Noah D. Arney

Author: Noah Arney

  • Humanities Vs Business has more to do with marketing than reality

    As has been the case since before I got my BA in English and Theatre, people remain concerned about the crisis in the humanities and the shift to business instead.

    John Warner has a great post about this over at his blog.

    I wanted to look at something I find interesting with the data though, from a career development standpoint.

    My English degree has been incredibly helpful in all of my roles, and something I’ve, especially when I lived in Calgary, is the number of management people I met who have humanities degrees. It’s really common. So common that it sometimes makes me question why so many universities have a BBAs in Management. Accounting, economics, finance, and supply chain all make sense to me, but Management before the graduate level has always been strange to me.

    Business degrees are often chosen because there is a straight line from degree title to job title and that makes things less worrisome. It’s what I call the “well worn path” method of choosing a post-secondary education program.

    Some quick definitions about what is normally called an Arts or Humanities program in Canada using ISCED info to help align things (PDF here).

    Generally under Arts:

    • 2 Humanities and arts
      • 21 Arts
        • Fine arts: drawing, painting, sculpture;
        • Performing arts: music, drama, dance, circus;
        • Graphic and audio-visual arts: photography, cinematography, music production, radio and television production, printing and publishing;
        • Design; craft skills.
      • 22 Humanities
        • Religion and theology;
        • Foreign languages and cultures: living or ‘dead’ languages and their literature, area studies;
        • Native languages: current or vernacular language and its literature;
        • Other humanities: interpretation and translation, linguistics, comparative literature, history, archaeology, philosophy, ethics.
    • 3 Social sciences, business and law
      • 31 Social and behavioural science
        • Sociology, demography, anthropology (except physical anthropology), ethnology, futurology,
        • Psychology
        • Geography (except physical geography), peace and conflict studies, human rights.
      • 32 Journalism and information
        • Journalism;
        • Library technician and science;
        • Technicians in museums and similar repositories;
        • Documentation techniques;
        • Archival sciences.

    Generally under Business:

    • 3 Social sciences, business and law
      • 31 Social and behavioural science
        • Economics, economic history, political science;
      • 34 Business and administration
        • Retailing, marketing, sales, public relations, real estate;
        • Finance, banking, insurance, investment analysis;
        • Accounting, auditing, bookkeeping;
        • Management, public administration, institutional administration, personnel administration;
        • Secretarial and office work.

    So Arts covers everything from fine arts to sociology while business is more focused. And oddly enough, social sciences, the section that in Canada is considered Arts but internationally is together with business seems to be the one group in Arts that’s bucking the downward trend. There’s a lot of cross over in the social sciences between arts and business, especially as economics tends to show up in both areas. Similarly the blurred line between communications and public relations has caused many a faculty argument in the past. Side note, the ISCED considers Supply Chain Management or Logistics to be part of Management and instead of Human Resources uses the term Personnel Administration. They also put political science and economics together. Instead of separating that I’m just putting both in the Business category.

    To simplify things I’m going to break it down into some common majors in the two fields, and this is a massive oversimplification.

    • Arts
      • Fine & Performing Arts
      • Graphic Arts and Design
      • History and Archaeology
      • Human Geography and related studies
      • Journalism, Publishing, and Media Production
      • Languages, Literature, and Linguistics
      • Library, Museum, and Archival studies
      • Philosophy & Ethics
      • Psychology
      • Sociology, Anthropology, and related studies
      • Theology
    • Business
      • Accounting
      • Business Administration
      • Economics
      • Finance
      • Human Rescources Management
      • Management
      • Marketing
      • Political Science
      • Public Administration
      • Public Relations
      • Retailing and Sales
      • Supply Chain Management

    But with those definitions out of the way lets move on to the NOC and compare the jobs there under business with the various majors. I’m only looking at TEER 1 jobs (generally requires a 4 year degree) as the TEER 0 (management) and TEER 2/3 (1-3 year degree) aren’t usually the ones BA/BBA students are looking at right after graduation.

    With that though suddenly the number of careers in the NOC drops rapidly. For the Arts/Business crowd you’re left with Professional Occupations in Business and Finance (11) and Professional occupations in art and culture (51). It excludes the entirety of Sales and Service occupations (6). In general the included roles under Art and Culture require an arts degree, but there are substantially fewer of them than the roles under Business and Finance. So let’s drill down into the jobs in Business and Finance.

