On Normative Whiteness

In my experience, one of the most challenging concepts for students to grasp (or, perhaps more accurately, one that they are most reluctant to grasp) is normative whiteness. The idea behind normative whiteness is that white people are socialized to perceive white skin as "morally neutral, normative, and average," to quote Peggy McIntosh. That is, when white people see other white people in print advertisements, on television and movie screens, on the street, or elsewhere, they do not perceive those white people as having "race". Because whiteness is the default category, white skin does not register as being "raced" in any way. Conversely, when white people see people of color, they immediately perceive them as having race because people of color do not fall into the racially-neutral or normative category.

Normative whiteness is a somewhat abstract concept, therefore it is difficult for many students to comprehend. However, for students who have never grappled with issues of race and white-skin privilege, the concept of normative whiteness also challenges their perceptions of themselves as "colorblind," which makes comprehension even more difficult. So, I like to use concrete examples to illustrate this concept in class.

Consider the old Allstate Insurance commercials -- you know, "You're in good hands with Allstate." At the end of these commercials appears a pair of cupped human hands. I show this clip and then ask my students, "What was shown at the end of the commercial?" They respond, "A pair of hands." Then I ask them, "How many of you observed a pair of white hands? Or did you just see a pair of hands?" This is generally greeted by uncomfortable silence. I continue, "OK, imagine if it had been a pair of Black hands at the end of the commercial. How many of you would have noticed that it was a pair of Black hands? Most of you, right? And that's the point. You didn't notice that the white hands were white because whiteness is normative -- the default category. But when a person (or, in this instance, a body part) differs from that norm, you notice. That's because non-white skin is non-normative."

I am always on the lookout for examples that illustrate the concept of normative whiteness. Turns out I had to look no further than that exemplar of colorblindness, Bill O'Reilly, for a truly superb example.

Consider the exchange from last night's O'Reilly Factor with Temple University professor Marc Lamont Hill:

On Fox News’ The O’Reilly Factor last night, Temple University professor Marc Lamont Hill argued that when politicians like Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin invoke “Joe Six Pack,” they are using a “code word” that excludes African-Americans. “Why can’t an African- American guy be Joe six pack?” asked O’Reilly.

HILL: What I’m saying is that when people think of Joe Six Pack, when — the immediate image that comes to your mind is not a Black man. It is often a white man.

O’REILLY: The immediate image - no, the immediate image that comes to my mind is a guy of no color with a six pack of Bud. No color.

HILL: [laughs] You might be the only person in the galaxy who is able to imagine a raceless human being. For most people our images of people are racialized. And oftentimes the index of the normal average American is a white person.

Watch the exchange here:



It is perhaps the greatest luxury of white-skin privilege for a person to be able to say, with a straight face, that he can visualize in his mind's eye a "guy of no color". Indeed, a "guy of no color" really means a "guy of white color" in a world where whiteness is the absence of color. That is precisely the point Dr. Hill was trying to make.

I can't imagine why it evaded Mr. O'Reilly.

Extra Credit for Voting?

I've been contemplating giving my students extra credit for voting in the November election, but I have a few questions I'm wrestling with before I decide for sure. Here's what I've considered so far:

I asked my students in class today who was registered to vote, and everyone raised their hands. (Yay! I must admit, I was pleasantly surprised.) This alleviates initial concerns I had about this extra credit assignment being unfair for students who are not registered to vote and/or do not request an absentee ballot in time. (Actually, I'm not entirely sure how the student voting thing works -- I believe that students can register either in their home precinct or in their school precinct, but I'm not sure about that.)

Then there is the issue of how to prove that they voted. I suggested that they take an index card with them and ask one of the poll volunteers to confirm that they had voted by signing it, but some of my students suggested that volunteers in busy precincts might be unwilling/unable to do this.

Someone else suggested bringing me their "I voted" stickers, but those seem easy enough to procure even if you don't actually vote.

Another student suggested taking a photo of the ballot with their camera phone, or of themselves outside of the precinct, but the point was quickly raised that this was probably illegal.

So, what do you think? Is this a good idea, or are there too many logistical problems? Have you ever given your students extra credit for voting? If so, what proof of voting did you require? I really like the idea of providing incentive for my students to be politically active (whatever their affiliation), especially in such a crucial election, but I'm not sure about the specifics of how I might do this. Thoughts?

