Experiencing the Triple Crown

With the end of the spring semester, we have three events for our Adult Degree Program students that are wonderful reminders of “why we do what we do” as professional continuing educators.  Once again, I’m borrowing from my colleague Roger Whittaker with the phrase he used as president of UPCEA in asking and answering the question “why we do what we do.”  I don’t know about the rest of my colleagues, but it is always wonderful to have events that remind me of the significance of our work.

Back to the Triple Crown (or staying with the racing theme, we could call it the trifecta), the three events we have are the Senior Banquet, the Senior Project Forum, and then the big event, Commencement.

Our Senior Banquet is an event where we invite current students, alumni, faculty and others who support our students in the Adult Degree Program.  At the banquet we recognize our outstanding students and faculty advisors.  One of the students we recognized this year started college at a different institution down a completely different track, graduated and didn’t find her work fulfilling.  A few jobs later she found her passion and she was able to use the flexibility of the Adult Degree Program to complete her second degree. Now she is only an internship away from fulfilling her dream.  Her story and her passion are my reminder of why we do what we do.

We also recognized this year’s outstanding advisor, as nominated by the students.  This year our outstanding advisor was described by his advisee as someone who was always there for her, going the extra mile to provide encouragement and direction.  She indicated that without his encouragement she may not have completed her degree.  Think about this: the difference between completing a degree and not completing a degree was the willingness of one individual to make a difference.  This advisor was the difference between reaching a dream and not finishing the degree.  In every interaction we have with our students, we have the opportunity to provide the encouragement needed to make their dream come true.  That’s why we do what we do.

The next jewel in our Triple Crown is our Senior Project Forum, where our soon-to-be graduates present their interdisciplinary capstone project, which is directed by a faculty advisor. This is one of my favorite events because I have the opportunity to hear about a large variety of projects, from lessons plans for kindergarten students to exploring how to modify college students’ eating habits.  The night is a celebration and recognition of not only the students, but also the fact that it takes a group effort for our students to complete their degree.  We have mothers, fathers, spouses, partners, children, friends, and faculty attend this event.  And I love to see the pride each has in their student.

Almost to a person, the students are a bit nervous as they begin their presentation but then the passion for their topic begins to come through. It’s wonderful to witness this passion and watch as they just can’t wait to tell you what they’ve learned and how they intend use this in their careers.  One of JMU’s points of pride is the access all undergraduates have in doing research with our faculty.  With the Senior Project Forum and the collaboration of students with faculty, we add to this point of pride.  Listening to our students’ presentations, it does remind me of why we do what we do.

Finally, the last jewel in this Triple Crown is the main event itself, Commencement.  I’ve been going to commencements for nearly 30 years, and for most of that time, I’ve watched students receive their handshake and congratulations from the president.  Since I came to JMU, where we hold separate graduation ceremonies for each college, I’ve had the pleasure of being the one on the stage giving them their ceremonial degree. And heck I don’t shake hands, I give them a hug for their accomplishment.  Some of my colleagues dread commencement, but I love it.  It is one of the few places where so many people are so happy and dare I say relieved.

There are two stories I was reminded of while watching our graduates.  One of our graduates works for JMU as a police officer, and while he has been to many commencements directing traffic, he reminded me that this is the first one where he wasn’t working and that this time he was getting his degree.  Another student told me that his wife graduated from JMU a couple of years ago and she told him that the number one item on his “honey do list” was to finish his degree.  He can now take that off the list.  (Although I did ask him when he plans to start on his master’s degree.)

At the end of the commencement ceremony, our Adult Degree Program Students turned to the audience and shouted out thanks to their friends and families, and then all of a sudden they shared spontaneous high fives.  Yes, that is why we do what we do.

Congratulations and thanks to our 2013 Adult Degree Program graduates.

Character Strengths of a Leader

I had one of those events that as a leader you hope will never happen.  What happened was that I simply missed the point of why a colleague wanted to meet with me, and the message I sent was “I don’t really care about your idea.”  The worst part is that I would have gone merrily on my way if it hadn’t been for a chance meeting at a celebration lunch for leaders in our non-profit community where I was serving on a panel to discuss BOLD leadership.  Imagine that, I had one of my best lessons in bad leadership while trying to provide insights into successful leadership.