    • Financial auditors and accountants
      • Licensing or certification post business degree in Accounting or Finance
    • Financial and investment analysts
      • Business degree in any major, Economics or Finance preferred
    • Financial advisors
      • Business degree in any major
    • Securities agents, investment dealers and brokers
      • Business degree or any other degree and experience
    • Other financial officers
      • Business degree with additional designations after
    • Human resources professionals
      • Business or social sciences degree
    • Professional occupations in business management consulting
      • Arts, Business, or Social Sciences degree
    • Professional occupations in advertising, marketing and public relations
      • Arts, Business, or Social Sciences degree

    So the TL:DR there is that it is a “well worn path” to have your major be the same thing you’re looking to do in a job, but outside of regulated professions like Accounting and Finance it’s not actually needed.

    Why is this important? I want students who want to work in marketing and communications to stop worrying about whether they should be in a marketing program or a communications program or a journalism program. Similarly I want students interested in HR and Organizational Management to stop worrying about if they should be in an HR program or a Psychology program or a Sociology program. They all work. What matters is who you are, what skills you develop, and how you want to use them.

    It is always easier for students to pick the “well worn path” program. That’s a communications problem that post-secondary hasn’t solved yet, but maybe someday we will.

    Final Note: I didn’t go into the management ones today because, well that has a lot more to do with the organization itself than with the degree. I’ve met a lot of IT managers with a Bachelors degree in English and a two year programing diploma. Because their job is a lot more about writing to non-technical people than it is programming.

  • AI Hasn’t Cracked Persuasion Yet

    I spent some time today playing with ChatGPT between meetings. I figured that I should see what it could come up with when asked about job application documents. It’s idea of what a resume looks like is rooted in the resumes of yesteryear, but it’s not so bad that I’d throw it out, just guide the writer in how to explain their impact in the prior roles.

    However, what I really wanted to see was what it could do for a cover letter. I started out simple by seeing if it knew the formatting, and the result was… well I guess that counts?

    Read more: AI Hasn’t Cracked Persuasion Yet

    Dear [Hiring Manager],

    I am writing to apply for the [position] at [Company]. With my extensive experience in [field], I am confident that I can quickly become an integral part of your team.

    In my current role as [position title], I have been responsible for [responsibility 1], [responsibility 2], and [responsibility 3]. These experiences have given me an understanding of [industry] and a valuable set of skills. I also have experience with [software/platform], which could be beneficial to your team.

    I am very excited about the opportunity to join [Company] and believe I have the dedication, knowledge, and enthusiasm to excel in this position. I am a quick learner and would appreciate the chance to bring my skills to the team.

    Thank you for taking the time to consider my application. I look forward to hearing from you and discussing my qualifications in more detail.

    Sincerely,

    [Your Name]

    It kinda looks like a narrative version of a resume though and that’s not the point of the cover letter. The broad strokes of the formatting are correct but it’s as if the system doesn’t know the point of the format. As you’ll see, that was the theme of my tests.

    Next up I gave it a job posting (I’m redacting certain info because it was an internal posting)

    Dear Hiring Manager,

    I am writing to apply for the Financial Analyst Co-op position at XYZ. With my educational background in finance, my enthusiasm for working in the capital markets and my strong analytical skills, I am confident that I am a perfect fit for this role.

    I have obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in finance, and I am currently pursuing a Master of Science degree in finance. My studies have provided me with the knowledge and experience to understand the complexities of the capital markets. I have also developed strong analytical skills, including the ability to analyze datasets, develop insightful commentary, and create analytical tools and initiatives.

    I have excellent verbal and written communication skills, and I can work independently and under pressure in a high-pressure, high-reward environment. I am also motivated to gain my CPA or CFA and am eager to take on increasingly greater accountabilities.

    XYZ is an organization that I truly admire and I am excited at the prospect of joining your team. I am confident that my enthusiasm and experience will be an asset to your organization. I look forward to discussing further how I can contribute to your team.

    Sincerely,

    [Your Name]

    It was able to pull some things in from the job posting, but it didn’t understand the required education and also wasn’t quite sure how things connected together. Instead what I got was a listing of skills in the job posting but with the words “I have excellent” ahead of it. It’s exactly what I expect to see of a generic cover letter from someone who doesn’t actually know what they have that’s valuable to the employer. There’s no real content in the cover letter it’s just reposting what the employer asked for. Also, Masters of Science in Finance? Really? That wasn’t asked for in any way, and the job is for someone with two years of education.

