A couple of years ago I was talking with a friend my age about our primary and secondary school experience as he was lamenting the sorry state of American education. I reminded him that we were pupils during the absolute pinnacle of public education for many reasons, but one of them was gender discrimination. When we were in school we had a premier crop of women teachers: in the 1950s school teaching was just about the best job an educated woman could get.
I had this confirmed today while listening to Superfreakonomics*. In 1960 40% of schoolteachers scored in the top 20% of standardized aptitude tests. Today that is well under 20% and the percent in the bottom 20% has doubled since 1960.
As the authors comment, American education has suffered a major brain drain as women have departed for other professions. The reason is partly that education is not every woman’s cup of tea for all women, but it is primarily that teachers’ pay has declined relative to many other professions. The authors do not mention (as my teacher friends know well) that the community and parental support for teaching and the honor accorded teachers have also declined steeply over that period.
Interestingly, in a later section the authors point out that a very careful study of the male/female salary differential in the financial industry showed that the major factor was that the women MBAs like kids. They take more time from their working years and they are less willing to work long hours than men. The salary differential between men and unmarried women with children (after correcting for educational differences and years experience) is well under 5%. Thus, more talented women could probably be attracted back to teaching without having to match 100% of other professional salaries.
So give a few moments for warm thoughts of those women (and men) who followed their passion, and not just their economic advantage, to put up with the likes of us and for those in later student generations who have done the same. As the bumper sticker says, “If you can read this, thank a teacher.”
* If you think you understand the world, this book and its best-selling predecessor, Freakonomics, will quickly disabuse you of the notion.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
A friend remembered
Some time ago I reserved a spot on Blogger for this weblog, but it has been exceedingly hard to find time to devote to it. My daughter in Oregon, Annette, has been pushing me to get something written. I am sorry to admit that it took the death of one of my dearest friends, Carl Hatlelid, to impel me to put pen to paper, but it is here for all to see. I will miss you, Carl; you were one of the early guides who helped awaken the suspicion that there is more to life than meets the eye, if only we can push hard enough and look hard enough to see beyond our present circumstance.
Carl Martin Hatlelid (1943-2010).
(This is an expanded version of brief remarks I made at Carl’s memorial service at First Presbyterian Church, Ponca City, Oklahoma, February 15, 2010.)
I know as a biologist and as a parent and grandparent that many things shape what we become in life: our genes and their epigenetic modification, our life experiences, especially our family, friends, associates, and also our own choices in life. I can say with certainty that I am what I am today in part because of my friendship with Carl Hatlelid. Three things define his impact most fully: he was a formative friend, a congenial competitor, and an enthusiastic encourager.
Formative Friend
Carl and I met at Jefferson Elementary School here in Ponca City and we were in school togethr through our senior year in high school. [This has not been an easy year for Jefferson alumni, for both Dennis Kinkaid and Sam Wheeler have also died in the last nine months.]
Carl and I were in class together, performed together, were in the band together, and even double-dated together. We lived only a few blocks apart and even after graduation I would bask in warm visits to the Hatlelid home. Carl was as supportive a friend as one could wish for, and no disagreement was ever large enough to drive us apart.
Congenial Competitor
But while I had many friends, I had no other single competitor who challenged me as consistently and over such a long time as Carl did. He was always striving to do his best, and it challenged me to stay up. I remember well the time in grade school when Carl and I chose to read the same book during the library period, and Ms. Patterson, the Jefferson librarian, sat us down next to each other and we flew through the pages, each trying to be the first to reach the bottom and turn the page. In the fourth grade Ms. Parsons offered a book prize to the student who could finish the most books over the school year by reading during our in-class free time. When she tallied the results at the end of the year, she had to award two prizes, because between us Carl and I had read almost as many as the rest of the class.
Carl’s superb academic skills and his drive to excel meant that the pressure was never off during our years together; yet it was always felt as challenge and never as threat. It never reduced our friendship to alienation.