The best news is that this story has a happy ending. After recognizing I had missed the boat, I quickly called a meeting and now the train is back on track.  As is one of my great weaknesses, I ruminated about this situation, asking myself how did it happen, how did I miss the point of the conversation, how could I have been so oblivious, and what was I thinking, or in this case not thinking.

As I was in mid-rumination, I received an email from a friend with a study done by the Center for Creative Leadership titled “The irony of integrity: A study of the character strengths of leaders.”  Some people say that there is no such thing as coincidence and in this case, the content of the study was just what I needed as I replayed what went wrong.  The article provided a great context for me to sharpen my saw, as Covey reminds us, in thinking about leadership.

The study begins with pictures of and listing of some of the great ethical scandals that have taken place recently, from Ken Lay to Bernie Madoff, emphasizing these as examples of character flaws.  Their research, however, was looking at the importance of character strengths in the performance of leaders in organizations.  The character strengths they highlighted are integrity, bravery, perspective, and social intelligence.

Integrity

For me as a leader and as a person, the overriding principle begins with integrity.  The authors put it simply, integrity is walking the talk.  Integrity means “being consistent, honest, moral, and trustworthy.” One of the characteristics with integrity is striving for transparency.  Practicing transparency in our decision making is possibly one of the most difficult challenges we face as leaders.  And I’ve learned (sometimes I’ve learned this one the hard way by making mistakes) that the best way to build trust is to strive for transparency.

Bravery

The authors remind us that it is “lonely at the top” or it is lonely in the office where the buck stops.  The authors talk about bravery in leadership when we provide the “lead on unpopular but necessary actions.”  Bravery is also being able to make the tough decisions about what to fund and what not to fund.  Bravery is making the decision for the common good even though it doesn’t benefit ourselves or our organizations.  Bravery is recognizing when you’ve become the problem rather than the solution and having the courage to say, I am wrong.

Perspective

As one of my mentors would say, we need to pay attention to what is coming around the curve even though we just can’t quite see it right now.  Leaders must have perspective, an understanding of the environment, so they can “make decisions that position the organization for long term success.”  I think perspective is an ability to step back, an ability “to go to the balcony” so that you can take the emotions out of decision making.  Leaders also need to “keep perspective” and to help others to that as well.  Keeping perspective means modeling that yes, we know we have a job to do, and the job is important, but that family comes first.

Social Intelligence

Social intelligence is being aware of others’ feelings, what makes people tick, having “the agility to adapt your behavior to what the situation dictates.”   Social intelligence is treating others as you would like to be treated; it is treating others with respect and honoring the gifts they bring to accomplishing our mission.  Those who flunk the social intelligence test are the folks who treat your staff rudely but are all sugar when they meet with you.

The authors go on to look at which of these character strengths are most important for what they call C-Suite leaders as compared to middle managers.  Suffice it to say that successful leaders embrace all four character strengths and that we find the time for professional development that enhances each of the strengths.

When I first started Shaeffer’s Forays, I indicated that I would use this blog as a way for me to think things through. It’s like Jimmy Buffett’s song “When the coast is clear” – this post is an opportunity to say “hello, mister other me.”  Thanks for letting me have this chat with myself when the coast is clear.

 

 

 

 

 

 

How do we work together and repair an ailing society?–James Madison University: Citizens Forum

How do we work together and repair an ailing society?

James Madison University: Citizens Forum

March 11, 2013

 This week James Madison University is celebrating the inauguration of our sixth president, Mr. Jonathan Alger.  As with any inauguration, there have been multiple activities celebrating JMU and Mr. Alger. To kick off the week, we had a community forum called the “Citizenship Forum,” where three speakers addressed the question: “How do we work together and repair an ailing society?” Each speaker took a different perspective on the question: community engagement, civic engagement, and promoting ethical decision making.

