Category — Volunteering

Hi all,

About two weeks ago I attended a workshop at the Centre for Teaching, Learning and Technology during which we discussed “What do you wish you had known as a new instructor or student at University?”

I attended this session as a means of gaining insight from the brains of wise veteran instructors.

The group was small, but I was very much enlightened by the end of the session. We explored both the realms of students and instructors – what we’d like to be equipped with when new to the (either) scene, and what resources we should provide to new folks, as veterans.

In answering these questions, we constructed maps with clustered post-it notes that summarized themes, pivotal questions, and solutions. The maps for students and instructors ended up being virtually identical. It seems that, in being a “new” anything, our biggest issue is fear of the unknown and how to be confident and succeed in new and unfamiliar environments. As veterans, it seems that providing support in a number of ways – paper resources, directing to campus services, reading groups, one-on-one guidance – could do the trick.

What really struck me was that the (self-declared) lack of the “newbies” could be easily remedied by what the veterans could provide – mentorship. I suppose I use the term “veteran” to mean “expert”, implying that there is an understanding of the field, the content, and likely of the cogs that make the whole machine work. This is why I say they could “easily” support those facing the unknown, I refer to the inherent knowledge base of a veteran.

When I began my engagement with teaching and learning, my dad (an emeritus professor) sent me a book he’s had for years, titled Adviser, Teacher, Role Model, Friend: On Being a Mentor to Students in Sciences and Engineering by the National Academy Press. This book starts by broadly defining a mentor as “someone who takes a special interest in helping another person develop into a successful professional”. It mentions that in academia, mentor is often used synonymously with faculty advisor or lab supervisor, which isn’t always the case. Mentoring fosters a relationship that is personal in addition to professional; “an effective mentoring relationship is characterized by mutual trust, understanding, and empathy. Good mentors are able to share life experiences and wisdom, as well as technical expertise”.

Since this cartoon lightbulb has gone off at the CTLT workshop and continues to float above my head as I go through this nice little book, I have been thinking a great deal about mentoring and ways to improve work environments via this avenue.

I encourage you all to think about issues you may have run into as a “newbie”, problems you may be facing in the workplace, and consider what place, if any, mentoring has in the solution. Feel free to leave a comment and start a discussion too! I would be happy to discuss – this is my own personal “Hot Topic” right now!

I obtained my undergraduate degree, a B.Sc. in Environmental Science, at the University of Guelph.

I love Guelph. I say “Guelph” meaning the University, mostly, but the city itself and it’s people are wonderful too. There are a lot of people with really big hearts in that city. Back when I lived in Guelph, I volunteered/worked for an organization called Guelph Environmental Leadership (GEL). A good portion of my job was spent with a portable GEL booth set up at public events or outside local stores. I met so many environmentally-conscious citizens – really thoughtful people who thought locally. A lot of my peers and the professors I met during my studies were equally as awesome.

Anyway, I was just researching some things on the internet and stumbled across this article, linked from the UoG webpage. I had to shake my head in a kind of motherly satisfaction: of course Guelph is the only city in its region with a student volunteer centre. Of course UoG is having a free one-day conference aimed to connect students with volunteer opportunities and inspire the general public to take positive social action. Of course this is something Guelph does, because positivity and outreach suit Guelph naturally.

I am so happy to have stumbled across this article. I have now discovered that one of my great true loves, Guelph, is intersected in a beautiful Venn-diagram-like way with one of my other great true loves, Volunteerism.

Ugh. Perfection!

Here is a link to the Student Volunteer Connections website, in case anyone out there is interested. I just signed up for their weekly newsletter. Inspiration does not have to be found locally.

There are a lot of things I think of as I say/write/type “pushing forward”. It stimulates reflection on the past, and visions of the (immediate) future.

I spent this past Wednesday at the Aquarium, volunteering for the school program I am involved with. Due  to a busy semester and a bit of re-prioritization (I gotta graduate sometime!) it was only my 3rd time doing the program in about 10-12 weeks of programming. All day I was very aware of the stark contrast between my experiences on Wednesday and this time last year. One year ago (1-2 months into this weekly volunteering job) I was terrified to take a small group of students and lead them on my own. Each week I would hope to team-teach or shadow someone because I just didn’t feel comfortable. On Wednesday I was team-teaching, and found it very challenging. It’s interesting how your attitude can completely change once experience or “expertliness” is added to the equation. Now that I feel comfortable teaching the program, it’s more challenging to share the dissemination of knowledge with a partner.

Could it be that I’m already an old curmudgeon at this program? If that’s true, I think my fellow volunteers are guilty of this as well. More likely, I felt uncomfortable because I’ve rarely been around this term or because we didn’t discuss our approach very much before jumping in. My approach was to let the newer volunteers do their thing and hold out on the urge to add or (on one or two occasions) correct. I found that sometimes, when I would chime in with a new idea or comment, I would meet some resistance from my partner. It was very interesting. I remember well being nervous of leading, and now it seems I wanted more talk time. At some point in the last year, I pushed through the comfort zone of fading into the background.

Beyond my volunteering experiences, “pushing forward” also makes me think of my recent teaching opportunity – the one in which I gave a 50-minute lecture to 200 undergraduates. I had discussed the possibility of teaching with one of the Instructors a month before, and we had decided to revisit the idea next semester. Lo and behold, an opportunity arose out of the blue, and I had only a week and a half to prepare (though really, what would I have done with more time?). I decided I simply had to dive in and just get ‘er done. It was scary, but it was time to take the next step. And I received such positive feedback as a reward.

Finally, I think of “pushing forward” through the next thesis hump which is to: start writing and continue?/finish up experimenting and analyzing. I’m currently frustrated with an important data set I feel like I can’t resolve without another huge push, and I want to start writing but get overwhelmed. I feel like in order to write more than I’ve got, I have to read, and I am afraid of reading.

So all in all, I this thesis data/writing push is what’s next/now on my agenda; hopefully I can draw from my previous push-throughs as inspiration. I’ll let you know how it goes….

Today I discovered what the best job in all the world is:

Answering letters written to Santa – or, in my case – Scuba Claus.

Scuba Claus is what we call the Vancouver Aquarium’s version of Santa – did you know that up until Christmas Eve he feeds fish, whilst swimming alongside them? This year, Aquarium visitors can leave a pledge to help the environment for Scuba Claus, and I help Scuba Claus write his responses back to the letter writers. It is so fantastic.

More broadly, volunteering keeps me sane. I believe strongly in volunteerism (and it’s ability to foster positive and strong connections to community) and have been doing so since high school. My first volunteer experience was required in order to graduate high school (seriously: excellent idea, Ontario school system!), which I spent running my hometown’s Community Services office at night during weekly legal aid sessions. Since then I’ve volunteered for a number of causes over the years, and now I spend my time at the Vancouver Aquarium. Volunteering for VanAqua has been such a wonderful experience; I’ve been able to flex so many muscles: imagination, play, curriculum development, leadership, teaching, learning. Yowza. What could be better?

I take great pride in my VanAqua Volunteer shirt.