 Hello there, it's Thursday at noon. I know it is Do you remember our arrangement Thursdays at noon on CFUV Are you ready to get started? What do you have in mind? What I want to do now is called first-person plural You make it sound excessively attractive That's what I have in mind Today has come and gone. The campus parking lots are full again. Traffic is back to its usual grind There's no apartment to be rented within miles of campus Students are lined up to get their identification cards validated and their tuition paid Notebook, paper, pencil, pen and backpack sales are up. In short, welcome back to school In today's episode, we are putting a different spin on the words quote back to school close quote Back to school rhetoric usually evokes images of teenage or 20-something men and women in jeans, t-shirts and backpacks Riding bikes to campus into their part-time jobs However, Laurie, Suzanne and Tish are 40-something women who have had full-time jobs and a lot of life under the bridge They have chosen to come back to school after a long hiatus Having graduated from high school before most of today's undergraduates were born. They are what have become known as non-traditional students Laurie is a grandmother who will be starting a diploma program this fall Her three children are the age of most college students and are living independently as adults Suzanne is a single mom whose kids were elementary school age when she decided to start a university program She has just finished her BA and begins graduate work this fall Tish has never married and has no children but has had a full career in the restaurant industry She's augmenting her gourmet skills by going back to school in her mid 40s She is in her last year of graduate school and hopes to be teaching junior college and writing books by this time next year These women had more in common than their desire to further their education They talk about how going back to school is bettering their lives and opening doors of opportunities for them But it isn't a bed of roses and their expectations have been tempered by the realities of school and the workforce We talked with each of them this week about why they've chosen the non-traditional path Why it seems that women do this more often than men And what they hope to gain as they work towards their goals and come back to school Let's start off with a little bit about your educational history tell us about where you went to high school What happened after that? Why you didn't go straight to college? I went to high school in Northern, BC I mean moved up there when I was 15. I up to that point did very well in school, but due to Crazy family of origin problems. I just wanted it. And so even though I was finishing school a year early I still didn't have that academic goal anymore of doing really well And so when school was over in June, I decided to go to college and take a theater arts diploma in Prince George I Saved the money for myself and earned the money for myself and I went off in September and did it, but Due to the crazy family of origin when I came back home at Christmas time I ended up staying with my family for a while one of my sisters was pregnant and it was a huge family drama And so I felt that I had to be there to help so that was the end of that Why are you going back to school now what's changed in your life that's made it possible or desirable for you to do so? Well, there have been a few times when I thought about going back I have gone back for particular courses before but this is the second time that I realized at the end of a Relationship that I need to do something for myself and not just be taking care of other people And so at this point I decided okay now. I have the freedom. I don't have to consider what someone else is doing I can do what I want to do. I'm taking fairly non-traditional course for a woman I'm a risk taker and often when you're in a relationship the other person is not for me It's important to take the risks and go out there and do what I want to do because after all I'll be dead a long time How do you see this as a risk? I think it's always a risk when you are over 40 and you go back to school and decide to do something completely different I could stay doing the same kinds of things that I'm doing and do it forever and ever and be bored forever and ever Maybe risk isn't the right word. It's a more creative approach a different path than what I've been on And I've been on a path where I was looking after other people for a long time And by looking after I mean looking at the emotional needs of other people instead of looking after my own This is what I'm doing to look after my own self When I started thinking about doing the show for this week and started thinking about friends of mine who were over 40 Who had gone back to school in some way shape or form I came up with one guy and about 15 women Do you think that this is a female path? It is a female path because somehow at least for women our age We're still even though I grew up not thinking that I couldn't do something because it was female I just assumed I could do whatever I wanted to do. In fact, I didn't In fact, I got married and had children and I looked after them. It's not that I didn't work all that time But I was working as a practical means and not as a creative end or beginning I think that's just typical. Men generally speaking look at their life at least, I think And go, okay, what am I going to do? Or I am choosing this path because this will be best for how I'm going to look after my life and my family And women don't do that. Women operate from the feelings perspective a good part of the time And so the feeling is to look after the family or look after the man or the relationship instead of looking after our own self There's a dichotomy that's drawn sometimes by feminists in looking at male roles in society and female roles in society And that dichotomy is between domestic life and public life where men care about the domestic life But they do what they do in the public realm in order to benefit the domestic life But they don't really do much in the domestic realm And women on the other hand to show that they care about the domestic realm Kind of