    After some tweaking I got a bit better of a cover letter

    Dear Hiring Manager,

    I am writing to express my strong interest in the Financial Analyst (Co-op), Capital Markets Performance Management position at XYZ. With my background in accounting/finance and reporting, my exposure to Capital Markets products and businesses, and my experience with analytical tools and managing large datasets, I believe I would be a great fit for this role.

    My background includes a B.Sc. in Accounting and Finance, in addition to experience in PowerPoint presentation, verbal and written communication, and strong analytical skills. I am a motivated individual who is comfortable working under pressure and can prioritize activities to ensure accuracy and timeliness of reporting.

    I am excited to join a team that is dedicated to providing trusted advice, helping clients thrive, and achieving success that is mutual. With the opportunity to do challenging work, take on greater accountabilities, and build close relationships with counterparts across the company, this position is a perfect fit for me.

    I am eager to learn more about this position and discuss how I can contribute to your team. I am available to discuss this opportunity further and can be reached at (000) 000-0000 or at [email protected]

    Thank you for your time and consideration.

    Sincerely,

    Your Name

    At least now it looks like a cover letter that I wouldn’t immediately throw out. But it still doesn’t understand that the point is to persuade the reader that they’re a good choice, not just restate what’s in the job posting with some platitudes.

    I’d share what happened with another job posting, but it was more of the same. Lots of platitudes and restating the job posting.

    I figured that it didn’t understand how to connect to the things in the posting because it didn’t have a resume, so I fed an example resume (we make fake resumes based off fictitious students to use as examples) and job posting in. The resume was one that would be just slightly indirectly connected to the job posting so that it was a bit harder. But it would still be something that I could easily walk a student through on how to make those connections. The AI on the other hand… well…

    Dear [Hiring Manager],

    As a 4th year Bachelor of Arts majoring in English and minoring in Psychology with an intention to pursue a career in the not-for-profit sector, I believe I am the perfect candidate for the position. My comprehensive knowledge of customer relations, developed through 5 years of high-caliber service in the food and beverage industry, combined with my strong team player and proficient interpersonal communication skills fostered by 3 years of experience as a community volunteer in event planning make me an ideal candidate.

    I am also highly organized and have excellent time management skills; maintaining a full course load with a cumulative 3.95 GPA while working a part-time job and volunteering. I am proficient in all MS Office Programs (Outlook, PowerPoint, Word, Excel). My experience volunteering at Anytown Shelter Thrift Store, assisting clients with community resources, as well as helping with social media posts and event management will be beneficial to the role.

    I have also presented a poster on sleep deprivation during student exams at the Psycology Conference in Anytown and have been awarded the Coop Student of the Year Award for my excellence and hard work as an Anytown University Coop Student. I am confident that my skills and experience make me an ideal candidate for this position.

    Thank you for your time and consideration and I look forward to hearing from you soon.

    Sincerely,

    Ella Pink

    My first thought was “YES, they got the idea” but then I kept reading. There were four connection points between the resume and cover letter, and the AI was able to figure out one of them. Even worse, it literally just dropped in wording directly from the resume without elaborating on it. And finally, there was something mentioned multiple times in different sections of the job posting (something a human would read as a flag that you need to mention it) but the AI didn’t bother.

    I ran that same resume through with a job posting for a psyc student co-op job with a child care company and a huge red flag went up for me. As soon as it had both a feminine name and childcare connected job the AI decided to stop overselling and be a little more humble about itself. It’s writing about how perfect it is for the job, over and over again, until it thinks it’s a woman applying for a job working with children then suddenly it’s talking about how it’s only a “good fit” for the role instead of “perfect fit” and now instead of talking about itself in an expansive way it talks about how it can provide “valuable support to the team”. Remember everyone, AI isn’t unbiased, it just lacks the ability to critically examine its bias.

    After all of that… well it’s a fun toy, and it’s better than nothing. If you had a resume with one of these cover letters and a resume without a cover letter I’d pick the one with the ChatGPT one. But it only understood structure and copying content, it didn’t understand what the job postings meant, or where the information in them was important or how to frame things in a way that was convincing.

