April 30

So yeah...that paper. Here's the prompt:

Does it seem to anyone else like this is similar to the sort of anonymous surveys where students tell their honest opinion of the class? You know, like an ICES form? It seems to me that if they want honest essays about this, they shouldn't put our names on them. Then again, that's just my opinion. At this point, I don't really care any more because I'm done with this class forever!!!

Also, if those who read my ICES form followed the link, welcome and thank you for coming.  Take a look around.  Please don't make this class required any more.

April 28

Today, we began class by filling out the ICES forms. That was the entire reason I showed up. We had to finish making our hard decision, though, so we all got into the groups we'd had last time. We had started with five groups, but we were down to three by the end. We had $300,000 to split among them and we couldn't divide it evenly. One girl suggested we move one dollar from one group to another. Then it wouldn't be an even split, but it would be close enough. After we implemented her plan, that was the end of our hard decision. I suppose this means that we shouldn't ignore any of these categories. That's a benefit. Honestly, by this point, I was ready to leave and never have to go to this class again.  We are all so close to being done! Did I forget to mention there was homework that the website said was due next week but was supposed to be due today for our class? Yeah. More on that in the next post.

So close...

April 21

We heard the last presentation today. Then we swiftly moved into deciding whose cause was best. No, that's pretty much accurate. We're not allowed the just split the money evenly among the various groups. Some group is or groups are going to get more money than others. We're rating the importance of several huge, important topics that are all problems facing a significant chunk of humanity. So...leadership as in dictators? The money split is also based on how much help the money would be and where it's going and such. Those factors make this a little less horrible. Still. Choose which is more important between...hunger and poverty. Maybe you'd rather choose between education and infrastructure, you know, providing clean drinking water, houses and electricity and such. It just seems a little terrible to me to rank which of these are more important than others. But, hey, we're all going to end up being leaders and need to make these kinds of decisions where we can't just give the same amount to all of them. I understand they want us to think about this issue and that's why we can't just split the money, but it still irks me, obviously. Anyway, next class, we'll be able to see which of these categories is worthy of our consideration and which one(s) we should just ignore. Tune in next week to find out!

How much money will we give to the Humane Society? Oh wait, I forgot... They're not humanitarian enough.

April 20

This week, our homework was making a discussion board post. We're going to debate about which of the organizations brought up in our presentations we would fund if we had a bajillion dollars. Debating leads to leadership? I mean, I suppose it kind of can. By this point, I pretty much don't care what they have us do in the name of leadership, as long as it's something I don't have to think about too much. We're so close to being done with this stupid class forever! Anyway, I know you're dying to see their words about what we needed to do.

There's no grammar mistakes! I'm impressed.

It's a good thing they told us to thoughtfully respond to other posts. That meant I put a little effort into what I was typing. This assignment was less annoying than having to read a kascrillion page article, especially if it was dumb and based on faulty research, but it was still more annoying than reading something short and interesting. Anyway, the whole assignment didn't take me very long, so I suppose I've seen worse for this class.

April 14

The homework for this class was watching videos associated with the group presentations. Since they're TED talks, I have no issue with them. The class was just about the same as the week before. I suppose talking in front of a group and putting a project together is sort of working on our leadership. That doesn't mean I have to like it. This project took me back to high school. Again. Ah well. There's just one more group and then we'll be back to our regularly scheduled ridiculosity. Also, the end of this class is rapidly drawing near. Thank the deity of your choice!

I'm more glad about the end of this class than you are to see this baby elephant.

April 7

Today, we had the first group presentations. Each group is expected to take 25 minutes with their presentation. The suggested (or maybe demanded, I couldn't tell) allotment of time is 10 minutes of the group speaking and 15 discussing. Since there's three or four people in each group, I suppose it's not that bad. I kind of resent having to come up with that much to talk about for this class, but I'll get over it.

Other than that, I had no issues with this class for once.

Maybe I have less to complain about because they were staring me down while I wrote this.

March 31

Today we learned, for the third time, about students in our class who want to study abroad and where they want to go. I'm nearly positive there were fewer students who said they wanted to study abroad this time. They probably figured that they had answered the question enough already. After asking this, she had us say which language we took in high school. A few people said, “French,” and one kid said, “German” because there's one in every crowd. After most of us answered, “Spanish,” she asked if we wanted to know the genesis of the program. I'm not sure why she had to use that word, but she used it several times. It just seems a little odd, and it relates this class to the Bible, which is just weird. Then she put some French words on the board. Apparently, LAS 122 is about “I”, the formal and informal uses of “you”, and “we”. Once she explained it, this made sense. One starts with “I” then branches out to working with people one could address as the informal “you” and working for people one would address as formal “you”, until the whole group of people becomes “we”. Still, French? This program is based on four French words? There's nothing wrong with the language, but it seems like a random thing to use to start a class. Then again, I'm not too surprised. I mean, it is this class.

