Jim Stellar

I rarely write by myself in this blog, but this last week I had a great intense experiential experience. From Monday evening to Friday afternoon last week I was a 5 day / 4 night WACE Global Institute on Experiential Education on Martha’s Vineyard.  We had 32 participants from 7 universities (or university organizations) from around the world and 8 faculty discussing experiential learning and facilitating plans to increase that learning in the 7 Universities. 

Truth be told, I was a co-founder of this institute at the College of Arts and Sciences at Northeastern University with Tim Donovan and Rick Porter (past blog co-author, twice).  It grew out of a Writing Program with a 20+ year history that we used as internal Ex Ed institute for Northeastern faculty and staff.  Then we took it external in 2005 so that other colleges and universities could send their people - from Presidents to faculty to staff - to develop an institutional plan for Ex Ed back on their campus.  The programs include study abroad, undergraduate research, service-learning, internships, and either cooperative education or work integrated learning depending on the country tradition.  Up to this year, we had 39 participating universities and colleges.

When I left Northeastern, the World Association of Cooperative Education (WACE) took over the non-profit status of the Institute.  But it was much more than that.  WACE took it out from under the umbrella of a single university.  WACE gave the institute a global as well as an experiential focus.  As a result the Institute broadened to be much more international in both its participants and its faculty.  This year, we had Australia, South Africa, Sweden, and the US among the participating countries.  Among the faculty we had representatives from Austria, Australia, Canada, Germany, The Netherlands, and the US.  The Institute also picked up from WACE the able leadership of Paul Stonley, head of WACE, and Michelle Hansford the able WACE administrative assistant (and also a past blog co-author).

What started out right away and continued to evolve as a central feature of the program is the way the place and the program encourage people to really get to know each other within and between universities as they work.  It is unlike anything I have ever experienced in a seminar or conference or even a workshop.  Perhaps that is exactly the way an Ex Ed institute should be. Since Ex Ed aims to change students by experience, why shouldn’t the planning institute do the same for its participants?  The program starts with presentations by the faculty, but quickly moves into discussions.  A facilitator appears and starts working with the team to develop their plan even as the faculty team presents tools of planning - how to promote faculty engagement, Ex Ed program types, etc.  Discussions draw out the expertise of the participants.  Faculty facilitators work closely with each team to help them develop their plans.  On the last day, the participants present their plans while the faculty take a back seat and comment where they can. 

To facilitate endless discussion, everyone lives in houses close thogether just outside Vineyard Haven so that discussions within a team can run well into the night.  The teams walk to the center which is just a nearby large house with a meeting room off the back.  Teams play together, exploring the Martha’s Vineyard Island and mix work with that play.  When we faculty bump into the university teams at an ice cream shop or at dinner they are often talking about how their plan is developing or how an idea will play back on campus.  The faculty does the same and continuously fine-tunes the institute program on the fly, with often long full group or smaller discussions.  For me, the extensive discussion with new and long-time colleagues is the experience.  It is real experiential learning and results in a deep, personal learning experience.  Teams speak of bonding.  Friendships are made or strengthened within and between universities and with the faculty.  We eat, sleep, and drink Ex Ed.  Faculty facilitators constantly compare notes to try to help the institutional plans develop. We sit in their houses, if needed.  Every year I have as a faculty member at the Institute, that week is one of the best experiences of the year, indeed of my professional career.

Now the plans are in, the participants back in their far-flung institutions, another institute is over.  I am back a day at work and having trouble re-adjusting.  Gone is the dorm living style for adults.  Gone is the fellowship of all those people.  I have often stated that experiential learning taps into a kind of brain circuit different from the facts and theory of academic learning.  This circuit is of a limbic system logic, an emotional/instinctive computation that declares something of value and a judgment rendered.  We want our students to marry their academic learning to this kind of development as a person so that they will not only know they are in the right field (major), but also how to use that information wisely, humanly, powerfully with others.  Some call that maturity.  Well we faculty can do it too.  I am most proud of the Institute for being a place where this kind of thinking also comes forward.  We at the Global Institute on Experiential Education just had some Ex Ed ourselves.  And I had to write about it.

My thanks to all for a great week and all past participats for what you have taught me over the years.

Lauren Donohoe QC’11, Ana Sofia Lucero QC’12, Sarina Katanov QC’10, Jennifer Weintraub QC’11, Rosemarie Ott QC’11, Anthony del Rio QC’11, Paulina Kulesza QC’12, Stacey Rimikis QC’12 and Jim Stellar 

This is a most unusual post in that I am writing with a group, not an individual (first time).  They are undergraduate researchers in the laboratory of Professor Lauran Calandruccio in the Department of Linguistics and Communication Disorders at Queens College.  When I visited the lab recently as the new Provost, I was struck immediately by the way that they seemed to relate to each other as well as to how they were doing front-line science that is soon to be published and has been and will be presented at conferences in the field.  So, I asked them collectively to write a blog post with me.  Here it is.

My first question is a deceptively simple one. We used the analogy to a family to describe the way you interact with each other and the Professor in the lab.  Why is this important and how does it work to enhance your growth experience from participating in research with a professor?

