Successful people don’t operate alone

America's Insensitive Children?
Perhaps unlike their U.S. peers, kids in Denmark—where happiness levels are the highest on Earth—are taught in school to care for one another from a young age.

Contrary to popular belief, most people do care about the welfare of others.

From an evolutionary standpoint, empathy is a valuable impulse that helps humans survive in groups. In American schools, this impulse has been lying dormant from a lack of focus. But in Denmark, a nation that has consistently been voted the happiest place in the world since Richard Nixon was president, children are taught about empathy from a young age both inside and outside of school.

[...]

Another, less obvious example of empathy training in Danish schools is in how they subtly and gradually mix children of different strengths and weaknesses together. Students who are stronger academically are taught alongside those who are less strong; shier kids with more gregarious ones; and so on. The goal is for the students to see that everyone has positive qualities and to support each other in their efforts reach the next level. The math whiz may be terrible at soccer, and vice versa. This system fosters collaboration, teamwork, and respect.

Studies show that this system of interactive teaching involves a steep learning curve. Students who teach others work harder to understand the material, recall it more precisely, and use it more effectively. But they also have to try to understand the perspective of other students so they can help them where they are having trouble. The ability to explain complicated subject matter to another student is not an easy task, but it is an invaluable life skill. Research demonstrates that this type of collaboration and empathy also delivers a deep level of satisfaction and happiness to kids; interestingly, people’s brains actually register more satisfaction from cooperating than from winning alone.

Perhaps, then, it is no surprise that empathy is one of the single most important factors in fostering successful leaders, entrepreneurs, managers, and businesses. It reduces bullying, increases one’s capacity to forgive, and greatly improves relationships and social connectedness. Empathy enhances the quality of meaningful relationships, which research suggests is one of the most important factors in a person’s sense of well being. Research also suggests that empathetic teenagers tend to be more successful because they are more purpose-driven than their more narcissistic counterparts. And if you think about it, it all makes sense. Successful people don’t operate alone; every human needs the support of others to achieve positive results in his or her life. [...]

When I was younger I might have dismissed this as new age twaddle. But I'm older now, and I've learned to appreciate that people are, to varying degrees, interdependent on one another. No one lives in a vacuum, and certainly "successful" people have good relationships with other people.

Empathy does matter. I think we are sometimes resistant to it because our empathy can be manipulated for political or commercial purposes. But regardless of attempts to misuse it, it still has a place in human society. There is a lot of alienation in American culture. You have to wonder, if children were taught to recognize and understand empathy and human emotions, their own and others, at an early age, if there would be less school shootings and bullying?

As a landlord, I've also seen a lot of people, many young people, who seem to have no control over their emotions, and they often end up being evicted, because they lack self control and seem not to understand basic human interactions. They seen not to understand their own emotions, and unable to empathize with other peoples emotions. In frustration, they become angry and lash out, which only makes their problems worse. It does not bode well for our culture or our country.

I'm amazed at how many young people I see, who have everything going for them, who have much more help and resources available to them than I did at their age, repeatedly fail and sabotage themselves. They are angry all the time, and seem to lack basic social skills to succeed in life. Even if one does not agree with everything in this article, I would still say there is definitely room for improvement in this area.

     

How to Get a College Degree without the massive, crushing debt inflicted on us by the “Student Loan Industrial Complex.”

Testing Out: How to “Moneyball” Your Way to a Debt-Free College Degree

I don’t know about you, but I’m fed up with the ancient “college savings tips” so-called experts keep force-feeding us:

“Fill out the FAFSA before senior year to maximize aid eligibility!”
“Buy used textbooks, you’ll save hundreds!”
“Apply for scholarships. Try FastWeb.com!”

If you follow this advice, you will be thoroughly and totally prepared for college…in 1995. (You know, just in case that year ever comes back.) But in 2013, these strategies will get you slaughtered by the “Student Loan Industrial Complex.”

[...]

Why You Should Look at College Like an Investment

If this post makes it sound like you’re “Frankensteining” your education, cobbling various exams and credit sources together to form a degree…you’re right. That’s exactly what I’m advocating.

This might seem strange at first, but I encourage you to look at it differently.

