Think About Social Media

I was a reluctant neophyte to the social networking scene.

I like to consider myself a non-conformist, but so do a lot of other people, which effectively defeats the point. It's just another label, anyway, and I'd prefer not to place a label on myself. I'm just me.

Generally speaking, though, if the proverbial "everybody" is doing something or seeing a certain movie, I refuse to. I don't necessarily think everyone else has poor taste, but I want to form my own opinions and do or see something based on its merit, not its popularity. I've too often been disappointed when I've seen movies that multiple people told me I just "had" to see.

There are exceptions, of course. I had refused to see Forrest Gump for a long time because "everybody" kept raving about it. I've always enjoyed Tom Hanks, though, and I also have a lot of respect for my parents' taste in movies. When they told me that I'd like the movie, I trusted them. They were right; I loved it. (Incidentally, I prefer not to see movies that have been adapted from books, unless I've read the book first. In this particular case, though, I read Forrest Gump after I saw the movie. The book, though, is so different from the movie that it neither affected my view of the movie nor tainted my enjoyment of the book.)

So, before I joined Facebook, I mulled it over for months, with this singular thought running through my head: Am I being duped into joining? As silly as it seems now, I was so afraid that I was giving up something of myself. Like my dignity or my self-respect.

Joining Twitter was easier. In my research of that medium, I read a number of articles about how essential Twitter is for a writer. Sure, you can connect with other writers/publishers/editors on Facebook, but certainly not in the same way you can on Twitter.

As with most ideas, I like to take into consideration the views of someone "external" whom I respect, someone who carries weight as a kind of mentor. Yesterday I watched a short video clip of author Margaret Atwood expressing her views of social media. She offers an interesting perspective, as she sees social media as just an "extension of the diary" and as nothing different from anything we as a society were already doing, like sending letters to people. She even compares a tweet to a telegram. I found her point of view fascinating. She is, especially, an enthusiast of Twitter and actually sees it as a chance to boost literacy. I must acknowledge that what she says makes sense. Much more than on Facebook, "tweeps" (Twitter peeps) read and share articles and information, regularly exercising their minds and entering into discussions. (I realize that this is not the main purpose of Facebook, so this is not meant as a negative comment. I know that each form of social media has its own motivation.)

While I realize many of the merits of Facebook, I'm still hesitant. One part of me wants to ask, "Why do so many people want to share all the personal and often mundane details of their lives with the world?" But, the other part of me answers, "You idiot, that's exactly what YOU'RE doing." Touché.

When I first joined, I checked Facebook religiously. It's addictive--you sit on pins and needles waiting for people to post what they're going to eat for their 3 o'clock snack, how long it took them to shower that morning, and whether or not they've recovered from yesterday's root canal.

For me, it quickly lost its luster, though, largely because of the poor grammar, punctuation, and spelling I kept witnessing (In case you didn't know, my nickname in both high school and college was the "Grammar Nazi." Dude, I take this stuff seriously!) It doesn't bother me as much on Twitter because when you only have 140 characters to work with, you have to give a person some slack. Same goes for texting.

What really inspired this particular post on social media, though, was an online discussion in one of my classes (Teaching Literature). After muddling through 50 pages of a chapter on literary theory, I learned that literary theory, by definition, might not really exist. And, what about literature? How is it defined? As much as I love literature, you'd think that this would have been something I'd thought a lot about. I hadn't. My answer (in (very small) part) was: "Like Justice Potter Stewart on the definition of pornography, I say about literature: I know it when I see it."

So, how does this apply to social media? Any learning, in my opinion, in order to carry weight, has to have some relevance (personal relevance, political relevance, social relevance, whatever, as long as it has relevance for the student). When we teach literature, perhaps we need to start with a prompt (intuition-based or not) and see what a particular piece means to a large scope of people. If relevance is what we need to get at, we need a broad (and diverse) scope of people to look at it. To this point, maybe social media/forums are the best ways to teach (and learn) literature. You get a wide variety of responses under the guise of anonymity. You reach outside of the classroom. Isn't that the fad nowadays anyway? (And I'm not using fad as necessarily a negative term here.) Learning doesn't (and can't) take place in a vacuum.