Guest Lecture Etiquette

This semester I am having a few guest lecturers give presentations to my students. (ShockProf is one of them!) In the past, guest lecturers I invited to my classes were fellow grad school pals, but this year the people I've invited are professionals who will be driving over an hour to get to my class.

In anticipation of these visits, I am wondering whether or how I should compensate my guests for their time and travel efforts. Would a small gift card be in order? A university mug or other trinket? Or simply an official letter of thanks? If you've had guest lecturers undertake subtantial effort to present information to your students, how have you said thank you?

P.S. ShockProf, "All you can eat and drink at ASC" is not a legitimate suggestion! Ha ha!

Push-Polling

There has been talk in the news recently about push-polling, which occurs when individuals or groups who support a particular political candidate plant in voters' minds negative (and completely baseless) ideas about an opposing candidate under the guise of political polling. So, for example, a caller posing as a legitimate pollster might ask a voter, "Would it influence your perception of [opposing candidate] to know that he has a secret pornography addiction?" The idea is not to assess voters' opinions of the candidate based on that hypothetical scenario, but rather to create the association in voters' minds between that candidate and a pornography addiction, thereby hopefully undermining his voter support.

Perhaps surprisingly, I had never heard the term "push-poll" before this week. Here, from the Wiki article, is what I found particularly interesting (with my emphasis added):

One way to distinguish between push polling as a tactic and polls which legitimately seek information is the sample size. Genuine polls make do with small, representative samples, whereas push polls can be very large, like any other mass marketing effort.

True push polls tend to be very short, with only a handful of questions, so as to make as many calls as possible. Any data obtained (if used at all) is secondary in importance to negatively affecting the targeted candidate. Legitimate polls are often used by candidates to test potential messages. They frequently ask about either positive and negative statements about any or all major candidates in an election and always ask demographic information at the end.

In other words, a dead give-away of a push-poll is the massive, unsystematic sampling strategy (to the extent that it even is a sampling strategy) and the brevity of the calls. Contrast this with the characteristics of sound research polling -- a systematic sampling strategy designed to achieve a representative sample and comprehensive data collection -- and it's easy to see why this is little more than a fear-mongering tactic masquerading as political research.

I bring this up because I thought it would be an interesting topic of discussion for those of you teaching research methods courses. At the very least, you can use it to spruce up dry, student-dreaded methods lectures with salacious talk about porn addictions!

P.S. Here is a story from TIME explaining why this topic has been in the news lately.

Back to the Grindstone

So, by now all of us are returning headfirst to academic life after (hopefully) enjoying a restful summer. So, I'm curious: is anybody testing out a new classroom activity or project in their classes? Doing something different in the classroom this semester than they've done in the past? Do tell!

My new teaching venture is using Moodle, the open-source course web-page program. I've never used it before so I'm still feeling it out. The jury's still out on whether I'll prefer it over ANGEL, Blackboard, et al. We'll see...

What's in a Name?

This fall I'll be teaching for the first time since earning my Ph.D. The other day as I was working on my syallbi, a question suddenly occurred to me: How will I have my students refer to me?

As a doctoral student I always had my students call me by my first name -- that's what I thought was most appropriate and what I was most comfortable with. I always thought that once I completed my degree, however, I'd go by "Dr." (if for no other reason than to justify the years I spent in grad school!) ...but now I'm not so sure. Here are the issues I've considered:

* I am young, and I am a woman. Based on my previous classroom experience, this means I often have to work especially hard to establish appropriate professional boundaries with my students. Case in point: I've been invited out for drinks by my students on several occasions -- "Hey, we go to Crunchy's every Thursday if you want to come! It'd be a blast!" -- which suggests that they see me as a contemporary more than as their instructor. While my relative youth often works to my advantage because I relate easily to my students (hey, I watch Project Runway, too!), I still occasionally have to struggle to be seen as an "authority" figure, for lack of a better term. Thus, I always assumed I'd go by "Dr." to help ameliorate this problem. But....

* My last name is hyphenated, which makes the whole thing ("Dr. Burgess-Proctor") unwieldy and rather cumbersome to say. Plus, there's the whole rhyming thing (One fish, two fish/Doctor Proctor!), which is kinda lame. (Sorry, honey.) So, maybe using my first name as I have in the past actually is the better course of action. I mean, who needs honorifics anyway? Besides, there's still a part of me that feels like a phony baloney using the term "Dr." in the first place. When a passenger on an airplane has a heart attack and the flight attendants ask, "Is anyone on board a doctor?!" they sure as hell don't want me traipsing up there, you know?