Why do we see college as this magical guarantee of financial success? It’s because of these oft-cited studies on how much more graduates earn over their lifetimes than non-grads. We hear sweeping statements (“people with bachelor’s degrees earn $1 million more!”) and assume that it MUST be a great investment, no matter what it costs.

Actually, we don’t just assume it — we’re explicitly told that it’s true:

“Over a lifetime, the gap in earning potential between a high-school diploma and a bachelor of arts is more than $800,000. In other words, whatever sacrifices you and your child make for [a] college education in the short term are more than repaid in the long term.”

That’s from CollegeBoard, the organization that makes the SATs. They’re basically telling you to just pay whatever a degree costs.

It’s horrible advice.

You don’t make huge financial decisions with simplistic rules like “whatever sacrifices you make are worth it in the long-term.” How is that any different than telling you to shoot first and ask questions later? No — you make huge financial decisions is by running the numbers.

Which brings us back to these studies on college graduate earnings. They aren’t “wrong,” but they are misleading.

Here’s why: earning a higher income doesn’t automatically mean you’re getting ahead. You can earn $20,000/year before college, get a $60,000/year job afterwards, and still be no better off. If you spend $100,000 for a degree (and take four years off of work to do it) you have incurred a huge financial and opportunity cost.

You took out a loan against your future earnings which must now be repaid over five, ten, maybe even fifteen or twenty years. Even then, once all the loans are repaid and you’ve earned back all the income you lost by not working, guess what? All you have done is break even!

You’re back at square one. Finally, after years of repaying loans and interest, you can start actually benefiting from the higher income you earned your degree for. Most college students don’t realize that this is what they’ve agreed to until after they graduate. They just see college as a magical guarantee of financial success. Yet whether they realize it or not, their student loans often chain them to a life of indentured servitude.

The return on an investment is inversely proportional to the time and money invested. In plain English: the longer it takes you to graduate, and the more you pay, the less valuable your degree ultimately is. [...]

This is a fascinating article, not only for pointing out the pitfalls of going into debt for an education, but also for the heaps of practical advice for avoiding that debt and still getting your degree.

The comments after the article are just as interesting. The author is criticized for his advice, and he answers his critics. A very lively, informative discussion.

And this isn't theoretical; people are actually doing it:

The DIY Degree: Using Self-Education to Earn a Bachelor’s Degree in 1 Year

“What’s the point of learning, if you don’t get a degree after?”

This has been the biggest criticism of my MIT Challenge, and honestly, it’s not an easy one to avoid. Even if weirdos like me are willing to learn a degree outside of school, the truth is the world still values that piece of paper. Unfortunately, until recently I’ve had little answer to this complaint–it seems if you want the degree, you have to suffer through an often slow and expensive process.

That was before I met Jay Cross. Jay in many ways did a project similar to mine–he completed a bachelor’s degree in less time, mostly through self-study. The only difference? Jay got a real degree for his efforts.

I asked Jay to write a guest post to share his method with you. Not only does it work, but it gets results in the real world as well. Jay has already had career opportunities that would be the envy of a lot of college grads, having staff writing positions for major publications and entrepreneurial ventures. Jay demonstrates that not only can self-education work, it can be a true alternative for many students hesitant about college.

The DIY Degree, by Jay Cross

Today, I’m going to show you a totally new twist on self-education.

We’ve long been told that learning is an “either/or” decision. You can either spend four years in college and earn a degree…OR study on your own with no degree to show for it. But what if you could have the best of both: the credential employers crave, with the speed, personalization and low cost of self-study?

You can.

Using the “degree-by-examination” approach, you can earn a bachelor’s degree by taking tests instead of classes. It works no matter where you live, lets you graduate in one year instead of four, and costs roughly 1/20th the price of a regular degree…with the exact same legitimacy and earning power.

The problem: society DOES still value degrees

Some jobs require degrees no matter how smart you are. Even in more flexible professions (like programming) there’s always one or two “By-The-Book Bob” types who reject non-grads on principle.

This concerned me, even with all I had accomplished already. If there was any way to graduate for minimal time and cost—and eliminate this potential obstacle—it seemed worthwhile to try. Of all the different approaches I researched and read about, degree-by-examination was the college shortcut that actually worked.