After getting a brief language lesson, we discussed our service projects again. I do love hearing multiple times about these projects, especially when several people in the class went to the same place. It just seems like there's something more useful we could do with our time...like coloring. That would be pretty awesome. When we were discussing this, our teacher asked how we used leadership. Maybe it's just me, but it seems like entry level volunteering won't involve leadership so much as it will involve grunt work. Then again, what do I know? This class is just like high school, so I definitely know nothing compared to people who organized it. Also, we already knew that working with animals wasn't “humanitarian enough”, but today we learned that working for the environment isn't “humanitarian enough”, either. It's not like we live in the environment and we need to work to keep it livable. No, it's that other thing... I keep thinking that I won't be surprised by the ridiculous things that come from this class, but I'm wrong so many times.

March 29

Reflection Paper 3 arrived. I knew it was coming, but that doesn't mean that I want to have to deal with it any more.  Firstly, I have another of my famous edited versions of the prompt. Hopefully this one will be easier to read.

God help you if your project involved animals!

I had to add on a little more BS than usual to meet the two-page requirement. I don't know, maybe this paper won't net me a score of 9. Gasp! Also, do they expect us to say that we wouldn't help out our volunteer site more if we were able? I suppose in my mind it's more of a, “You have a crap-load of money. Would you give some of it to this site?” I doubt anyone will say something like, “No! I hate the place where I volunteered! No money for them!” Most people try to seem like awesome people in hypothetical situations because it doesn't take any effort. Anyway. The end is in sight of this terrible class, so I have less to snark about. Just know that I wrote this paper in one sitting and didn't bother to edit it much.

March 17

Today, my teacher confirmed something I've suspected about this class for a long time. “This is just like high school or a job, you let your supervisor know if you can't get something in.” I'm glad someone is finally owning up to the fact that this class is just like being back in high school. We have contrived group projects, none of the readings really pertain to the class, late work isn't a big deal, we have busy work all the time (I consider all of our homework busy work), and, when it comes down to it, this class's worth will be summed up when I check it off my list of required classes.

Speaking of that, the teacher asked us all to write down our impressions about the walkabout on a slip of paper. She assured us that, probably within a half hour, our papers would be shredded. Excuse me? You're going to read through them once and then shred them? (Saying that she'll read them is kind of a large assumption, but I can be optimistic at times.) I realize you don't care about our opinions, but this is a little much. I hope she takes my honest statement that I don't understand why we went on the walkabout to heart. Because they asked for student input in arranging this class, then ignored it, I doubt anyone will care about my opinion, though.

There was one bright spot to this class: one of our papers and our final reading are canceled. They wouldn't want us to have to spend effort on a class that has no merit close to finals. I'm glad they realize the pointlessness of this class, at least in part.

None of these penguins took this class, and look how happy they are!

March 15

I just wrote the second reflection paper for class. I hadn't realized we had another paper, so I'm glad my friend was complaining about it. The prompt was this:

"How does leadership play a role in living and learning in a diverse community like that of the University of Illinois?  Did the cultural Center walkabout influence how you think about leadership in the campus community?  Why or why not?  In what ways did the Walkabout lead you to any new insights, inspirations, questions or concern related to this class (and what are they)?

Your paper should consist of a response to the prompt above that is carefully crafted and edited.  The minimum length is 2 pages, double spaced, in an 11 or 12 point font with standard 1 inch margins."

Yes...a carefully crafted paper. With directions like these, there's no way I BSed this paper. No, wait...that other thing... I don't care enough about this class to actually spend time on this paper. I put what I think in it, though. That could be dangerous. I might not get the coveted “9” score! Oh no! Really, though, the cultural center walkabout taught me nothing about leadership. I don't understand how we're supposed to write a paper about how it did. That's why I called them on their ridiculosity in my paper. When I got to the part about questions, I almost put this in my paper, “I question this class every time I think about it.” I decided to phrase this a bit differently and much more subtly. While I was writing this paper, my friend was sitting next to me writing hers. I took down a few quotes while we were talking. Unless otherwise noted, these quotes are hers.

“Did I just make connections with stuff that wasn't even in this class?” she asked. “That's the only way to write this paper,” I replied.

"It's pissing me off; race has nothing to do with leadership."

“This is bad and I don't even care.” (about her paper)

Also, remember how one of my friends dropped being a spiffy scholar so she could drop this class? I just learned that another one of my friends dropped being this kind of scholar as well so she didn't have to take this class, before she started it. Just the idea of taking this class made her stop being this spiffy kind of scholar. A friend of a friend was scared away from being a scholar because she didn't want to take this class and the one I had to take last semester. I'm pretty sure the people organizing these classes are doing something wrong. I'm just sayin'.