I was asked to address this question from the perspective community engagement, specifically what is the role of a community engaged institution to enhance how we can work together in addressing the issues facing society. I touched on five items: the recent history of engagement (celebrating the 150^th anniversary of the Morrill Act); the definition of community engagement; the question of why do we engage; the question of what community engagement looks like at JMU; and finally how does community engagement assist in helping us work together and take on the challenges facing society?

There are a couple of very cool things about this topic and the other activities going on at this week. The first is that the week and the activities have been built around the importance President Alger has placed on our institution being engaged. And second, these activities are in line with what President Alger sees as our mission of becoming the model of an engaged university.

Recent History:

It seems more than fitting that we should be addressing the question of community engagement so close to the 150^th celebration of the Morrill Act.  In terms of recent history of promoting community engagement in higher education, the Morrill Act, which was put forward by Justin Smith Morrill of Vermont and signed by President Lincoln, is a significant milestone.  What Morrill envisioned was to have a “college in every state upon a sure and perpetual foundation, accessible to all, but especially to the sons of toil.” (Morrill Act, 1862) Two very important pieces of this statement are that these institutions were intended to be accessible to the community, therefore engaging the community.  And second, it charges these institutions to reach out to the community and to especially reach out to those who may not be served, in this case the “sons/daughters of toil.”

Directly related to community engagement, Morrill and Lincoln felt that the Morrill Act established what they called Democracy’s Colleges.  As Nancy Cantor, chancellor and president of Syracuse University, indicated, for the “post-civil war America’s prosperity, these institutions would barn-raise with their communities to create innovation and spread educational opportunity.”

(http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nancy-cantor/college-identity-crisis_b_1858171.html)

The metaphor of “barn-raising” is a very powerful metaphor when we think about institutions of higher education being community engaged.  What is a barn-raising? It is the collective action of a community, in which a barn for one is assembled collectively by members of the community. Our institutions by being community engaged, by being a Democracy College, works with the community for the common good of all.

Definition of Community Engagement:

Now what does this all this talk about barn-raising have to do with being community engaged institution?  In 2010, James Madison University joined a limited number of higher education institutions as being classified as a Carnegie Community Engaged Institution.  Carnegie defines community engagement as the collaboration between higher education institutions and their larger communities (local, regional/state, national, global) for the mutually beneficial exchange of knowledge and resources in a context of partnership and reciprocity.  There are three very important concepts in this definition that differentiate simply doing something “to” or “for” a community to moving to engaging “with” a community.  The first concept is that we must have a mutually beneficial exchange of resources where as partners we not only recognize but honor the expertise and knowledge each partner brings to the table.  Secondly, it must be a partnership, that is the exchange must be of joint interest for all partners.  Finally, we have the concept of reciprocity, the activity must be reciprocal and to the equal and mutual benefit of all parties.

Why do we engage?

A major reason we provide opportunities for community engagement is to enhance the learning of our students.  The Kellogg Foundation recognized the importance of providing community engagement opportunities for our students in their report Returning to Our Roots, suggesting that one of the best ways to prepare students for the challenges life will place before them lies in integrating the community with their academic experiences.

Another reason we engage is because our joint success is interweaved.   E. Gordon Gee, president of Ohio State University said it well: we engage our community because we understand that the health and wellbeing of one affects the other, our success and survival depends on creating new collaborations with our cities, our neighborhoods, our businesses, and our universities. (E. Gordon Gee, remarks at the National Outreach Scholarship Conference, Monday, Sep. 28, 2009, Journal of Higher Education Outreach and Engagement, 2010, (14) 3, p. 5-12.)

Finally, as a public institution we engage our community, I believe because we have a moral obligation to share our knowledge and expertise for the good of all.

What does engagement look like at JMU?

Community engagement takes place in many ways on our campus. We have community engagement that takes place as part of academic courses; we have community engagement that is outside of coursework; and we have community engagement activities done by the numerous student, staff, and faculty organizations. All are designed to improve the quality of life of our off-campus community residents.  In addition, we engaged our community in providing to the access to the promise of education with multiple off-campus credit and noncredit programs.

