Transportation Planning and "Bad" Teachers

Conflict is an important part of story telling. Fortunately for the writer, there is no shortage of conflict to draw from. Recent reports about plans to evaluate teachers illustrates one of the conflicts I had in my work in transportation planning.

Conflict in Transportation Planning

For much of my career in Transportation Planning I advocated a program to monitor and adjust the transportation plan. This is the application of the scientific method to planning. I would likened it to keeping your eyes open when you drive your car.

I strongly believe in the value of monitoring, but because it is so often misunderstood and misused it is very difficult to implement

In the last few years before I retired, I was assigned to develop a monitoring program. I ran into a lot of resistance. Partly it may have been my style that generated resistance, but then many others have faced the same resistance.

My rationale for a monitoring program was that there were too many unknowns that could not be accounted for in advance. The world does not always unfold as we expect. Sometimes population growth is slower, some times faster. A transportation solution that worked well in other cities may not work well in yours. Changes in fuel costs and transportation technology can have a profound impact on how successful a plan is.

When you develop a plan, it isn't reasonable to account for events that are unlikely to happen. But, there are so many possible events that are unlikely, it is likely that some will happen. We just can't know which ones.

Why, if there is so much uncertainty about the future, would any rational person resist a monitoring program?

I think the main reason is the misapplication of such programs by managers and political leaders who fail to understand how these programs actually work. They see it as a way to put the blame for bad outcomes on someone else. Naturally, anyone who works on transportation planning will see such programs as a personal attack on them.

It was never my intention to approach monitoring in this way, but many people reacted as if it was. The history of misuse undermines any attempt to apply the proper application of the method.

Where I Come From on This

As I noted above, "monitoring" is the application of the scientific method to transportation planning. Although I was an advocate since early in my career, it wasn't until I read W. Edwards Deming's book "Out of the Crisis" that I was able to understand what was involved.

Deming's ideas are not easy to learn. It took me six months to read the book, and even longer to absorb a superficial understanding of his methods. I fear that even a very intelligent person who has only a rudimentary understanding of probability and statistics will not be able to understand. It is no wonder that his ideas are so often misused.

The purpose of Deming's method is to understand what factors affect the outcome, and then address the areas most likely to make a difference. Deming says that it is the system that is the biggest factor and the individuals are constrained by the system. To blame the individuals for poor outcomes is to divert efforts from the changes that need to made to the system.

Getting Rid of Bad Teachers

Earlier this month The Alberta Government released a report that advocated more stringent testing of teachers. (source:  http://www.calgaryherald.com/news/Teachers+union+leader+calls+report+offensive/9810740/story.html). In it I see the same problems I saw in my work on transportation planning. The focus is on "the teachers" as the problem, and the goal is to get rid of "bad teachers". That might not be their real intent, but it is certainly how most people would interpret the report.

As with transportation planning, this is the wrong focus and will only divert attention from more productive actions. A recent report in the U.S. by the American Statistical Association (ASA) reported that only 1% to 14% of the variability in how successful students were was due to teachers. (source: http://www.amstat.org/policy/pdfs/ASA_VAM_Statement.pdf).

This statement needs some clarification. Teachers do have a major impact on students, but what the ASA talks about is the variation. It may be easier to see this as a measure of the difference between good teachers and bad teachers. What this suggests is that even if extreme measures are used to replace all the "bad teachers", the effect on student success would be small. It may even make the problems worse.

There are other factors that are more important and these need to be the focus. A report from the American Education Research Association and the National Academy of Education provides more information on other factors. (see: https://edpolicy.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/publications/getting-teacher-evaluation-right-challenge-policy-makers.pdf)

Sadly, it looks like many more years will be wasted while administrators try to fix the wrong problem.

Where Can This Conflict be Used in a Story

A major goal of this blog is to explore ideas for my stories and movies, so I want to consider the conflicts above as the basis for future stories. I do see this conflict as important, but I can also see that the complexity of the issue would make it difficult to express in story form. Long discussions would be needed to properly explain the conflict. Unfortunately, long discussions would quickly drive away the audience.

When I made my movie "Line of Taxis" I decided to draw on the emotions I felt from a particular situation, but used none of the details of the actual situation. Partly that was to create some distance to allow me to express what I felt, but it also put the focus on the human and emotional issues. I think this helped make "Line of Taxis" a success. As Gene Roddenberry said, "What people are most interested in is other people."

Maybe I can do something similar with this issue. The essence of the conflict is a misunderstanding where the protagonist has a benign goal, but the antagonist sees it as a threat to them. The challenge would be about how to bridge that gap and remove the misunderstanding, and do it in a way that is entertaining. Since I wasn't able to do that in the real world, I'm not sure how I could do it in a fictional world.