On the topic of not being organized... At the beginning of the year, we had to print out the syllabus and bring it to class. Each of our paper assignments was written on the syllabus and they told us that was exactly what we would be writing. I don't know why I'm surprised when they lie to us anymore. According to the syllabus, we were supposed to write:

“How do you connect your current definition of leadership to the idea of being an ally in a diverse society? Describe how you believe being an ally can aid progress towards addressing humanitarian issues. How did the Cultural Center Walkabout help you lean about being an ally and effective leader on campus? In what ways did the Walkabout lead you to any new insights, questions, or concerns, and what were they? What are some possible ways you can involved [sic] with Cultural Centers on campus in the future? Do you plan to do so? Why or why not?”

It would be nice if they could be consistent. Oh, and having correct grammar would be a good thing, too.

I'll make that class make sense later.  These puppies are so cute!

March 8

We had to do a walk-about today. It went from 7 to 9 at night. Our walk-about covered the various cultural houses on campus (Native American, Asian American, African American, Women's Resource Center, GLBT, La Casa). I'm not sure being a woman is a culture, but whateves. Anyway, this walk was mostly handled by the people whose houses we were visiting, so I don't have much to complain about. My two dislikes are these:

-It was cold.

-It was raining and I didn't have an umbrella.

Pretty much like this, except without a way to keep my head dry.

There's nothing anyone could have done about those (except for me bringing and umbrella). I accept that, but this blog is a complain-a-thon so there you go.

Anyway, after our tour in the rain, I went back to my dorm and tried to twist myself up to squeeze out all the rain.

March 2

A couple of things have come up since my last post. Firstly, remember that paper we had to write where only people who wrote with heart would get a 9? Remember how I BSed it? I got a 9. Either I'm good at pretending to write with heart, or my teacher is bad at telling, even though she told us she wasn't. Either way, I feel this is a win.

Secondly, I dislike using Moodle even more now. I got an e-mail about every discussion board post. Every. Single. One. I know I could mark these e-mails as spam; that's not the part that bothers me. Every group's decisions about what they are doing are delivered to my mailbox. I was uncomfortable with the lack of privacy in planning before, now I'm a little pissed. Instead of there being a possibility that someone in the class could see what someone else had written, now everyone in the class gets what everyone else has written shoved in their face.

Those points aside, the homework for this week was as follows:

Pretty much, "Whatever you came up with in class, put up here with a spiffy video."

My group-mates and I discussed this over e-mail. (Sucks to your asmar! I mean moodle.) One of them posted a nice summation of what we talked about. I pretty much had no homework for this class. It'd be nice if this were to become a trend. I mean, if it's going to be a waste of time, it may as well be a small waste of time.

February 24

The only thing that happened in class today was my teacher bothered me.  It was little things and mentioning them won't help anyone, so I removed this post.

February 23

The reading for this class was another chapter in the same book by Eboo Patel. The book is called Acts of faith: the story of an American Muslim, the struggle for the soul of a generation and it's basically amazing. I suppose one good thing about this class is that it shows us some pretty awesome stuff. Granted, we don't tend to actually discuss these things in class, particularly. Then again, if we discussed these amazing things, I probably wouldn't be writing this blog.

Anyway, here's a screen-shot of another part of our homework:

On Moodle, or it didn't happen

Maybe it's just me, but if we're being leaders, shouldn't we be figuring these things out on our own? I'm not saying that leaders don't need help sometimes, but shouldn't that be at our discretion? I don't think it's helpful for students to toss ideas around in a space where the teacher can tell them, at any time, “You're doing it wrong.” Also, everyone in the class can see what you're planning. This isn't a problem like the teacher's constant threat of advice, but it's weird. People in the class could look at what other groups are doing, just to get an idea, and judge you. It's a little intimidating. I would rather that they trusted us enough to plan our presentations alone, using e-mail or whatever else worked best for us. Then again, what do I know? I'm just a student, after all. I had hoped college wouldn't repeat this high school mentality, but this class sure seems to.

February 17

Sorry about the string of late posts. This whole idea of leadership must be just a little too large for my tiny brain.

Then, for the first time, we actually had a chance to do some leadership in this class. She told us to make our groups for the project we had. We had to pick topics that didn't overlap, break ourselves into groups, and decide who would present on which day. I'm proud to say that we rose to this mighty challenge. Someone offered to write things down on the board and it was fairly smooth sailing from there. After she came back in the room, she double checked everything we had done, then let us out early. All of that student leadership is tiring for all of us, you know.

February 14

I had time today so I figured I may as well get the homework done for this class so I didn't have to think about it until class. So, I read the assigned reading.