To give you some feel for the amount of community engagement at JMU, in the application to the President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll, our Office of Community Service-Learning reported that along with academic departments they worked with 80 community agency partners and placed 1,500 students as part of 50 service-learning courses.  In addition, they offered 45 Alternative Break service trips.

How does community engagement assist in helping us work together on the challenges facing society?  In thinking about this question, it is similar to what Nancy Cantor suggests, that higher education may be at an existential crisis. Do we work around the edges of solving some of the problems of the run-away train of higher education? Or do we transform our universities into democracy universities.

Resilience Leads to Sustainability

Greetings from Washington DC, I am attending the National Council for Science and the Environment’s annual meeting titled Disasters and Environment: Science, Preparedness, and Resilience.

So why in the heck is Shaeffer attending this meeting? After all, we know I’m not an environmental scientist. Our office was approached by JMU’s Office of Environmental Stewardship and Sustainability to work with them because they knew we would look at the content a bit differently than others.  When we look at content our office immediately begins to think about programming; what types of programming can we develop around the content to meet our various missions of engagement with the community, enhancing workforce and economic development, and extending the resources of our campus.

In my conversations with the Office of Environmental Stewardship and Sustainability, and as I think about the content from this conference, I do see our involvement in this area as a leadership opportunity.  Our office works across campus in the same way that the concepts of resilience and sustainability cut across academic disciplines. We also have the power to convene not only our campus community but the greater community. Our mission requires us to have partners on and off campus, and we can provide the bridge between these partners.

The concept of sustainability — the capacity of human society to meet its current needs while assuring the well-being of future generations — has been widely adopted around the world.  The scientific concept of resilience has emerged more recently; resilience can be defined as the “capacity for a system to survive, adapt, and flourish in the face of turbulent change and uncertainty.”  (From Jan 14 Symposium on Resilience and Sustainability–US. Environmental Protection Agency, National Science Foundation, National Council for Science and Environment and Dow Chemical.)

What are my take-aways from this conference?  I will put them into two categories: the first is a list of concepts that capture for me content areas on which to build programming; and the second category includes specific program ideas I will suggest to the Office of Environmental Stewardship and Sustainability. This is really stream of consciousness, so if they sound like half-baked ideas, they just might be.

Key take-aways: concepts

• To build resilience, each must take more responsibility for their own risk
• Risk considerations are best made at the local level
• With this in mind, we need to provide local decision makers with “the tools” for making good decisions about managing risk
• Building community resilience (ability to respond to risks) leads to greater sustainability
• We need to move from governance to “anticipatory” governance
• We need to raise the public’s awareness of risk and I believe we are responsible for finding ways to have these conversations
• We need to communicate, communicate, and communicate, and one of the most effective tools for communicating is telling stories
• We must gather stories about what we are calling survivors and those who succeed

Key take-aways: programming

A common theme throughout the conference was the importance of acting locally with preparedness and resilience.  One of the speakers said it well: preparing for risk increases our resilience in responding to a disaster.  Some program items to consider related to this:

• Taking a lead in managing risk associated with growth, population, JMU, and industry
• Providing the “tools” for our local officials to understand risk while developing and moving forward with community plans
• Helping individual citizens in taking more responsibility for their own risk management
• Assisting with establishing of environmental baselines that will assist with measuring the impact of growth
• With warming temperatures, drought conditions are an increasing problem. We could take the lead to “plan” for a drought as compared to “responding” to a drought
• Use the power of convening to bring specific constituents, farmer to farmer, to share best practices

I am convinced that our offices have a pivotal role to play in educating and assisting with making our communities more resilient and better positioned to be sustainable.

 

 

 

What a Year Part II

One of the highlights of this past year was a parental moment we dream of…our youngest son’s graduation from college!  The youngest of five, James graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University with two degrees, art history and sculpture.  He is now in Berlin, Germany kicking off his career as a curator.   We are very proud of him, as we are of all our children.

This past spring, I had the opportunity to return to China, spending 12 days visiting a number of higher education institutions and meeting with government officials exploring potential partnerships.  I continue to be in awe of the country and learned much about the resilience of people and education when we visited Aba Teacher’s College. Destroyed by the 2008 earthquake, the university was moved to a new site and completely rebuilt. It is amazing what they have accomplished in such a short time.

