Carol J. Carter

CAROL’S SUMMARY:

Employee satisfaction has hit a 22-year low. That’s how long the Conference Board has annually surveyed 5,000 households on the topic. In 1987, 61% of people reported being satisfied with their jobs and in 2005 it dropped to 52%. Today it’s 45%, sparking interest in “happiness coaching” in the workplace. According to the Wall Street Journal article below, employers are starting to hire trainers in the field of positive psychology to inspire workers to have a more positive attitude. Commonly referred to as “happiness coaches,” they may suggest the following tips for boosting office personnel and consequently office morale:

o “Write e-mails to your co-workers every day thanking them for something they have done.
o Meditate daily to clear your mind.
o Do something for somebody without expecting anything in return.
o Write in a journal about things you are thankful for;
o Look for traits you admire in people and compliment them.
o Focus on the process of your work, which you can control, rather than outcomes, which you can’t.
o And don’t immediately label events good or bad, but remain open to potentially positive outcomes of even the most seemingly negative events.”

The article also cites the following studies that indicate employees’ positive attitudes can be good for business:

o A 2004 study of 60 business teams in the journal of American Behavioral Scientist found teams with buoyant moods who encouraged each other earned higher profit and better customer-satisfaction ratings.
o A 2001 study at the University of Michigan says people who are experiencing joy or contentment are able to think more broadly and creatively, accepting a wider variety of possible actions, than people with negative emotions.

The value of coaching is also increasingly being implemented in the field of education, and to help meet the demand LifeBound offers academic coaches training twice a year in Denver, Colorado. Our training–which is attended by administrators and faculty across the country from k-12 through post secondary–is designed to boost emotional intelligence and develop leadership skills. Many of our participants who were formerly principals, teachers or counselors have been promoted to the district level after completion of our training sessions. Our next training dates are June 14, 15, and 16, 2010. For more information about LifeBound’s academic coaches training and the registration process, please call us toll free at 1.877.737.8510 or email contact@lifebound.com.

ARTICLE:

Thinking Happy Thoughts at Work
By SUE SHELLENBARGER
January 27, 2010

Like many workers, Ivelisse Rivera, a physician at Community Health Center, Middletown, Conn., feels stressed-out by mounting workloads. And she didn’t expect to get much help during her employer’s annual staff meeting last November—just the usual speeches on medical issues.

Instead, she got a big dose of something new: Happiness coaching. Keynote speaker Shawn Achor—a former Harvard University researcher and former co-teacher of one of the university’s most popular courses, Positive Psychology—extolled 90 listening employees to shake off dark moods at work by practicing such happiness-inducing techniques as meditation or expressing gratitude.

To her surprise, Dr. Rivera says, she drove home filled with thoughts about cheering up; “if I assume a negative attitude and complain all the time, whoever is working with me is going to feel the same way.”

To view this entire article visit www.wsj.com

CAROL’S SUMMARY:

Many American colleges and universities have longtime connections to aid work in Haiti and since the devastating earthquake earlier this week, are providing financial assistance and on the ground emergency relief. As the article below cites, “The largest effort to put teams of university doctors on the ground has come from the University of Miami, which began sending medical professionals to Haiti the day after the earthquake.” Because of its proximity to Haiti, Miami has dispatched several flights each day back and forth, transporting doctors and supplies to Port-au-Prince and bringing severely injured patients to Miami hospitals.

The program director for emergency and disaster management and homeland security at American Military University, Christopher M. Reynolds, said, “I knew of more than a dozen students and faculty members in Haiti, doing such work as logistics operations and search-and-rescue missions through the military. The university’s students get course extensions on the basis of their deployment papers.” Similarly, Wallace E. Boston Jr., president of the parent American Public University system, wrote the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to pledge their support. He launched an e-mail to more than 1,000 students and alumni informing them that he was creating a list where people can submit their skills and availability to FEMA. Dr. Kurt K. Rhynhart, a general surgeon at Dartmouth-Hitchcock, said in an e-mail message from Haiti, “I have never seen so much poverty and am humbled by it,” “But the people are the most friendly, proud, and thankful I have ever met. I am certainly glad I came and am sure this won’t be the last time.”