stay behind that front door of the house and take care of that So even as a working woman, I hear you saying to me, even though you went out and you worked and you did some very similar things to what men do In terms of providing resources for the family, providing money for the family, you know There was still this domestic life that you felt you had to take care of I think it may be too just the kind of person that I grew up to become That I felt that I had to look after everybody else I always knew in some part of my mind that, you know, I was smart enough, why wasn't I doing something since it's smarter Why wasn't I doing something that required a brain for instance But at the same time, you know, my own emotional needs were I had children and I needed also to look after them and do a good job looking after them I think that, you know, there comes a point where you're sitting watching Braveheart and going, what the hell am I doing with my life And you go, okay, now I get to live too Wait a minute, I remember I used to be somebody that cared about these very same things Well, I got the wrong impression, I thought it must be that you were tired of watching Mel Gibson movies I'm not a big Mel Gibson fan It was just that Robert the first was a childhood hero of mine At 10, I used to read English history, what can I say I remember when I was sitting in the theater who I was at 10 and 12 years old And where was I? I had gone this whole path where I put myself to one side, looked after the children, looked after the family And I didn't do anything for my own self at all, apart from some little painting and, you know, things like this But almost everything that I did was something that I did in order to produce something within the family A sense of well-being for the children or, you know, money or whatever I have two follow-up questions to that and they actually will lead us to tell them two different paths So I don't want us to forget the other path when I ask the first question I hear you saying something that I think is very remarkable when you look at feminist rhetoric about work and about women I hear you saying you don't regret taking care of your children, putting them first for a while It wasn't an either or thing It sounds like what you're constructing here is, okay, for a while I had to do this and that was fulfilling And then one day I realized there was this other thing I needed to do and now it was time to move into that Not, oh my god, I regretted having kids, I regretted doing that and I lost myself It wasn't that you lost yourself, it was that you put yourself aside and then came back to it Is that a fair assessment of what you're telling me? I would say sometimes I have regretted it, I've not regretted having children, I mean, I love them I have regretted that I put myself aside that much They felt it, you know, they've talked about it They know that somehow and this has induced some kind of guilt in them They feel somehow responsible for the fact that I did this That's interesting They're smart, you know, that only just, you know, the whole guilt thing goes back and forth They feel guilty and I feel guilty because I made them feel guilty Then they feel guilty, you know, I would say that's maybe a quarter of what's going on The rest of it is, yeah, I did what, I made a choice I chose to do what I thought were the right things to be a quote unquote good mom And that's what I did, and I did a good job I think I did a good job, they mostly think I did a good job So, well, they say I never said no and that's very important to me Now the other rabbit, how is education, how is going back to school a way of finding you, of following yourself for lack of a better way to predict You used the word creative earlier, I take it you meant creative from the standpoint of personal development I think I mean creative also just actually creating things that are not centered around the domestic scene You know, allowing my mind free rein to do what I want to do Without having those constraints of making sure that what I was doing was not affecting the family status quo So you meant creative in these little used sense of getting out of the house I mean that before all of my creativity went into making sure and ensuring that the family was looked after And now my creativity is going to go wherever the hell it pleases and fuck off everybody else Does that make sense? But I think I missed your point now What I was asking was are you anticipating this to be an opening up, a broadening of yourself Because an opposite argument can be made about education as being very limiting I understand that I homeschooled my children for part of the time because of that But definitely a broadening and the reason is not because I'm going to be taking a narrow set of classes If you know what I mean like a narrow path But because what I'm learning is something I already know a little bit about What I'm after is I want a certificate at the end And I want to interact with other people doing the same thing so that I can learn It's not that I want to go sit in a class and be read to It's that I want to learn For me the broadening is going to happen because I'm in a sense forcing myself into a schedule of interacting with other people Instead of staying at home and sitting by myself behind my computer and learning more About what I already know I'm going to go and talk to other people and interact with other people and learn It's more creative, more intuitive That's interesting because that's exactly the way I felt about my education I didn't see it as necessarily a credentialing Though I was happy to finish the PhD and get the credential But my primary goal was to find a place to think about and write about and have the space To do things I was already thinking and writing about but had no space for in my life And didn't know anybody else who was into that either I guess I didn't think about it in these terms before I went But I saw school as like the place I could go An institution that I go to and meet people who thought the way that I thought I didn't want it to be limited to that And I didn't particularly care whether I was good at what I did The grades I got, I got because I was interested