Before I explain, allow me to share the struggles that led me to this discovery in the first place. [...]

See how he did it. This is must reading for anyone who is considering going into deep debt for a college education. There ARE alternatives. I wish I had known this back in the day, when I dropped out of college because it was so enormously expensive. These are alternatives that can really work.


Also see:

Graduate faster and spend less money with DIY Degree’s “Cost-Per-Credit” Calculator
     

My Brilliant Career, part II

Previously, I explored Tax Preparer as an additional source of income. This time, I'm going to look at Pharmacy Technician.

It's a better option than Chickenblogging, and it seems that for the foreseeable future, healthcare is where the most jobs are.

I've been taking some accounting courses from Ed2go.com, and I was perusing some of the other non-college credit courses, and this looked interesting:

Explore a Career as a Pharmacy Technician

Health care is a booming field these days, and pharmacy technicians are in high demand. In this course, you’ll take a look at the many job settings and career paths open to you if you become a pharmacy technician. In addition, you’ll master the skills you need to get an entry-level position as a pharmacy tech or clerk.

You’ll start by learning basic terms for medical conditions and anatomy, gaining the skills you’ll need to read prescriptions and patient records easily. In addition, you’ll find out how common classes of drugs are made and how they work.

Next, you’ll master the simple math that every pharmacy tech needs to know. You’ll learn how to calculate dosages accurately, practice using simple formulas and math tools, and find out how to translate metric measurements into familiar household measures like teaspoons and tablespoons. Turning to the business side, you’ll look at sales and find out how prescription pricing works.

In addition, you’ll learn about the important laws and regulations that govern pharmacies. You’ll also hone your communication skills, learning how to handle customers courteously and efficiently. And finally, you’ll explore the steps you can take to enhance your career prospects becoming a Certified Pharmacy Technician (CPhT). By the time you’re done, you’ll be prepared to start your career in this popular and rapidly-growing field.

Note: This course is designed to give you an introduction to the profession of pharmacy technician. It will not supply enough information to sit for the national exam. If your goal is to become a Certified Pharmacy Technician (CPhT), then upon completion of this introductory course, enrollment into the advanced course is recommended. The advanced course is located in the online Career Training section of the ed2go catalog: http://www.gatlineducation.com/pharmacytechnician.html.

The Advanced Course is 330 hours, and prepares you to take the State Exam. Both courses are on-line (which allows great flexibility), and offer demos so you can see how they work. The introductory course offer's an entire lesson and quiz free. I think I may take the introductory course, just to see if I have what it takes, and if I can see myself doing it. No point in taking an advanced course till I know that.
   

The Benefits of a "non-credit" Education

I've been looking at ways to expand my current work skill-set. I came across this website, which offers many different kinds of courses on-line:

www.ed2go.com

Online Courses:

Comprehensive online course in a convenient six-week format

Expert instructors lead each course

Engaging student discussion areas

New sessions starting monthly

Confirmation of completion awarded with passing score

These courses are non-college-credit courses, so they cost much less. You do get a certificate of completion afterwards, so if you use them to learn business skills, you have something to show that you studied the material and passed the exam. You just can't apply it toward college credit, which is fine if you aren't aiming for a degree.

You can take these courses directly from the website. But it's worth noting that Ed2go also has partnerships with colleges, where the college offers these courses as part of the college's own website. My local community college does this, and cost of taking courses through them is more than 1/3 cheaper than taking courses directly from Ed2go.

The courses I looked at took six weeks to complete, with an additional two week grace period to complete the work and take the completion exam.

If the courses that Ed2go.com offers are not substantial enough for you, they have a link on the lower right side of their front page, to more substantial offerings:

www.gatlineducation.com

Online Career Training Programs:

Learn in-demand skills recognized by employers

Start anytime - work at your own pace and complete in 3 to 6 months

Textbooks and learning materials are included

Support offered via phone, email, or live chat 7 days a week

Expert instructor assistance provided

These are also non-credit courses, but more specifically oriented toward job goals. For instance, their Bookkeeping course is for preparing the student to take a national exam to become a certified bookkeeper. Their Pharmacy Technician course prepares the student to take the Certified Pharmacy Technician's exam. Etc.