Enthusiastic Encourager
And, I am sure that a good part of that is because Carl was always encouraging those around him to excel. Charlie Parks noted on the class Facebook™ page that when Carl got into the Po-Hi band, Pete Long tried to make him lose the high-stepping marching style he had, and Carl could just never tone it down. I suspect that may be why Mr. Long solved the problem by making Carl Drum Major.
I have with me in my pocket a German U-boat periscope prism. It was given to me by Josephine Plunkett*, our ninth grade algebra teacher when I visited her at the time of the Cherokee Strip Centennial in September, 1993. She gave it to me because, although she had had it for years, only Carl and I had ever made any particular use of it. I don’t know whose idea it was (and it really doesn’t matter), but Carl and I put up a sheet of wrapping paper across her back blackboard and for several weeks we came in during lunch at about the same time each day and marked the daily progress of the stationary periscope’s spectrum cast across the paper. We got no extra credit for it, but we did it anyway and both Ms. Plunkett and I remembered it 35 years later.
Carl continued our friendship well after our graduation. He visited me twice in Cambridge, Mass., during his Air Force Academy days, once in our junior year, then – much to my surprise and delight – he showed up for my wedding without any prior notice!
My folks moved away from Ponca City in 1966, so there was no logical meeting ground for several years. We were delighted to have Carl and Kathie near us in Houston when I was at Texas A&M, and to meet them at Disneyland when they were moved to the Los Angeles area.
When Carl came back to Oklahoma for his last Air Force assignment as head of engineering at Tinker AFB, we were able to see him a little more frequently since by then my dad had moved my mother back to a nursing home in Guthrie.
As I said, though, I would not be what I am today without Carl, and that extends even to the job I hold. For twenty years I have been President of the nonprofit Environmental Management Institute, a hazardous materials training organization based in Indianapolis. I had to found the Institute in a great hurry in 1990 because the board of the larger nonprofit I had been employed by had discovered belatedly that the Executive Director had mismanaged its affairs so badly that he had turned a seven million dollar endowment into a million dollars in only seven years. The place imploded and I needed to take my training activity elsewhere. Carl and Kathie generously came forward with two other couples and loaned us money to provide a cash reservoir to get us through the first few difficult years.
Everyone should have such a friend, but many – perhaps even most – don’t. Anyone who has known Agnes and Bert Hatlelid and their other fine children will not be surprised at the kind of person Carl was, but his wholehearted pursuit of his destiny was clearly his own. I am very grateful for the life of Carl Martin Hatlelid.
*On the campus of University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond there is a small amphitheater dedicated to the memory of Josephine and her sister Emma (?). Both were teachers and neither one married. Josephine took care of her mother in Ponca City and each summer the three of them would go to a small lake in Canada to relax and read and talk.
On the plaque there is a quotation from Emma, who was a physical education professor at what was then Central State College. It says that each year she would begin class by stating “My name is Emma Plunkett, and I will not be associated with mediocrity.” I thought of that while reading Carl’s obituary; fortunately, though, while Carl demanded excellence of himself, he allowed for the weaknesses of others.
Carl Martin Hatlelid (1943-2010).
(This is an expanded version of brief remarks I made at Carl’s memorial service at First Presbyterian Church, Ponca City, Oklahoma, February 15, 2010.)
I know as a biologist and as a parent and grandparent that many things shape what we become in life: our genes and their epigenetic modification, our life experiences, especially our family, friends, associates, and also our own choices in life. I can say with certainty that I am what I am today in part because of my friendship with Carl Hatlelid. Three things define his impact most fully: he was a formative friend, a congenial competitor, and an enthusiastic encourager.
Formative Friend
Carl and I met at Jefferson Elementary School here in Ponca City and we were in school togethr through our senior year in high school. [This has not been an easy year for Jefferson alumni, for both Dennis Kinkaid and Sam Wheeler have also died in the last nine months.]
Carl and I were in class together, performed together, were in the band together, and even double-dated together. We lived only a few blocks apart and even after graduation I would bask in warm visits to the Hatlelid home. Carl was as supportive a friend as one could wish for, and no disagreement was ever large enough to drive us apart.