So, that's where I'm at: completely undecided. This is where you all come in: how do you have your students refer to you? By "Dr."? By your first name? By something else? Do you reserve the "Dr." title for your undergraduate students while allowing your graduate students to call you by your first name? (As long as they don't call you late for dinner. Zing!)

Guest Speakers

I teach the first course in our MA/PhD sequence of classes. It is designed to introduce students to the breadth of research in criminology and criminal justice and to socialize them to the larger grad school experience. In the past, I have had guest speakers come to a few classes. In my evaluations, students asked that I broaden the range of individuals that come to class. In particular, they would like to see more practitioners be invited, so they can better understand what they can do with an MA.

I would love to hear your suggestions for speakers. In general, any information on the type of job placements made by your students would be helpful.

More on Student Writing

I read last week's post about student writing with great interest (although obviously without enough energy to actually comment).

I am one of those professors who assumes that students should be able to write when they get to me (sorry, Velma). I am constantly annoyed by students who do not know how to use punctuation, capitalization, or even paragraph breaks in the appropriate manner. While I am happy to assist them with synthesizing, making connections, and critically analyzing academic literature, I really don't think it's my job to explain that a group of words with no verb does not a sentence make.

I feel vindicated by an article in today's Chronicle about the new SAT writing section and its ability to predict student success.

The authors point out that the SAT may not be a perfect predictor of success, but when teamed with other methods of assessment can prove valuable for college admissions:

Among their findings: When controlling for other factors, such as level of parental education, each 100-point increase on the SAT writing section correlated, on average, with gains of 0.07 on first-year grade-point averages, 0.18 on grade-point averages in freshman English courses, and 0.54 in credit-hours earned.

"While the scores are imperfect," the researchers wrote in a working paper on the study, "taken together with high-school GPA, other portions of standardized tests, AP credit, and noncognitive variables, they clearly help predict first-year student academic achievement.

Certainly, the increases found are small (but significant). I'm left wondering, however, what the writing portion of the SAT actually measures--is it the ability to construct a sentence using the rules of English, or the ability to analyze and critically assess a problem using those skills? I suppose those are questions best left to the researchers in the College of Education.

As a final note, I leave you with the ever-so-wise opinion of Calvin.

*Any spelling or grammatical errors in this essay are the fault of the New Jersey Public School System, and not the author herself.

What the Doodle is "Moodle"?

Recently I was made aware of "Moodle," which is a
"free, open-source course management system for online learning". I've never used Moodle, and in fact had never even heard of it until about a week or so ago. Have any of you used it before? It is similar to ANGEL or Blackboard or WebCT? Have you had success with it? Would you recommend it? Will I love it as much as I love Zotero? Do tell!

Stick to Teaching

Stanley Fish has a new book out on teaching entitled Save the World on Your Own Time, and he has a nice interview in inside higher ed. Here is an excerpt from the book -

(Professors) They “can (legitimately) do two things: (1) introduce students to bodies of knowledge and traditions of inquiry that had not previously been part of their experience; and (2) equip those same students with the analytical skills — of
argument, statistical modeling, laboratory procedure — that will enable them to move confidently within those traditions and to engage in independent research after a course is over.”

And what should they not do? Everything else.

As suggested from the title, Fish discusses the importance of keeping teaching time focused on inquiry and training - not social advocacy.

While I, for the most part, agree, I have also had some success in service-learning approaches to class. In addition, it is difficult for me to show a film on the Innocence Project without engaging in some advocacy. It is a fine line. Thoughts?

GBOC Lightning Round, Take Three

Over the last few weeks I've compiled a list of stories I've been meaning to share, but I haven't quite found the time to write about each one. So, rather than let these stories go unblogged (gasp!), let's commence another GBOC Lightning Round! (See previous rounds here and here.)