in what I was doing Not because I was competitive with the other people there And I think that that was wholly different than my younger counterparts One of the things, I wonder if this rings true for you, Chris, you're kind of at the beginning So you may not have enough experience right now to say this But I wonder if that rings true to you that somehow being going back to school later in life And you have some life experience under you when you have a perspective It's not as intense, it's not as competitive You don't feel as much constraint on doing it perfectly You know, the permanent record thing just isn't intimidating anymore after you've changed diapers I would have to say two things about that One is that I've been back to school for a couple of different courses previously A couple of bookkeeping courses, you know, they took place in high school And it was very part-time and it was extremely competitive Every single one of us were like, if we got one mistake wrong on a test, we were angry I'm thinking I may be that way and it won't be about credentials It's I'm an adult, damn it, I should be able to do this I don't know, I'll see what happens I'm probably a little more flexible than I was about ten years ago But I wanted to go back to what you were saying about You're going there when you're going to a class or school or college For a social atmosphere in a way It's community What I want is community in a whole sense With people that are doing the same thing I'm doing in order for us all to grow and learn Because for me that's the way I learn By talking, by checking things out, by looking at what somebody else is doing By the constant interaction And that's what I need And I also need structure because being an arty kind of person I can be very undisciplined Because as I said, I don't have to go the type of job that I'll be getting in the end It requires a portfolio, not a certificate Even though the certificate is something that I personally want It won't be in the portfolio, nobody's going to care They're going to look at my work and say, is this good or isn't this good But the sense of community is what I need In one way, I mean it's very practical to go back and go into a community I'm overusing the word because you make connections this way This is a good thing when you're looking for work But for me, it's definitely the social aspect of the community is extremely important I need to see what my peers are doing and interact with my peers And in this case, peers is not an age issue, it's a mindset Any last words? It's tradition I would say if you're out there and you're thinking about doing something Do it, don't wait You don't know what's going to happen You don't know what's going to come around the corner in your life But still, I would say, don't be afraid to take a risk You're only going to live the one time So you're going to be willing to check back in with us after you've had some of these courses Get your certificate and give us a perspective from the other end Yeah Alright, thanks Lori Alright, well tell me a little bit about why you decided to return to school Well it actually was, I suppose it was a return to school But I had actually dropped out of high school So I had never attended college For many years I did things sort of outside of the system for a living Throughout my teens and 20s I did things that were sort of outside of the law as well And then when I started having kids I did a lot of freelance stuff Had my own day care for 10 years I was kind of cynical about quote unquote the system and also about the educational system But it was getting harder and harder to really keep my energy for working outside of the system And I wanted to get some kind of license so that I could have some kind of authority Work within the system for change rather than trying to work from without Was there any kind of particular event that happened that sort of said Okay, this is it, it's time, or was it just sort of a gradual thing? It was fairly gradual, I started doing a training in an alternative form of therapy With this woman named Beth Roy She had been practicing this, she had a practice for about 30 years And she was never licensed, she's a PhD but in sociology And she from time to time would train groups of people to do what she did And I got into one of her trainings and I decided as soon as I got into that That I didn't want to try to set up some kind of a practice without being licensed That I was tired of being outside of the law and outside of the system And I think at that point I decided to look into going back to school to get some kind of license And I found out at that time that I could get various grants Because of being low income, I could get state grants, I could get federal grants To do undergraduate work Okay, is it your intention, you said you're starting graduate school now, right? Right Is it your intention to go all the way through to the PhD or an MSW? Well my intention is to go through to an MSW And I'm actually considering law school at the moment, which is kind of elite And I don't know yet if it's something that I want to do And if it is something I want to do, if I want to start next year Or finish this MSW program as a two year program So I don't know if I want to finish this program and then go on to law school I don't know if I have the stamina for this much school But I just decided to look into that I giggle because I understand Yes Right, and this much, you know, I'm really building up quite a debt load here Yeah, I understand that too Yeah, yeah Did you have certain expectations when you went back to school about what Just the education itself would do for you and Well, my expectation was that it would Was for a lot to a large extent about economics That I would have a way to make a more secure living I didn't know if I would have to go on to graduate school in order to do that And that was kind of a surprise to me to learn once I had a bachelor's degree How little it actually meant in terms of making money in the world Compared to not having one It didn't make very much of a difference at all actually In San Francisco and the Bay Area So I knew really that I had to go on to graduate school to make that For