Disasters like this are strong reminders that we live in a global world. As educators, we play a key role in helping students envision the difference they can make as future professionals. Students tend to be more motivated and engaged in the classroom when they understand how education connects to careers and perhaps more importantly, why we work. While everyone needs a job to support themselves and their families, it’s the ability to use our gifts and talents to help other people that give real meaning to college and career success. Let’s champion our students to do and be their best. There’s a big world out there that needs them.

ARTICLE:

The Chronicle of Higher Education
January 21, 2010
American Universities Rush to the Front Lines in Haiti
By Andrea Fuller

Brian W. Loggie, a professor of surgery at the Creighton University School of Medicine, has gotten little sleep in the past week.

Days after a devastating magnitude-7.0 earthquake rocked Haiti, Dr. Loggie and several of his colleagues arrived at a medical facility in the Dominican Republic, 30 miles from Port-au-Prince, Haiti’s capital. Since then, they have been operating on victims and trying to manage the flow of the hundreds of people overwhelming the facility.

“What we’ve been seeing are just many, many, many patients, a lot of orthopedic injuries, a lot of open fractures that are infected,” Dr. Loggie said in a telephone interview. “We’re seeing so many amputations.”

There are dozens more doctors like Dr. Loggie spread across Port-au-Prince and nearby towns, performing surgeries in makeshift hospitals and calming frantic patients. While many American colleges are providing financial assistance to Haiti, some, like Creighton, have sent teams of nurses and surgeons.

To view this entire article visit www.chronicle.com

CAROL’S SUMMARY:

According to the Wall Street Journal article below, the evolving times and dour economy have left permanent scars on the job market. Even when the economy picks back up, certain positions such as those in the housing and finance sectors are not expected to return to their pre-economic crisis status. Also, the recession has accelerated unemployment in careers already on the path to extinction due to advances in information technology. These jobs include record shop workers, photofinishing establishments, and secretaries and mailroom clerks. Therefore, unlike recessions of the past, recovery will take longer because new jobs will need to be created. Workers will need to acquire a whole new set of skills necessary for surviving in the ever-changing job market.

While we cannot accurately foretell what jobs will flourish in the future, we can prepare today’s students for tomorrow’s careers by instilling emotional intelligence and critical and creative thinking skills in order for them to possess interpersonal skills and achieve problem-solving success. With an evolving employment landscape, it is critical for students to be sharp and adaptive. At LifeBound, our programs for grades 5-12 aim to develop academic, emotional and social skills to help students learn and succeed in the global marketplace. For more information on LifeBound programs visit www.lifebound.com or email contact@lifebound.com.

ARTICLE:

The Wall Street Journal
JANUARY 12, 2010
Even in a Recovery, Some Jobs Won’t Return
By JUSTIN LAHART

Even when the U.S. labor market finally starts adding more workers than it loses, many of the unemployed will find that the types of jobs they once had simply don’t exist anymore.

The downturn that started in December 2007 delivered a body blow to U.S. workers. In two years, the economy shed 7.2 million jobs, pushing the jobless rate from 5% to 10%, according to the Labor Department. The severity of the recession is reshaping the labor market. Some lost jobs will come back. But some are gone forever, going the way of typewriter repairmen and streetcar operators.

Many of the jobs created by the booms in the housing and credit markets, for example, have likely been permanently erased by the subsequent bust.

“The tremendous amount of economic activity associated with housing, I can’t see that coming back,” says Harvard University economist Lawrence Katz. “That was a very unhealthy part of the economy.”

To view this entire article visit www.wsj.com

CAROL’S SUMMARY:

The paideia teaching model still survives today in Cincinnati, Chicago and Chattanooga school districts, as implicated in today’s article from ASCD’s Smart Brief report. The paideia model uses the Socratic method by engaging students in long discussions and classical debate to build critical thinking skills, debating/verbal skills and the ability to synthesize information. Teachers coach students through a series of difficult questions to help guide them to the best possible answers or perhaps to a new revelation. Asking powerful questions is the core of academic coaching, and LifeBound offers coaching classes throughout the year at its home offices in Denver, Colorado. These seminars teach educators and administrators how to ask powerful questions of themselves and their students, which tap internal motivation and boost emotional intelligence.

