Nobel Prize for Mentorship?

by Lynn Barendsen

The recent announcement of the Nobel Laureates in Medicine point to another achievement that deserves recognition: outstanding mentorship. Elizabeth Blackburn and Carol Greider were members of a scientific “lineage” with Joseph Gall at its head. Blackburn studied under Gall; Greider studied under Blackburn. Two very successful women in a field that has been dominated by men, in a field in which mentoring does not typically come first.

In the New York Times interview after the announcement of the award, Greider was asked about the nature of her research with Blackburn, and whether the type of research (on telomeres) was in itself particularly attractive to women. In her response, she specifically credits Gall’s mentorship efforts:

“There’s nothing about the topic that attracts women. It’s probably more the founder effect. Women researchers were fostered early on by Joe Gall, and they got jobs around the country and they trained other women. I think there’s a slight bias of women to work for women because there’s still a slight cultural bias for men to help men. The derogatory term is the “old boys network.” It’s not that they are biased against women or want to hurt them. They just don’t think of them. And they often feel more comfortable promoting their male colleagues.”

In the world of science, especially post-doctoral work, the relationship between students and teachers may be fraught with tension. Unlike other fields (journalism, business, theater, for example), in science students DO have mentors – they are assigned to someone and that relationship may be complicated. We heard quite about this during our GoodWork research. The years post-docs spend working in labs often result in frustration, and this is sometimes the result of a poor relationship with an advisor. One version of this advisor/advisee relationship is as follows:

“I know in an ideal setting it would be true that your advisors would have ways of talking to students and post-docs that separates science from the individual, but it just doesn’t happen in the real world. And I think that part of that is that the people who become advisors are selected because they are great scientists, not because they are managers or not because they have well-developed interpersonal skills. So, you get these people who have spent their whole life at a bench and all of the sudden, they’re in charge of fifteen people. Where were they supposed to learn?”

Considered within this context, the achievements of Gall, Blackburn and Greider are even more remarkable.

We’ve learned a lot about mentors on the GoodWork Project. We’ve learned that most often, people, especially young people, don’t have mentors. When we asked them to talk about mentors, instead we heard about “antimentors” – people who came to exemplify qualities they themselves didn’t want to develop. And worse, some told us about “tormentors”. Our colleagues on the GoodPlay Project have found that young people lament the lack of mentors who are able to help them navigate cyberspace. Young people are digital natives, while the older generation, who may have some wisdom with respect to ethical issues, are “immigrants.”

Resourceful individuals develop a practice of “fragmentoring” – or piecing together qualities and lessons learned from various different people in their lives. Mom teaches a lesson about finishing what you started; Coach Andy hammers home a message about follow through; a drama teacher invites you to push your limits, and an unfailingly honest friend inspires you to tell the truth even when difficult. Even individuals who lack bits of positive exemplary behavior find other means – for example, emulating the work of inspirational public figures. In short, what’s involved in finding a mentor is changing, what it means to be a mentor is evolving. It’s a lot harder to do this mentoring work on your own, however, and it takes tremendous determination and focus.

Who we allow to have influence over our choices, our beliefs and our lives is no small decision. It is not always a conscious one, but clearly it ought to be. Following the examples set by these outstanding scientists is a good place to start.

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/13/science/13conv.html?hpw

The Road to Hell?

by Howard Gardner

If the proverbial inter-planetary visitor observed educational policymakers around the world, she would soon infer their single preoccupation: “How to raise scores on international comparisons like the TIMMS or the PISA tests.” This mentality also dominates the United States. A focus on standardized tests, how to raise scores, and what consequences follow there from, has become a national, as well as an international, obsession.

That ‘road to hell’ is paved with good intentions. Concern with performance grew out of a consensus that American youth were not getting properly educated. Since the 1980s, leaders from across the political spectrum have joined forces to focus sharply on test performance.

I don’t question their motivation. Policymakers were concerned with the mediocre education in most inner-city schools, the lack of preparation (and sometimes motivation) of teachers, and job applicants who lack skills and a sense of responsibility.