previous years worthwhile at all And I was willing to, but it's a lot of work to Be doing this as an adult and have kids And I think I had an expectation that I would enjoy the academics of it And I think that I would if I weren't so torn in my focus Right So How old are your children? They're 10 and 14 now So they were 6 and 10 when I started I'm hearing that you haven't really had That school hasn't exactly turned out the way that you thought That your first expectation was Well, a little bit of it hasn't I sort of had an expectation that I'd have time to read And enjoy the reading But that's more about my life than school I went into it pretty cynical And I remained that way Although I have sort of more I have more basis for my skepticism and criticism now But I'm just generally a critic of everything So Probably rightly so though Do you anticipate that the MSW Will get you where you're hoping to go? Yeah, definitely There's really a demand for licensed social workers In this area At the moment there is And the program I'm in It's quite a competitive program I think it's the only one in the northern part of the state Besides there's one other one There's a big demand for social workers right now And the schools have not caught up to that They will in three or four or five years But at the moment I'm pretty sure that I won't have a problem getting some kind of a job that I want And making decent enough living One of the things that I noticed When I started thinking about doing this show Is that when I sat down and thought about All of the 40 somethings That I knew in That were Either had gone back to school Or were in the process of going back to school That I could think of maybe two men And like 50 women And I wondered if you've observed that Do you think that women go back later in life Is there a difference Between men and women along this line? I don't really know I mean I In my own experience I know a few men who Have gone back Part time I know that Sort of in my mother's generation It was typically women who would go back to school After the kids were grown In my experience In the undergrad school that I was in I was in the regular sort of daytime humanities program But they had a program They're called a weekend Bachelor of completion program Which if you had some college credit You could complete your bachelor's In a year By going to school on the weekend And I took some of those classes And that was all adults That was all adults around my You know they're 40s and 50s And there was a mix Of men and women although You know there was Actually there were Very few white straight men In the classes that I was in I don't even know if there were any There were some African-American men Who were middle aged And there were some white gay men So I'm not sure what that means But that's just my own Sampling Which is pretty small I don't really know In the program I'm in right now I'm really the oldest In my particular class Oh really Yeah most everybody is in their I shouldn't say everybody Probably there are a handful Of us who are over 35 maybe Most everyone is in their 20s And this is in graduate school Yeah Because I noticed a big difference Because I went to a commuter school And so there were quite a few people That were older The average age there was 27 Or 28 for Attendees at the school But I noticed in graduate school That the age actually went up I turned out to be kind of in the middle In my early 40s I knew plenty of people Who are older than me As well as people who are younger But it might be location too Yeah Yeah I think so I've had some classmates say to me Who were in their early 20s Oh I haven't been to school for four years Just look at them Thinking I wonder what they think I am It's like yeah it took me 20 years To do my bachelor's degree And when I taught That was kind of nice Because I had a lot of students Who were like freaking out Because they weren't going to finish In four years And I said you know You get done when you get done Right So it was almost 20 years to the day From the first college class I took To my graduation day Well that's a nice leisurely pace Yeah I wouldn't exactly call it leisure Right So you were talking about You know a lot of younger people In your classes and so forth Have you noticed much difference In the way that they approach school In the way that older students Approach school Well I don't know The program I'm in right now I don't know this is only the second week And I mean what I did notice last week There's a big difference between the two schools The undergraduate school I went to Was a very small private liberal arts college And this is a big state university Really competitive and I noticed That the students in this program Who are younger tend to be really So far what I've noticed Seems sort of frantic and focused Yeah On you know making sure they're In the right place Making sure they know what to do And the energy is completely different In this program Maybe I looked that way too I sort of felt that way the first day In the other school The people that went there were younger I mean they were in their 20s But not necessarily right out of high school And that was a school that You know sort of the basic philosophy Was already questioning The institution of education So there was a lot of real big difference In the field of energy And in the way that students Approached it between that school And this school I would say Anything that you want to add In terms of telling me about Why you like, why you're going Why you're not, what you expect Any of this stuff that I've asked I don't know I guess I would say I think it's wrong that it's so hard To get an education At least my experience has been That it's been hard A lot of people that I know Are not even going to be able to Get in it as much of an education As I've gotten So I do, I still have enormous criticism For the way that it's structured And for, you know the way You sort of get lost when you're in the system And end up, you know Really focusing on getting a degree And rather than really learning And that's just sort of my life Long criticism of the way education Is most education is structured I have a daughter that I was going to Home school