    It seems like it may be a wile before AI has figured out what makes human communication convincing. But since that’s something a lot of humans haven’t figured out yet perhaps it’s not doing as bad as I think. Basically it’s the same issue that AI has with essay writing. The writing fits the structure it’s imitating, and mentions the things in the prompt, but it doesn’t have the ability to write in a way that makes connections between the material and the audience in a meaningful way, or to connect things between the material in a way that is convincing and not simply “hey these two phrases probably go beside each other”.

    I intend to use the output from this in my teaching on cover letters this year as it shows the difference between a good cover letter (which these aren’t) and a bad cover letter (which these aren’t) and a boring/formulaic/lazy cover letter (which these most assuredly are).

  • Grade Inflation And Bullshit

    Adapted from a twitter thread.

    Remember back at the end of September when it came out that a university professor Chris Healy was part of the pro-fascism deadly protest in Charlottesville five years ago? Well, it’s important to connect the dots sometimes because he’s also the person who collected data on grade inflation that has been used for the last decade and a half to complain about modern universities. And data collection is fine, but he also put a spin on that data which has impacted how it’s been used. Biases and perceptions are important and concept that you can fully remove your biases from your interpretation of data is probably a fools errand. Well, turns out his biases may have impacted his analyzing of the data.

    If you haven’t seen it before, “grade inflation” is used as an attack on under-represented minority students in university by many groups (looking at you Fox News), but turns out it really happened because rich white parents wanted it for their kids. No seriously, he doesn’t interpret it that way, but Chris Healy’s own data shows it.

    There’s 2 issues that show up in the data: the SATs and the difference between Private and Public universities and student results.

    First the SATs. Now, there are a lot of problems with SATs, and I’m sure the decision in the 60s to make it harder (and thus showing a drop in SAT scores over the next decade) had nothing to do with more Black students applying to universities /s/. But that’s not what I’m talking about today.

    Healy assumes that SAT should directly predict GPA. But those who study education know that the ways to game the SATs are many and varied, and usually used for those trying to get into either elite private universities or into elite STEM PSIs, aka the schools he identifies as having GPAs lower than what the SAT should predict. Meanwhile students less likely to game the SATs tend to be in the schools he identifies as having a higher GPA than the SAT would predict. The takeaway should be that the SAT doesn’t predict success (and that rich parents generally pay for more SAT prep than poor parents), his takeaway is that public flagship universities are inflating grades more. Except his earlier finding in his data is that public flagships inflated grades substantially less than the private equivalents.

    So the second problem, public vs private university comparison. What his data seems to show is in the 1950s private universities started inflating grades (I’m sure this has nothing to do with how private universities became the bastion of segregation for a decade as wealthy whites sent their kids to them). Then when the last of the Ivy League universities kinda desegregated, the public universities started increasing grades to keep up with the substantial grade inflation that had ALREADY HAPPENED in the private universities.

    Yep, the grades were the same until private universities decided to inflate grades, a decade later the public universities played catchup, but they never actually caught up to the inflation of private universities, because the inflation slowed drastically in the mid 70s as both private (.4 GPA increase) and public (.2 GPA increase) flattened out. It remained that way for the next two decades in public university while private continued to creep up. Then the public universities began to increase again. The end result being private universities were 0.7 above their 1950s average GPA and public universities were 0.4 above. And remember in 1950 public and private had the same GPA average.

    TL:DR what it shows is private universities having massive grade inflation, and public ones following suit a decade later to try to keep up.

    So though the stick of “grade inflation” is used to complain about lowered standards because of historically excluded students, it’s actually happening because legacy rich white students didn’t like that black students or poor students were getting the same grades as them.

    I’m 0% surprised by that, it’s exactly how the US higher education system works, and how they like it to work. It’s another case of privilege laundering.

  • Maslow’s Changes

    Based on a twitter thread

    Patty Krawec on twitter pointed out something that has been discussed by Indigenous education theorists and philosophers for decades even as it’s mostly been ignored by non-Indigenous educational theorists and philosophers.

    And she’s right. Maslow’s work is elite capture, his work before visiting the Blackfoot is so incredibly different from his work after that he clearly had to fully transform his understanding of people because of it.

    You can see much smarter people than me discuss it here and here.

    But we also need to remember the difference between what Maslow originally wrote, as he was trying to shift western education away from an oppressive system, and how it’s been used since then, in many ways to entrench an oppressive system.