Item 1: Criminology, Genocide, & Darfur
The other day I received in the mail an advertisement for the forthcoming book Darfur and the Crime of Genocide by John Hagan and Wenona Rymond-Richmond. I am really looking forward to reading this book. Recently I have been part of an effort to boost the level of activism in one of the feminist organizations to which I belong, partly in response to the brutalization of women and children happening in Darfur and in the Congo. I share the sentiments of Robert Sampson, who wrote in his endorsement:

"Why has the field of criminology ignored genocide for so long? The answer to this question has important implications for theories of crime and international policy alike. The terrible tragedy in Darfur serves as the motivation for Hagan and Rymond-Richmond to trace the intellectual history of competing approaches to genocide, from the pioneering work of Sheldon Glueck on Nazi war crimes to controversies over official reaction to atrocities in the former Yugoslavia and now Africa. A call to action, Darfur and the Crime of Genocide is disturbing but necessary reading for all those concerned with international justice and a more general criminological conception of collective responses to crime around the world." --Robert J. Sampson, Harvard University, Henry Ford II Professor of Sociology

Item 2: "In the Basement of the Ivory Tower"
A colleague forwarded to me this Atlantic essay about the challenges of teaching students who by most estimations should not be in college. Writing anonymously, the author discusses the cultural shift in recent decades that has made college attendance compulsory for many students -- even those poorly suited to higher education -- and the ramifications of that shift for the faculty members who must evaluate the academic performance of these students. In particular, the author discusses the challenges of grading papers written by students with remedial writing skills. An excerpt:

America, ever-idealistic, seems wary of the vocational-education track. We are not comfortable limiting anyone’s options. Telling someone that college is not for him seems harsh and classist and British, as though we were sentencing him to a life in the coal mines. I sympathize with this stance; I subscribe to the American ideal. Unfortunately, it is with me and my red pen that that ideal crashes and burns.

Sending everyone under the sun to college is a noble initiative. Academia is all for it, naturally. Industry is all for it; some companies even help with tuition costs. Government is all for it; the truly needy have lots of opportunities for financial aid. The media applauds it—try to imagine someone speaking out against the idea. To oppose such a scheme of inclusion would be positively churlish. But one piece of the puzzle hasn’t been figured into the equation, to use the sort of phrase I encounter in the papers submitted by my English 101 students. The zeitgeist of academic possibility is a great inverted pyramid, and its rather sharp point is poking, uncomfortably, a spot just about midway between my shoulder blades.

For I, who teach these low-level, must-pass, no-multiple-choice-test classes, am the one who ultimately delivers the news to those unfit for college: that they lack the most-basic skills and have no sense of the volume of work required; that they are in some cases barely literate; that they are so bereft of schemata, so dispossessed of contexts in which to place newly acquired knowledge, that every bit of information simply raises more questions. They are not ready for high school, some of them, much less for college.

My guess is that most of us would recognize more than a few of our students in this essay...

Item 3: Kids Count Data & Juvenile Justice Reform
A few weeks ago the Annie E. Casey Foundation released its 2008 Kids Count report, an annual state-by-state survey that evaluates the well-being of children using a variety of indicators: employment, education, health, poverty, and so on. Criminologists may be particularly interested in the juvenile incarceration data. For example, according to a Detroit Free Press article:

Among the most alarming trends: Michigan continues to incarcerate kids at a much higher rate than the national average and often for nonviolent crimes.

There are 137 children per 100,000 in some sort of state facility or detention in Michigan, compared with the national average of 125 per 100,000. That puts Michigan 33rd in that category.

This report might be a useful teaching tool, as the website allows users to generate profiles by state, so that you can see how children in your particular state (or, if you live in a large enough metro area, your city) are faring. Finally, accompanying the report is a thoughtful essay, "A Road Map for Juvenile Justice Reform", that also includes a state-by-state summary of child well-being indicators.

Item 4: Supreme Court Bombshells!
As Velma noted earlier today, this week the U.S. Supreme Court rendered two opinions particularly relevant for criminologists:

(1) In Kennedy v. Louisiana, the Court banned capital punishment for child rape, stating that such punishment is disproportionate to the crime and therefore constitutes cruel and unusual punishment under the 8th amendment.

(2) In District of Columba v. Heller, the Court struck down Washington DC's ban on handgun ownership, ruling that the 2nd amendment right to bear arms extends to individuals.