In order for a research lab to work at its optimal level, it is imperative that everyone involved work well together.  We like to think of the SpAR lab as a “family” because we help and support each other.  As the Linguistics and Communication Disorders department’s first research lab of this kind, we want to make a great impression and get people in our department, and Queens College as a whole, talking.  We take every opportunity to share our research: at the CUNY Pipeline Conference, the Q.C. Sigma Xi research fair, and at our department’s alumni event. We received great responses from everyone and took into consideration any idea that was offered.

The most important thing to remember is just how we got to be so successful.  The answer to that is: teamwork!  We do whatever we can to help and always give 100% to everything they do.  Dr. Calandruccio is an amazing collaborator because she encourages us to do what she knows we are capable of and encourages us to partake in great opportunities, such as NYU’s Rusk Program that two of our members will be participating in over the summer.  All of the research assistants are extremely happy when we hear that our fellow lab members get the chance to do something great because we want the best for each other.

Another thing that is vital to our success is our outgoing personalities and that we are very comfortable with each other.  It is important to give and accept criticism from those you work with: it will only make your work better. Being comfortable facilitates this process.  Comfort relates back to the “family” analogy, because family means that you can just be the person you are and people will appreciate that.  We all work so well together because we all want the same thing: to see our lab thrive in the future. 

Very impressive. My own lab at my previous institution was much like a family too (e.g. we were on a first name basis, helped each other learn lab skills, master the literature, etc.).  I always felt that the encouragement from the members - one to the other - was very powerful, much more than the nice encouragement I could give.  That was because, lab members were the same roughly age and when one could do something, others just believed they could as well.  Another factor was that we had a very real job of discovering and publishing scientific phenomena within the budget of our grants. The lab may have been located in the College, but it functioned as a real-world company where production mattered, where things could and did go wrong, and where individuals just had to take responsibility.  How important is this comparable-age effect in forming a lab-family compared to the real-world effect of research production in getting the most out of undergraduates in a lab?

Our lab is made up of very different individuals: different backgrounds, different life experiences, and different ages.  Even though these differences exist, we all have the same attitude- we always give our best and work hard to reach our goals, both on an individual level and as a lab.  The age differences between us does not pose an obstacle, but rather, it helps us.  The older lab members are great mentors for the younger ones: offering up what they have learned throughout their research experiences as well as giving advice.  The younger members are grateful for the advice and use it to their benefit.  The younger lab members can also put in their “two cents,” and everyone’s suggestions are taken under consideration.   Dr. Calandruccio selected a group of individuals who are committed and determined not only with their research, but to helping out one another.

To all of us, there is no real “comparable-age effect” because we are all treated with the same courtesy and respect and that has a big impact on how our lab succeeds.  No lab member tries to “nurture” others, rather, we are all treated as individuals with our own responsibilities.  No one gets a smaller or larger workload: everything is evenly distributed.  Getting the “most” out of what we do involves teamwork, and being on a team means that everyone pulls the same weight.  Combining everyone’s efforts is what really makes our lab run smoothly and allows us to really go above and beyond with our work.  After all, families are made up of members of different ages, and like a family, the SpAR lab works for the benefit of all its members.  Our lab is not about each individual “getting ahead,” but rather supporting each other and wanting to see our lab do well. 

I want to end by pointing out that people do things for their families that they do not do for others.  We have that saying, “blood is thicker than water.”  Some of this loyalty may be knowing that biological families have shared genes that we all want to see in the next generation, but it is also the caring, the communication, the common purpose, the in-it-together mentality that calls us out to do better than we might otherwise.  As illustrated above, this happens in a lab family, and it can similarly have a high impact on the work a student does and even on how much this opens them to learning about the field and about their own professional potential within it.  The learning may be informal compared to a classroom, but it is also powerful for the individuals, not to mention how powerful it is for the professor and the College.  We in the higher education business need to better leverage such informal but powerful learning opportunities.

Bronwyn Lommel and Jim Stellar

Bronwyn and I knew each other some time ago as lab student and professor in molecular-behavioral neuroscience at Northeastern. We both had an interest in larger questions and recently began to talk about how my emerging blog and her writing might be connected. She produced this small poem and that got us thinking about how poetry might be seen as having a contribution from “otherlobe” type thinking. Given the academic status of poetry, we wondered if there might not be some insight to be gained from looking at a poetic treatment of a classical theory of mind. First the poem:

Homunculus

Little man, sequestered in the

greymatter sprawl –

Droopknuckled ape, opressor unwitting.

I am his prisoner,

mouthpiece, muse. His numbness

clasps tight the strings of my

Feeling –

His blindness wills my gaze – Silence

tugs at my tongue. I am governed deftly in his paralysis.

            Yet, should I fall at last to calm –

Peel back the layers and, with great care,

open his glistening ivory chamber.

I have been his prisoner,

he the mute unquestionable habitant

Within, poised atop hills I could not mount –

Now fugitive, defeated tyrant in a desolate country.

What does “otherlobe” thinking have to do with this poem, aside from the fact that it touches on a topic long discussed in Neuroscience, the homunculus? While BL points out that Mallarmé famously said that poems are “about words,” someone once told JS that the highest form of writing was not description of people, places, things, ideas, or one’s own feelings, but rather a “verbal object” and a poem was offered as an example of a verbal object.  We took that to mean that it had some creative, internal structure that would allow it to generate multiple meanings and symbolism. Then we thought that poems must be the interplay of the academic part of the brain with the emotional and intuitive part of the brain. There must be a dance here between these partners, and like any good dance, the integration must be smooth and sophisticated if it is to work.