No Child Left Behind and content-based teaching formulated for standardized testing has replaced paideia in most public schools throughout the U.S., but with today’s emphasis on 21st century skills that promote critical thinking, teamwork and creativity, the Socratic method may make its way back into mainstream education. Chad Flaig, a teacher at Shroder Paideia High School in Cincinnati, says, “That’s one of the things as a teacher in seminar [debate], you are not the information provider. You are just kind of the guide, and sometimes they’ll go down a different path. You just kind of go with it, and the big thing is to make them think and get them out of their comfort zone.”

In order to compete for jobs in this country and around the world, the next generation of students will be forced to stretch themselves and venture into the global marketplace where employers value analytical, creative and practical intelligence. LifeBound’s book, Critical and Creative Thinking for Teenagers, is designed to help students develop the requisite skills for college and career success. To request a review copy of this book, or to find out more about our academic coaching classes, contact the LifeBound office by calling toll free 1.877.737.8510 or sending an email to contact@lifebound.com. We look forward to hearing from you.

ARTICLE:

Cincinnati.Com » Education
January 2, 2010
Where good old-fashioned debate still rules school
PAIDEIA TEACHING IN CINCINNATI
By Ben Fischer

Sports fan and Shroder Paideia High School senior Brandon Ross thought departed Cincinnati Bearcats football coach Brian Kelly was a disloyal turncoat before a Dec. 16 class with teacher Chad Flaig.

Then, with the desks arranged in a circle, Flaig asked tough questions: What does loyalty require? Can you be loyal to only one group at a time? What about loyalty to yourself? Is it possible that loyalty to his players led Kelly to downplay the Notre Dame job until after the crucial Pittsburgh game, avoiding distractions? Or does being loyal require absolute honesty at all times?

The teens didn’t have all the answers.

But they debated Kelly’s departure for the entire class, moderating their opinions when Flaig made a good point and pushing back when they disagreed.

Afterward, Ross wasn’t so sure.

To view this entire article visit www.news.cincinnati.com

CAROL’S SUMMARY:
Yahoo! hotjobs posted an article this week on new careers from the Occupational Information Network’s latest directory. Employment expert and author, Laurence Shatkin, stated “O*Net [Occupational Information Network] officially recognizes job titles once there is a critical mass of workers in those jobs and a clear road map for attaining the position.” According to the BLS, small companies have the highest percentage and large companies have the lowest percentage of new and emerging occupations. Small companies— those with fewer than 50 employees— often lead the economy in innovation. They can respond quickly to consumer trends and advances in technology. Professional associations and trade groups are good sources to identify jobs in emerging occupations. Some international careers open to new college graduates include global business credit risk analyst, trade relations coordinator, and import and export specialist. A software localization engineer translates and adapts programs to a foreign country, with sensitivity to customs and cultural values. Most international positions are held by employees with experience or graduate degrees.

Among the new jobs mentioned in the article below are wind farm engineers, business continuity planners and directors of social media. Many new occupations, especially those in the technical and scientific fields, require diverse skills. Multidisciplinary occupations may be a good match for the increasing number of students who choose to double or triple major. This trend was highlighted in “So, What’s Your Other Major?,” an article in the March issue of Counterpoint: The MIT-Wellesley Journal of Campus Life. Career advisers often see students with wide-ranging interests who choose multiple majors (or majors and minors) because of those broad interests

In order for students to effectively compete in a global marketplace amid today’s restricted economy students need 21st century skills, particularly problem-solving and critical and creative thinking abilities. That’s why each LifeBound book offers a corresponding curriculum that includes rigor and relevance activities, as well as powerful questions for discussion within a cross-disciplinary context.

Questions to consider:

As educators, how can we challenge and best prepare students to enter emerging career fields and acquire 21st Century Skills?

How do we engage students in meaningful lessons that build the necessary skills to compete in today’s global marketplace?