This post is a mirror from my main blog http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/blog

Internal and External Conflicts in "The Barrier"

In the past people often told me that there was no conflict in my stories. I found it hard to understand why they said that, because I did have conflict. It took me a long time to realize that most of the conflict in my stories was internal to the characters and these inner conflicts did not come across in my writing.

I didn't know how I could bring out these internal conflicts in my stories, so I decided to shift more to interpersonal conflict in my stories. I felt it would be easier for me to depict interpersonal conflict. Although, I was reluctant to do that because I felt that internal conflict was more important.

Over the last few weeks I have tried to absorb the feedback I have had on my last movie: "The Barrier". I started to see that interpersonal conflict can be used as a metaphor for internal conflict. in the barrier. I'm sure I had been aware of that from other people's work, but had not thought of it for my own work. It seems pretty obvious now.

When I developed the movie, I thought of the characters Arthur Macdonald, Brandon Baker and Dennis Kennedy as different aspects of myself. The conflicts between them, and with some of the other characters, reflect my own internal conflicts.

I can see places in the story where I have used this concept, although I didn't realize it at the time. There is one point where Arthur argues with Dennis in a scene and in the next scene Arthur tells Ling that he actually agreed with Dennis. I know that I had the same kind of argument internally many times in my career.

Over the next few months I will decide what I should do with "The Barrier". I think I can use this insight to develop the story further. Certainly it should allow me to work more depth into the interactions between these characters.

This post is a mirror from my main blog http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/blog

How to Listen - Part 1

Listening is just as important as talking in a conversation. I believe listening is much more difficult than many of us think. In this post, I want to explore the challenges of listening. My goal is to better understand how people listen, so I can incorporate that into my own writing.

Why Listen?

I’ve worked on several projects where the bulk of the story is a conversation. The best example is my short story “The Crying Woman”. In that story, a woman talks with a man about her problems. While the focus is, of course, on the woman, the role the man plays is also important. We need to understand why he listens.

When others come to ask us for help, we want to help them and listening is where that starts. Every one knows how to listen, but not everyone is a good listener. Few of us give much thought to how we listen, but we can become better listeners.

Barriers to Listening

Many things can make listening difficult.

Our ability to hear clearly.

Other noises and problems with our hearing can severely limit our ability to understand what people say to us. If the place where you talk is noisy, it is easy to miss the nuances of what the other person says. If the location is noisy, a move to somewhere quiet will help.

Many people, myself included, have some hearing loss. I don’t believe that is as important as most may think, but as a listener, you need to be aware of your limitations and act to minimise the handicap.

Our own inattention.

If we have other thoughts in our mind or don’t care about the other person and their problems, we can’t really listen to them. We all have our own problems and interests. These can divert our attention away from what other say to us. It will take significant mental effort to put away your own thoughts. It is much harder if you don’t care about the other person.

Emotional reaction.

What the other person has to say may strike a chord within us. It could be that we have strong feelings about what they have to say. These emotions can blind us to what they say. We may be tempted to “egg them on” when we need to calm them down. We may need to distance ourselves from the problem. In a way, we need to “not care”.

The problem solver reaction.

Often the mistake a listener makes is to tell the talker how to solve their problem. I know I’ve had this problem. This can fail for a couple of reasons. First, the talker may want emotional support rather a “solution” to their problem. Most people already know the solution to their problem when they ask for advice. If you start to tell them what to do, you do not give them what they want.

Second, when you give a solution too quickly, you tend to trivialize their problem. In both cases you shut down communication. It is not unusual for people avoid asking directly about their problem. They may want to get advice without admitting they have a problem. They may not be clear in their own minds what their problem is.

Judgemental reaction.

We can disapprove of what a person says. If they have a problem that they created themselves, we will tend to blame them. While it may be a true assessment of their culpability, it can quickly close off communication. You must avoid any judgement of what they say. This is not the same as agreeing to what they say. You can express your disagreement later.

How do these barriers play out in a story?

The tendency I’ve had is to write conversations where both people are articulate and perfectly understand what the other says. In my experience, this is not the case. When I listen to someone, I usually find that I wonder how to respond. Have I understood what they’ve said? Do I understand what they want? What can I say that will help them?

Conflict is the basis of any story. The barriers to listening can form the basis of internal and interpersonal conflict. In a story, communication between people is essential and the struggle to understand each other is an important source of conflict.

In a conversation, the talker struggles to express what they need to say. The same is true of the listener. When you tell the story, you need to show the listener’s struggle to understand. The listener may have to conquer some or all of the barriers to listening. This will make for a more dramatic conversation.

In subsequent posts on this topic, I will explore some techniques people use to improve heir listening.

This post is a mirror from my main blog http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/blog