With my presidency of UPCEA over and moving to the role of past president, I anticipated that my schedule would slow down.  That was only partially true. As I reflected in August, sometimes we need to give away time to get time…and most recently, a turn at Dancing with the Stars of the ‘burg kept me hopping – literally. Giving Away Time to Get Time (http://shaeffersforays.wordpress.com/2012/12/05/leaving-you-dancing/) and, Leaving You Dancing (http://shaeffersforays.wordpress.com/2012/12/05/leaving-you-dancing/

Dancing was easily the most interesting experience I’ve ever had.  I quickly found myself learning something I knew absolutely nothing about…a situation I am sure many of you reading this can relate to in your lives! Like many learners, I was initially insecure and uncomfortable and the first six weeks were challenging. In my case I simply couldn’t get my feet to go where my head was telling them to go — not only did I feel silly, I looked silly.  Then over time and practice I gained more confidence.  I realized I could and should take directions from my excellent teacher and dance partner.  My Dancing with the Stars of the ‘burg was a positive experience for a great cause. It was also a good reminder that it’s always a good idea to learn a new “step or two” every once in a while, which is in itself a nice reminder of seeing things from a learner’s perspective. Many thanks to everyone who provided support.

I don’t know if I planned it this way but within 36 hours of the “big dance,” Peggy and I traveled to Spain and Italy with our colleague Felix Wang.

Our trip to Europe was a follow-up to previous meetings we have had with schools in Salamanca, Spain and Florence, Italy.  While Peggy has visited the schools in both countries, this was my first trip to meet with the teachers in Spain. With the support of JMU’s Office of International Programs (thanks, Lee!), Peggy has led an effort to have JMU students who are either on a semester in Florence or in JMU’s EU master’s degree assist teachers in teaching English.  Over the last four years this has turned out to be a great success.  Our students love the opportunity to work with the teachers and middle school students, the administrators and teachers of Scuola Machiavelli in Florence appreciate the support of our students and having native English speakers in the classroom, and the kids in the school love interacting with JMU students and benefit from the instructional support the JMU students provide.

During our visit to Florence JMU signed a formal agreement with the Scuola Machiavelli to continue the program, and we plan on expanding the program beyond English classes to assisting with teaching in the content areas in English.

While I was in Florence I also met with personnel from the City of Florence office that is responsible for providing lifelong learning experiences for adults as well as professional development for teachers.  It was a fascinating conversation; they are concerned about many of the same things we are in our country when offering our lifelong learning programs, and take full advantage of the city of Florence in their offerings.

I found they also had a similar challenge in assuring that the professional development provided for teachers addresses and supports the challenges faced in their schools. Something relatively new to the schools in Florence is the growing number of children whose native language is not Italian, similar to our second language learners in the United States. This challenge is a great opportunity for us to partner with the teachers, schools, and the City of Florence to share our mutual expertise in addressing the challenge.

Finally, I learned that young children are young children no matter where they are.  To quote my wife, “people are people and no matter how different we believe we are, we are much more alike than we are different.”  This was made clear to me in my visits with the middle school students. I had the opportunity to make two new friends, two students at the Scuola Machiavelli.  These two middle school boys had already established a reputation of being troublemakers because they didn’t pay attention in class.  They invited me to arm wrestle, which I politely turned down! During our conversations together, I found out these “troublemakers” and their families have been quite transient and therefore their formal education has been spotty at best.  These are simply two kids that, like so many kids everywhere, are trying to connect with others. I left the schools impressed with these two young men and with a continuing admiration for the teachers at the Scuola Machiavelli and all teachers everywhere who daily find ways of reaching and helping students learn.

Let’s fast forward to today; we left Arlington, VA this evening and traveled home to the Shenandoah Valley.  I know there are many beautiful places to live, but I was reminded driving through the valley to our home that we may have found one of the prettiest.