It was chapter 3, Identity Politics, of some book whose title I don't know by Eboo Patel. This reading was absorbing and actually good. However, I don't know what finding your niche based on your race, or not, has to do with leadership. I wonder if it will be a pattern that anything good in this class has nothing to do with it. I do have a few things about this reading that bothered me, but they don't have much to do with the reading itself. I hate where the reading ended. Maybe it's because I read so much, but it bothers me that the story wasn't finished. The chapter ended in the middle of relationship problems between the main character and his girl and, when our reading ended, he hadn't figured out what he would do about social justice and such. I realize the first part isn't necessary for this class, but I still want to know what happened to them, dammit. I'll probably read the book on my own later. Really, though, they should have finished the thread about what he would do about social justice since that's kind of what we're talking about in class...a little. Anyway, the other problem: the last two pages were sideways. This is yet another indicator to me of how little the people running this class care about it.

After our reading, we had to complete a survey. It was short, thank goodness, but there were some things about it that bothered me. Of course there were questions on rating things 1 through 5 and then there were questions where we could type our responses. The first question where we really responded asked what had help us learn material for this class. I'm wondering what they thought we might write. I don't think we've learned anything, so nothing has helped us learn. Also, the survey was titled “How is this class going so far?”, but that's not a question in the survey. The title isn't even close to one of the questions they asked. I realize that would be a vague question, but it would be helpful to them to know how we were liking their class and what they could change about it. Then again, that assumes that they want to know what we think of the class in the midst of it. I know we'll get to tell them our opinions at the end. Maybe next year's class will be lucky and this class won't be required.

On another note, to be in this class, you have to be in a certain honors program. One of my friends was so fed up with this class that she dropped being in the honors program so she wouldn't have to take the class anymore. I think that shows more than this blog ever could how terrible this class is.

However, just to show I'm not bitter, I think I'll give this class a valentine. It's the day for it after all.

February 10

Sorry this post is late. Clearly, I was considering how to be a great leader.

One of the first things we learned again in class today is that both the Humane Society and something like picking up trash in a park are “not humane enough”. Apparently, different volunteering projects have a set level of humane-ness. Well, that's one thing I learned from this class, anyway.

Then our teacher handed around something called the Social Identity Wheel. Basically, she wanted us to to mark the traits we used most often and least often to identify people, which ways of classifying ourselves we thought about most, and which labels have the strongest effect on how we perceive ourselves. I have the wheel for you here:

The line for between Age and National Origin looks like it was put in at the last minute. Age isn't a real identity.

Personally, I don't label myself by any of these too often. I tend to think of myself as a person, you know, a mix of things and not easily classifiable by one word. That's just me. I'm sure there's plenty of people who only have one side to them and are nothing else except that. No, wait. That other thing...

February 7

We had to watch a TED talk for this assignment. I was annoyed about this when I first hear about it but when I watched Chimamanda Adichie talk about the danger of a single story, I realized it was actually good and worth my time. Really, you should go watch it, if you've got about 19 minutes. So, because it was good and this is a blog about how terrible this class is, I won't talk about it anymore.

By the way, I have no idea why we watched this video. As far as I can tell, it has nothing to do with this class. That's probably why it was good. The prompt for the reflective essay that's due this week has nothing to do with the video, either. I guess they just felt like having us watch it. The essay prompt read as follows:

“Reflection Paper 1.

The purpose of this reflection paper is to explore your initial perspectives on leadership and service. Provide a carefully considered definition of leadership. Then, to explain what you feel are the most important connections between leadership and service, locate examples of leadership (in your own experience or that of another person you know or admire). Describe these examples in some detail, paying special attention to how they can be considered purposeful, inclusive, empowering and ethical. Using these examples, explain how you see leadership as related to doing service for the good of society.

Your paper should consist of a response to the prompt above that is carefully crafted and edited. The minimum length is 2 pages, double spaced, in an 11 or 12 point font with standard 1 inch margins.”

I know my initial perspectives on leadership (it's something I don't like doing), and service (helping people in need is very important). There, I just summed them up in two parenthetical statements. They want us to write a paper on this? To be fair, it's only really one page long. The first task, defining leadership, seemed incredibly easy to me.

Now what's the definition for "smart-ass"?

I decided not to use this definition and instead write some BS. Not writing this paper with heart? I've got it covered from the first paragraph. Moving right along: connecting service and leadership. Yes, when someone leads, they provide service to the people they are leading. Granted, it may not be a good service (Hitler was a leader who provided his subjects with the terrible service of genocide), but it will be some sort of service. Really, it's not hard to connect those two, especially if you decide to write about a volunteer leader.

Also, describe how leadership is purposeful? In order to lead, you need a purpose. You can't lead and have nothing to lead towards. Why even bother telling us to write about that? Oh wait. I forgot. It's this class, of course they're going to do things that are annoying and don't make sense. Silly me.

Also, for the good of society? Is that something like the greater good? If you've seen Hot Fuzz, or are fairly well-read, you'll know the danger inherent in that phrase. Just trust me, serving the greater good is not always the ethical or good thing to do.

As I was writing this paper, I realized I needed two examples. I didn't write this, but I was very tempted to: “Another wonderful leader was your mom.” Heck, for all I know, it's true. Then again, I don't know my teacher's mom, so I couldn't write anything about one time when she led something awesome. Hey, I can dream. Maybe my teacher's mom will lead a revolution that liberates me and my people from having to take this class. ¡Viva la Revolucion!