BL is interested in the ways in which these ideas might touch on concepts of determinism vs. free will, and the value of ambiguity and whether meaning is determined or open. She says: What makes poetry work is indeed the multiplicity of meanings. Ambiguity is beautiful, and it can be wielded very powerfully in any kind of artistic expression. That is another feature of poetry that may show this “otherlobe” functioning in that the mind-as-computer does not do well with ambiguity or open-ended meaning.  For example, consider the ultimate fairness in an academic test – a multiple choice test.  There can be no complaint that the test is unfair as the answers are right there in front of you and questions are the same for everyone in the class. Essay tests are much more real-world and can support some form of ambiguity. Also, rarely does someone from the world outside the academy ask your opinion about something in multiple-choice format. 

The relationship between reader and poem parallels the mind/brain quandary extant in neuroscience and philosophy, for in some sense one could argue that the poem’s meaning depends on the reader who draws it out– And yet the persona of the reader is manipulated by what meaning may be said already to exist in the poem. There’s a codependence, much like that depicted in Homunculus. As the poem progresses, it lays out the many very personal and yet indirect ways in which the “ghost in the machine” can be seen to manifest in the individual’s life. The search for the ghost in the machine, in Homunculus, (occurring when the “glistening ivory chamber” is opened) is reminiscent of the search for Schrödinger’s famous cat. Where is our tyrant, of whom we have only indirect knowledge? This dualistic, somewhat contradictory nature explored in the poem echoes the way in which a reader might interact with the poem itself.  Maybe this is the same discussion as the one about whether Michelangelo put a brain structure into his painting of the neck of God on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

We would be interested in readers’ opinions on these issues or anything else that you may see of interest in the topic or the poem.  We would be especially interested in what research you knew about that linked brain areas to this kind of intellectual product – highly creative writing.

An Ethnic Salad and a Mathematical Identity

Dina Margelovich QC’11 and Jim Stellar

Dina is a Math major at Queens College and has a wide variety of interests in application.  This has led us to conversations about how one chooses such an interest as well as how internships, and real world experiences in general can be brought into academic disciplines for the betterment of the students.  We also talk about issues of religion, race, and gender and how they influence student growth in an academic institution.  Let’s begin with a question about her. 

Dina, what influenced you to pursue a major in applied math and how does being a math major affect your identity?

As a child, I did not suit the paradigm role of taking interests in toys and games. Personally, I found such activities unappealing, which in turn, forced my parents to find other ways to satiate my ardent desires. Extracurricular workbooks, color-by-number paintings, numerical connect the dots, were all significant sources of my enjoyment and they simultaneously enabled me to engage in problem solving at a very young age.

My fascination with mathematics was evident at a very young age, but I was uncertain as to what I would do with it at the time. It was only until after I joined the Business and Liberal Arts program last year, did I see the impact of business decisions on global economies. Further research piqued my interest in business and risk management and it was at that moment that I decided to concentrate on economics, an application of mathematics.

When people hear that I chose to major math, something that has come to be known as a difficult subject, they raise their brows in disbelief. Furthermore, upon hearing of my decision to pursue a career in business, many cannot comprehend what would drive me to such lengths. The most common question I have heard thus far is, ‘why?’ However, it is only because I have had such a life-long fascination with numerical calculations that I would wish to engage in such tedious calculations as a career choice. Mathematics, in application or theory, drives me to understand the logic behind the most mundane topics to the most abstract.

While I share my passion of the subject by tutoring mathematics in my spare time, I have come to realize that although there is a shortage of math teachers, there is a shortage of professionals working in global markets and looking out for the people’s well being, more specifically, the overlooked middle class.    

After numerous multi-billion dollar corporations incurred large losses in these past two years and required government bailout funds, I saw the power that financial decisions have on global markets. Thus, after the near collapse of our economy in the recession of 2008-2010, I realized the need for a greater number of individuals to analyze different risks and their economic effects. By doing so, I would not only be integrating my knowledge of mathematics with business, but I would be impacting global economies.

OK. How does the world outside Queens College affect your identity?

Until I enrolled in Queens College, I had always attended Jewish private schools. I never thought I missed out on any opportunities; students were provided with infinite amounts of extra-curricular activities, intended to give their transcript further appeal. However, when I began my freshman semester, I broadened my horizons and saw that while I had been provided with umpteen opportunities in private school, there was one thing I had never seen: diversity.

When the time came to choose a college, my required criterion were affordability, accessibility to the city, and diversity. Ultimately I chose Queens College, not only because it fulfilled my initial criterion, but because it had a diverse student body, with large percentages of its students being first generation college students.

Throughout my attendance at Queens College, I have come to see that our campus is in fact a microcosm of the world. I am exposed to all sorts of nationalities and ethnicities, something I probably would not have seen if I attended an institution that was not as centrally located to New York City. 

