent that are either hoping to carry on and progress to the famed MA course or strike out on their own with labels, fuelled by the recent success of young graduates like Craig Lawrence and Mark Fast. We picked out ten students from the forty that showed and quizzed them about their collections, hopes and dreams and idols with a lot of people name dropping Gianni Versace. An indication of a shifting mood perhaps.

In amongst the chosen ten are L’Oreal Professionnel Awards prize winner Marie Hill and runners up Dean Quinn and Luke Brooks. Not that the prizes mattered as much as the diverse showcase that the school continues to come up trumps with.

You can read all the interviews HERE

photographs and writing by: Kasia Bobula

Via Dazed Digital

Today I walked across the stage, Summa Cum Laude, and landed myself a Bachelor of Arts and a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism. I officially completed four years of schooling at a fabulous private university and majored in Magazines and English, and minored in Sociology. I received departmental honors for both schools, and was acknowledged for my numerous other things.

I don’t have a job, I’m intimidated by the grad school requirements, and I don’t know what’s in store for the remainder of my life…

But I’m ready. I am so ready.

]]> http://mattparish.wordpress.com/2009/03/23/house-show-in-watertown-ma-in-the-boston-phoenix-31109/ Mon, 23 Mar 2009 20:06:38 +0000 mdouglasparish http://mattparish.wordpress.com/2009/03/23/house-show-in-watertown-ma-in-the-boston-phoenix-31109/

Quick and dirty run-down of a Boston show off the beaten path in quaint olde Watertown, which actually has lots going for it besides the Deluxe Towne Diner. See: This House. On the menu: You Need New Glasses, Thief Thief, Whitetail, Bachelor of Arts, and Big Bear.

Link to article at Boston Phoenix HERE.

Dead Herring is a great place to see bands.  The cozy apartment is warm and welcoming with colorful streamers running across the ceiling and fresh-baked cookies coming out of the oven.  There’s even a perfect loft space to perch on, peering down on the bands from above.  Real Estate was the first band of the night; I’ve written before about how much I admire these guys.  Their live set was good- a lot of very exciting and different ideas in their music. While I still think they need more performance experience under their belts, if this band keeps going they have really good chances of doing very, very exciting things with their career.  Unfortunately, I ran out of batteries for my camera, so I only got pictures of Real Estate and Dinowalurs, but Bachelor of Arts, The Forms, and Boogie Boarder also played.

Real Estate:

Dinowalurs:

Tutoring going well – boring and repetitious and more work than I get paid for but the girl is nice & it’s $25 more than I was making previously; Kylar is back, yay – K-Rudd impersonations & Cuban cigarettes & bubble gum cigarettes & amazing, amazing things at the MCA & stories from the Americas; excited about upcoming zine fairs (Wollonghetto on the 5^th of April; MCA on the 24^th of May); excited about Feels Like Friday #9; the boy is lovely; I’m pretty excited about starting the third year of my Bachelor of Arts, although the idea of essay deadlines and early mornings is not so pleasant; my zebra-print curtains are too awesome; had my last trip to the dentist today, finally (although I still need to get a crown on my root canal & get one more wisdom tooth taken out, but those things can wait).

看得我一頭煙。先旨聲明，最好別看這篇了，因為應該只有在煩惱選科的我才能看明白 =____=

就是為了搞清楚如果在 Bachelor of Arts 之外，同時唸 Diploma in Mathematical Sciences 的話，到底要選修哪些科目。心裡蠻著急的，因為下星期三至五裡有一天要去見 subject selection advisor，所以最好現在先弄明白。

令我越看越頭痛的是這兩個網頁：這個跟這個。

好像解釋得蠻詳盡的，不過那幾張圖表卻看不懂。（喔，我要唸的是 accelerated mathematics stream，但我只想正常地七個學期唸完，不想讓自己更辛苦……）沒人了解的痛苦啊 =______=