And she didn't go to school until she was eight Mostly because we both got really lonely We really didn't have community of people Who weren't in school And she is very, she's very intent On going to college She's really focused on education And is sort of, you know Skeptical of my criticism She's thinking that I might be Unnecessarily critical So we'll wait and see, you know How it goes for her Doing that, something she really wants to do She's in a college prep high school And she's really interested in college And I'm glad, I'm not wanting her Not to go to college And I'm really interested in supporting her I was not supported to go to college So I'm really planning on being able to support her But it's just interesting to see the The way that she's approaching it You said one thing that I know That at the end of my schooling I felt this, you know I'm the first person in my family To get a PhD First person in my generation Both sides of my family My mom's family My father's family And, you know, not just my immediate family But my extended, like, I have no cousins Or aunts or uncles Who have advanced degrees And I remember, you know At the end of this When I finished the PhD I thought this doesn't prove That people can do it Because I know I have very intelligent people That I'm related to Who just through the circumstances of life And their ability to pay and so forth That the education system doesn't encourage them To come forth and learn this kind of stuff Exactly, yeah I've had an enormous amount of support To do what I'm doing from community You know, I have all of my grants and loans But it's still not enough to support me in this town And I work two part-time jobs But I've had, you know, I'm right on the margin So if my car breaks down Or my computer breaks down I'm borrowing money from friends And I happen to have friends who can do that Yeah But so many people don't So there's no way that they could do what I'm doing They don't have that cushion You lock out in some ways But you also have to, like, just work really hard At building that support system In order to make it happen Right And I know at the end of the education I almost had a guilt feeling about it for a while You know, it's like... And also a great fear That there would be other people who would say Well, she did it so it obviously could be done And it isn't easy Right It wasn't easy and it shouldn't be that hard And I do have a lot of, I guess For lack of a better word for it Resentment that it was that hard Yeah, yeah You know, just because I did it Doesn't mean that it was an easy thing to do Right I totally understand what you're saying Yeah And I imagine it's... I have friends who are starting school Who are, you know, their kids are young And I don't have children But I have friends who have children And, you know, I'm supportive of them going back Uh-huh But I know that you sit there and cringe Because you know it's not going to be as lovely as Right But, you know, that's one of those things That a lot of people have to find out for themselves Yeah And I don't know anybody actually Who has kids Who's not doing something that's like Carrying them in several different directions Sure Whether it's their job or, you know I don't know any stay-at-home moms anymore Yeah So, you know Well, thank you very much for being a part of our show Thank you, Paige And we will... I'm sure that we'll meet again on the net Yeah If not talk in person again sometime Okay, take care Okay, you too Bye-bye Bye-bye On CFUV Victoria's Public Radio 101.9 FM 104.3 cable And on the internet CFUV.uvig.ca Giving sociology an edge! Why did you decide to return to school? Well, I didn't really return to school I didn't go to school in the first place I had a single mother And she worked really hard to make sure that She had money and resources So that I could have gone to school I didn't, you know, it was the 60s And I was a hippie chick And I didn't trust the institutions And I thought I'd get a better education in the streets So I never went So when I decided to go I was in my mid-40s I'd worked as a cook most of my life And I thought I might, if I got a degree I might be more marketable professionally It was kind of about economics Was there anything specific going on in your life At the time that said This is the right time to go? In a way, I had just quit Job managing a tourist restaurant In North Beach here in San Francisco In which I was making a lot of money I was making a six-figure salary And I was, you know, is that right? I think I always say that wrong But I was making a lot of money But I hated life And I knew that if I didn't do something I was, you know, just doomed Because I really, really was really unhappy So about a year after that I started just sort of mumbling about Maybe I should go to college Maybe I could be a therapist Maybe I could be a teacher Maybe I could be blah, blah, blah And a friend was going to a small alternative Ed kind of hippie college And took me down there just to show me around And it was a pretty one thing led To another kind of thing that happened at that point You said that there were economic reasons What are you hoping to get out of your education? You know, it's interesting Because I have, that's really divided I mean, I'm always hoping to get out of my life And this is true before I went to college I'm always hoping to get learning It is not that I don't want to learn in college I mean, I definitely want to learn in college I just don't think you have to go to college to learn I always read a lot before I went to school But I mean, since I'm there I'm hoping I'm going to learn something I'm hoping I'm going to be engaged With other people who are engaged In the process of learning But at the end of the day It's about getting the letters that theoretically Hopefully, possibly, make you more marketable In terms of getting jobs that I don't right now Have any credibility to get Like teacher, well, teacher right now So then it becomes about economics Because you know, I want, you know My resume looks great as a restaurateur But not so great in any other way Is school turning out to be what you want it to be? I went to school I walked around my first year school saying