WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP? Part 5

Does it strike you strange that I should have anotherchapter on what I want to be when I grow up when I already explained how I arrived at my present profession in the previous chapter? I think if I had written this 30 years ago I, too, would have been surprised that there would be more to write. I thought I had arrived at my career, and that was the end of that. Well, as I keep saying, life is a journey, and it's not over until you reach the final destination. You may pause for a while along the way, but eventually you get going again. So with my journey.

Several years before my mother passed away, she said to me, "I'm not afraid to die. I just don't want to miss out on all the things that are going on." The particular thing going on that she mentioned at that point was that there had been men on the moon. Now, for a lot of people exploration of space was a waste of money. But not to my mom. Discovering new things made life interesting. I recall once when the King Tut exhibit was coming to Chicago, My parents attended a series of lectures at the University of Chicago about Egyptology so they would be properly prepared to view the exhibit.

What's that go to do with career and that sort of thing? I realize now that I share that interest in everything going on. I started in my first parish and discovered after awhile that I missed learning new things. After all, I had been in school steadily for twenty-something years. The church I served was a little over a mile from Florida International University, the State University in Miami. A few times I wandered over there and spent time in the Library. After a few trips I picked up a catalogue to see what it offered. At the time FIU was what is called a senior college. It had no lower division courses, only upper division and a few graduate programs. The idea was to provide a completion for those who had completed an AA at a junior college (latter called a community college). I just decided one day to take some classes. I think I started with symbolic logic. This was right up my alley. I did so well the professor checked my records to make sure I hadn't taken the course somewhere else before. Of course he discovered I already had M. Div. degree, so he asked my why philosophy. I explained my own ignorance of the subject and how that had been something of a handicap. I took more courses. That instructor became my advisor, and I found myself one day close enough to complete a B.A. degree, something I had not anticipated at all. All I lacked was 7/8 of a credit in philosophy (don't ask how that number came about) and two science courses. Not being interested at this point in taking science courses, I took CLEP exams and naturally passed them with scores higher than the clerk who did evaluations had ever seen.

And so it came to pass that I had a newly printed B.A.in Philosophy with honors and an award for outstanding academic achievement in philosophy. But so what? I had never been out after another degree. I didn't even go to the graduation ceremony. I wanted the intellectual challenge of learning something. Now that had come to an end. (Note: Sadly I wouldn't be able to do something like that today. The state university system doesn't want students with mere scholarly interests. They want people who start a program, finish in four years or less with no extraneous course work, and then get out of the system. They've talked about a financial penalty for any student who tries to learn too much by taking additional courses. Another achievement for the politically controlled education factory, and another defeat for true learning.)

I don't remember now if it had dawned on me, but I had developed another vocation-that of scholar. I would never be the sort of scholar who knows almost everything about very little, but rather a scholar who knows a little about almost everything, a sort-of renaissance man. This scholarly vocations was not at odds with my profession as a pastor (the vocation that provided me with food and shelter), but a complement to it. One of my faculty advisors and valued colleagues once wrote a letter of recommendation for me describing me as being like a nineteenth century Anglican vicar who spent the morning having tea with the ladies missionary society and then retired to my study in the afternoon to write the definitive commentary on Galatians. That's a very apt description.

What was this amateur scholar to learn next? Well, I had taken some continuing ed classes in Spanish–a necessary skill for living in Miami–but I didn't want to go any farther with that. I had done some refresher work in Hebrew, but didn't get any farther than I had in seminary. What interested me, but I had no real knowledge of, was art and especially architecture. I knew I had no talent for actually drawing or designing anything, but, so, I enrolled at the community college for courses in art history and architectural history. I have to say I learned things, especially from the architecture instructor, but much of the work in the class was busywork, not much more advanced than a high school course would have been. Of course, given the intelligence of some of the students, that was about as difficult as they could manage. My impression was (and still is) that the community college was a good institution for technical/vocational programs, but it really wasn't a very good choice for students seeking to do the first two years of a bachelor's degree. Maybe it is all right for marginal students to get them acclimated to college, but the brighter students would be better off at a four-year college from the start.

I wasn't satisfied just taking a class here or there, so I returned to FIU and enrolled in the M.S. in Adult Education/Human Resource Development program The purpose was to train people to teach adults, a rather different set of skills than teaching children and youth. All in all it was a good program especially in learning how to design a course an develop programs. I have used what I learned a number of times since. As I was completing the program I thought about pursuing doctoral work. My inclination was to seek a D. Min (Doctor of Ministry) degree from a quality school like Vanderbilt (I was very impressed by one of the faculty members there). The cost was prohibitive, however. Instead I pursued the Ed.D. (Doctor of Education) degree in Community College Teaching at FIU. Ironic that with my low opinion of the community college I would seek that as a major field? In practice the focus was really on higher education in general. It allowed me to take courses in religious studies as a teaching field and so fulfilled my desire to additional work in religion. It also required three more courses in research and statistics beyond the course I had taken for the master's degree. Boy, was that ever hard work.

Once the course work was done there was a comprehensive examination which involved answering essay over a two day period. I cleared that hurdle, as I was sure I would. The strange thing in the religious studies exam was that almost all of the subject matter was on books that my advisor chose. None of them had been covered in any course I took. I had to study for weeks to get ready for that.

The next task was a dissertation that was supposed to cover new ground. It took years to finish it. I had to do extensive research to find a topic, propose a thesis to defend, learn enough personality theory to underpin the work, develop instruments to measure things, conduct the research, do statistical analysis and finally write a dissertation. The process is an interesting exercise in getting three faculty members who act as advisors to agree on everything you do. And then comes a defense of the dissertation in which anyone can come and ask questions. Eventually I completed all the steps and then nearly pulled my hair out trying to get the graduate dean to read my dissertation and sign off on it. I eventually got a secretary to look in his office where she found my signed dissertation lying in a corner of his sofa. Yipes! Then came the ceremony where my degree was awarded and I was hooded as a new Doctor of Education. My mother came for that occasion. (And there was a certain irony when as everyone was robing for the ceremony, I noticed the graduate dean had his hood on inside out and I had to send a faculty member over to him to get him straightened out.)

So what does a Doctor of Education do next? Has a party, adds the letters Ed.D. to his name and then goes on doing exactly the same thing he did before. Well, not quite the same. During the time I was working on my dissertation, I taught a course for the religious studies department. That was the first on many over the next eleven years. I think I did quite well teaching. I came to teach philosophy courses as well. One of my great delights was that twice faculty members recommended that their children take philosophy courses from me!

Did I contemplate a change in career? Well, I did apply for a few faculty positions and an administrative position at our denominational headquarters, but nothing came of it. About ten years ago I went through a week long program to evaluate alternatives to ministry. Vocational councilor was a possible alternative as well as stand up comedy, but I was too fixed in my path to make a change. I have taught at a seminary and a local college, done a number of assorted adult education programs here and there, including training church musicians.

Boy, you know this is really a boring blog. Of course you know. You just read it. I have been writing this for a couple of weeks because it was hard to think of anything clever to say. Well, to tell the truth my life has never been all that exciting. I have been considering writing a blog with advice to college students drawing on my vast (ha!) experience, but who knows. Well, if something a little more entertaining occurs to me, I’ll try to have it ready for next week. If not, it will probably not be until a couple of weeks after Easter before I get back to posting.

As we come to the end of Lent and the passage from darkness to light may the Lord God bless you on your way and greet you on your arrival.

Wayne