The Gatlin website is also run by Ed2go, but these more advanced courses are not offered directly by Gatlin or Ed2go; they must be taken via a participating partner school. They have a page where you can type in your zipcode, and it will show you the nearest partner school to you.

Even so, since these courses are on-line, you can usually register with the partner-school for the courses without ever having to set foot on their physical campus.

These courses are typically 3 to 6 months long, you can do them when it's convenient for you, and if you don't finish by the end of the course, you can get a 6 month extension to compete it, free of cost.

I like this a lot, because you can take the courses at your own pace, you get the benefit of the knowledge and a certificate to prove that you did the work, but you don't have to go into debt borrowing money to earn college credits that you may not want or need.

For anyone who is just looking to increase their job skills, I'd say it's definitely worth checking out.

     

The Mindset of the Class of 2016

OR, what are the new College Freshmen like? Read on:

Listen to radios? Watch TVs? Not for Class of '16

(AP) MILWAUKEE - Remember when suitcases had to be carried instead of rolled? Or when an airline ticket was a booklet of pages separated by carbon paper? Maybe you remember when Lou Gehrig held the Major League record for consecutive baseball games played.

This year's college freshmen don't.

They never lived in a world where Kurt Cobain was alive or an NFL team played its home games in Los Angeles. The Class of 2016 has no need for radios, watches television everywhere except on actual TV sets and is addicted to "electronic narcotics."

These are among the 75 references on this year's Beloit College Mindset List, a nonscientific compilation is meant to remind teachers that college freshmen, born mostly in 1994, see the world in a much different way.

(Scroll down to read the entire list)

The students are also accustomed to seeing women in position of leadership. They were born at a time when Madeline Albright was serving as the first female U.S. secretary of state, and women have held the position for most of their lives.

And the old Hollywood stereotype of ditzy blonde women has given way to one of "dumb and dumber males," according to the list.

[...]

The new generation gets a lot of its news from Jon Stewart's "The Daily Show." But if they miss an episode, they can always get instant news from YouTube (No. 5 on the list).

Here are some other items to make you feel old: These teens weren't born when "Pulp Fiction" came out. Instead of asking who shot J.R., they wanted to know who shot Montgomery Burns. And to them, "Twilight Zone" is about vampires, not Rod Serling.

But Thorin Blitz, 18, disagreed with that item. He said it's 13-year-old girls who watch "Twilight."

"I've seen quite a few 'Twilight Zone' episodes," said the incoming freshman from Charleston, Ill. "Most of us know what that is."

Similar list items have drawn criticism in previous years. Some teens were insulted by the insinuation that they had no knowledge of events that happened before they were born, as if they had never studied history. So Nief and McBride have softened the tone, replacing "They don't know about..." with "They never experienced..."

The theme of last year's list was how wired the incoming class was. This year's class includes students who might be bitter at the previous generation, Nief said. While their elders went to college in good times and had jobs waiting for them, these students grew up watching their parents worry about unemployment and foreclosures.

That sentiment was captured in item No. 16, which notes unemployment has risen 2 percent in their lifetimes.

But they also live in an era of potential. Gene therapy has always been available, and they don't waste time with outdated technologies like radios and point-and-shoot cameras.

They're also less likely to identify with a specific religion. McBride noted that many church denominations have been losing members, while membership is up at nondenominational churches.

"When I teach Shakespeare or Milton there are a lot of biblical allusions, and I have to explain them all," said McBride, an English professor. [...]

The list goes on for three pages.
     

Does Obama = Tolerance? The Experiment

Tolerance fails T-shirt test

As the media keeps gushing on about how America has finally adopted tolerance as the great virtue, and that we're all united now, let's consider the Brave Catherine Vogt Experiment.

Catherine Vogt, 14, is an Illinois 8th grader, the daughter of a liberal mom and a conservative dad. She wanted to conduct an experiment in political tolerance and diversity of opinion at her school in the liberal suburb of Oak Park.

She noticed that fellow students at Gwendolyn Brooks Middle School overwhelmingly supported Barack Obama for president. His campaign kept preaching "inclusion," and she decided to see how included she could be.