To learn more about LifeBound’s books and curricula, visit www.lifebound.com

ARTICLE:

Yahoo! hotjobs
Newest Professions, Growing Salaries
Larry Buhl, for Yahoo! HotJobs

The latest directory of job titles from Occupational Information Network (O*Net) features a variety of new entries that many people have never heard before.

Some of these jobs — at least the duties — have been around in some form for a while. What’s new is a “professional pathway” for these careers, according to employment expert and author Laurence Shatkin. “O*Net officially recognizes job titles once there is a critical mass of workers in those jobs and a clear road map for attaining the positions,” he says.

To view this entire article visit www.yahoo.com

SUMMARY:

The gap between rich and poor isn’t only connected to race and gender, now it’s between young and old. According to the article below from USA Today, many young people (particularly those in the 25 to 34 year-old age bracket) are losing ground as their incomes shrink compared to earlier decades. One reason behind declining wage potential, economists say: The caliber of jobs available in a recession, and their accompanying wages, tend to suffer. High-end firms hire fewer people and drive down salaries because jobs are in such demand. The National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE), an organization of career counselors, reports that employers will hire 22% fewer college graduates than last year.

If you are a recent college graduate, or you are preparing to graduate, take heart. Hard work, perseverance, strong thinking and decision-making skills and a commitment to your own competence is generally recession-proof. Here are some tips for turning this situation around from someone who got a job right out of college in the last bad recession:

1) Show a willingness to learn, to grow, to work hard and to do high quality work. To be credible you will need to share examples from school, work and community service that show exactly how you do this when you are interviewing for jobs.

2) Get internships which will attest to your business acumen and maturity. While many internships don’t pay, what you learn during an internship can be priceless and often lead to part-time or full-time work. Try on your career interests through seeing first-hand if you are cut out for what you think you love.

3) Develop a strong academic record complemented by leadership experiencee. You may not be at the top of the class, but if you work hard to learn all that you can and you get involved in activities to make a difference, you may be more valuable to an employer than the 4.0 student who isn’t as well-rounded. Show your employer that you are passionate and you know how to make a difference and provide specific examples.

4) Have a creative, determined and resourceful attitude which involves making a difference. If you are out of work right now and you have time on your hands, find a cause—any cause—that you value where your contributions can help. It could be reading to students, it could be teaching handicapped children to ski, it could be volunteering at an old folk’s home. Any of these activities—if your heart is in them—will make you a more valuable employee. When you interview, describe what you learned from this work, how it challenged you and how you grew. You may also get some valuable insight as to what you are called to do for your career.

If you are a graduate who really offers value, focuses on results and is a delight to work with you will have the strongest chance of landing a job as a starting point which can blossom into a career for you. Don’t worry if the job isn’t paying much, focus on what experience it provides to you so that when the economy turns around you will be ready to soar. Each experience is a stepping stone. You may need to work two jobs right now to make ends meet. You may have a lot less free time. But, when the economy turns around if you have worked hard in the tough times, you will have the resilience to do well when things are better. It is like storing up for the winter. And this is a good winter to store up with strong skills, more savings and good planning for the future.

ARTICLE
USA Today
by Dennis Cauchon

The incomes of the young and middle-aged — especially men — have fallen off a cliff since 2000, leaving many age groups poorer than they were even in the 1970s, a USA TODAY analysis of new Census data found.
People 54 or younger are losing ground financially at an unprecedented rate in this recession, widening a gap between young and old that had been expanding for years.

While the young have lost ground, older people have grown more prosperous over the years and the decades. Older women have done best of all.

To view entire article visit
http://bit.ly/2guuW6

CAROL’S SUMMARY:

Over the past 20 years, many bright minds were lured to careers in finance because of lucrative salaries, but when the bubble burst hundreds of thousands of employees had to search for other work and new graduates are looking elsewhere for careers. Today’s article from the Wall Street Journal describes a migration of workers drawn high money-making jobs to lower-paying ones that may more closely align with their personal values.  The health care and education fields are experienceing a surge of applications from laid-off finance professionals, and the recent downtown also appears to coincide with a rising interest in government and public service.  According to a Gallup poll conducted in April for the Partnership for Public Service, 40% of U.S. workers are open to considering federal careers, up from 24% in 2006.