    Maslow talks about how by hierarchy he means that the things higher up the hierarchy require and include the things below it. So in his conception of the hierarchy self actualization includes the other needs, inverting the common diagram that we use for Maslow’s hierarchy into something much more resembling what a Niitsitapi knowledge keeper or educational philosopher would say.

    His writings when they discuss how culture should support self actualization, based on it doing that among the Blackfoot he lived with briefly, make me think that though he is doing elite capture, the rest of western psych has spent the 70 years since trying shift it away from what he learned from the Blackfoot.

    It makes me think of a man seeing his psychologically broken culture, then seeing a culture that wasn’t broken despite being subjected to worse conditions than his own, and trying to make sense of it. His understanding of the world was that his culture and context was the natural result of the conditions within which it existed, but here was another culture who hadn’t gone down that path.

    The rest of psychology seems to have just taken what he wrote and said “but what if we ignored how broken our culture is…”

    Maslow isn’t perfect. He is very clearly taking concepts from the Blackfoot, and while he does credit them to a certain extent, it’s still a very colonial elite capture of the concepts.

    But he is also the person who tore Terman’s work on IQ to shreds back in 1944, decades before the rest of Educational Theorists realized that it was worthless. He is on record as the person, like Dewey before him, pointing at the education system and saying “that’s not how it has to work, it can be better”.

    So yes, Maslow’s hierarchy maybe not quite bullshit, but it is problematic. But it’s problematic not because of what it is, but because of how it’s been extended, implemented, and stripped of its connection to the Indigenous philosophies and culture on which its based.

  • Indigenous Students in BC

    I was considering Indigenous student recruitment this week and I decided to check to see if we have data about where Indigenous students go to post-secondary, and because BC’s PS data system is pretty good, we do have that data. Take a look at it here. Here’s the highlights. FYI I’m using 2019 as the stable year because it is both pre-pandemic but still recent enough to be similar to today. We could do this again using 2022-23 data when it comes out in two years.

    First, the average Indigenous student enrolment at a public PSI is 6%. That’s actually a good thing because Stats Can tells us that that is also the percentage of Indigenous people in BC. So we get a win there, in that Indigenous students are no longer underrepresented in postsecondary. The work of Indigenous PSI staff in this between recruitment, mentoring, and supporting initiatives off the side of their desk cannot be ignored. They have done amazing work to shift college’s and university’s perspectives on Indigenous students and remove barriers.

    Now for where Indigenous students go. 19 public Post-Secondary Institutions make up 90% of Indigenous student enrolment, and all of the research universities are included in that group. Of course, that means that the other 7 institutions only make up 10% of provincial Indigenous student enrolment. Specifically I’d like to call out the abysmal recruitment of Langara College, especially because they used to have good Indigenous student recruitment, but their new numbers are under 2% Indigenous students while 30% of their students are International.

    In student recruitment the students are often classified by Domestic Non-Indigenous, Domestic Indigenous, and International for better targeting of recruitment money. There is a lot more breakdown depending on the strategic enrolment management done by the institution. Because of that I’m looking at number and percentage of Indigenous and International students at the different PSIs to determine who’s doing what type of recruitment.

    Top recruiters from a percentage standpoint are:

    • NVIT**
    • Coast Mountain*
    • College of New Caledonia
    • Northern Lights
    • UNBC*
    • North Island College*
    • Vancouver Island University

    All of whom have more that 12% Indigenous students. Those starred also recruit more Indigenous students than International students, an important number, because the average institution recruits three times more International students than Indigenous students. NVIT gets special mention as the only institution that is majority-Indigenous.

    The worst recruiters are:

    • Langara College*
    • SFU*
    • UBC*
    • Kwantlen Polytechnic*
    • Douglas College
    • Emily Carr

    All of whom have 3% or fewer Indigenous students. Those starred recruit 10 times more International students than they do Indigenous students.

    Now, percentages aren’t everything. Here are the Institutions with the largest Indigenous student populations:

    • Thompson Rivers University
    • JIBC
    • Vancouver Island University
    • Okanagan College
    • BCIT*
    • UBC*
    • College of New Caledonia
    • UVic*
    • NVIT
    • University of the Fraser Valley

    UBC and BCIT both have poor Indigenous student recruitment and UVic has below average recruitment, but all three are such large institutions that they make this list anyway.