I'm in college I'm like, what does it mean? I really didn't have a big Even when I started going to school I didn't have a thought about What it was going to be If anything, I was worried that it wasn't Going to be interesting enough That they were going to try to make me Memorize and regurgitate information And that it wasn't going to be that interesting Because I went to this small, silly little school It was pretty great It was really compelling Those classes were small Conversations were pretty interesting And now in my graduate school There's a similar, there are times When we get really good information And conversations can be really great But I also find that very often The oldest person in the classroom And a lot of people are, you know Younger people are as I was when I was younger And this is also a generalization But they're more interested in sort of partying And having fun and living their life And so the reading becomes a burden The writing becomes a burden The joy of learning becomes, you know Something that they have to do like a job So the conversations become, you know People don't do the reading And you can't have a conversation about the reading If people don't do the reading So I kind of go there with this real This is so great I want to talk all about this stuff And I very often there's these sort of dull eyes As I look around the room And I'm sure teachers experience that Regularly and with great frustration And also I just think that there's a way In which America makes learning bad You know, learning dumb It's only the geeks that read And learn and care about that stuff And the rest of us are too busy Or being hip Or, you know, being trendy Or being fashionable, you know As long as you're keeping up with MTV It's all good And so I think America kind of I mean, I even heard Howard Zinn In an interview on C-SPEN yesterday He used a word that I don't remember But it was a bigger word And he made a little joke about using the word Because it reflected his education It reflected the fact that he'd been a A professor at university I flinched when he did that Because I know that Howard Zinn is a very Class-conscious man And I know that he would never want to Be put offish to anyone Because they didn't know the word And I sort of might be willing to extend that That's the reason he did that But I just kind of want people to love words And love language and love learning And there's a way in which in America That's just not true I mean, I think it's become this Really, oh my god, you read I have been made fun of in my college For using a big word My fellow students will roll their eyes And go, what's that word about? I find that really sad and kind of tragic You would think that a college would be Where you would be allowed to use words Yeah, and love words And think they're interesting and fun And great and not I mean, they become a dividing line Up between people And I think that's very much about race And class and gender and ethnicity And all those things Because of traditionally Who gets to learn the words To take the time to learn the words Yes, it's interesting Because I wonder sometimes When I started thinking about doing the show I sat down and thought about who I knew Who was a non-traditional student Or whatever that means I thought of maybe two men Right And I don't know, 40, 50 women Right, right The proportion seemed to me way out of whack Is that your experience too? I mean, if you do run into people in your classes Do you find that the people that are your age Are female? I'm not sure exactly how to put this But I've noticed that The timing is different in a woman's life Yes That we think about domestic things And family and so forth And taking care of others Earlier in our lives And it takes us a while to get to the point Where we say, okay, it's our time Yeah, I think you're right And I think that was certainly truer In my... I think in my mother's generation I think in the baby boomer generation There was a way in which Our parents really wanted us to go to school Because they didn't get to I mean, I was certainly true about my mother And I know a lot of my contemporaries Or even the women I mean, I think a lot of... More women went to school kind of in that age cohort At an earlier time But I do agree with you And I also think that a lot of women leave school And they get pregnant Or, you know, they decide, well I want to work at having my family now Yeah, I know in my own case My first husband's education came first Right And you hear that a lot You hear that the deal that is made is You get me through this school And then I'll get you through that school And the deal falls through The divorce happens at an interesting time In that little scenario Yeah, a lot of that Baby boomer generation saw more women Going to school, going to college You know, from the middle class Yeah I mean, I think you and I are both old enough To even remember that in the late 60s A lot of schools weren't even available to women Yes That there were still all male schools Oh yeah, definitely And also women got funneled into liberal arts and MRS degrees Right You mentioned How you felt like The younger people in your classes Some of the younger people in your classes Regarded school as more Like a job and something That they weren't really enjoying as Learners. Do you notice any other Differences between people who Come to this later in life And people who just sort of Like go from high school straight Into college experience Yeah, I think You know, and again I don't know how many You know, for people My age, there's sort of a little more Internalized fear that we aren't Going to do it well enough or get it done And we're Tireder and you know, it's a little harder And I think that for older people There's a little more intensity because There is an internalized sense That you might not be able to Do it, that you might be too tired Your brain might not keep up It is harder, I mean, I'm up Sort of perimenopausal and menopausal And, you know, my brain definitely Doesn't work quite as well As it did when I was In my twenties, although in my twenties I was high So maybe it does work as well For different reasons, I guess If I really want to think about