It has been quite a year, and I owe so many thanks to so many people for their support from the Outreach & Engagement Staff, to the UPCEA staff, to the many volunteers at UPCEA and faculty and staff at JMU.  And I am blessed to have a great family (and growing  - we are expecting grandchild number five in March) and to my wife Peggy, thank you for your support, patience and a very happy 25^th wedding anniversary.

Happy New Year to all.

What a year (part one)

What a year (part one):

For probably close to twenty years, a Christmas Eve tradition at our house has been celebrating with prime rib and corn chowder.  This year was a year when our kids were with the other sides of their families and our youngest, James, is working studying in Berlin, so our family was separated by miles and oceans. However, the traditions lived on and sons in Berlin and Minneapolis prepared the prime rib and chowder and through the miracle of Skype we were all together in spirit and traditions!

So, here it is Christmas Eve, Peggy and I are in Arlington, VA enjoying the evening with Peggy’s brother Greg and sister-in-law Ava, Greg and I are golf partners and have a good time on and off the golf course.

And as we end this year on a much quieter note that other Christmas holidays with the house brimming with kids and grandchildren, I have had a chance to look back over the year through the words I shared in Shaeffer’s Forays. I knew it was quite a year but re-reading some of the posts to Shaeffer’s Forays I must admit it was an unbelievably amazing year filled with gifts and adventures.  What a lucky person I am.

It started in February, a trip to Dubai to present at the 14th Annual International Conference on Drug Discovery & Therapy.  It was a great opportunity to not only visit a country and enjoy their hospitality but also stretch my comfort zone in writing and presenting a paper about innovation related to drug discovery.  Thanks to Sarah MacDonald, we looked at innovation in drug discovery.  We found that we need to find new ways to encourage more research that can assist in addressing drug discovery for disease impacting a small population, a need for drug therapy for impoverished countries and further the work on drugs that are no longer under patent.   While the work with pharma is often life and death decisions, we  in higher education face similar challenges in that we also need to find new ways of providing greater access to education and the opportunity to education in the US.

The next stop on my trips was to Cambridge, UK for the University Association for Lifelong Learning (UALL) annual conference.  It was a great experience to be in Cambridge and to interact with our colleagues in Europe.  They are wrestling with issues similar to the challenges we face in UPCEA;  accessibility, affordability, and accountability.  One of the gifts I took away from this experience was a quote from James Stuart which I see as a call to action: “The object of all education is to teach people to think for themselves, that is the direct or specified object of what is called Higher Education…..a man who is educated in the truest sense may even be unable to read or write, for an educated man is a man who is capable of thinking about what he sees.”  (Thanks, Adrian.)

My year as president of UPCEA culminated with our annual meeting in Portland.  Any reflection about the 2012 UPCEA Annual Conference must begin by thanking David Schejbal and his excellent conference planning committee for bringing together an excellent annual conference.  The planning committee, with the expert assistance of the UPCEA National Office, implemented a number of new initiatives for this conference that included establishing program tracks that centered on the primary professional responsibilities of our members, kicking off the conference with half-day intensive sessions for each track, and featuring a track based on the conference theme of Resilience which examined sustainability from several perspectives including environmental, programming, organizational, and financial.  Many thanks to all involved in planning the 2012 Annual Conference.

In addition, we passed a new strategic plan for UPCEA and going through that process I was reminded of the many articles and books I’ve read about change.  Change is hard, to be successful change cannot be a zero sum game, change is messy and requires making hard decisions, and I found I felt best with change by giving it a personal touch.

I was and continue to be humbled by the opportunity I was given to serve as president of UPCEA.

I will close part one of “what a year” with the recognition that you really can go home again.  I was lucky enough to be invited back to the University of Wyoming to address old friends and new associates about what I had learned during my year as President of UPCEA.  This presentation allowed me to take “a look in the rear view mirror” regarding what I had learned about leadership and outreach in the last year.  For me, the major take away from my year as president of UPCEA is the important and vital role our units play in being the leading advocate for this cause.

Part two of “what a year” needs a little work but should be out soon.  Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night.

Leaving You Dancing

Where in the world is Shaeffer’s Forays? It has been over a month since I posted, but this is not due to the lack of material to write about.