February 3

I walked into class a couple of minutes early today. I thought this was fairly impressive because I left my dorm a little later than I'd intended and the sidewalks are skating rinks. However, when I walked into class, the teacher had already started talking and it sounded like the things we talk about for class. I was, and I'm sure the others who walked in before the bell were also, confused at her early start time. I suppose the important thing is that she wasn't saying anything crucial so I didn't have to worry about missing it. Come to think of it, that kind of sounds like the entire class.

As I'm sure you know, emotions lead to thoughts which lead to actions which lead to performance. The performance is supposed to refer to job performance, by the way. When I first heard that, I began thinking of how often I hadn't acted on my emotions. After typing that sentence, though, I think of how teenagers have “dirty thoughts” that cause them to commit actions that will surely send them directly to Hell. I'm reminded of Frollo from Disney's adaptation of the Hunchback of Notre Dame.

Sometimes they aren't teenagers...

 
Anyway, soon after that we started talking about the volunteering we had to do for this class. (At one point, the teacher used the word “volunteerism”. I don't think that's a real word, whatever a dictionary will tell you.) The abbreviation this class is using for that is ISP. Don't ask me what that stands for because I don't care enough to remember. I just need to be sure not to confuse that with the ISSP from Cowboy BeBop. The police force of a futuristic society has very little to do with getting 5 volunteer hours for some humanitarian cause, so I think I'll be okay. By the way, the Humane Society is not humanitarian enough for this class. Never mind that adorable animals can be beneficial to people, too.

Pictured: Not Helpful to People. At All

Then she told us about the reflection papers we have to write. In this paper, we have to talk about our “initial perspectives on leadership and service.” I suspect that if I wrote my true feelings, I wouldn't score very well on the paper. However, she warned us that only papers written with heart would get a coveted “9”. That's the highest score, by the way. Why would it be ten? That's silly. You're silly. Her declaration that she can tell when a paper has been written with heart *really* tempts me to write a paper with little to no heart and see what grade I get.

Also, I'm pretty sure I spend more time on this blog than I do on the class itself.

January 31

Today I did the assigned homework, which was to take The Emotional Competency Inventory. First of all, I noticed this lovely quote: "Participation in this study is completely voluntary, and you may opt out at any time by exiting your browser. Exiting will not affect your grades, status, or relationship with the University of Illinois." If the person taking this survey isn't taking it for a class, this is legit and applies. If you have to do this for homework, it's dumb. They had a box you could check so the people running the survey wouldn't use your responses, but I still think there's a better, less contradictory way to do this.


Before I could take the test, I had to edit my profile. I had already given them my name, major, college, ethnicity, and naming rights to my first born child, but they also needed my university identification number. I don't know why they didn't have us give this number to them in the first page of giving them information. I also don't know why an anonymous survey needs all of this information, but that's another matter entirely.


Already wary, I started taking the quiz. The format is that you grade yourself on various qualities that constitute emotion competency. If you think you're completely self-aware, you give yourself the highest on a scale of five. You could be completely wrong about this, it's quite easy to do, but according to this test, you're totally self-aware. To my mind, a better quiz would be situational and you'd pick a response. Honestly, the best test would be situational and you'd enter your response (or, you know, real life) but I don't expect that level of sophistication from this sort of test.

Hey!  I have high emotional self-awareness.  Probably.  I've even got accurate self-assessment.

At first, the statements that we were rating ourselves on weren't all that interesting. Then, I read this one: "I motivate others by arousing emotions". Oh my. They really should have picked a word besides arousing. My mind immediately goes to sex. I can't speak for everyone taking this class, but I try not to persuade people to do things because of sex.


Sex aside, the next statement that caught my eye took my mind in a different direction. "I offer feedback to improve another person's performance". Do you know that person who always tells you what you're doing wrong and what you should do instead? As nearly as I can tell, that's not me. This behavior seems bitchy to me, unless the person asked for feedback or you're in some sort of mentor-type position. Most college freshmen probably aren't on a day to day basis.


So maybe I think too snarkily (yes, that's totally a word), but I almost always try to disprove sweeping generalizations. Notice how I avoided making a generalization there? It's because of this tendency that I noticed this statement: "I believe I am among the most capable for a job". What job? I might be the best for something I know, but I would be a terrible person to put in charge of raising cattle. To my mind, if you think you're always the best person for every job, you have an ego that might be straining your back and you should get that checked out.


The last statement that caught my eye is a doozy. "I cut through red tape and bend the rules when necessary". I do this when the rules are dumb or not explained, but that's not the entire meaning of their statement. There are some rules that are a good idea. Their statement seems to advocate breaking any rule that gets in your way. Hey, if someone dishonors your family, you'd better hunt them down and kill them. Sure, there are laws against that sort of thing but, if you're going to complete your aim, it's necessary to break them. Don't you have high emotional competency?