I cannot really say that the world outside Queens College is having as much as an impact on my identity as it would if I were situated in a non-metropolitan area. Because I have been exposed to such diversity, I have become a more accepting and tolerant person, and have learned to conduct myself in different manners when I am with people of other races or religions. If I had not attended Queens College, I doubt whether I would have learned such important life lessons at this stage of my life.

It may seem odd, but I have found the general consensus to be that the world outside Queens College, is encapsulated within Queens College. I have been exposed to different identities while pursuing my undergraduate career and along the way; my sense of self and understanding of others has been strengthened. My religious observance, something many would think holds me back, has actually taken on a character of itself, showing others that if one wishes to accomplish something, it can be made possible.

This exposure to other identities is fascinating. How does your identity affect the way you see prosecuting your major after you graduate in a job situation?

Undoubtedly, I have grown tremendously within the past three years and I inevitably will grow some more in this coming year. While I have never considered myself to be intolerant of any race or ethnicity, I had never interacted with many individuals of different backgrounds due to my elementary and high school background. However, after attending Queens College, a school with a diverse student body, for the past three years, I can truly say that I am a very tolerant person.  One thing that will not be an issue when it is time for me to enter the workforce, will be a sense of understanding.

Queens College offers numerous opportunities for students to take on positions of leadership and although I cannot take on infinite positions, I have tried to be an active member in our student body. From giving tours of the college to involving myself in the little details needed to plan events for our chapter of Golden Key International Honor Society, I can safely say that I have attempted to make myself a leader amongst my peers. While such opportunities may seem unnecessary while attending college, I feel that such experience will prove to be quite beneficial when I enter the workforce and am faced with situations where I will need to voice my opinions with confidence.

As I have stated, I made the brazen decision to major in mathematics, and to pursue a career in business, more specifically, actuarial work. Watching my peers take numerous summer courses, as have I, has taught me the importance of microeconomic decisions. It is with such a background, that I have chosen to work in risk and attempt to impact the various financial decisions that are being executed. I would actually like to mirror some of the actions taken by Ben Bernanke, a man who was raised with a middle class background and eventually rose from there to become the current chairman of the Federal Reserve. Bernanke’s financial decisions affect the lives of millions of people and I too would like my job decisions to have an impact on many others. I personally have seen the negative impact poor business decisions can have on households and firms in Queens College, and feel my background in leadership will enable me to not only speak up for others, but make decisions in global markets leading to their favor.

Note how well this piece fits with the last post on entrepreneurship where the comment section took us into a conversation about risk. Perhaps I am over impressed with this connection having just finished the Michael Lewis book “The Big Short” about the sub-prime bond market (and the recent financial disaster to which Dina refers) and being half way through the book “The Black Swan” by Nassim Taleb on risk estimation in financial markets and beyond.

Because of that fit and the fact that we have reached more than 1,300 words, let’s stop here for now and return later to the discussion I had intended of how internships play into a student’s career projections.  I want to end by thanking Dina for sharing this part of her story and noting again that her planning judgments fit well with what we call in this blog “other lobe” processing in that they are anchored in the personal, connected to her identity and the subject matter, or even from experiences in on-campus leadership. Almost certainly, her judgments so well laid-out above, were processed in those brain areas discussed previously as being associated with neuroeconomics.

Allyson Savin NU’07 and Jim Stellar

Allyson was one of the most impressive of the student leaders with whom I had the privilege of working when I was Dean at Northeastern University.  A graduate of the Business College, she is now working in the very timely field of bank regulating for the federal government.  Over our extensive contact during and after her college experience, one element of our recurring conversation has been about individual leadership and how that taking that responsibility can not only lead to growth of the individual person but help the society. 

So to begin, let’s ask Allyson how she defines entrepreneurship and particularly at the level of an individual.

When I think of entrepreneurship, I immediately seek to differentiate between being an entrepreneur versus possessing the spirit of entrepreneurship – two concepts which I do not take to mean the same thing.

Anyone can have the spirit of entrepreneurship without actually being an entrepreneur. The spirit often contains the unyielding need to attain a sense of achievement or accomplishment (broadly defined as success) and a creative approach for how to make processes/people/organizations better.  While being an entrepreneur often requires seeing an opportunity and taking the necessary risks to realize its potential.

But to be honest, I think the original question is limiting. I think that starting with entrepreneurship as a jumping off point immediately conjures the image of a small business owner or risk taker (despite my assertion that there could be multiple interpretations of the word).   Yet, if I understand the purpose of the blog correctly, I’d have to say that a different starting point, say for example, “what role does the feeling of success play in developing an individual?” might provide a better insight into individual leadership and how taking the responsibility can lead to growth of not only the individual, but also lead that person to help society.

For example, are some individuals happier, more motivated, or more successful if they are able to shape the definition of success to fit their lives?  Or, does a person need to fit their life to an unwavering definition of success?  

Keep in mind that the notion of success is not black and white or exclusive of many of the other ideas we have talked about during our mentor/mentee relationship.  For example, as it relates to entrepreneurship, is success merely defined as starting a successful venture? Or can success be found from lessons learned on a “failed” attempt?

In regards to the TED talk by Barry Schwarz on practical wisdom that we discussed a while back– the speaker argues that successful completion of a list of job responsibilities for a hospital janitor may not equate to success. Alternatively, applying practical wisdom to a list of job responsibilities may produce better results – or in other words, more success.