I spent several weeks preparing for a performance for Dancing with the Stars of the ‘Burg. See Sept. 3 blog post “Giving away time to get Time.” I wouldn’t put myself in a situation where I can make a fool of myself, but Dancing with Stars of the ‘Burg is a fundraiser for the Rockingham Harrisonburg Child Daycare Center, which is a great cause.

I am happy to report that during the performance on November 11, I met my goal of getting through the dance without falling down. And the truth of the matter is that I learned a great deal from this experience.

Some lessons learned:

 

A willingness to take direction –

I don’t dance, so I was the classic example of starting from scratch. What I quickly learned is that I was very lucky to have an understanding dance partner who provided not only suggestions but also helpful encouragement.  I also had a great dance instructor who broke down the routine into small pieces that allowed me to master the dance in small bites. She provided coaching throughout our practices and she pushed me, and us, near the end to work on small things to make the performance better.

Thinking about working with new employees and new students: they need the same support I received in preparing to dance.  These folks need understanding, encouragement, training, and coaching.

 

Thank goodness for friends—

There are two responsibilities for those of us who were “celebrities,” as they called us.  One is to dance and the other is to raise funds. Quite honestly, I must confess that the harder of these two responsibilities was the fundraising.  I don’t know that I have ever done anything harder than asking people for financial support. My greatest fear was that I wouldn’t be able to raise much money.

I knew that I would get support from my family — I could embarrass them into giving something and as it turned out they were all very generous. But to my surprise and relief I received support from friends throughout the US, including people I’ve worked with at UPCEA, the Army Education Advisory Committee, and other national and local boards.  I also have great colleagues and friends who stepped up as well. I had the modest goal of raising $3000 and thanks to everyone’s support we raised just short of $6000.

Many thanks for the kindness and generosity of my friends and colleagues.

It’s all about the team—

Let’s be clear, Dancing with the Stars of the ‘Burg was a competition, both in terms of who raised the most money and of course who were the best dancers. Despite the nature of the competition, I was so lucky to be part of a greater team of fellow dancers and a great support team. What made this fundraiser so successful was our ability to work as a team to address our mission, which was clear: raise money for a great cause.  Teamwork included sharing great ideas for fundraising events, partnering on fundraising events, and most importantly supporting and cheering on all the performers. It was this team work that helped us to raise nearly $60,000 this year, which is a record for this fundraiser. Clearly because we worked together, as a team, we were more successful.

Practices makes…….being flexible easier—

Thanks to my dance instructor (Karen) and to my partner (Julia), we finished putting together our dance two weeks before our performance, which allowed us to practice the complete dance for at least an hour nearly every day for two weeks. This allowed us to work on small items; in my case I needed to learn to control my arms.

 

You might think that all this practice would lead to perfection. That was what I was thinking, keep practicing so that you make it perfect, so you don’t make any mistakes.  Well, it turns out  that all this practice allowed Julia and I to be flexible in dancing through any mistakes that I might make during the performance. This flexibility came in very handy on the night of the dance — I over-rotated on one of the lifts and we were on the wrong sides of each other, and all that practice allowed us to just keep going. We were the only people who knew we made a mistake.

All this practice reminds me of what I’ve learned in my 30 years in professional continuing education. We practice, we work hard, we come prepared; not to be perfect but to have the flexibility to be successful.  It reminds me of the phrase “The harder I work, the luckier I become.”

When I said yes to Dancing with the Stars of the ‘Burg, I thought I was saying yes to learning how to dance. That part was true, but I also learned a whole lot more. I learned what it’s like to be learner or new staff member who begins from scratch and the support they need to be successful. I learned about fundraising and how important it is to have the support of long-time friends and colleagues. I learned (or remembered) that practice is important, not so much to find perfection but to have the flexibility to get to success.

So, the event is behind me and now I want to share it with you. You can decide for yourselves how well I learned to dance.  Go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqSW-LJilPk and take a look.

Stay tuned for future posts: I still need to write the annual “what I am thankful for?” and what happened on our trip to Spain and Italy.

I hope I left you dancing.