I had something of a brainstorm the other day. Looking ahead, I thought about what I might want to do later, in 20 years, at a point when I might want to stop working full time. I’ve seen ads for college and business school teachers, and I think that might be fun.
I’ll have the experience, no doubt about that. But I’ll need the degree. I have part of an MBA under my belt, but never finished. Every time I got involved in a program I either got sent to an out-of-town long term assignment or had to change priorities due to something my ex needed or wanted. This was before the age of the Internet and online classes at reputable schools. In recent years most of my continuing education has focused on keeping up with the skills required to maintain my professional certification: new technologies and project management.
This new idea has me thinking again about a degree program. I’ve just started looking; my MBA work is so old there’s probably not much advantage from that standpoint in continuing it over pursuing some other degree if I find something else I’m really interested in studying. But last week in the library while looking for something new to listen to on a trip, I ran across Ahead of the Curve: Two Years at Harvard Business School by Phillip Delves Broughton, unabridged. Whatever degree I get will be from a Chicago-area school, but this sounded interesting, and maybe it would help me figure out whether an MBA is what I want to pursue.
I don’t think it is. Not a Harvard MBA, at least. I have no interest in being an investment banker or hedge fund manager, nor the kind of consultant described in the book. I have many years of successful consulting experience already and have never once treated (or cheated) a client in the fashion described. I would be interested in understanding some areas better than I do, and the case approach sounds interesting, but I absolutely don’t want to be part of the elite, arrogant, snobbish world of the Harvard Business School graduates.
The thing is, business is what I might like to teach, from a different perspective. I’d like to teach what I know: troubleshooting, problem solving, building and motivating teams, project management, using technology as a tool to support business. I’m not done with the recording yet, so maybe the program will redeem itself in my eyes, but so far even the descriptions of leadership coursework doesn’t sound like leadership to me.
The book is fascinating, and I’ll finish it. Maybe I’ll feel better when it’s done. Stay tuned.
Monday, May 10, 2010
Sunday, May 2, 2010
SB1070 is wrong
The news lately has of course been full of the new Arizona Law SB1070 (and its hastily-passed modification, HB2162). It makes it a state crime for an alien to be in Arizona without proper documentation and requires police to determine the immigration status of anyone if there is “reasonable suspicion” that s/he is an alien. It does not appear that “reasonable suspicion” is defined. It also says someone who cannot prove s/he is here legally can be arrested, and if arrested the person will be detained until the federal government can confirm the person’s status. It does not seem to put any kind of time frame on this confirmation.
I have friends and relatives who have publicly voiced their support for this law. I also have friends who have publicly voiced their protest, on the grounds that illegal aliens should not be pursued. I believe both are wrong.
I don’t know if anybody else stands on this where I do. I suppose there must be other people in the middle somewhere, but I usually feel very alone. I don’t like this law, but not because I think it’s OK to enter this country illegally. What bothers me about this law is that I think it will be used to inconvenience and harass many people who belong here because they look Hispanic or because they are heard speaking some other language than English.
It happens that I carry my Voter’s Registration Card in my wallet, because it’s easier to do that than try to figure out what I did with it when it is time to vote. So, if I were stopped in my car for a broken taillight and the cop happened to say “By the way, can you prove you are in this country legally?”, I could do it. But I don’t carry my wallet when I walk the dog or ride my bike. If I were to be stopped by the police for running a stop sign on my bike (which I do all the time if there’s no automobile traffic approaching the intersection; at 10mph or less it’s very easy to see the situation in plenty of time to make the decision), I wouldn’t be able to prove anything at all. Let me tell you, I’d become pretty irate if I got hauled off to jail for not being able to prove my identity. There is no law requiring citizens to be able to prove they are citizens except when they are entering or leaving the country.
Of course, it’s not likely anyone would suspect me of being something other than a U.S. citizen. I look like the mish-mash of Anglo-Saxon and Eastern European that I am, and my accent is more or less Midwestern – that is, to a policeman’s ear here in ChicagoLand I wouldn’t have one. That doesn’t prove I’m a citizen, by the way, it just more or less eliminates the thought coming into anyone’s head that I might not be. That’s the problem: what on earth would constitute reasonable suspicion someone is an alien? The answer CANNOT be that s/he looks or sounds Latina/o.
