Serving More than Coffee

Over the past few weeks, I've been spending a lot of time in committee meetings discussing what "student success" might mean for YSU. Part of the committee's definition of "student success" is the unlovely phrase, "productive post-collegiate performance." For many of those we've talked with in focus groups, that has a simple meaning: a job.

Jacob Harver offers a different model. He doesn't just have a job. He's an entrepreneur, founder of the Lemon Grove Cafe downtown. But in my book he counts as a good example of "productive post-collegiate performance" because he's doing business in a way that reflects the things he learned in History, Sociology, and other courses -- lessons that have less to do with how to run a business and more to do with how society works. He's a great reminder of the productive value of a liberal arts degree and of why it matters that so many YSU faculty make understanding Youngstown part of the curriculum.

Talking with Jacob Harver is always fun, in part just because he's so enthusiastic about almost everything he does. He believes in downtown, but even more important, he believes in the power of people, the arts, and organizing. What I admire most about his work in creating The Lemon Grove isn't just that it's a good addition to the downtown entertainment district, but that Jake has such a strong sense of using it as a venue for what we might think of as purposeful entertainment. Lemon Grove events support local artists, both visual and musical, but the cafe also sponsors film screenings, discussions, and meetings. And that happens not only formally, at scheduled events, but also informally. It's become my favorite place for small meetings, and every time I'm there I see other tables where people are not just sharing a meal but also figuring out how to solve a problem.

Jake offers a great answer to the perennial question facing students who major in history or English: what are you going to do with that?  

Youngstown Goes International

Eric Planey believes in Youngstown. Like many young professionals who've left the area and returned -- some call them boomerangs -- he's studied and worked in other cities and around the world, and he's come back to Youngstown with the specific goal of helping revitalize this community. As Vice President for International Business Attraction at the Youngstown-Warren Regional Chamber, he combines that positive attitude with knowledge of international business and a fair amount of patience as he works to attract international companies to set up shop in the Mahoning Valley and help local companies find global opportunities.

It's Eric's job to focus on the positive, but I appreciate that he was also honest in talking about the gap between potential and accomplishments. He's been on the job just over a year, and economic development is always a slow process. We want fast, concrete, dramatic results, but I think most people understand that creating new jobs involves exploring multiple possibilities, building relationships, and navigating financial and legal mazes. None of that happens quickly. But instead of simply touting how great things are, Eric acknowledges the limited concrete results of his efforts so far. He clearly doesn't feel discouraged; he's just realistic. In a community that has sometimes tended to be either overly negative about the possibility of local growth or idealistic about the latest turn-around, that moderation is refreshing.

Towards the Future at YSU

Two key things stand out when talking with Dr. Cynthia Anderson about what’s happening at YSU.  The first is that for her, students really are the center of everything.  Research and community connections matter, but students are, for her, the University’s most important element, its very reason for being.  No doubt, that’s a carryover from her years as Vice President for Student Affairs, but I find it a refreshing change.  For too long, students mattered primarily as enrollment figures.  For Cindy – and yes, she insists on being called that, not Dr. Anderson or any other formal title – students matter as people, as learners, as members of the University community. 

The second thing that stands out is her ability to be at once incredibly enthusiastic and relatively practical.  That is, she doesn’t pretend that we don’t face real problems, or that addressing those problems will be difficult.   At least so far, though, she addresses the issues with confidence and optimism. 

Take, for example, her insistence that the current Strategic Planning process will generate concrete plans that will guide YSU over the next decade – rather than being the usual type of feel-good (or feel only sort of good) process that gives the illusion of widespread participation and investment.  I’ll admit that I’m skeptical, even though I’m a member of the Strategic Planning committee.  I’ve spent enough time at universities to have seen plenty of fake planning, often well-intentioned but only rarely leading to real change. 

What does it take to make Strategic Planning work?  First, I believe that strategic plans work best when they not only set goals but also identify concrete, appropriate steps toward those goals.  We need not only to identify “indicators,” as the leaders of this process have requested, but also tactics.  Setting priorities and measuring progress don’t yield change.  It’s what you do in pursuit of those priorities that generates measurable progress. 

Second, those who have the power to make decisions have to be committed to pursue the plan – not the plan they think ought to be generated but the one that actually emerges from the process.  That means that those with power must truly listen to what others have to say.  It also means developing a plan that makes clear the rationale for key decisions, including how they will benefit the institution.  Put differently, the plan has to be persuasive both to those with power and those who will be affected.

Finally, that kind of plan can only emerge if people speak up.  Many individuals on campus and in the community will be invited to meetings to discuss one or more of its four “cornerstones.”  I hope most will respond.  As I see it, if I refuse to participate in the process, I give up my right to complain about the outcome.  But you don’t have to be invited to participate.  The Strategic Planning website lists e-mail addresses for committee members, and soon the site will have tools to allow you to offer your thoughts.  It sometimes seems that everyone in the Mahoning Valley has an opinion about what YSU ought to do.  Now’s the chance to speak up.

Standing with the People

As Lucienne Siers explains in our conversation this week, the Partnership for Global Justice believes in not only advocating on behalf of those who don't run governments or corporations but also helping make it possible for them to speak for themselves.  "Standing with," she explains, means listening to, offering moral support, helping organize additional supporters -- being present.  This is the role of NGOs -- non-governmental organizations.  So while she is clearly proud of the work of the United Nations, where her work is based, she also recognizes the importance of representing those who are not usually invited to the tables of power. 