To start at entrepreneurship is really to start at too micro of a level. If I were to put a theme to our conversations, I would argue that it is “success and how people define it, achieve it, and inspire it from others”.  And to draw on your neuroscience background, I would pose this question to you:

What impact do you think EQ versus IQ has on an individual’s success?

To answer your last question first, I think the combination of EQ and IQ is critical.  It is like firing both booster rockets in one’s career development whether in getting the job after college or in getting further higher education in law, medical, business, graduate, or other schooling.  While my career was more in the molecular neuroscience direction, my general reading of human cognitive neurology is that many processes happen at once in the brain and that somehow they get integrated into a stream of behavior. At a very macro level we could call that a career path that fits with who the person believes they are (interests, strengths, …).  The field has seen before thinking that combines broad brain areas, such as a language functioning left hemisphere vs. a spatial functioning right hemisphere.  I think this EQ vs IQ queston could be another one with the developing cognitive knowledge being seen in contrast to the growing emotional (limbic system?) knowledge of oneself and of the world into which that knowledge is applied.

But to go back a bit, I want to accept and say that I really like the re-specification of the question you made by focusing on that “spirit of entrepreneurship” and “feeling of success” ideas.  I like it here particularly because it allows me to ask you a key “otherlobe” question: How did you feel your experiences in college on cooperative education programs and/or as a student leader helped you develop this trait in you?  Or did it?

I could have attended a “better” school – one that had more name recognition or was better ranked; however, and this is critical, I do not think I could have attended a school that did more for me by way of cooperative education and student leadership.  While those two components did not create my spirit of entrepreneurship or need to define, and at times, redefine success, they gave them a foot hold and jumping off point.  Without my co-ops, I would not have known to add on finance as my third concentration/major. And it was that decision that has, by many standards, allowed me to be successful right out of college.  Further, without my student leadership experiences, I would not have been able to foster my spirit of entrepreneurship.  As Executive VP of the Student Government, I had my first real chance to quench my unyielding need to succeed, which for me meant leaving processes, people, and organizations at the University better than where I found them. 

So when you ask “how my experiences in college helped develop my spirit of entrepreneurship and feeling of success?” the answer is easy – without those experiences, I wouldn’t even be collaborating with you on this blog right now.  In other words, without those experiences, I may still be searching for my jumping off point.

The words “jumping off point” seem to us again to summarize the contributions that experience can make to education and to leadership.  No one knows from where the next word or thought comes when we are speaking. Yet it is the quality of a leader to be able to live in that world of continuous creativity working with what is being presented at the moment (usually by people) to mobilize a group or even an idea into action.  We think that mentoring (a real experience with a real person), working, even interacting with students outside of a class (informal learning?) is all part of how experience teaches the receptive student how to take their academic knowledge and tie it to real world concerns.  While we keep reflecting on the basic question asked in the title, another question for us to is how does a receptive college/university maximize that learning so that the students are more work-ready and grow to the highest extent possible to be ready for still more learning?  What do you think?

Juliana Schatz NU ‘08 and Jim Stellar

Juliana and I have been talking for some time about doing a blog post together.  She sent me the following e-mail which is really an essay in itself.  I thought that this essay was something that should be seen in its entirety as it shows one student’s evolution from high school through a fantastic job that ended in employment after graduation.  I am happy now to also report that Juliana got into graduate school in Journalism at Columbia University and so now has opened up to her the highest end of ambitions of any academic department – that their student will get into an top graduate program.  Let me stop here and let Juliana tell the story.

My trajectory through experiential education begins in a working class town of East Hartford, Connecticut with a lot of ethnic diversity. My high school class was about a quarter white, black, Latino and everything else from Pakistani to Vietnamese. Many of the students were new to the country or first generation Americans. College was on some of our minds, but the guidance counselors did little to encourage us to reach beyond a safe bet like community and state colleges.

When I told my parents I wanted to go to a private institution, hesitation was their first reaction and financing was their primary concern.  When money’s tight, there’s no luxury to coo over who the rock star faculty members are or what the facilities are like. Practicality is front and center. So when I followed up by telling them I didn’t want to be a nurse, doctor or lawyer — they looked at me with some pause and concern — they had no idea what to expect.

After a dissatisfying year at my first college, I learned about cooperative education from a friend at Northeastern University. From the moment I went to orientation, I knew it was the right place for me. There was something redeeming about getting couple of jobs under my belt by the time I graduated. My parents also liked the idea. I eventually decided to major in Communication Studies and Political Science — confirming my parents’ initial fears. But while I was at NU, I reassured them, I would be able to work in the field and really get to know what I wanted.

No one I ever knew ever worked in television. But somehow, I figured I would be able to do so. “Someone has to do it, right?” I would say to my dad. As a transfer student, I knew I would only have enough time to complete two co-ops (normally students do three in five years). The fall semester after my first co-op as a press assistant for Mitt Romney, who was governor of Massachusetts at the time, I decided I would take a step to the other side of the news and apply for an internship at FRONTLINE. Thankfully, I could fit in an internship during my normal class schedule.