    Thompson Rivers University is the single largest Indigenous student enroller at nearly 3000 students, but Justice Institute (JIBC) isn’t far behind. In fact when you add in VIU and Okanagan College you have 1/3 of the provincial Indigenous student enrolment.

    Now to just call out the top universities for Indigenous student recruitment and worst recruitment.

    Thompson Rivers University recruits the most Indigenous students, while University of Northern British Columbia and Vancouver Island University recruit the highest percentages of Indigenous students.

    Simon Fraser University and University of British Columbia do the worst job of recruitment percentage wise, but SFU is the worse recruiter because they have fewer than 800 Indigenous students even though they’re the second largest university in the province.

    So, I’ve talked about recruitment, but what should a good target for Indigenous students at a post-secondary institution be? You should be using the larger of two numbers. Either the provincial percentage of Indigenous people (6%) or regional percentage (7-9% depending on the region). That’s for starters. If you’re below that then you need to re-assess your recruitment. And just a note, that the percentages are for *total current* students, so recruitment means nothing if you don’t retain students. Also, once you’ve reached that percentage the next step is to look at what will make a difference to your community both inside the institution and to the regional community.

    A quick idea here is to look at your percentage of Indigenous students compared to your percentage of International students. If you have parity with your region’s Indigenous students but many of them are still the only Indigenous student in their classes, that’s an issue. This could look like targeting somewhere between 1/2 as many or just as many Indigenous students as International students. And for 11 PSIs they’re already there (star means they are at or above parity with both regional population and International students):

    • NVIT*
    • Coast Mountain*
    • NIC*
    • JIBC*
    • College of Rockies*
    • UNBC*
    • VIU
    • Northern Lights
    • Okanagan
    • CNC
    • Camosun

    Two universities have regional parity and are working on closer parity with International students (UFV and TRU) and two institutions are above provincial parity but not yet above regional parity (Selkirk College and UBC-O). The remaining 11 institutions are below provincial parity and need to do some serious work. Perhaps they need to call up those who seem to be doing this the best? For colleges that’s Coast Mountain College, College of New Caledonia, and North Island College. For universities that’s UNBC and Vancouver Island University.

  • Employment Training and Skills Gaps

    Originally two twitter threads: thread 1 thread 2.

    Careering Magazine (part of CERIC) had an article by Malika Asthana (from the LMS company D2L) about The Skills-Gap Paradox.

    It showed a substantial disconnect from employers with the research essentially showing them saying:

    1. We worry about if we can recruit people with skills we need
    2. We don’t have capacity to deliver internal training
    3. We don’t provide time off or funding for external training
    4. We don’t see a problem with this

    Some key quotes from that article:

    “Only 21% of decision-makers at Canadian SMEs report feeling very confident that they will have the skills and talent they need to grow their organizations over the next three years,”

    “With smaller budgets, many SMEs struggle to create and deliver robust, broad training programs in-house.” “Only 34% of SMEs in both Canada and the US provide financial support or time off for training delivered by external providers.”

    “SME decision makers said that internal training or on-the-job learning was sufficient.”

    https://ceric.ca/2022/06/the-skills-gap-paradox/

    So the question then is, how do we fix this? If there’s no time off or funding then external trainers, like PSIs, can’t help. If there’s no capacity for in-house training then contract trainers can’t help.

    Is this the logical conclusion of lean staffing?

    Well, in the mid 90s workers in Canada received an average of 44 hours of training provided by/paid by their employer, which was average for comparable countries. Most of those countries remain the same. In Canada, however, it dropped to 20 hours by the end of the ’00s.

    But this didn’t matter, it was the post ’08 employment crunch. Employers were guaranteed a stream of diagonal applicants to jobs, people who had done much of the job somewhere else for slightly less pay.

    The #greatretirement (is that a thing now?) has brought us back to the late 90s in terms of employee choice, but that means that employers aren’t able to get people with the same level of skills they relied on, because those people all got bumped up a substantial pay level.

    Employers need to get back into the employee training game or they will be left behind by those who do more/better training. If an employee is offered the same $ by two companies but one of them also offers twice as much training to move on to bigger and better things, guess who wins?

  • PSI Strategic Plans as Government Consultation

    A former twitter thread

    Alex Usher over at Higher Education Strategy Associates posted in June about Strategic Actors, Strategic Planning, Strategic Hiring. I had some thoughts about it.