My father and both his parents were born in this country, American citizens from the moment their baby lungs took in air. But Dad spoke only Polish until he was six years old. I don’t know how old my grandparents were when they learned English, but you could always hear slight differences in how they pronounced some things as compared to people who only spoke American English. There are still Polish-American communities in the Chicago area where that happens. I had dinner with friends last week in a restaurant where a large table full of happy celebrants spoke only Polish, and I would be willing to bet every one of those folks was born in or near Chicago. Similarly, there are lots of Hispanic communities here and in many other places, including Arizona, where Spanish is spoken pretty much exclusively in every home.
We need immigration laws that make sense. They need to be clear and they need to have the teeth to remove people who are not legally here. They need to make the process for legally immigrating reasonable. There needs to be a good guest worker program, so that jobs Americans can't or won't fill can be filled by people who want the work, and those people need to be protected, paid adequately, and treated properly and with dignity while they are here. The laws also need to have some compassion and there needs to be some room to consider individual cases: people who were brought here illegally as babies or toddlers, for example, should not be deported to a country they don’t remember and know little about. And no matter what else it does, I am strongly against any law that hassles American citizens.
The percentage of white Anglo/European people in the United States is currently a little over 65%. Still a majority, but this means that there are more than 100 Million people -- let me say this again: MORE THAN ONE HUNDRED MILLION PEOPLE -- who are something else. Last I checked it does not make them any less American than I am. Any law addressing illegal immigrants must not touch them any more than it touches me.
I have friends and relatives who have publicly voiced their support for this law. I also have friends who have publicly voiced their protest, on the grounds that illegal aliens should not be pursued. I believe both are wrong.
I don’t know if anybody else stands on this where I do. I suppose there must be other people in the middle somewhere, but I usually feel very alone. I don’t like this law, but not because I think it’s OK to enter this country illegally. What bothers me about this law is that I think it will be used to inconvenience and harass many people who belong here because they look Hispanic or because they are heard speaking some other language than English.
It happens that I carry my Voter’s Registration Card in my wallet, because it’s easier to do that than try to figure out what I did with it when it is time to vote. So, if I were stopped in my car for a broken taillight and the cop happened to say “By the way, can you prove you are in this country legally?”, I could do it. But I don’t carry my wallet when I walk the dog or ride my bike. If I were to be stopped by the police for running a stop sign on my bike (which I do all the time if there’s no automobile traffic approaching the intersection; at 10mph or less it’s very easy to see the situation in plenty of time to make the decision), I wouldn’t be able to prove anything at all. Let me tell you, I’d become pretty irate if I got hauled off to jail for not being able to prove my identity. There is no law requiring citizens to be able to prove they are citizens except when they are entering or leaving the country.
Of course, it’s not likely anyone would suspect me of being something other than a U.S. citizen. I look like the mish-mash of Anglo-Saxon and Eastern European that I am, and my accent is more or less Midwestern – that is, to a policeman’s ear here in ChicagoLand I wouldn’t have one. That doesn’t prove I’m a citizen, by the way, it just more or less eliminates the thought coming into anyone’s head that I might not be. That’s the problem: what on earth would constitute reasonable suspicion someone is an alien? The answer CANNOT be that s/he looks or sounds Latina/o.
My father and both his parents were born in this country, American citizens from the moment their baby lungs took in air. But Dad spoke only Polish until he was six years old. I don’t know how old my grandparents were when they learned English, but you could always hear slight differences in how they pronounced some things as compared to people who only spoke American English. There are still Polish-American communities in the Chicago area where that happens. I had dinner with friends last week in a restaurant where a large table full of happy celebrants spoke only Polish, and I would be willing to bet every one of those folks was born in or near Chicago. Similarly, there are lots of Hispanic communities here and in many other places, including Arizona, where Spanish is spoken pretty much exclusively in every home.
We need immigration laws that make sense. They need to be clear and they need to have the teeth to remove people who are not legally here. They need to make the process for legally immigrating reasonable. There needs to be a good guest worker program, so that jobs Americans can't or won't fill can be filled by people who want the work, and those people need to be protected, paid adequately, and treated properly and with dignity while they are here. The laws also need to have some compassion and there needs to be some room to consider individual cases: people who were brought here illegally as babies or toddlers, for example, should not be deported to a country they don’t remember and know little about. And no matter what else it does, I am strongly against any law that hassles American citizens.
The percentage of white Anglo/European people in the United States is currently a little over 65%. Still a majority, but this means that there are more than 100 Million people -- let me say this again: MORE THAN ONE HUNDRED MILLION PEOPLE -- who are something else. Last I checked it does not make them any less American than I am. Any law addressing illegal immigrants must not touch them any more than it touches me.
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