One last note: they don't put periods at the end of their sentences. If you look back, all of the periods are outside of the quotation marks because I put them there. If they won't bother to have good grammar, should I bother answering their questions with anything but the same response each time?


Finally, finished with the inventory (that's a strange name that technically fits), I had to print it. Little did I know that my test results would take eight pages. Fortunately for me, my friend had already printed hers and adjusted my printer settings to print double sided and put two pages on each sheet of paper. To quote her opinion on the whole ordeal, "This is full of bullshit." I'm wondering if we'll even need to look at these results when I have class, or if this will be like the personal essay that we had to print for last week.

January 27

The crowning jewel of this day was when we got a handout of a PowerPoint presentation.  I was skimming through it when I noticed this: "Does IQ alone enough?"

What?  I understand that people don't use complete sentences in PowerPoints, but they need to be understandable.  It's never too early for a little irony in your day.

Shaking my head, at least on the inside, I continued reading the printed PowerPoint.  Then, I saw the question, "What were some examples of emotionally intelligent leaders that you posted to Moodle?"  Looking back before I made this post, I saw that my initial response was right: we weren't asked about emotionally intelligent leaders.  I wish they would read their own material.

The next slide declared, "Leadership development programs yield disappointing results, wasting billions of dollars."  This makes me wonder about the wisdom of having this class.  Again.

Then, after the teacher told us that volunteering for the Humane Society wasn't good enough for the volunteer requirement of five hours, we ended class.  I wondered about the rampant species-ism of this class before I shrugged on my backpack and left.

Also, as I realized later, we never shared the things we wrote and brought to class.  How silly of them.

January 25

Those of you who can do math will notice that this is before my second class. I just did the homework assigned for it. We had to read a 9 page piece about "emotional IQ" which the LAS website referred to as EQ. The piece was written with three columns per page, like a brochure. This layout makes me a little annoyed. They're having us read a brochure? It's too long to be a brochure, though. Anyway, we have to post on the discussion board about this. The button labeled "Post a New Discussion Topic" gave me pause, but, since it was the only button, I assumed this was how we were supposed to post our mini essay. Our prompt was this:
"What Makes a Leader? Emotional Intelligence, or EQ.


How can you tell if someone has high emotional intelligence? How can you recognize it in yourself?


Provide two examples of instances when you have witnessed (in yourself or in others in your daily work or school life) those skills described as integral to the concept of Emotional Intelligence (as defined by Goleman reading). Give one example of self-management skill, and one example of relationship management skill. Be very specific as to how the example relates to specific components of Emotional Intelligence (self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy or social skill).


Come to our next class prepared to contribute these examples (or others) as part of a discussion on Emotional Intelligence."

It's entirely possible that I took a screen-shot of the webpage with this prompt and edited it using Paint.

Paint is the editing program of kings and the king of editing programs.

Also, it may seem that we're saving paper by posting these online but we are also required to bring our musings to class, on a laptop or on paper. Laptops are heavy, so I'll be printing mine. I'm figuring most others will be too.
Anyway, I'm sure you're all wonderfully curious about the reading itself. It was "What Makes a Leader?" by Daniel Goleman. While I was reading, a few things caught my eye.


"How can one recognize self-awareness?" This question makes me sad that someone decided this brochure was worthwhile to read.

"There is an old-fashioned word for the phenomenon: maturity." I was unaware that maturity was old-fashioned. Perhaps I should refer to it as Goleman does in the previous sentence, “Emotional intelligence increases with age.” Then again, I think I'm not emotionally intelligent enough to want to give up my word. I'm not old enough for that yet.

"That story illustrates two other common traits of people who are driven to achieve. They are forever raising the performance bar, and they like to keep score." We should all keep score. About everything. Ever. This is emotional intelligence.

"As anyone who has ever been a part of one can attest, teams are cauldrons of bubbling emotions." Especially those teams with women on them! People are so difficult with their emotions and their needs...

"Social skill, rather, is friendliness with a purpose: moving people in the direction you desire, whether that's agreement on a new marketing strategy or enthusiasm about a new product." Silly me. I thought social skill was being well versed in interacting with people. It's a good thing I read this article and learned my mistake.

"That doesn't mean they socialize continually; it means they work according to the assumption that nothing important gets done alone." If people look like they're working alone, they will not get as much done as if you help them. They love it when you stand about an arm's length away, squinting at their computer screen and offering helpful advice when they mess up.

"For instance, socially skilled people may at times appear not to be working while at work." Clearly, socially skilled people are working even when they're joking and seem to be becoming closer to people around them. Secretly, they don't like anyone and every smile, every laugh is forced and painful

"It would be foolish to assert that good-old fashioned IQ and technical ability are not important ingredients in strong leadership." This seems to almost contradict everything else this brochure has said. Almost. I'm glad they told us this flat out. Wait a minute. I thought we weren't being old fashioned. What happened to that?

