In the excellent baseball film, The Natural, there is a moment of dialogue between the main character, Roy Hobbs, and a woman he knows.
Roy Hobbs: I coulda been better. I coulda broke every record in the book.
Iris Gaines: And then?
Roy Hobbs: And then? And then when I walked down the street people would've said: "There goes Roy Hobbs, the best there ever was in this game."
I have always been intrigued by the idea of “the best there ever was.” I do understand the obvious unattainability. And the fact that it is just a line in a book and in a Hollywood screenplay.
But, I think there might be more here than just an unreachable story point.
I think there's something that can be worth pondering.
Whether we have taught for 10 days or 10 years, haven’t we all seen the professor who simply doesn’t bring his or her A-game to the playing field? Whether it is because of age, repetition, boredom, incompetence, overwork or just simple lack of motivation, those faculty members exist everywhere. The cliché of yellowed notes and a monotone delivery are never far from the truth.
Those faculty drag down the esprit de corps. They drag down the students. They drag down all by their actions and attitude.
And their attitude is never even close to good, let alone the “best there ever was.”
So should we ignore those people? Of course we should, at least in terms of ourselves and our own growth. Their lack of whatever is not our immediate concern.
Our goal is the opposite: personal challenge, self-growth and, simply, bringing our A-game to the field every day. Every day.
As teachers we think of our own skills in various ways. Some things we are very good at doing. Some things we are okay or adequate at doing. And some things we constantly work at improving.
And we ask ourselves questions.
• What about the fact that it too often seems like I’m teaching to the few rather than the many.
• What about the fact that I have to teach the same class over and over?
• What about the monotony of grading and planning and day after day of what gets to be tediousness?
• What about learning new technology, new techniques, new information, and meeting new people?
Why challenge myself further?
Maybe for promotion, tenure, or self-esteem. Maybe to live and breath creativity, knowledge, and exposition. Maybe because we have a burning desire to do this.
YES. Exactly.
And if you think that’s all bulls#*t, then perhaps higher education is just not for you. (Yep, that’s a little preachy, but mostly true.)
Challenging yourself for any worthwhile and beneficial purpose is great. And we have to be in it for the long haul, not just the moment gratifying, self-satisfying, ego-boosting day or week of being really excellent.
There has to be motivation to be better and better for years and years.
How have I tried? I’m not calling myself any sort of expert, but every time I taught a class I tried to teach it a little differently. Every time I gave assignments I tried to avoid the same-old, same-old. I used the summers that I taught for experimenting with new ways to teach during the regular year. I read about my field, about teaching, about motivation. I watched others in my department or college who were better than I was. I tried hard and consciously to never stop learning and improving.
I never stopped trying. Even when my time was at a premium. I had a family. I had creative interests. But I loved the challenge, actually needed the challenge. And I made time for the challenge because it was my job.
The first four years I was an administrator, I sucked. Sucked really badly. So bad that I stopped for nine years. When I went back to it, I was markedly better, not only because I had matured a bit, but because I had consciously thought and studied how to be better.
In order to move academia forward in the many ways it has to be moved forward, it will take all of us to deal with constant self-challenge and self-improvement.
Can we get to “the best that ever was?”
If we don’t try, we will never even get to “as good as we can be.”
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