This kind of adapatability is necessary in today’s global landscape;  where statistics from the BLS show that workers between the ages of 18 and 38 change jobs an average of 10 times.  Whether that number indicates a change in place of employment or career field, it is a big one.  If you’re rebounding from a lay off, here are tips that can help:

CAROL’S SUMMARY:
New occupations develop when employers need workers to do tasks that have never been done before. Based on employment forecasters and other educational and career experts, The Chronicle of Higher Education points to the following five new majors related to emerging career fields:
service science, health informatics, computational science, sustainability, and public health.

For students, these emerging careers offer a chance to be on the leading edge of their fields. For adults, a shift within their career field can be the path out of a slow-growth career and into work with a more promising future. According to Career Voyages, a website collaboration of the U.S. Department of Labor and U.S. Department of Education, these five areas of study fall into three growing industries:

1. Biotechnology: The areas of research and development, quality control and assurance, manufacturing and production, agriculture, and bioinformatics all offer in-demand occupations in biotechnology. In bioinformatics, one of the newest sectors, specialists organize and mine huge amounts of biomedical data, such as research related to the study of the human genome, clinical trials, or diseases.

2. Nanotechnology: This field includes research and development of practical commercial applications using particles of matter the size of atoms.

3. Geospatial technology: This emerging field encompasses photogrammetry, remote sensing, and geographic information systems (GIS). The most widely known application is the GPS (global positioning systems) that are familiar to many of us in our vehicles and cell phones.
Source: http://www.careerpath.com/career-advice/209482-emerging-career-fields

As cited in the article below: “Most of the interesting work today is done at the interstices of disciplines,” says Robert B. Reich, a former U.S. labor secretary and a professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley. While not all colleges and universities are offering these majors, most do offer courses in related subject areas. For example, in the field of service science, 250 colleges and universities in 50 countries offer courses, mostly for graduate students. Often these are specialties that build on more general experience within a career, like a move into a homeland security role for a police officer. On the other hand, some of these emerging careers creatively link together two or more fields of expertise, such as nursing and computer science. Here are questions to consider:

How might high school curricula need to change to better prepare students in these emerging career fields?

What steps can students take to analyze opportunities in these new areas and figure out which ones might be a good fit for their interests, gifts and talents?

To view the entire article visit
http://thechoice.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/01/experts-point-to-5-emerging-majors/

CAROL’S SUMMARY:

The article below outlines several myths surrounding public service and volunteerism that institutions of higher education often unwittingly reinforce.  President Barack Obama and his administration are seeking to debunk these myths by calling all Americans to serve their country.  The call is not misguided because often the best motivator for a lifespan of educational and career success is helping students connect their abilities and values to a cause they care about.   When students can envision how their academic and personal interests, as well as their abilities, can make a difference in the real world, they are more likely to persist with their educational and career goals. 

This is the premise behind the Tiger Woods Learning Centers (TWLC) in Anaheim, California.  On his podcast at http://www.twlc.org/message.html Tiger says, “This is certainly bigger than anything I’ve done on the golf course.  We want to help students understand what it takes to succeed and to understand career paths.  It’s exciting for all of us to see them this fired up about learning.” In her opening remarks at the ribbon cutting of the TWLC, Maria Shriver gave a commentary on her dad’s speech to his alma mater, Yale University, when he challenged graduates to “break the mirrors that make you only see yourself and prevent you from seeing the world outside yourself.” 

Helping students become self-directeed learners is one of the goals of  LifeBound’s text, Junior Guide to Senior Year Success:  Becoming a Global Citizen, where we’ve included stories about real-life “globe savers,” people who are using their gifts and talents to make the world a better place for all of us.  Most get ready for college books are all about applying and getting in.  Our approach is larger and impacts how the young adult develops as a person.   As an example of this kind of “social innovation,” consider an artist from Pittsburgh, Bill Stickland, who is implementing his entrepreneurial skills and applying them to social problems.  In 1996, he won the McArthur Fellowship “genius” award for economic development.  To read the Wall Street Journal interview with Mr. Strickland, visit  http://bit.ly/3KPDid

What kinds of programs help students gain a bigger perspective of the world and help them find an interest their passionate about?