I will leave the commentary about the Heller decision to the gun experts (and enthusiasts?) on the blog, and instead will share my thoughts about the Court's death penalty decision. Though I've disclosed my secret retributionist stance toward child rapists, I agree with the Court's decision. (I'm sure that Justice Kennedy and the four justices who joined him in the majority are relieved to know that I approve of their reasoning.) As several analysts have noted, because most child rapes are committed by someone the victim knows (often a relative or close family friend), asking a child to testify against the assailant with the knowledge that a conviction could lead to that person's execution understandably would cause undue emotional distress for the victim. Much as my maternal instincts might favor stringing these guys up on the courthouse lawn, the rational part of me knows that it would be utterly inhumane to put child sexual assault victims in a position where telling the truth could get their father, uncle, or other loved one killed, no matter how much we might think that person deserves it.

That's all for now. As always, I look forward to reader comments!

Warm Fuzzies

This week's batch of secrets from PostSecret featured a lovely reminder of why teaching can be such a gratifying and rewarding profession:

"Our Nation's Greatest Injustice"

The most recent issue of Grand Valley Magazine, the quarterly publication of GVSU (my alma mater) featured an inspiring story about several GV alumni who have joined Teach For America, an organization that places exceptional, motivated recent college graduates in 2-year teaching positions in disadvantaged urban and rural public schools. Teach For America recruits academically gifted graduates from all majors who demonstrate excellent leadership skills. The program also has a firm commitment to diversity, prioritizing the recruitment of people of color and people from low-income family backgrounds. Once selected, corps members spend 2 years teaching in a low-income school, guiding and mentoring students who face daunting educational obstacles.

Calling educational inequality "our nation's greatest injustice," the program's website states:

[W]e see evidence every day in classrooms across the country that when students in low-income communities are given the educational opportunities they deserve, they excel.

It is this - the clear potential of students - that makes the disparities in educational outcomes so unconscionable and fuels our sense of urgency and responsibility to do everything we can to ensure educational opportunity for all.

This is a noble and extremely important effort, in my opinion. If you have bright and talented students in your classes who are undecided about what to do after graduation, please consider sharing with them information about the Teach For America program.

I heart RatemyProfessors.com

It is midterm time, and the results of my midterm course evaluations are rolling in. We have a nifty web-based system that tallies the responses and allows students to include comments. Overall, I have some good feedback that will help me structure the remainder of the course.

As I was thinking of reviews, I meandered over to RatemyProfessors.com. Our students rarely use this service, so I only have one new comment that includes - "She is goofy and adorable". OK, I am so glad I spend hours slaving over my lectures and this is what I get.

I know of Scoob's love of this site (something to do with Honey! I Shrunk the Kids). Anyway, they have given professors a chance to comment on the responses - see it here.* What would your video say?

*This information has also been posted on scatter and a lot of other blogs lately - I don't want anyone to think I am double dipping!

Criminology Limericks, Vol. 2

Well, it is that time in the semester again: time for criminology limericks. So this semester I decided to do something a little different. I gave my students about 15 minutes at the end of class today to write their poems using criminological concepts. I told them that I would chose three of the best and post them to this blog and let you all choose the best of the best (I ended up selecting 4). I am giving the winning student an extra credit point, so my students are counting on your vote! Please comment on which one you like the best! Thanks!

Student A

Everyone has the same goals in life;
We all want money, power, and maybe even a husband or wife.
The problem is that everyone’s opportunities are not the same,
Individuals are stressed, strained, and end up doing something lame.
These people turn to crime through illegitimate avenues and some even use a knife.

Student B

There was once a theorist who went by the name Merton.
The social structure of American society was to blame for crime he was certain.
Achieving wealth and status became the main goal,
But this just caused people to feel like they were stuck in a hole,
And in the end the whole American society ends up hurtin’

Student C

There was a rough side of the city,
Some of the buildings were quite shitty.
Because of the high turnover,
The buildings would often get looked over.
Crime now runs this community.

Student D

Hirschi and Gottfredson have a general theory of crime,
That if your parents rear you right they can save you in time.
Unfortunately for them it fails to explain,
Why white-collar criminals use their brain.
Perhaps their theory ain’t worth a dime.

What would you do? Reflecting on NIU

The recent events at NIU have created an element of uneasiness among many of us. After Virginia Tech last year, I was comforted by the fact that deadly acts on college campuses were extremely rare and geographically distant, at least from me. “It could never happen to me,” I reasoned. Maybe it also helps that those of us who study criminal justice issues can (or at least should be able to) look at the problem rationally and therefore realize that the likelihood of victimization on campus is very low.