They hired me. It was my first experience in news and in production. I was handling equipment I had only used briefly in class and some I had never heard of. Not to mention, I was working with producers whose pieces I watched in my very first Media Studies classes. I was thrilled - in over my head, but thrilled. My work involved the menial, too — the coffee making, the mail getting — but I was very happy to do it.

One day as I was walking to get the mail, I stopped to chat with Steve, an editor who I had become friendly with. He was frustrated that he might miss his son’s hockey game that night because he had to sit and monitor media that was transferring from one drive to another. I asked him if it was a difficult thing to do and he smiled and said all it really involved was sitting there making sure nothing went wrong.

“That’s it? I can do it.”

It was the best offer I had ever made. Happy to get a night off, Steve gave me a few instructions and was on his way.

Steve, it turns out, worked for Michael Kirk, one of the founders of the series. He produced several films per year with his independent production company (Kirk Documentary Group) and had won more than his share of awards. After helping out that night, I was invited to join lunches with Steve, Michael and the rest of their crew. The rest is a little foggy to me — but as time to apply for my next co-op rolled around, I decided to wing it and ask for a job. I knew I could work for free and keep my job at Starbucks in the mean time. But to my surprise — not only did Michael hire me as a production assistant — he also paid me a full time wage.

There I was, 21 and learning the ins and outs of the best documentary filmmaking around.

Ultimately, I hung around with Kirk Documentary Group throughout the rest of college and continue to work with them today, three years later. I am now an associate producer, working on story creation and editorial research. I fly to shoots around the country and work with Peter Jennings’ old crew. Never, in a million years would the stars have aligned this way if I didn’t make the decision to co-op.

Sadly, my father passed away suddenly mid-way through my co-op with Kirk Documentary Group. But, I have to say, in spite of my tremendous heartache, I am delighted that he lived to see the first time my name ever scrolled through the credits. He called after the show, his voice proud and full of emotion, and said to me “Jules, you’re a documentary producer. You did it.”

And then added, “Thank goodness…you would have made a lousy nurse.”

Michelle Hansford and Jim Stellar

Michelle is the Director at the World Association of Cooperative Education (WACE) and someone with whom I have worked in the past as part of a team to put on workshops in the field of co-op and experiential education.  But she is also an English major from Assumption College in Worcester, MA and is currently finishing up her Masters in English at the University of Massachusetts Boston.  At Assumption College, she never had the opportunity to do co-op, but she did focus on her writing, communicating, and marketing skills, all of which assisted her in the marketing position she held after completing her undergraduate degree, and certainly continue to assist her today in her role as WACE Director.  So, I thought we would begin by asking her to describe what it is like to pull off conferences all around the world, discussing with universities what are and how to improve their programs of Work Integrated Learning (WIL).  How was that experience?

As an English major who didn’t really think that I was good at much other than reading, analyzing, and writing about old texts, the position of WACE Director, in which I communicate with people from all around the globe and even travel to some exotic places, was initially quite overwhelming to me.  How would I know how to correctly communicate with important university and corporate people from around the world?  And would I like travelling abroad and experiencing foreign cultures?  It didn’t take me long to realize that communication skills were probably the most important thing I learned in my undergrad and graduate schooling, because people everywhere – no matter their level or background – like to be listened to and treated with respect.  I was certainly not a Work Integrated Learning expert when I began with WACE, but learning about WIL was something I could do.  It was my communication skills that I found really invaluable, and I continue to improve them with each conference I organize and execute, each foreign country I visit, and each person with whom I work in the global sphere.

This finding of a core skill set (in your case communication skills), that you can develop in a professional environment, is the best way to grow at any time. Like physical growth which makes one taller, this professional growth allows a deeper vision into the area of your work.  So, can you comment on what you have learned from these conferences about what is called Work Integrated Learning (WIL) or what we would call either Cooperative Education or full-time paid internships?  Is WIL or Co-op really an added value to higher education or can people just get it after college as you and I did?

You know, I think that people can actually acquire these types of valuable skills after graduating from a standard liberal arts college or university.  However, I did feel behind in the game when I graduated.  I had no related work experience, no contacts, and no foot in the door, so to speak.  So when I finally landed the position with WACE that I currently hold, it was three years after I graduated from undergrad.  My first job after graduating was with a medical software company – totally not in my field of study, or interest.  But it was a job, and after applying to over 80 (!) jobs in the months before graduating, I felt as though I had to take it.  Being in the top 3% of my class, I thought that landing my dream job would be no problem.  However, I learned – the hard way – that looking good on paper is not the same as the contacts one makes through experience.  This notion is even reflected in my current WACE position, as I was actually recommended to my boss by a personal contact.  Thus, I’m not saying that it’s impossible to acquire the skill set one needs after college.  I’m just saying that it might take longer to be able to actually use it.

Many people agree that Co-op or WIL gives one a head start that people like you and me who did not go to co-op schools might envy even as we try to catch up.  But I want to back up a little and focus on the phrase “dream job.”  Dreams are aspirational.  They also can have a powerful free-flowing emotional logic to them that seems very much to be what we mean when we talk about otherlobe functioning.  So, do you think your dream job has changed now that you have experience in the real world?  How do you think it would have changed if you had done a 6-month work experience (say your current job) as a junior undergraduate?