Congenial Competitor
But while I had many friends, I had no other single competitor who challenged me as consistently and over such a long time as Carl did. He was always striving to do his best, and it challenged me to stay up. I remember well the time in grade school when Carl and I chose to read the same book during the library period, and Ms. Patterson, the Jefferson librarian, sat us down next to each other and we flew through the pages, each trying to be the first to reach the bottom and turn the page. In the fourth grade Ms. Parsons offered a book prize to the student who could finish the most books over the school year by reading during our in-class free time. When she tallied the results at the end of the year, she had to award two prizes, because between us Carl and I had read almost as many as the rest of the class.
Carl’s superb academic skills and his drive to excel meant that the pressure was never off during our years together; yet it was always felt as challenge and never as threat. It never reduced our friendship to alienation.
Enthusiastic Encourager
And, I am sure that a good part of that is because Carl was always encouraging those around him to excel. Charlie Parks noted on the class Facebook™ page that when Carl got into the Po-Hi band, Pete Long tried to make him lose the high-stepping marching style he had, and Carl could just never tone it down. I suspect that may be why Mr. Long solved the problem by making Carl Drum Major.
I have with me in my pocket a German U-boat periscope prism. It was given to me by Josephine Plunkett*, our ninth grade algebra teacher when I visited her at the time of the Cherokee Strip Centennial in September, 1993. She gave it to me because, although she had had it for years, only Carl and I had ever made any particular use of it. I don’t know whose idea it was (and it really doesn’t matter), but Carl and I put up a sheet of wrapping paper across her back blackboard and for several weeks we came in during lunch at about the same time each day and marked the daily progress of the stationary periscope’s spectrum cast across the paper. We got no extra credit for it, but we did it anyway and both Ms. Plunkett and I remembered it 35 years later.
Carl continued our friendship well after our graduation. He visited me twice in Cambridge, Mass., during his Air Force Academy days, once in our junior year, then – much to my surprise and delight – he showed up for my wedding without any prior notice!
My folks moved away from Ponca City in 1966, so there was no logical meeting ground for several years. We were delighted to have Carl and Kathie near us in Houston when I was at Texas A&M, and to meet them at Disneyland when they were moved to the Los Angeles area.
When Carl came back to Oklahoma for his last Air Force assignment as head of engineering at Tinker AFB, we were able to see him a little more frequently since by then my dad had moved my mother back to a nursing home in Guthrie.
As I said, though, I would not be what I am today without Carl, and that extends even to the job I hold. For twenty years I have been President of the nonprofit Environmental Management Institute, a hazardous materials training organization based in Indianapolis. I had to found the Institute in a great hurry in 1990 because the board of the larger nonprofit I had been employed by had discovered belatedly that the Executive Director had mismanaged its affairs so badly that he had turned a seven million dollar endowment into a million dollars in only seven years. The place imploded and I needed to take my training activity elsewhere. Carl and Kathie generously came forward with two other couples and loaned us money to provide a cash reservoir to get us through the first few difficult years.
Everyone should have such a friend, but many – perhaps even most – don’t. Anyone who has known Agnes and Bert Hatlelid and their other fine children will not be surprised at the kind of person Carl was, but his wholehearted pursuit of his destiny was clearly his own. I am very grateful for the life of Carl Martin Hatlelid.
*On the campus of University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond there is a small amphitheater dedicated to the memory of Josephine and her sister Emma (?). Both were teachers and neither one married. Josephine took care of her mother in Ponca City and each summer the three of them would go to a small lake in Canada to relax and read and talk.
On the plaque there is a quotation from Emma, who was a physical education professor at what was then Central State College. It says that each year she would begin class by stating “My name is Emma Plunkett, and I will not be associated with mediocrity.” I thought of that while reading Carl’s obituary; fortunately, though, while Carl demanded excellence of himself, he allowed for the weaknesses of others.
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