So, my now-definitive conclusion about social media is that it is, in no uncertain terms, good for something besides displaying one's poor grammar and lack of proofreading skills: it's good for prompting discussions about "real" things in the world...like the social implications of literature!

Perhaps this is precisely what Margaret Atwood was getting at.

And that's all I have to say about that.

Think About Libraries, Part 2

You've probably heard this phrase (or similar wording) before: If you're not outraged, you're not paying attention.

There are a lot of people not paying attention.

In the latest Toledo-Lucas County Public Library e-newsletter, the library director writes that the Toledo [Ohio] Public Library system "continues to see major increases in customer use. Last year, nearly 3 million visitors, more than any other Lucas County institution, visited one or more of our 19 library locations, while checking out over 6.9 million items." Access to books, computers, information in general, is essential to human development. Not all households have computers or internet access. Not all households have books.

Children who do not have early access to books start falling behind in their formal education before they even start school. According to the National Institute for Literacy: The Partnership for Reading, by age three, children should be able to recognize books by their covers, they should pretend to read books, and they should understand how to hold books and how to turn their pages ("print awareness"). They should understand what words are. Even when children are only a few weeks old, they benefit from being read aloud to. Those first few years of a child's life are critical for learning to read. When children are read to often and in a positive environment, reading becomes a pleasant experience. Children learn about print, words, "book language," and the world. It's also important for young children to see others reading--newspapers, magazines, books. It helps them grasp the significance of reading. And reading IS significant.

If parents or guardians do not have access to books or if they cannot read, the children are the ones who suffer. Many libraries offer programs that can help. Or, at the very least, it costs nothing for a parent to take a child to the library. For this reason, libraries are one of the most important public institutions in this country.

But here's the thing: "Although demand and usage is high, unfortunately since 2001 state funding for public libraries has continued to drop, prompting TLCPL [Toledo-Lucas County Public Library] to spend less on materials...."

The TLCPL e-newsletter goes on to tell about the job search and computer skills programs that are available for FREE at the main branch library. This career service is highlighted with one patron's personal story. Read her story, and you'll see that public libraries clearly make a difference.

And if we're not doing something to make a positive difference (directly or indirectly) in someone's life, what are we here for?

Are you outraged yet?

-----------
On a semi-related note, I highly recommend the book Readicide: How Schools Are Killing Reading and What You Can Do About It by Kelly Gallagher. I read it a couple of years ago and consider it one of the most important books I've ever read. Check it out at your local library!

Think About Reading

I'll proudly wear the title of Literary Snob. I'm okay with that, I admit it. There are some authors that I won't read because their books don't contain what I think of as "good" writing. They may be engaging stories, but their writing is simplistic and basic. Their characters are flat. No depth.

So, yes, I'm a Literary Snob. I'd rather stay a more-or-less unpublished writer than be an author of a flatly written book. That's just me. I value good literature. Likewise, it's what I strive to write.

However, I also believe that if millions of people are reading a poorly written book, that is far better than not reading any book at all.

Think about everything you might read in a day, words you read without even thinking about it. When I became a tutor for a local literacy organization, I realized just how much I take my reading ability for granted. Twice a week I meet with a student who managed to graduate from high school without knowing how to read fluently. Every day she faces struggles that the average adult knows nothing about. Menus, prescription bottles, recipes, receipts, billboard signs, ingredients on a box of cereal, and on and on.

Although poor writing, grammar, and proofreading skills irk me, having poor reading and reading comprehension skills sadden me. It saddens me because it is often under-privileged children who are the victims of poor reading skills. Through no fault of their own, these children may start school already academically behind their peers, simply because nobody has ever read to them or taken them to a library or even showed them a book.

But what about the children who are not under-privileged? I don't want to make this an issue about the public education system in the United States; that's only part of the problem.

A larger part of the problem in this country has to do with our society's values (or lack thereof?). A large chunk of people in our society put emphasis on the wrong things: money, status, fashion, outer beauty..., to name a few. An enlightening article from the April 18th Publishers Weekly articulated this idea nicely for me. In "The Light at the End of the Publishing Tunnel? On finding fans, not formats," Rudy Shur writes that "[i]nstead of focusing on how our books are going to be delivered to the reading public, we ought to be concerned with who will be left to read books."

Think about that for a moment.