Your question just put a big smile on my face!  Yes, I absolutely think that my concept of my “dream job” has definitely changed now that I have been out in the “real world” for almost seven years.  When I was in undergrad, I knew that I liked to write, so I equated this passion with “becoming a writer,” or perhaps “becoming an editor.”  I did not think beyond the very narrow constraints of these positions or that there are, in fact, many jobs in which one gets to write, and edit, and communicate in a variety of ways.  My job right now with WACE allows me to communicate all day long via email, letter correspondence, publications, website, etc. with people from all around the world.  Before, I would not have equated a Director position with an international work integrated learning nonprofit organization to be a “writing job,” but it really is.  With that said, my position with WACE also includes a lot of other things, which is great.  I have learned how to coordinate events around the globe – an interest I never knew I had – and I have also learned how to manage a membership organization – another interest I never knew I had.  Thus, being out in the real world has allowed me to move beyond the confines of what I assumed my dream job was.  There are many expressions of one’s interests, and I think that finding the right balance between doing what you love while also learning new things is a major key to long-term success.

Notice how the emotional laden words keep coming up, such as “passion” and “love.”  Perhaps this comes from the nature of the job we are discussing - communicating all over the world interacting with people.  Certainly, we both agree that such interaction with people in the service of a good cause is certainly energizing.  But students often do not know that.  They have heard about it, but unless they experience it on a co-op or  WIL or internship, they cannot know the importance of having fun in the job as a key to growth, which is a key to sustained effort and productivity as well as satisfaction.  We believe the other lobe of the brain functions best when it is happy so that the emotional logic circuits are free to properly assess a situation, properly integrate with the academic facts and theories, and achieve that positive communication with others.  It also helps to communicate across cultures where sometimes one of the best forms of interchange is a genuine smile.

Kelly Dumais NU’10 and Jim Stellar

Kelly worked in my behavioral neuroscience laboratory in my last year at Northeastern and then she did a coop experience at McLean Hospital with my former graduate student Heather Brenhouse (see the next blog) in a neuroscience research drug addiction research laboratory. Like most students, she grew from her experience.  But what was most important to this blog is that we begin to talk about how her experience working shaped her in some pretty basic ways that almost seem the same as how cocaine experience acts on the brain to reshape what animals and humans will do. So to begin, let me ask Kelly to talk about how cocaine acts on the brain, at least in terms of what she saw in the lab.  Then we will try to work back to experiential education…if we can.

My time at McLean served not only as an opportunity to grow professionally in the field I want to pursue, but also as an amazing learning opportunity as I finish my undergraduate academic career. Filled with nerves and excitement, I dove into my first laboratory research project head first, to learn about the rewarding effects of cocaine, and how adolescents may neurobiologically have an increased vulnerability to drug-cue associations and addiction. How the brain develops, and how our specific neurobiology at different periods of our lives influences our decisions, has become of great interest to me. 

To understand how adolescents may have this increased vulnerability to addiction, some background of the rewarding effects of cocaine may be helpful. Drugs of abuse act on particular neurological pathways in the brain to create the rewarding experience of pleasure. They increase the activity of the brain’s reward and motivational systems. These motivational and reward circuitries are located within the limbic system of the CNS, including areas such as the hippocampus and amygdala, providing memory and emotional salience, and the nucleus accumbens, creating  a type of “pleasure center”.  This reward circuitry consists of dopamanergic neurons originating in the ventral tegmental area (VTA) near the base of the brain, which send projections via the mesolimbic pathway to the nucleus accumbens (NAc), located in the striatum. Cocaine affects these brain systems by increasing the dopamanergic transmission, particularly in the NAc, by blocking dopamine transporter systems, therefore creating a rewarding experience.

 A principal goal of the research I participated in at McLean was the study of cue learning and how cocaine creates cue associations when paired with environmental stimuli.  Interestingly, adult and adolescent rats differ in their sensitivity to reward and drug-paired cues. Only adolescent rats were shown to form a strong preference for a drug-paired environment when using a comparatively low dose of cocaine. Also, adolescents maintained their drug-cue associations 75% longer than adults, and had a stronger drug-primed reinstatement (relapse model) of cocaine.  This data suggests that adolescents assign greater salience attribution to cocaine-paired cues than adults. It was also found that the dopamine D1 receptor may play a role in this increased salience attribution. Adolescents have an elevated D1 expression on prefrontal cortex projections to the NAc relative to juveniles and adults, and it was found that by manipulating this receptor expression, adolescent cocaine-cue associations were altered. This suggests that the D1 receptor expression at different developmental stages may create a period of vulnerability to drug cue associations during adolescence, and therefore contribute to adolescents’ increased vulnerability to addiction. The role that salience attribution plays in addiction, and how emotion, memory, and cue-associations can alter our behavior.  It is a fascinating area of research, and one which I believe can have applications to other arenas in life.

Thanks for the science lesson.  Apparently you were a success because I want to tell the readers that as we were writing this piece you got into a variety of great Ph.D. and Master’s graduate programs, some with full financial support.  We could talk about the value of serious undergraduate research (like you had) for making this happen, but instead let’s pick up on the last theme of salience.  Here is a question for you.  Did the work you did in the lab, increase the salience of your learning about the facts and theories of the field of psychobiology?  As you are answering, go back and think about how increased salience in your experiential learning may have been positive emotionally and how that might have been accumbens dependent in you.  I am not saying you are a rat, but let’s take the parallel seriously for a moment.