Since last week, however, I have found myself questioning how insulated I actually am from that kind of incident. (I applied to NIU when I was on the market, so I easily could have been there.) Today I read an article in the Duluth News Tribune that detailed an incident that happened at the University of Minnesota in Duluth this morning:

Assistant Professor Pedro Albuquerque was teaching his Principles of Macroeconomics class about 9:15 a.m. when he noticed a man he didn’t recognize as a student staring at him in a way that caught his attention.

A 36-year-old Duluth man who later was found to have a 6- to 8-inch wooden stick and a leather whip was removed from a University of Minnesota Duluth lecture hall after concerned students called police this morning.

So, the question is: what would you do if you saw someone acting suspicious in your classroom? I teach an intro section of 120 students, and am unsure if I would even notice someone who didn’t belong. For the first time, this semester I have a seating chart for that class, so maybe I would. Even if you did become aware of someone who wasn't supposed to be in your class or observe a student acting odd, how would you respond? Would you intervene? Would you call campus police? I often leave my cell phone in my office during class though I also know that it typically doesn’t work in our big, interior, lecture hall. Would you confront the individual?

I don’t have any answers, so I am looking for your thoughts. Have you experienced anything that concerned you in the classroom? Should professors be allowed to carry concealed weapons or tasers or be taught self-defense? Should we lock classroom doors while class is in session? Perhaps at the beginning of the semester we should establish a “secret word” or duress signal of some kind that would alert students to quietly leave and call the police. Should we have drills to practice for this unlikely scenario much like we prepare for fires or tornados?

By the way, as many of you know, I also applied for a job at UMD back in the day. Seems like I am narrowly escaping these unpleasant incidents…

I Love My Job, Except.......

As I mentioned a month or so ago, I have been struggling with work issues. I really enjoy my job, and I can't imagine having to be in the office from 9-5. That said, I have had problems transitioning to a leadership role in the department. As I near tenure, my service commitments have increased (yes, I have volunteered for some of this). I was searching the blogs a bit this morning, and I found this superb discussion of the challenges of gatekeeping in the discipline.

Here is a glimpse -

The one thing, however, that I was not emotionally prepared for was to sit in judgment of people’s futures.

Interesting, isn’t it? I might not have gotten into the very program for which I am now a gatekeeper.

It is worth a read. I think it blends well with Dr. H's discussion of the academic job market. Off to read applications...............

Cheating on Exams

When it comes to exam time for your students, what do Team Bynum members do? Do you all walk around the classroom? Make sure there is an empty space between students? Make sure students turn their caps backwards? Do you stand in front of the class with your arms crossed, carefully observing the moment of everyone while they work on their exams? This is a really good discussion thread posted by a security expert I admire.

Joke

I was having a nice chat with some grad students last week, and they asked how I had decided on my dissertation topic. In particular, they wanted to know how to design a unique project. I explained that there was a lot to be done in corrections as many researchers see corrections as less "sexy"* than other areas, so I think that there is a considerable amount of room to create your own niche.

Student A: Let me guess. This is because you think inside the box.

I thought it was hilarious - clearly I need to get a life.

One a side note:I begin my first steps toward tenure quite soon, so I may be a bit quiet. How about some of the boys picking up some slack!

*I actually had a very prominent scholar describe corrections as the wicked step-child of criminology. Good news :)

"Entertaining" vs. "Engaging" Students

I stumbled across this blog this morning that discusses the difference between "entertaining" and "engaging" students. Doug Johnson, a school tech guy from MN, makes these distinctions:

Entertainment's primary purpose is to create an enjoyable experience; engagement's primary purpose is to focus attention so learning occurs.

Entertainment is ephemeral, often frivolous; engagement creates long-lasting results and deals with important issues.

Entertainment needs have little relevance to the the reader/watcher/listener; engagement experiences most often relate directly to the learner.

Entertainment is an escape from problems; engagement involves solving problems.

Entertainment results through the creativity of others; engagement asks for creativity on the part of the learner.

Perhaps the greatest distinction is that entertainment is often passive, whereas engagment is active or interactive.

While the post is directed toward teens and middle or high school teachers, I think we can learn a thing or two when trying to capture and maintain the attention of our students. This is something that Scooby laments about regularly. Though I try hard to be 'fun' in the classroom, sometimes I even agree with him that we're not hired to be a dog and pony show.