Friday, August 29, 2003

Friday Five


I don't make a habit of Friday Five's but this is on a topic near and dear to my heart.

1. Are you going to school this year?
No. I did attend a 3-day training course for certain software in March of this year, though. I doubt that counts.

2. If yes, where are you going (high school, college, etc.)? If no, when did you graduate?
I graduated university in 1995. I did not go straight from high school to college, and the experience from being out in the world, so to speak, gave me a leg up later.

3. What are/were your favorite school subjects?
I was one of those extremely irritating children who was good at math AND english AND music. I'm sure everyone hated me for it at one time or another. My favorite subject was probably math/science. I know I always loved my science classes.

4. What are/were your least favorite school subjects?
At the time, I'd say, social science. Oh, no, duh -- Physical Education. Though, when I was doing gymnastics, and archery, even that was fun.

5. Have you ever had a favorite teacher? Why was he/she a favorite?
Plenty. I've had good teachers. One who, in fourth grade, pointed at a bunch of test scores and explained that they weren't supposed to show me this, and then told me what the numbers and graphs meant: "you can do anything". Those words have stayed with me all my life.

I like teachers who believe in what they're doing as part of their lives. My best history teacher was an Amnesty International activist. Another simply said "I hope you keep writing". Another recommended me as a chemistry tutor at a community college. Another loaned me One Day In The Life Of Ivan Denisovitch. One of my most important science teachers, in college, reminded us when we were talking about ballistics in my classical mechanics course that a scientist has to think about the implications -- political and ethical -- as well as technological, of what we might choose to do.

There are more. This music teacher, and then that one, my German teacher, my Japanese teachers, my physics teacher for whom I was the unofficial TA in high school, all the teachers in all the years who said, to all of us, "you can do this, c'mon, it'll be fun".

You get out what you put in, y'know? And I always put in a lot.


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