So just before the election, Catherine consulted with her history teacher, then bravely wore a unique T-shirt to school and recorded the comments of teachers and students in her journal. The T-shirt bore the simple yet quite subversive words drawn with a red marker:

"McCain Girl."

"I was just really curious how they'd react to something that different, because a lot of people at my school wore Obama shirts and they are big Obama supporters," Catherine told us. "I just really wanted to see what their reaction would be."

Immediately, Catherine learned she was stupid for wearing a shirt with Republican John McCain's name. Not merely stupid. Very stupid.

"People were upset. But they started saying things, calling me very stupid, telling me my shirt was stupid and I shouldn't be wearing it," Catherine said.

Then it got worse.

"One person told me to go die. It was a lot of dying. A lot of comments about how I should be killed," Catherine said, of the tolerance in Oak Park.

But students weren't the only ones surprised that she wore a shirt supporting McCain. [...]

Death threats? That's a bit over the top. But hey, it's eighth graders we're talking about, so I wouldn't take it too literally. But still, not exactly a lot of tolerance.

Of course, she wore the Obama t-shirt the next day, and the reactions to that... well, read the whole thing. In the end she wrote a report about it for her history class, and the irony of intolerance by the "tolerant" Obama supporters made for an interesting classroom discussion.

Even after the experiment, Catherine never did say who she preferred. Maybe she'll grow up to be a "swing" voter. ;-)
     

Are we becoming a nation of idiots?

This piece from the Dallas Morning News looks at several major factors in the dumbing down of public discourse, and gets it exactly right:

Susan Jacoby: Is America getting dumber?

[...] Dumbness, to paraphrase the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, has been steadily defined downward for several decades, by a combination of heretofore irresistible forces. These include the triumph of video culture over print (and by video, I mean every form of digital media); a disjunction between Americans' rising level of formal education and their shaky grasp of basic geography, science and history; and the fusion of anti-rationalism with anti-intellectualism.

First and foremost among the vectors of the new anti-intellectualism is video. The decline of book, newspaper and magazine reading is by now an old story. The drop-off is most pronounced among the young, but it continues to accelerate and afflict Americans of all ages and education levels.

Reading has declined not only among the poorly educated, according to a report by the National Endowment for the Arts. In 1982, 82 percent of college graduates read novels or poems for pleasure; two decades later, only 67 percent did. And more than 40 percent of Americans under 44 did not read a single book – fiction or nonfiction – over the course of a year. The proportion of 17-year-olds who read nothing more than doubled between 1984 and 2004. This time period, of course, encompasses the rise of personal computers, Web surfing and video games. [...]

(bold emphasis mine) Americans are reading less and less. The lines between news and entertainment are becoming blurred, into a mish-mash of "info-tainment". Focusing on video media instead of reading seems to also encourage shorter attention spans, which is even manifesting itself in the way presidential campaigns are conducted:

[...] As video consumers become progressively more impatient with the process of acquiring information through written language, politicians are under great pressure to deliver their messages as quickly as possible. Harvard University's Kiku Adatto found that from 1968 to 1988, the average sound bite on the news for a presidential candidate – featuring the candidate's voice – dropped from 42.3 seconds to 9.8 seconds. By 2000, according to another Harvard study, it was down to just 7.8 seconds.

The shrinking public attention span fostered by video is closely tied to the second important anti-intellectual force in American culture: the erosion of general knowledge. [...]

It's not my imagination the electorate seems to be getting dumber and dumber. A growing number of people seem to lack the most basic kind of knowledge. But it isn't just the lack of knowledge that is the the problem:

[...] That leads us to the third and final factor behind the new American dumbness: not lack of knowledge per se but arrogance about that lack of knowledge. The problem is not just the things we do not know (consider the one in five American adults who, according to the National Science Foundation, thinks the sun revolves around the Earth); it's the alarming number of Americans who have smugly concluded that they do not need to know such things in the first place.

Call this anti-rationalism – a syndrome that is particularly dangerous to our public institutions and discourse. Not knowing a foreign language or the location of an important country is a manifestation of ignorance; denying that such knowledge matters is pure anti-rationalism. The toxic brew of anti-rationalism and ignorance hurts discussions of U.S. public policy on topics from health care to taxation. [...]

