The Professor's Apprentice

#mentors #mentoring

Everybody needs:

A mentor about the same age as you

A mentor two to four years older than you

A mentor much more senior than you

What I know for sure is that all of the best mentors in my life have shown up unexpectedly. They each came into my life at the perfect time. In the beginning I was never aware of how badly I needed these dear guardians to show me my way. Now I understand what a gift their presence in my life has been. 

Some of my mentors have shown up as old friends, people with whom I share common interests, similar pathways, and a bit of history. These mentors validate my experience, they provide me with friendship, understanding, and compassion. They tell me I am not alone on my journey. Most importantly they remind me of who I have been in the past and who I am today.

Others walk a few steps in front of me. They are the ones who say "I've been there, and I've lived to tell about it". As they blaze new trails in hot pursuit of their passions, they lead me into blazing new pathways of my own. They understand my plight, my responsibility, and my fear, and they promise me I will make it to the other side of the rainbow. Most days I believe them.

And then there are a very special few who have become my most sacred and cherished guardians. These magical people have the power to accompany me each day, in mind, body, and spirit as I navigate myself through the world. These mentors have reached my core and have validated all that they see as being a part of me.

My purpose.

My connection.

My light. 

These mentors have rocked my world. They have given me special access, gotten me into top secret circles, and proven the impossible, possible. They have introduced, networked, and broke all the rules. Most inspiring of all they have risked, they have followed the white rabbit down the proverbial hole... twice. My greatest teachers. My allies. My Elders. My wise counsel. Each day they show me courage, love, kindness, and the stillness of patience. 

- Lindy Garneau, The Professor's Apprentice 

Working on my literature review today, comforted with hot and delicious loose leaf tea and a ziplock bag full of my favourite chocolate pieces. I started out my work today with a bit of an attitude - psychologically, mentally, and emotionally I am so very ready to be finished this body of work. However, I was reminded how much I love they way transformational learning (TL) connects effortlessly to other areas of knowing and study. Jack Mezirow (2009), the Father of TL writes about how TL is connected to Jungian Psychology. He writes,

"The content or process of formal learning evokes images realized through dialogue. In the course of this interaction, both content and ourselves are potentially transformed. Individuation is an ongoing psychic process. When entered into consciously and imaginatively, it provides a deepening awareness of the self, and expansion of one's consciousness, and an engendering of soul. We become more fully who we are, and we are more fully able to enter into the community of humans. In Jungian terms, this is transformation - the emergence of the self" (p.24).

To me this is an incredibly beautiful connection. 

- Lindy Garneau, The Professor's Apprentice 

I could have used a guide like this two years ago. I was researching student engagement in a PSE program I had been helping to co-build. For about a 6 week period my research colleague and I met with students over lunch and asked them about their first year experience. I took notes on our conversations and created lists of the main factors that kept coming up in each conversation. My colleague and I discussed and analysed these notes. From the analysis a report was written. The report helped us to better understand the students we serve, however the knowledge gained never went beyond us and the work we did together. Having a guide to follow as part of teaching and learning practices would have made a difference to our research project and the way it was performed and reported.

Going forward, I'm glad we now have a guide to help inform good research.

- Lindy Garneau, The Professor's Apprentice

Living into Transformation: Professional & Academic Coaching Services 

MAKE A WISH. MAKE IT HAPPEN.

www.lindygarneau.ca

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This fall Nipissing University is providing all first-year business students with an iPad. Also getting an iPad are students enrolled in the Criminal Justice program and the Nursing program as part of a new pilot project.

Why is this seriously cool?

Using iPads opens up a range of new opportunities, including reading electronic textbooks, taking electronic lecture notes, and completing tests electronically, which reduces the cost of books and supplies for students and significantly reduces paper usage, helping the environment. In addition, the School of Business has been working with Nipissing’s Centre for Flexible Teaching and Learning, and University Technology Services to identify teaching strategies and applications (apps) that will yield measurable benefits for students and instructors. One useful app that was identified is Evernote, which allows students to create notebooks from a variety of online sources including text, photos, videos and audio recordings. The DocAs app, which allows for more advanced note taking, like PDF annotation and audio, as well as wireless printing is another promising app for the iLearn project.

- News Room, Nipissing U

I can't help but wonder how having an iPad back when I was completing my undergrad would have impacted me. Back then most people didn't even have cell phones. Today technology rules the world, and apparently now, the classroom too. 

It kind of makes me want to go out and buy an iPad 3. No - I will wait till the iPad 4 comes out.

Grace Mahoney on academic procrastination.

#education #teaching #learning #highereducation #academia

RULE ONE: Find a place you trust, and then try trusting it for awhile.

RULE TWO: General duties of a student — pull everything out of your teacher; pull everything out of your fellow students.

RULE THREE: General duties of a teacher — pull everything out of your students.

RULE FOUR: Consider everything an experiment.

RULE FIVE: Be self-disciplined — this means finding someone wise or smart and choosing to follow them. To be disciplined is to follow in a good way. To be self-disciplined is to follow in a better way.

RULE SIX: Nothing is a mistake. There’s no win and no fail, there’s only make.

RULE SEVEN: The only rule is work. If you work it will lead to something. It’s the people who do all of the work all of the time who eventually catch on to things.

RULE EIGHT: Don’t try to create and analyze at the same time. They’re different processes.

RULE NINE: Be happy whenever you can manage it. Enjoy yourself. It’s lighter than you think.

RULE TEN: “We’re breaking all the rules. Even our own rules. And how do we do that? By leaving plenty of room for X quantities.” (John Cage)

Here are some of the highlights:

1. Take a deep breath, rise to the challenge, and know that every college student has been just as terrified during that first week. 

2. Make notes about questions the material prompts. If you don’t have any questions, you haven’t read carefully enough. Your teacher is striving to make himself understood, but it’s rare that everyone in the class understands their new teacher’s words through and through.

3. Right from the start, try to see your teacher as an ally in your work, not an adversary.

4. Make sure to get a syllabus for each course that fully details course expectations and grading policies. Also, make certain you thoroughly read every syllabus and ask professors to clarify any part of the syllabus/class requirements you do not understand. Keep each syllabus in a safe/easy to reach place.

Dalai Lama

This one is for all the students who are counting down the weeks until college or university begins. Your life will change. It will open up. Think big. You have the ability to completely rock the world. I wish you an amazing and transformational journey :)

In the future the most successful people will not be found in the established business companies of today. Technology is changing so fast that within five years the top jobs of today will be obsolete. Upstart, a company that in exchange for a percentage of future profits will financially-back the entrepreneurial projects of university graduates, recognizes this shift in the world of work and is helping to create opportunities for graduates to build their own companies. Upstart is an example of how society is moving towards creativity and innovation as the new standard in the business world of the future over the cookie cutter jobs of yesterday. By making entrepreneurship a real financial possibility for graduates Upstart has the ability to transform the way graduates look for work post-graduation, from job hunting into business creating.