    Universities function in 10 year blocks of time. A new idea takes 2 years to become a reality, 2 more years to get working as hoped, will function well for the next 6 years, then it will change or stagnate. But governments work in 3-4 year cycles if not faster. It’s hard for them to watch over something that takes 5 years to be successful. Once something is successful it’s boring to the government. Hence Strategic Plans.

    Strategic plans (and their strange 5 year cycle) are a way of helping governments and other stakeholders understand what’s going on in and the direction of the Uni, and it gives official moments of redirection for when its needed.

    I think that the idea HESA proposes is a good one, that the act of hiring is the way that universities actually act strategically. But I propose that the purpose of the strategic plan is as much governmental relations as it is strategy, and that’s not a bad thing.

    Perhaps its instead a better plan to include strategic hiring plans in strategic plans. That will give even more direction and signal more the specific changes expected.

  • Alberta’s Draft Curriculum Is Built on Sandy Ground

    A former twitter thread

    In June 2021 Calgary Herald published an opinion piece by Dr. Martin Mrazik. It had a lot of issues, but most importantly it tipped the hand about how shaky the foundation of Alberta’s now introduced new curriculum was.

    “The capacity to critically think emerges from a solid foundation of well-sequenced factual background knowledge.”

    https://calgaryherald.com/opinion/columnists/opinion-albertas-draft-curriculum-provides-strong-base-for-critical-thinking

    That’s… not true. Dr. Mrazik is making two of statements in that single sentence:

    1) critical thinking is a result of background knowledge

    2) specifically well-sequenced knowledge (and in context he means chronologically sequenced)

    The capacity to critically think is aided by background knowledge, but it doesn’t emerge from it. If critical thinking emerged from content knowledge then the banking/blank slate method of education would always lead to critical thinking. We have over a century showing that isn’t true.

    What is true is that critical thinking is improved by and relies on background knowledge, which is wildly different from emerges from.

    Generally speaking, chronological sequencing makes it so that in the early grades students are taught an uncritical version of the content because the critical assessment of it is beyond their current abilities.

    Chronological sequencing is one way to teach, and this curriculum is very interested in that. However, concept based sequencing is another way, and one that is more supported by constructivist and humanist educational theories.

    The problem isn’t a new one from Dr. Mrazik. He said something very similar in May 2021 in the Edmonton Journal (side note: it was very telling that Dr. Mrazik was basically the only academic supporting this curriculum).

    I spend so much time working with people who follow constructivist, humanist, transformative, and Indigenous education paradigms that I sometimes forget that there’s still a strong group of cognitivists out there.

    Dr. Mrazik is a clinical neuropsychologist whose research is primarily into concussions and psychometrics. That’s where these editorials are coming from. From that perspective I understand what he’s trying to say. That having a “knowledge-rich curriculum” is important.

    However, he seems to be ignoring, or perhaps critiquing (he mentions but doesn’t enumerate what he calls “controversial pedagogy and questionable teaching practices”) the theories that have come from the constructivist thread of theories, such as experiential learning theories.

    There are many ways of looking at critical thinking. The one he’s approaching it from is the idea that you ensure a person has a store of knowledge and then you can teach them how to apply it and assess it critically. So first knowledge, then critical thinking.

    One that’s more informed by constructivists would say that if you learn something that is relevant to your experiences you are able to apply critical thinking to it now. That instead of a house where knowledge is the foundation, it’s a tree where knowledge is the leaves.

    Yes that means that you start with less of a knowledge store, but it means that from the beginning you train in critical thinking and apply critical thinking to all of the knowledge you gain.

    Here’s where it matters. If you apply critical thinking from the beginning you train that as a skill. If you try to add it at the end, you might learn it well, but much of your knowledge store was never thought of critically.

    And Dr. Mrazik is right, if you approach it from a cognitivist or perhaps even cognitive-structural development perspective this curriculum design makes sense. But it’s what Dewey would call education that is training for the future rather than present.

    Rogers would critique whether it actually allows the development of the self-concept or would produce incongruence. Freire would be the strongest critique calling this “banking style” education.

    Basically, we’ve spent the last several decades moving away from cognitivism in k-12 education because it doesn’t produce adaptable thinkers, it produces testable thinkers. So of course a cognitivist scholar of psychometrics will think this is a good curriculum.

    But, what is needed for the future is adaptability, and this curriculum doesn’t lead to that.