that And, you know, I had a very interesting conversation With a young man once about the fact That he went to high school He went to school, it was this Regimented thing, I mean he was The only difference between his Outside of his classrooms You know, whereas for me College is this opportunity To spend this time reading and Writing and talking to other people About ideas and learning So for me, it's an opportunity for him It's more the same thing he's been doing For the last period of time in his life It's always ever known in some way Yes, exactly, exactly Well, I appreciate your talking to us today And I Enjoyed it very much I enjoy the show I tune in every week Or every week that I am conscious of the time It's been a couple of times When I sort of wake up around one o'clock And go, oh god So we can advertise this as If you're one of our biggest fans You'll get a chance to be on our show There you go That is the deal We may use that as a promo Very good, very good Well, thanks a lot Tish Thank you One of the things that struck me About the three interviews this week With each of the women Was that A big part Of going back to school Later in life Is changing your economic Circumstances Specifically looking for credentials Suzanne talked about this Most explicitly But Tish talked about it to And Laurie talked about developing A portfolio for her Line of work And it reminded me of Peter Drucker's post-capitalist Society And his discussion about the accountable school Towards the end of it He predicted This book was written in the late 80s, early 90s And he predicted in this book That education would take a very practical Turn Towards preparing People for work And a knowledge-based society He said that the social position of school As quote producer Quote and quote Distributive channel Quote of knowledge And it's monopoly Are both bound to be challenged And he suggests that there's going to be Much more competition among schools And that this competition was going to Lead to Schools that would be held accountable For how well they prepared people For their corporate Positions For their jobs In society And I had, as you can imagine A really bad gut reaction To His ideas I don't like the idea of schools Being judged Merely upon how well they produce Laborers And he He predicted in Post-language Making it sound like it was something Holy different than that But in truth I think that's what the bottom line was That he was in fact Suggesting that The whole purpose of education should be To provide Laborers for a knowledge market And Michael Harrington was Writing about exactly this In the late 60s and early 70s He was writing about the disparity between The academy The preparation that took place there And what actually happened to people Who got out after Their time at the academy Into the so called real world He was talking about The gap between quote preparation Close quote and what actually happened The academy was raising these people Speaking of students in the late 60s To be quote gentleman close quote He of course meant the limit as well as the men And I'm sure you knew the term was Achaic and deliberately so in context And the students were finding out After they got out that in fact What the world wanted was engineers Harrington I think blamed The real world more than the academy So he wasn't calling for an educational System To Prepare engineers only I wouldn't say that he would call for the exact opposite Were he to call for anything He was calling for a world that would define Knowledge worker as something other than engineer Or consider the possibility that it could be Defined some other way Which I think is Drucker's definition When he says knowledge worker He doesn't mean person of letters He means engineer Well he means technician He means that's a better word technician He means someone who Can Manage information Can Create knowledge That is beneficial to The larger entity To the economy He means it in very economic terms Education for him becomes one more Institution that Supports what he calls the post capitalist Knowledge economy What Drucker leaves Out of his analysis That the more People gain These credentials The more the market gets glutted With credentialed people The more you have to go after More credentials Substance gets lost It goes back to what Tish was talking about Where we don't want to use too big Of words here We don't want to worry about Reading or anything like that What we're worried about is Having those little letters after your name So that you can compete with Other people who have those little letters After their names That seems really antithetical To the idea that Knowledge would be a commodity I mean, we're rejecting knowledge And only trying to look It goes, it's sort of Bardriard, isn't it? It's simulated education We look good We look like we have A certain amount of education But in fact, the majority of us Simply have A certain amount of credentials And I'm not sure I can come up What if education is For the sake of argument entirely ritualized What if it is simply a question Of showing up going through the motions And getting the letters after your name What kind of check would there be on that We'll agree for the sake of argument Again, that the consequences would be Noteworthy But where's the check Where's the check in the system Who's even paying attention to Whether credentialing has anything to do With anything but credentialing The universities don't care They get paid the same amount of money Either way, all they have to do Is turn out people with letters after their name The corporations don't care Where's the place in the quote System, close quote For a remedy I think that it basically Puts the system in jeopardy The system's no longer Sustainable And that's the ultimate Check on it If you don't have people Who are capable of thinking Capable of reading Capable of analytical Thought Eventually what you have Is a lot of followers And no leaders That's an argument that's been used for years And apparently it's out of vogue Well, it may be out of vogue But that doesn't make it less true And it doesn't make it without consequences I mean, look at what's going On with in-run right now Look at what's going on