Exactly. How are people who don't even understand the basics of the earth's physical relationship to the sun going to be able to even begin to understand debates about the weather and so-called "global warming"? They won't bother to understand; they'll just follow their "feelings". I find this pretty scary stuff. It's a kind of Brave New World that we don't need. This article goes into a lot more detail, and is well worth reading. Identifying the problem properly is the first step to begin turning it around.

And clearly, it DOES need to be turned around. The facts are appalling:

Only 1 of 2 students graduate high school in US cities: study

[...] "Only about one-half (52 percent) of students in the principal school systems of the 50 largest cities complete high school with a diploma."

Based on 2003-2004 data, the report said that across the country the graduation average for public school students is 69.9 percent, with the best success rate in suburbs -- 74.9 percent -- and rural districts -- 73.2 percent.

Asian-Americans score the highest graduation rate, at 80 percent, with whites at 76.2 percent and Hispanics at 57.8 percent.

Women graduate at a much higher rate than men, 73.6 percent to 66.0 percent.

In the country's city schools, the study found that in urban areas generally, just 60.4 percent graduate, and in the principal school districts of the top 50 cities, barely half graduate. [...]

And as if these figures are not bad enough, consider that many of the students who do graduate are "functional illiterates". They can read traffic signs and labels on packages at the supermarket, but they can't understand newspaper or magazine articles, comprehend written instructions, write letters or balance a checkbook. A high school diploma is worth less and less. Nowadays many employers consider applicants with less than two years of college to be unemployable.

All of this is fixable, but we need to start reversing it now. Political correctness and Self Esteem BS be damned.
     

OLPC: becoming available in America?

The One Laptop Per Child project, devoted to making low cost laptop computers available for schoolchildren in third world countries, is now considering also making the laptops available here in the USA.

From Chris Preimesberger at Desktoplinux.com:
OLPC Linux laptop could succeed in U.S.

The director of software for the nonprofit One Laptop Per Child project believes there is a big market for the self-powered machines in the U.S., provided the user wants to perform basic computer functions.

"The XO machine is quite sweet," the OLPC's Walter Bender wrote in an email to DesktopLinux.com today. "I guess the question boils down to what you want to do with the machine.

"If the goal is browse the web, send email, VOIP, chat, video conference, play movies and music, read, write, compose, draw, program, etc., then the XO is a great machine. If you want to play 'Grand Theft Auto III,' then it leaves something to be desired. From all indications, there is lots of demand for the former," Bender wrote.

Reuters news reported last week that OLPC founder Nicholas Negroponte recently said that the OLPC might market a version of its laptops in the U.S., reversing its previous position of only distributing them to the poorest nations.

"We can't ignore the United States. ... We are looking at it very seriously," Negroponte told at a press conference in Cambridge, Mass., according to the Reuters report.

Once known as the $100 laptop, the lime-green-and-white devices apparently are increasing in price. In February, the project estimated said they would sell for $150 each. Negroponte said their price tag for U.S. children would be $176 apiece, Reuters reported.

The laptop features a string pulley to charge its battery, a keyboard that switches between languages, a digital video camera, wireless connectivity, and an open-source Linux operating system tailored for remote regions. [...]

The article goes on about the potential for the US market (they cite a school laptop program in Maine, which I remember received a lot of enthusiastic support), and gives more details about the production of the units and the projects current status.

When I first heard about this project, I thought that it could also benefit kids right here at home. Why not sell it in the US, for a slightly higher price, and use the profits to subsidize the charity part of giving the units away to poor children? It looks like they are now considering doing just that.

I think they should also consider selling it commercially, to anyone who wants it. Why limit it to just kids? I think there are a lot of adults who would like to buy an inexpensive laptop that would let them do the things most people are interested in doing with their computers. Profits could then be used to subsidize the school programs. I hope they will do that eventually.

These laptops are a whole new way of thinking about and using computers. Hard drives are not the necessity they used to be, especially with Linux, and larger memory modules that can hold and run the entire operating system along with data files in RAM. I wish the project great success.




Related Link:

ONE LAPTOP PER CHILD by FuseProject
Read more about the laptop here, with more photos and many links, too.