I think everybody has these kinds of friends, those that you love dearly but you just have absolutely nothing to talk about. It could stem from the fact that one (or both) simply holds back so much of their life it's impossible to have anything to discuss other than mindless chatter. It could also stem from the fact that you are just two very different people with little to nothing in common.

It's always a curious position to have friends like these. You get along perfectly well, you may even like being in their company, but there is just nothing to talk about. This is not so much a friendship/relationship (f/r) killer as it is a f/r staller. You can still progress, but only so far, and if some new growth and development doesn't occur, the f/r will eventually deteriorate into bland pleasantries.

I call this stage 2 friendship (more on state 1 later). It's a stage of malaise. It is, however, possible to break free from it, but it depends entirely on the reason the couple is stuck in stage 2 to begin with. If it's from the fact that one or both are simply holding back, then once one or both start to open up, things can progress rapidly. If, however, two people just simply have nothing in common, it's perhaps impossible to break free.

continuing on...

Evaluating teachers in college requires a bit of a different standard than it does in elementary through high school. In those, simply knowing anything at all about the subject you are teaching makes a big difference. You would think that would be a pre-req. for teaching, but in the schools I went to, it really wasn't. Passion for the material is also not something you can take for granted.

In college, you look at these areas a little differently. In college, your teachers are obviously going to have knowledge of the material. They spend their entire lives studying it and rarely do they teach classes radically outside their area of expertise. Passion for a college instructor is really a different question. Obviously they are passionate about the material to spend so long studying it, but do they share that passion for teaching? The important thing in looking at a good college teacher is: 1) being able to break down his/her immense knowledge and present it in a logical and coherant way to the student and 2) actually give a rat's ass about teaching it and view it as something more than just a chore you have to do in order to work for the university and do what you really want.

Essentially, there has been two, one I expected, the other I added after thinking more about the subject:

Dr. Enomoto: I've had him twice so far in graduate school and he is probably the best professor yet, easily the best in the department. This guy knows basically everything and presents his lectures in a logical and coherent way that each one builds on the other. I've had a lot of terrible teachers since I've been in graduate school, but I've probably learned more in his classes than in the rest combined.

Dr. Berrens: This is the one I added upon further reflection. I didn't care much for his class, nor did I think much of the guy personally, he was kind of a pompous ass, but I actually learned a ton in his class. I forget a good chunk of my classes after I'm done with them, but even when we cover utility theory in graduate school, my life is tons easier since he explained it to me so well.

The influence of teachers on students can be immense and run the gamut from extremely influential to uninspiring but ultimately harmless to completely turning a student off of the subject.

I've had a countless number of the uninspiring, mediocre breed. Such is the nature of public school, I think. But I also had a few really good teachers mixed in that have really influenced me and my education:

Mr. Hawkins 5th grade: I respected this man simply because he helped me, a mediocre student, better understand the importance of education and with a little application, I could be better than I was. Up until that point I was a solid C average student with nothing particularly remarkable about me. All my teachers up until that point had been in the uninspiring group and generally set low standards for their students, and if you do that, they generally achieve that level. Mr. Hawkins had none of that and he challenged his students in ways that most of them never had been challenged before. I realized that all I needed was simply higher expectations to be better than I was.

Mr. George 12th grade: Pretty long time, eh? I thought as hard as I could to find somebody in middle school to fill the gap but I simply couldn't. Even in most of high school the vast majority of my teachers were really nothing special. Mr. George, however, was different. At Farmington High School, he was a rather well known guy, an unashamed liberal freely expressing his views at a fairly conservative high school in one of New Mexico's great Republican strongholds. He injected his politics into his class frequently, but it wasn't so much about indoctrination as it was simply getting high school kids to think outside their rather narrow world view. I rarely agreed with his views, but I certainly appreciated what he tried to do..

That aside, his most important quality, however, was that he cared about his job and took it seriously. It seems like a trivial point, but it was not at all common in the teacher's I've had through the years. He actually gave lectures and cared if the student understood the material, rather than simply plow through a text book. I took him for an AP class and it was the only one I actually passed.

I'm running a bit long, but I'm going to write a separate entry for influential college professors...

I had an exam yesterday in micro theory. I had studied hard and knew the material that I, and everybody else in the class, understood was going to be on the test. What I got, however, was something totally different. I bombed, as did most of the class I suspect. I was unhappy with the exam, as was much of the rest of the class.

To me, there is a distinction between a hard exam and an unfair one. On a hard exam, you may specify generally what is going to be on it, but within those bounds make modifications that make the problem more difficult, but something that is still within the range of the test takers ability. This is not what happened here. This was just an unfair exam pure and simple.

What made it unfair was this: the professor said explicitly that the exam was going to cover A, B, and C. What ultimately happened, however, was that it covered D, E, and F. In general, I have no problems with professors testing a wide range of knowledge, but don't say you are going to test on one thing then do something else entirely. THAT is unfair. It would have been much better had he not said anything at all about what was going to be on it.

Had a pretty good week this week. The big thing that happened was that I turned 25, today in fact. Physically, of course, being 25 is the same as being 24 but psychologically, there is a difference that doesn't exist, in, say between turning 23 and turning 24. When you are 25, you can start (reasonably) viewing the span of your life in terms of a century. 25, a quarter of a century. 24% doesn't really say much, but 25%, ah, that's something you can use!

Milestone birthdays also have a way of putting your life so far into clearer focus. What have you accomplished? More importantly, what have you missed out on? My mind always tends to go to that place. What have I missed out on? It seems like a lot, but thinking in it in this way gives you incentive to move forward. Yes, I've missed out on a lot, but hey, that just gives me more to do and will make the next 25 years all the more impressive.

An early birthday card...

Hmmmm.... let's see, helps me protect against H1N1, but gives me diabetes? I'd say it's a wash.

I haven't been writing much in the blog lately because, frankly, I just haven't had a lot to say. Part of it has been the fact that I've been sick and my mental capacity has been greatly, greatly diminished. We had a group project, in fact, that required some work when I was sick and when I started to come out of it, I realized how horribly we all did on it. That was a week ago and my lungs are just now beginning to be fully recovered and let me do a full cardio workout.

But enough of that....