Additionally, he cites that video game sales surpass book sales. Twenty years ago, books were a common form of entertainment. Now, though, a lot of people look for ways to BE entertained, as opposed to finding a way to entertain themselves. To that point, Shur writes: "While other countries focus on educating their children, we seem more focused on amusing them.... However, the responsibility of raising children who value education, and hence read, in any form, is no longer a priority. Without a vibrant and growing reading public to buy e-books or tree-books, who are we going to sell our titles to in the future?"

I will counter Shur here and suggest that many people will still buy books (e-books or otherwise); for some, it's about status--a way to show off their e-gadget--or a way of appearing intellectual. Whether they will read them or not...?

Perhaps the people who have earbuds fused to their brains, ipods sutured to their pockets, and cell phones superglued to their hands actually take e-breaks when they are alone. Turn off the tunes, switch off the television, and power down the laptop. And, then, maybe they simply sit on the couch with a book (or an e-reader).

Ahhh.... Simple pleasures. When I learned to read, my mom told me that a book could transport me anywhere, that I could do anything or be anyone by reading. Not only that, but I soon discovered all sorts of stuff I could learn by reading!

Think about reading. Actually, don't just think about it. Read to yourself or read to someone else. Read to a child!

But, mostly...READ.

Think About Education

For those of you who are Toledo locals and read The Blade on a regular basis, you will remember the article a few weeks ago regarding overpaid (public school) teachers. While I have definite thoughts about what public school teachers get paid, I have not done enough research to substantiate those thoughts in a public forum as this. Succinctly, though, the main issue of a teacher's pay as I see it, is that there is little or no correlation between how good a teacher is and how much he or she gets paid. (And, yes, this trend is apparent in many other businesses and segments of society as well.)

As one of the editorials following that article's publication mentioned: "We pay kindergarten teachers $90,000 a year for 185 working days. That's outrageous.... I won't be voting for any levies." I agree wholly. I don't care how much schooling a kindergarten teacher has, if he or she is getting paid that kind of money, his or her students better be entering first grade able to read the abridged versions of Charles Dickens. We know this isn't happening, though, because, sadly, many high school graduates in this area cannot read Charles Dickens, not even the abridged versions. When I started my volunteer tutoring work for Read For Literacy, Inc., I learned just how illiterate the greater Toledo area is.

Now, this post is really not meant to be about the public school system.

It is meant, instead, to show the disconnect between college and grad school applications. Let me explain:

I never had to write an essay to get into college; I never had to do much of anything. The applications were simple. Of course, the schools needed transcripts and SAT scores, neither item telling very much about the student. I never worried about being accepted. It seems, these days, that colleges--save the Ivy Leagues and other highly competitive schools--accept most anyone nowadays. There's not a lot of pomp to it; it just happens.

Grad school, though, is a different story. Once I found the program I was interested in, I signed up for the GRE test, studied intensely for three months, and still did just okay--essentially, average. No problem, though; it could be checked off the list. Next, I've been working on finding three unsuspecting people who will write my letters of recommendations. This is difficult, as they should be people familiar with my writing, with my academic work, and with me. I also want to pick people who will write a grammatically correct and organized letter, since I will probably not see the letters before they are sent on to Admissions.

Probably the most important piece of my application (besides the application itself) is my Statement of Purpose, a well-framed essay displaying my strengths and my learning objectives and career goals. And, when you're going for a Master's in English, you really want it to be written perfectly. Oy vey.

Then, there is the 10+ page critical essay.

Shouldn't getting into all college (even to obtain an associate's or bachelor's degree) be this tough? At the very least, a Statement of Purpose should be required. Perhaps this might weed out some of the oh-so-many students who do not belong in college. Not only would this make it more pleasant for the college instructors, but it would also make it more pleasant for the other students.

I am certainly NOT complaining about all I have to for my grad school app. On the contrary, I am relishing in the work I have to do for it. That's because I want to go to grad school; I want to further my education. I'm excited about my future!

Unfortunately, I don't think many first-time college students share this same ambition and excitement. And, if they don't, that's fine; they just shouldn't be starting college yet. Then, perhaps, (undergrad) college instructors would not have to water down the lessons, adjusting them to go over information that students should have learned in high school. Which, of course, brings us back full-circle to public education and its problems...a good place for me to end.