with WorldCom And all of these other places In which unethical practices Are leading to people Trying to look good without any Substance to it I guess I didn't articulate clearly I don't mean That there won't be consequences I said that there would be What I talked about a check on the system was A check that stops This sort of downward spiral Before Armageddon Any thoughts on that? Yeah, people have to realize That Armageddon is coming Right now the check doesn't exist They've forgotten the middle part They pretend that as long as They keep the act up As long as the simulation is in place That it's the real thing That's what I'm suggesting Is that the only way that you're Going to create checks within the system Is somewhere to start valuing something In terms of sustainability Because what is going on Right now in the relationship Between corporations And education Is not sustainable It's not sustainable to Merely have credentialing If you don't have some substance Behind the credentials Eventually something bad Is going to happen It's already starting Will it happen before Armageddon comes? I don't know. Could it happen Before Armageddon comes? Yes Of course it could There are lots of ways in which People can know Whether or not you have substance Or not But it's going to require A sense of Public self It's going to require a sense Of sustainability Being a good thing It's going to have to be somebody Who appreciates intellect Not because it can compete With you, but because it can Enhance everybody's position At the same time. Substance Is exactly the issue We're talking about convincing A duopoly, if I'm in issues That weren't for the moment That is convinced that there is no substance Except that which they assign Well then it's going to fall apart They Concede that there is anything to the student Besides The grades they assign him The credentials they give Or withhold from him And then pass him on to an economy That couldn't care less About the greater good Or the collective good Or anything but Unenlightened self-interest In every specific case Unenlightened self-interest Is a really good term for this These people think that they're acting In their best interest, they're not They have to be enlightened They are individually In the cases of the corporations They are acting in their individual best interest It's the prisoner's dilemma They are only acting in their best interest In the short term Eventually they will be hurt Do you really think that the Arthur Anderson guys Who are sitting in jail right now Now feel that they acted In their best interest They have a generation in power Now that read Rachel Carson and said Gee, the resources are all getting used up Well, let's use them up before we die And send the credit card bill to the next couple of generations Or do you dispute that? I think it's a simplistic view Because you also have People of that same generation Who read Rachel Carson And are out there trying to change The economy to be more Sustainable To actually save something For the next generation to come Okay, so you're contesting the point of fact Yes, there are Contravelling forces Just because they don't make CNN Very often doesn't mean they don't exist We're talking about universities here You mentioned CNN I take it you're using that as an example Of legitimation Well, circulation of information But legitimation more in this case Universities are the quintessential Legitimation centers They are about putting letters After people's names Yes There are a few universities That don't grant degrees But they don't do well They don't do well In the particular Game that you're talking about I think some of their students Think they do very well And they do serve a purpose And they do exist And therefore they are part Of the possibilities of the future I'm not just being contentious I'm trying to get at a very Central dilemma which is How do you reconcile The a priori notions of education Or intelligence or skills Or whatever you want to call it With the legitimation The credentialing So how do you reconcile the two I think that what The problem that you're presenting Is Is not reconcilable Within its box I'm suggesting to you though That To keep it in its box Is an inaccurate assessment Of what it is I'm suggesting that there are Contravelling forces that happen Outside its box I'm not trying to be difficult either I'm just saying that it can be more complex That you're not going to find If education is simply credentialing The legitimation institution And that only Institutions Who legitimate Can be called universities And if that Then in turn is the only respectable Place to go for your education Then you're stuck But if people begin to Look outside of that And say okay I want something more I'm going to go to This Institution that doesn't grant A degree I'm not going to worry About Whether or not I have a degree I'm going to worry about whether or not I have Certain body of knowledge Those people Act upon the system As well In other words they're outside the box That you've created but they're not outside Interaction of human beings And if those kind of things caught on Eventually the credential mills Would be out of vote You can't act as if Because they don't They're not acceptable within the box That they don't have influence On what happens inside the box Do you understand what I'm saying? You're saying that my model is naive Yes In other words if you limit me To only coming up with a solution From within the box Then I would say that the solution could come Before the whole thing falls apart But it would require A cultural change It would require a change in attitudes It would require us to respect And reward People who don't live inside that box And the universities aren't going to do that And the corporations aren't going to do that There are universities that do that And there are corporations that do that They don't make CNN And they aren't very powerful right now But they could grow into something Important So your answer would be They are there if we need them They are there if we want to use them Yes For more information about First Person Plural Or Patty Thomas and Carl Wilkerson Visit our website culturalconstructioncompany.com