As I spoke with her, I kept thinking about a recent column by New York Times commentator Nicholas D.  Kristof, reminding readers, in the midst of the latest discussions about how churches handled cases of abuse by priests, that there is another Catholic Church: "the grass-roots Catholic Church that does far more good in the world than it ever gets credit for. This is the church that supports extraordinary aid organizations like Catholic Relief Services and Caritas, saving lives every day, and that operates superb schools that provide needy children an escalator out of poverty."  The Partnership for Global Justice clearly represents this version of the church. 

I'm not Catholic, but unlike many of my politically-progressive friends I not only value the progressive work that many religious groups do but also participate actively in a religious community.  I do so without ignoring the limitations and contradictions that are inherent in all institutions and with the intention of pushing my religious community toward more engagement with the world and less concern about rules, boundaries, and control.  So I may be more inclined than some to respect the kind of work Sr. Lucienne Siers and her sister Catholics are doing.  Projects like this remind me that faith can -- as it should -- inspire us to act justly.

By the way, Lucienne mentioned the UN's "Millennium Development Goals" a couple of times in the interview.  You can find them here, and learn more about how they're being pursued.

Dial 211

It's as simple as that.  If you need help with anything from paying bills to domestic abuse to your sister's depression, dial 211 and you'll be connected with Help Hotline.  As Cathy Grisinski explained in our conversation this week, if they can't offer help, they can probably direct you to someone who can.

Of course, nothing is that easy.  What struck me most in talking with Cathy is that the problems that lead people to call Help  Hotline are so rarely simple.  Someone who's struggling to pay a mortgage bill might well be unemployed or underemployed, perhaps because of health problems or just the state of the economy, but unemploymentcontributes to emotional struggles -- self-doubt, depression, thoughts of suicide -- and behaviors that create more problems.  Help Hotline staffers know how to respond when the rest of us can't even identify the cause of a problem.


But Help Hotline is much more than, well, a hotline.  They run a community center, organize support groups, and provide education to community groups, school children, and anyone who wants to understand mental health issues.  May is Mental Health Awareness Month, so it's a good time to learn more about one of the most important resources in our community.  Visit the Help Hotline website to learn more -- including about how you can get involved.

Solving the Urban Education Puzzle

I've done several interviews over the last few years about education, including conversations with Wendy Webb and Randy Hoover and this week's chat with Anthony Catale.  I keep hoping that someone will provide some hope -- not just good intentions or even a strong critique, though I've heard plenty of that.  And I know that districts all over the country are wrestling with the same problems we have, so what I'm looking for is, to put it mildly, elusive. 

I'm impressed with Anthony Catale's determination, and he seems to have a good grasp of what's happening in the local district.  But while he can identify a great set of goals, I'm not hearing from him or from anyone a clear sense of how to achieve them.  Catale touts the benefits of "data-driven decision making," which might be the most popular buzz phrase of contemporary education.  The right goals and a ton of data don't necessarily add up to effective strategies. 

I hope the folks on the school board, on the state commission addressing the district's "academic emergency" rating, and in the city schools administration are paying attention to a couple of things:

• What's going right at Youngstown Early College?  Like some charter schools, YEC may benefit from self-selecting admissions and smaller size, but I can't help but wonder if the rest of the district couldn't borrow some strategies from the only building in the district to earn an excellent rating.
• What's happening in DC?  Michelle Rhee is creating plenty of tension and attracting lots of attention, and I'm not sure whether her efforts are yielding much.  But they do give us a very visible model of what top-down, data-driven educational management looks like. Is it a good idea?  Education journalist John Merrow has been following the story for over  a year.

• Diane Ravitch's rethinking of the current line of performance-based educational practice.  After years of promoting testing as the basis for educational planning, Ravitch now offers a different view:  "Today there is empirical evidence, and it shows clearly that choice, competition and accountability as education reform levers are not working." Of course, the local district can't change national education policy.  But they can rethink the idea that tests tell us everything. 

As my short list suggests, I have no real answers to offer.  I share the frustration that everyone I talk with expresses about this.  But that frustration also makes me skeptical that a new strategic plan is going to solve our problems.  It's not a bad idea, but we need more. 

Justifying Ourselves

According to Carol Tavris, we all do it: justify our own behavior and beliefs, even when they don't quite add up.  As she explains, and as her book, Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me), co-authored with Elliot Aronson, shows, we all feel cognitive dissonance when our beliefs, especially things we believe about ourselves, don't quite fit with clear realities.  She cites examples ranging from how some people justify continuing to smoke despite significant evidence that it's unhealthy to the responses of cult members to the failure of the world to end according to their predictions to the way hazing increases members' commitment to their fraternities and sororities.  We can see these phenomena, and no doubt notice our own experiences with it, every day.

I appreciate two things about Tavris's work.  The first is that she talks about the findings of psychological research in very accessible, down-to-earth ways.  Translating scientific research and theory into plain language isn't always easy, much less making the ideas seem both compelling and useful.  Second, I like how research like this invites us to connect our own experiences with psychological patterns that are common to many people and to link science with ethics.  So often, we think of these varied aspects of life as being entirely separate, and this work reminds us that everything is intertwined.