In closing, there were several pictures in this brochure and many of them looked creepy.  It was almost like someone wasn't using emotional intelligence to empathize with the viewers of the pictures.

January 20

My first class is where I learn our teacher is a dean. This should be interesting. We talk briefly about the homework but, just like most classes, we spend the first day getting to know each other better. She asked us about the seven traits of our generation according to the longer piece. We were supposed to absorb the reading that was wrong?

January 14

It is four days before classes start. They sent us an email with homework. This homework was two readings. The shorter one, listed second, contradicted the longer one, written first. While it was amusing to read about how some guy thought a 600 person sample from one high school told him about an entire generation of teenagers in the US, these readings were not worth my time. I get the feeling this will be a common theme.


The longer reading was by Howe, Neil and Reena Nadler. "Yes We Can: The Emergence of Millenials as a Political Generation." The paper itself is 23 pages long. There are 9 pages of notes that the end. Because it's so long, I'll just give you some highlights.


After the introduction, the authors almost immediately defend that their paper has a reason for existing. "The notion that Millennials constitute a new and different political generation seems novel and daring to some. But from the very foundation of the United States, if not earlier, many have observed a generational rhythm underlying the ebb and flow of American political life." Oh, well. If some people who were around when America was founded thought this was legit, it must be absolutely true with no questions asked.
"And finally, each new generation appears as a surprise. Its political attitudes and aspirations are never an extension of those of the previous generation, but rather represent a complete break, a turning of corners, an entirely different perspective." This is always true if you count each new generation as the group of people that throws off the expectations of them group before them.


There's probably more to pick at in the introduction, but let's move on to the meat of the paper.
"Howe and Strauss made major predictions in that book about how Millennials would transform the behaviors and attitudes of teens and young adults over the next five, ten, and fifteen years. Nearly all of them have turned out to be correct." It seems bad form to cite yourself in an essay that you write later. Then again, maybe no one else had written anything that would help them. Also, I wonder if they would have cited themselves if they had been wrong in their book.

"Critics may object that these trends do not apply equally to every Millennial subgroup, and therefore do not really constitute generational trends." Critics may also tell you that the 600 or so teenagers used for the statistics in this essay all go to the same high school in Virginia. These critics are clearly missing the big picture.

Then the authors of this essay decide to give us 7 core traits of “Millennials”. I'm sorry if those quotation marks seem unnecessary, but I'm not sure I can bring myself to type that word any other way. In the interest of saving space, time and my sanity in reading this again, I'll just give you one sentence that accompanies each trait. The traits are these:
Special-"From the precious-baby movies of the mid- 1980s to the media glare surrounding the high school Class of 2000, older generations have inculcated in Millennials the sense that they are, collectively, vital to the nation and to adults’ sense of purpose." If my parents hadn't had children, I know they still would have a sense of purpose. I and my siblings not the whole of my parents' lives, unlike this suggests.

Sheltered-"Helicopter parents figure these special kids will always require special care." Whenever I make generalizations about a large group of people, I always use the crazy ones.

Confident-"The Millennials have a new sunny outlook, confidence that they can achieve great things, and faith that America’s big problems really can be solved." Um... What? Have you spoken with people in this generation? Oh yeah, 600 of them in Virginia and nowhere else. That's right.

Team-oriented-"High school students now regard team skills (along with technology) as the most valuable for their careers." I tend to think that being able to do the job is the most important skill for my career. Then again, what do I know? People outside of the generation will always be able to tell you more about it than people in it.

Conventional-"Millennials trade advice easily with their parents and even share their parents’ taste in music and clothes." No, really. Have you talked with a teenager recently? Also, I'm not sure how the recent trend in gay rights and the kascrillion gay-support groups (on my college campus, at least) fit in with teenagers being conventional. Maybe the conventionality harkens back to a time when subjects were mad at an English king not for being gay, but for using their tax money to shower his boyfriends with presents. Somehow, I don't think the authors are using that as a framework for conventionality.

Pressured-"There is a new youth assumption that long-term success demands near-term organization and achievement—that what a high school junior does this week determines where she’ll be five and ten years from now." OK, I'll stop asking if you've talked with teenagers, because obviously you haven't, but really? I don't think that what I do this week will affect where I'll be five and ten years from now and I'm in college. Also, when I was a junior, I didn't worry about my activities on a weekly basis for affecting my future, unless they were potentially fatal activities.

Achieving-"Most students today support standardized testing and higher standards, and believe that the best cure for rampant classroom boredom is tougher curriculum." That's interesting, because I believe the best cure for classroom boredom, rampant or not, is not tougher curriculum. You see, there are these things called advanced classes for nerds like me. If people are bored in class, they might need more difficult classwork, or they might need a better teacher, or the student could be bored because s/he doesn't want to be in school and nothing a teacher does will change that. Sorry, that must have been my “sunny outlook” intruding.