還有，怎麼我算來算去只算到 BA 第一年要唸七科（87.5 分），而不是八科（100 分）？到底我第八科可以唸甚麼？因為必修的有兩門 IDF，加上兩門 Accelerated Mathematics 作為 breadth，所以剩下的選了 The Secret Life of Language（Linguistics 的）跟 Law in Society（Criminology 的），而 Logic: Language and Information 是 UBS，即是合共七科，欠一科呢。我的想法是，advisor 大概會叫我再選一門 BA 本身的科目，因為非 BA 的已經超過一半。雖然我也是這麼想的，而我也並非不願意再唸一門 BA 的科（畢竟 BA 也是我自己要唸的，是沒錯的了），困難之處是在於這最後一門要歸納到 Linguistics 還是 Criminology 裡去。這是因為課程指南說 Linguistics 跟 Criminology 各自都只需一門它本身的科目再加一門 IDF，所以我有點頭大了。不可能是要我唸四門 IDF 吧！？

救命……結論是，大概還是要等到下星期二的 Academic Advice Day 才能解開疑團了。雖然是這樣，但至少可以證明我已經滿腦子是大學的事了吧。這是好是壞……

BAUM ‘09 – ‘11 !

No, I haven’t finished enrolling yet =____= I’ll be done probably this evening.

But there’s something that has vexed me much over the past hour :

My University-supplied email address is v.yim@ugrad.unimelb.edu.au, and I was able to sign in without any trouble the first time, to get that confirmation message for change of something-or-other for one of the steps of the online enrolment process la-di-da. And I notice it’s Eudora, again =_____=

Anyway my point is that the second, third, fourth, etc. times I tried to sign in to my uni webmail again, it never worked T_______T

… Then I realised that the username used to sign in to the webmail is actually vyim, NOT v.yim with a dot =________=

As if x______x

Ah well, at least that means stupid people who try to guess their way into my uni email account will have some fun time indeed. Loll. (Okay not funny.)

…

But I’m still happy with BAUM x] Now I need to wait for tonight…

ENGL2321 Twentieth Century: Modernism and Modernity – 81 DN
HIST2060 (Un)Making the Third World B – The Americas – 65 CR
HIST2511 US and Conflict in the Middle East – 66 CR
POLS2020 Sex, Human Rights & Justice – 75 DN
POLS2048 International Security – 71 CR

How did this happen? I did barely any work, paid very little attention, skipped lots of classes and handed in pretty much everything late (sometimes weeks late). I expected to fail one or two subjects. I am a little disappointed with my International Security mark because that was my favourite subject and I’ve always had Distinctions for Politics but oh well.

ENGL2321 – I attended only Monday’s lectures because I had a clash with History for the Wednesday lectures. I tuned out completely when I was there. I relied on Zig’s notes and my skills at bullshitting to get me through. Mostly I was just there because I had/have a crush on Dr Kate, the lecturer/tutor. HIST2060 – it started off so well, viva la revolucion and all, but then I turned into capitalist scum or something and stopped going to the lectures, and skipped more tutorials than I was allowed to because my tutor was an absolute imbecile and everyone in the tutorial, except Clare, was a moron. HIST2511 – I really, really enjoyed this subject but it was a little on the difficult side. The lecturer’s accent was so amusing. POLS2020 – another subject I enjoyed but found a little difficult, just in a different way. There was a big split between people who were all about the law and people who were all about the principles of human rights, and people like me who wanted to be all Law and Order: SVU about it. I never got to say what I really wanted in tutorials. I handed in my essay, which was worth 60% of the mark, very late and it was just a rant about how prostitutes are just doing a job, which basically had no research behind it. Oh and I pretty much never did the readings and didn’t attend many lectures. POLS2048 – I loved everything about this subject but I was lazy and handed things in late and didn’t focus much. Boo. I hope Dr. Billingsley (he has a Facebook fan page!) will remember good things about me and not this mark because I want to suck up to him for an Honours project.

Either I’m a genius or Arts is too easy. I have my money on the latter.