And yet, the consequences of this testing mania have been mixed at best. Impressive, widespread improvement has not occurred. Scores may improve on familiar items but rarely on measures that are differently conceived. Classes focus on preparation for high stake tests, while less attention is paid to the arts, history, current events, humanities—indeed, anything untested. Educators with discrepant philosophies or approaches abandon the public sector, or education altogether. Teaching is becoming de-professionalized; students construe education as a winner-take-all tournament, rather than the opening of the mind and the imagination.

It need not be that way. No country need conceive itself in a ‘league table’ competition. And certainly the richest and most successful can chart its own course;

Visitor: What form might that course take?

My answer:

Start from the kinds of human beings that we desire. We want adults of character: persons who care about their family, their neighbors, the larger, society, the planet— good workers and good citizens. Perhaps at one time, these ethical, moral, and character issues could be addressed at home, on the street, in religious settings, in the media. But no more. If schools do not develop individuals of admirable character, the society won’t have them.

We want individuals who love learning, want to learn in (and outside of) school and will continue to learn throughout their lives. The current system stifles more than it stimulates. Young people gravitate toward learning when the older persons around them love learning and invite the youth to join them. In an age of exciting media and sundry other temptations, we adults have to be their heroes, their role models, their inspiration.

Finally, what to learn? Here I differ most sharply from those who favor fixed curricula, with lists of so-called important facts. Given the ubiquity of digital information sources, there is no need to prescribe materials. Once basic literacies have been achieved, it’s most important to master the major ways of thinking: historical, mathematical, scientific and artistic. Armed with these tools and suitably motivation, learners can achieve disciplined, synthesizing, and creative minds.

Lest one think that a misguided course is restricted to education, consider the current American quagmire in health care. Too many of our citizens, and too many of our leaders are blind to what is expected in other societies—affordable health care for all. Much of our population lacks compassion for fellow citizens and for the ills to be faced by future citizens.

Faced with such thoughts, I take heart from Winston Churchill who once observed “The American people always do the right thing—after they have tried every other alternative.”

Copyright Howard Gardner 2009

Looking for Good Work

by Amy Quon

A year ago, I was content in California—finishing up graduate school coursework and working in educational program assessment. Based on what I hear from everyone who has ever spent a winter in New England, I probably should have appreciated the sunshine and cool breezes back home (read: the opposite of gray skies and icy wind) a bit more. Yet, I felt strongly about moving here because I found myself in one of those precarious positions—where you know the work you are doing just isn’t enough.

For some people, it might be working against the grain everyday through nit-picking bureaucracies, with difficult colleagues, doing work that doesn’t seem to go anywhere and help anyone, or perhaps, it’s just not something that allows you to grow, it’s not where your passion is, maybe it’s just something you can do but not something you feel drawn to. I felt some combination of these factors, which pushed me to act, to take a risk, and to move towards something else.

After deciding to move to the east coast, I was confident; I had interviews lined up and a place to live. However, like thousands of others this year, I remained unemployed for several months. I was rethinking everything—whether or not it was possible to do work that was more valuable or better than what I previously had and whether it was even possible to pursue my ideal in the midst of the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. All the while, I struggled to manage student loans, bills, rent, and this weird social pressure to be building my career, or establishing something, not wasting time. In the back of my mind, I remembered friends complaining about horrible jobs they were “stuck” in, but I kept thinking, at least they had a job. I had to remind myself that I was hoping for something more, but honestly, I’d often forget.

I wondered if the lack of conversation as a student, around the type of work I would do in the future, and the choices I’d be forced to make on the job played a role in my forgetting. Often, the lesson in school is to adjust your efforts to what works, what the teacher wants and expects, but when no one is looking, when we work in our communities or help a friend, these are the times when we know our best matters most. Having conversations around how to bind engagement and excellence in all of our work can prepare us to surpass expectations and manage challenges more proactively as they come—even if these challenges include shifts in economic opportunity restraining our realities and perceptions of choice.

Understanding the diversity of ways people are experiencing this push and pull between what they hope for and what seems possible is important in helping others to strive towards good work. Given my own luck in finding a great match of my skills and interests with the GoodWork team, I feel like beyond it all, things do turn out. And, I hope that through open conversation on this site, we can reflect on what good work means to each of us, so that ultimately, we find and offer that support.