So, moving right along with this ridiculously long reading assignment...

"More than any other age bracket, Millennial teens favor reducing the restrictions on government surveillance of citizens to prevent terrorism and are willing to let government protect the community even at the cost of civil liberties. A right to privacy does not rank high in Millennial priorities." Personally, I strongly believe in my right to privacy. If I wrote a diary, I wouldn't let people read it. I know they're talking about other methods of finding terrorists, such as reading emails that might reveal several personal/painful details, but it's the same principle.

"Millennial children, by contrast, have been protectively raised in a society whose adults have been steadily weakening—or disobeying— these norms and rules." Wait. Didn't we have a bunch of rules a couple pages ago? Is it just me or is it getting contradictory in here?

"More than half of young workers would prefer that employers mandate a minimum standard for initial contribution rates, automatically increase contribution levels, and place them in default investment options." I would rather handle where my money goes, thank you very much.

"Millennials also support policies that allow government to assume benevolent direction over people’s life choices, particularly for those whom courts or psychiatrists have decreed cannot direct themselves." Woah. No. I disagree and the random friend I polled said that she'd never though about it. As it turns out, taking a sample from a variety of people who fit in your category will help you make better generalizations. Then again, trying to generalize about teenagers seems like an impossible feat to me. Even something like, “They all like to eat,” doesn't really work. There are plenty of people who try not to eat because they're concerned about their body image. A couple of my friends, that I know about, went through times when they didn't want to eat.

"Millennials rarely resist uniform dress codes, locker searches, see-through backpacks, urine checks, or cell phone GPS once they understand that these policies enhance their safety. Surveys show that today’s teens are comfortable with “zero tolerance” for even minor infractions in schools, are somewhat more inclined than prior generations to report such infractions, and are more likely to say that enforcement does not go far enough." I'm sorry, when did high school become totalitarian? It must have been when I wasn't looking. At my high school, getting students to dress for gym was enough of a hassle. My high school could never have had uniforms. Also, urine checks? As far as I know, that never happened in my high school.

"As already noted, this generation is smoking less, drinking less, and getting pregnant less in their teen years." So... those stories about parties full of booze and all of the students' children in my high school daycare are a decrease from previous generations? Wow. I am impressed. It's a wonder the previous generation didn't all die from smoking and drinking all the time. Wait... is the “smoking” in the article just cigarettes or does it also include pot? I'm not sure there was a day at my high school when someone didn't come to school high.

"Three-quarters of all teens agree that there is nothing embarrassing about saying you are a virgin—to the amazement of older Americans, who imagine that only a much smaller share of teens would agree." Ha! Hah! Oh. That was a good joke.


This is getting too long. I'll just skip ahead about five pages...
"By the late 1990s, the majority of high school students said they had detailed five- and ten-year plans." Granted, I was a high school student in the late 2000s, but still... Detailed five and ten year plans? This seems outrageous and/or made up.

"Through the 2010s, Millennials will be marrying, starting families, and giving birth in large numbers, returning to college for their fifth-year and tenth-year reunions—and swarming into business and the professions, no longer as apprentices. Already in the 2010s, some will enter state houses and the U.S. Congress. In the early 2020s, they will elect their first U.S. Senator—and perhaps in the early 2030s, their first U.S. President." This is a pretty generic group of predictions. However, they will all be wrong if the world ends in 2012.

"The prospect of an ideal match between the collective personality of the rising generation and the mood of the coming era may seem fortuitous, but it is nothing new. In fact, this happens repeatedly throughout American history. Consider how well prepared the rising Silent Generation was for the caution and conformity of the 1950s, or how well prepared Boomers were the passion and idealism of the 1970s, or how well prepared Gen- Xers were for the free agency and carnival culture of the 1990s. This recurring match may not be a coincidence." It's almost as if the people who are the “current generation” are raising the future generation in their world. It's strange how these things work out.

"Yet by thinking generationally, by understanding who the Millennials are and how they are spurring nonlinear social and political changes, certain themes in this drama can be anticipated and their implications made clear." It's the final sentence and the authors didn't even take their own advice.


By the way, the second article was “The Millennial Muddle: How stereotyping students became a thriving industry and a bundle of contradictions” by Eric Hoover. This is the article where I found out about how terrible Howe and co. were at getting statistics.

To Begin...

Those of you whom I've seen recently (sorry, people I don't know, you missed out on a lot of ranting) have probably heard me complain about LAS 101. That was so last semester. This semester, I have to take a class on leadership. I hate being a leader, but that doesn't matter, I still have to waste an hour of my life every week in a class for this and a couple of minutes on the homework. So, I've decided to share my annoyance.

Also, I reserve the right to change content if I later learn it's untrue, it's grammatically incorrect, if it makes me look bad, or if I feel like it.