To simply say that my work in the lab increased the salience of my learning would be an understatement. My salience to the field of drug addiction, and to the field of neuroscience in general, has grown remarkably. Though it may be a combination of general maturity, or general increase of knowledge after four and a half years of college education, I have noticed a drastic increase in my understanding of, my participation in, and my interest toward all four of my classes this semester. Somehow I have managed to tie each and every topic I’m learning about to its application in animal models in the field of behavioral neuroscience. I feel that a huge part of my increased interest and participation in my courses is due to my experience in the lab, and the knowledge that the lab gave me about the field, and the confidence that it gave me in pursuing the field further.  I find myself eagerly attending my courses, and I jump at the opportunity to discuss neuroscience with someone, whether it is a fellow psychology peer, or a friend where I get to teach new knowledge. As a drug-conditioned context becomes more salient to a conditioned rat, the realm of psychology and its associated contexts (Seminar classrooms, graduate open houses, school laboratories) become increasingly salient to me, and not only intellectually stimulating, but emotionally stimulating as well, because the love of psychology and neuroscience doesn’t become something of a hobby, but an emotional passion that finds its way into your everyday life.

We could go on, but to stop here, what we believe is that learning works on the limbic system as well as supplying data for what we can call the cognitive system that learns the facts and theories of the classroom and books.  The limbic system is one of the components we refer to in this blog as “other lobe” with the others being sensory and motor systems (think about the effects of violin practice).  Higher education does a great job of getting the facts and theories in to the cognitive part of the heads of students and experience helps those facts and theories impact the limbic system (cortical and subcortical) where we believe value judgments are made (see neuroeconomics research).  In this world of interconnected learning, the mentor is very important.  So, now we turn our attention in the next blog posted today about the mentoring of Kelly by Jim’s former graduate student, Heather, who was a Harvard Medical School Instructor in the laboratory at McLean Hospital in which Kelly worked on co-op. 

Note from Jim:  This is our first time connecting two blog posts.

Heather Brenhouse and Jim Stellar

Heather was a graduate student of mine when I was Professor of Psychology and Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences (something that required her to be patient with my absences from the lab).  She had a great group of undergraduates work with her in the lab and they considered it really their lab.  She got her Ph.D. in 2005 and took a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard Medical School at McLean Hospital where she remains as an instructor.  The last academic year, when I was on sabbatical at Northeastern, I took on a student, Kelly Dumais, who worked in the lab that year.  Then, Kelly did her coop placement with Heather from July-December 2009.  Kelly co-wrote the blog just before this one. My idea is that you read them together.

Fifteen years ago (no, really?!) I quietly asked my undergraduate psychobiology advisor, Linda Spear, what an “honor’s project” was, and whether I could try it.  I walked out of there a proud new undergraduate member of her lab, without the slightest idea of what that meant.  I was going into my Junior year, and could only assume that I had committed to a glorified extra lab course, where I would run a few experiments and come out the other side with a ‘With Honors’ next to my degree.

Instead, I had a new job.  The Spear lab became My Lab, where I would go first thing after crawling out of bed in the morning to do surgery on My Animals, and where I would go back after my morning classes to run My Animals, and where I would fall asleep on my arm in the animal room while watching to make sure My Little Guys were recovering okay.  The graduate students in the Spear Lab became my mentors, and listening to their discussions became a language emersion for me.  I picked up the lingo, and I started to Get It.

What’s more, I made some mistakes.  They were My Mistakes, which happened from my own bad decisions.  That’s where the ‘getting it’ really started to take hold, because when you are forced to make your own decisions, you will ultimately fall hard once in a while, which I did a few times.  On my face.  In the mud.  With people around. 

What I got was this:  Just because something is (ridiculously) hard to achieve, that doesn’t mean you don’t deserve it.   It’s a lesson that every young apprentice needs to learn before they can make decisions with confidence, lead others, and speak with authority.   I am still learning this lesson, and every time I fall (it hurts more as you start higher), I need to gather up all the memories of past wipe-outs, and how they were intermingled with wild successes—this one is no different, I tell myself.  The trick is to start accumulating those memories as early as possible, because they shape your development.  They certainly shaped mine.   

Last year, as an Instructor at Harvard Med School, I hired Kelly, a co-op student from Northeastern University.   She learned quickly, and did what she was asked to do.  Then I started to tell her to do what she thought she should do.  I got wide eyes and a frozen smile.  It was time for her to make some mistakes.  She did!  It was wonderful to see.  During her six months in our lab (Her Lab), Kelly grew from a student to a researcher.  By the time she left, she was questioning experimental procedure and writing sections of a publication.  Those things need confidence, which started with her ownership of her decisions and mistakes.  She has been accepted into two highly competitive graduate programs, and she knows what she wants to do—I think she’s starting to Get It.

Experiential education is more than just hands-on experience.  You get that in a good lab course.  What I have seen, from both sides, is how important ownership is.  If you are a student apprentice, take it.  If you are a mentor, give it.