General Education

Background Context

1. General liberal education
   • K to 12 University Entrance route.
   • B.A. (History, Psychology) U of Winnipeg (1968).
2. Professional Education and Training
   • for ministry:
     • B.D. (Pastoral focus, CPE, Intro to Corrections, with internship (1971).
       In terms of training in the counseling field, the Practical year included training in counseling in the Health Science Center (CPE training) as well as an introduction to similar work in the Justice system. Subsequent growth has been through mentoring , workshops, and personal reading.
       
     • M.Div. (upgrade of B.D.) U of Winnipeg, (1987)

   • for business:
     • BGS (focus in Business Administration, educational media and research methods) BU (1987).
     • Sundry Courses (in marketing, graphic arts, film making, photography) RRCC, Winnipeg Film Group, Correspondence. (1975-83)
3. Ongoing autodidactic skill learning of photography, film, and video (1964-present),
   
4. Concept Exploration
   • Masters in Rural Development In progress now.

   Approach Used

   Entering the K-12 system was not a happy experience. I now understand that it was a clash of gift-mix based learning styles in which a Teacher-Researcher approach was insisted upon at the expense of my Encourager-giver-administrator. one. I can do the other approach, and had excellent support from home, but I feel the collateral damage was totally unnecessary.

   Academic demands tightened up at the end of grade eight for me, and I constantly sought ways of learning which would enable me to accomplish the required tasks my way. I had a few excellent teachers along the way who facilitated this process.

   Upon entrance to University, my father made some comments which gave me permission to do the program my way and seek out what was important to me. I wanted a Psych. major and History Minor but the Psych. required a research methods course involving doing square roots by hand. I knew that wasn't doable for me, so I reversed my major and minor. They have calculators and computers now, but the best at the time was a slide rule. I a not a math type. I rapidly learned to translate my "encourager-gift" learning style results back into a "teacher-researcher format" to please the gatekeepers of that process. The one time I chose to submit a project in my third year of Arts my way, converting a research seminar on the Franco-Prussian War as a radio documentary news special, I was so heavily penalized I never tried it again. However, the same format now fills an entire "History Channel" and I still have people talking about the seminar, complete with details about it. I doubt the others in class could even remember who was in their class.

   Theology was a shambles as they were closing down the faculty a couple of years after our class, and the profs were preoccupied with their careers and/or retirement. We had a few excellent scholar-types who made the whole thing worthwhile, particularly in Biblical Studies, but the rest was of dubious value. The Clinical Pastoral Education and Intro to Corrections work (and learning to type) proved to be very helpful in the practical end.

   My Business Education degree was framed in a BGS as BU only offered a minor in business at the time. Those of us wanting more used the BGS structure and packed our degrees full of anything that resembled Business Administration, as well as other courses which filled out our needs, as there were absolutely no restrictions on which courses we took to get a degree. It was an excellent degree. I topped out in my interest in Business near the end of the degree and filled out the remainder of required courses in media and research methods, which turned out to be some of the best courses over all.

   My Masters of Divinity was an upgrade due to the rationalizing of the nomenclature of degrees across North America. When my dad took it, it was called a certificate. When I took it it was called a Bachelors. What is taken now is called a Masters. and each time they changed the name they lowered the standards. This is all part of the dropping of standards across north America of university degrees over the past fifty years. I have come to the conclusion that one gets out of a degree what one puts into it. I have been very satisfied with all of my degrees, mostly because I was told by my father that it was a self-learning sport, and was entirely up to me. I love to learn, and put just up with the system mostly.

   Like my father, I think I learned much more after leaving the formal system than I ever learned in it. The system did what it was supposed to do, it taught me how to learn, and gave me the message that I should start learning things myself whether in or out of the system, if I really wanted to learn. I met some wonderful role models of learners within and outside of the formal system, and to them, I owe a great debt of gratitude.

   My entry into the Masters program in Rural development was as a context within which I could pursue a specific conceptual issue.

   Current Status

   When I have finished this degree, I will have as many letters after my name as in my name. So much for the negative prediction of my grade four teacher who said I would never go to University.

   I am doing up two last required courses, with a possible further one in Business Development if it is offered next term, and if it looks like it is worth my while. That leaves the Thesis, for which preliminary work is now underway.

   Findings To Date

   As John Blakie commented a while back , degrees taken later in life have more of a consolidation of thought function than a preparatory function. I feel this present degree is both, and not necessarily terminal...but that is for up the road.

   I am presently doing a consolidation and reassessment of where things are at in my life in terms of both inputs and outputs.

   Lateral Connections

   Required for Completion

   This round, the two courses I am now engaged in require completion, and possibly a third (non-required one) and then the thesis. What happens after that by way of formal education is indefinite at this point.