How can we help students to discover more about themselves, their abilities and their future after high school?

What else can we do to help students relate what they learn in school to future careers?

 ARTICLE

Chronicle of Higher Education

By Paul C. Light

Barack Obama began his presidential campaign by promising to make public service “cool” again. He is now working to honor that pledge by strengthening three types of service: a day of volunteering now and again, a year or two with organizations such as AmeriCorps or Teach for America, and lifelong careers working in government or nonprofit agencies.

To view the entire article visit

http://chronicle.com/article/Busting-Higher-Educations/48280/

CAROL’S SUMMARY:

Within a philosophical context, the writer below explores the hazards of cyberspace on empathy, and the illustration that accompanies the text reveals the crux of Dr. Gorry’s essay:  Is digital technology taking the heart right out of us?  

Author of Born to Learn, Rita Smilkerstein, found in her research that all learning is linked to emotion, and among the digital generation we need to find ways to impart not only academic but social and emotional skills so that we engage both the mind and the heart of students.  This is the precise aim of LifeBound’s books, particularly our text, People Smarts for Teenagers:  Becoming Emotionally Intelligent, which has data-proven results to increase scholastic achievement while promoting qualities like empathy and motivation.

Dr. Gorry postulates that the virtual world has so permeated our conscious and unconscious selves that it might be making us numb to the “real suffering of others.”  The bombardment of so many problems worldwide can diffuse a sense of responsibility to actually do something about the plight of what we see and hear. 

The concept of friendship, for example, has enjoyed a renewed prominence via social networks that have emerged in the last few years, namely Facebook and MySpace.  This is born out of a universal human desire to connect to other people and is perhaps one of the noblest achievements of human culture.  It is in and through our friendships that we grow and develop as human beings.  We should be careful, therefore, never to trivialize the concept or the experience of genuine friendship. It would be sad if our desire to sustain and develop on-line friendships were to be at the cost of our availability to engage with our families, our neighbors and those we meet in the daily reality of our places of work, education and recreation.  Almost any parent of a teenager can give an account of the difficulty students have tuning out their iPods and cell phones and tuning in to their parents or siblings.  If the desire for virtual connectedness becomes obsessive, it may function to isolate individuals from real social interaction while also disrupting the patterns of rest and reflection that are necessary for healthy human development. Even more troubling, social sites have become a breeding ground for cyberbullying and have made it easier for pedophiles to access vulnerable adolescents. 

The digital world demands our attention in part by speeding up the pace of life, and the addictive nature of media multitasking takes away time and energy from something of far more value:  human interaction.  It’s the trap of emergency living, paying attention to the immediate rather than thinking more deeply about things like goals and the quality of our relationships and acting on those impulses to do something bigger than busyness.

Researchers at Stanford University released a report this summer regarding multitaskers of media activities like watching YouTube, writing e-mail and talking on the phone.  What they found is that they are not very good at any of their tasks.  After testing about 100 Stanford students, the scientists concluded that chronic media multitaskers have difficulty focusing and are not able to ignore irrelevant information.

At their best, teaching and learning aren’t purely academic pursuits; they are methods that promote a better planet.  New technologies have tremendous power for good in the world and can be put at the service of humanity to promote tolerance and understanding among communities, especially for those who are exploited.  Here then are serious questions to ponder:

How can we harness the power of technology to foster human interaction rather than compete with it?

What potential of the new technologies can be used to promote human understanding and solidarity, especially for those who are most disadvantaged and vulnerable in our world?

What can educators do to transfer technology in such a way that it fosters empathy rather than detracts from it?

ARTICLE

Chronicle of Higher Education

By G. Anthony Gorry

We live increasingly “on the screen,” deeply engaged with the patterns of light and energy upon which so much of modern life depends. At work we turn our backs to our coworkers, immersing ourselves in the flood of information engendered by countless computers. At the end of the workday, computers tag along with us in cellphones and music players. Still others, embedded in video displays, wait at home. They are all parts of an enormous electronic web woven on wires or only air.

To view the entire article visit

http://bit.ly/J6UrU