Higher Ed Budget Uninspired

Count me among the many North Dakotans who raised their eyebrows last month when state higher education leaders requested a $250 million funding increase for their 2009-11 budget cycle. That’s 57 percent more than their current base budget.

This was a bold move, to put it mildly. I had to read the news story twice, thinking surely I had misunderstood it the first time.

This budget request troubles me on three levels. First, it is selfish. It calls for devoting about half of the state’s revenue surplus (as projected today) toward higher education, leaving all other state functions like caring for the elderly and disabled, K-12 education, law enforcement, infrastructure, or even tax relief, to share the rest.

When I was a child, my parents gave me and my seven siblings one box of sweet cereal to share on Saturday mornings. We rushed to the kitchen to get our fair share. Similarly, higher ed rushed to the table and helped themselves to almost half the box.

Professors would receive a 14 percent raise, or more in some cases. Meanwhile, people who care for our developmentally disabled citizens – a job that requires incredible compassion and patience -- might be lucky to receive any pay increase.

Second, this budget request is uninspired. College inflation has increased at almost twice the rate of inflation nationally since 1982. Over the last 20 years, state funding for higher education in North Dakota has increased 86 percent or 4.3 percent each year. Again, well exceeding inflation in all but three of those years.

Over that same time period, tuition at UND, my alma mater, has increased more than 300 percent.

For our University System to request a 57 percent budget increase represents more of the same … on hyper drive. What is the justification for these steady and significant increases? Why should we devote a majority of the state’s potential budget surplus to one function?

To be fair, the University System did request measures to “Maintain Student Affordability,” such as a $14 million increase for needs-based financial aid and another $12.5 million to support two and four-year college affordability.

This is similar to Hillary Clinton’s solution to increase government funds for Pell Grants and provide tax credits for families who pay for college. These ideas make more money available to help families pay the expensive college bills, but they do nothing to address rising costs.

In fact, these solutions accept higher-than-inflation cost increases as inevitable and provide more government funding that will likely ensure the trend continues.

What’s missing, I believe, is evidence that college administrators in North Dakota are making every effort to restrain cost increases -- which leads to my final frustration. This budget request shows very little evidence of restraint or prioritization.

It’s difficult to argue that campuses are so far behind in funding that a 56 percent increase is justified when, as just one small example, both UND and NDSU are constructing new, million-dollar homes for their presidents.

I realize these homes are being paid for by a generous private donation. But who’s to say the donor wouldn’t have given the same amount for a different, more student-related purpose like constructing a new science lab or updating computers.

My husband and I are planning to pay for our children to attend college at a state school. I always considered this goal rather reasonable. In recent years, I have learned otherwise. This “reasonable” expectation called for us to begin saving $635 per month, every month, beginning in January 2006 (when two of our three kids were still in diapers) until 2026.

If costs continue rising as projected, the year 2023 could find all of us eating Ramen noodles and instant oatmeal cooked in a hotpot. That’s the year we’ll face a $75,000 bill to cover their tuition and expenses for one year at UND.

Parents today who want to pay for part or all of their children’s college education need to plan decades ahead. They have to work harder, do without the newest or the best, or sometimes simply do without.

That same spirit is sorely missing from the North Dakota University System’s recent budget request.

Can We Fix It? Yes We can!

I’ve been cleaning up a lot of messes lately – the product of little boys more focused on destruction than construction. One recent disaster resulted from a war waged with Styrofoam weapons they fashioned from a large box of packing materials awaiting garbage pickup.

I spent several hours with a vacuum sucking little white foam dots out of the garage and our house. Nothing was safe from that hose. I even vacuumed my kids – it was the only way I could get those clingy little beads out of their hair.

Despite my vacuuming prowess, Styrofoam snow continues to appear everywhere. In our beds, washing machine, yard, my neighbor’s house and virtually the entire block. Apparently Styrofoam is like hair, you pluck one and two more come out for its funeral.

The next day, my wrecking crew took to the basement with a rousing round of toy dumping. Every parent’s favorite. If it was plastic or wood and made in China, it was on my floor -- hundreds of disparate pieces.

While evaluating the damage, a shattered basement window I had discovered earlier in the week stared me in the face. I know I heard it say, “Don’t kid yourself lady. The damage has just begun.”

During a few moments of calm before his nap, my four-year-old and I had the first in what promises to be a series of talks about being a builder not a breaker. As we were discussing ways to be constructive rather than destructive, it dawned on me that this behavior – the urge to break down rather than build up – is hardly limited to children.

We see it in our work places, where people often choose to criticize or deflate rather than applaud the work of coworkers or the intentions of their boss.

We see it among friends, neighbors or acquaintances who choose to let jealousy rather than joy rule their reaction when good things happen to someone else.

And we certainly see it in politics. So polarized and competitive are today’s political parties that it’s a rare and notable occasion when one side reacts positively to a smart policy decision or idea from the opposing party.

In both children and adults, our actions are a clear and personal choice. We choose to be constructive or destructive, and live with the results. This is what I’m hoping my children learn.

There’s one obvious difference between the destruction caused by kids and adults however. Adults typically harm a person rather than a pile of plastic toys. And the damage can’t be fixed by a few hours of sorting or vacuuming.

As I sat with my earnest little pre-schooler, my mind flashed to him as teenager. I remembered the pack of young men my husband and I heard tipping over garbage dumpster’s downtown recently, and I imagined any number of dangerous and destructive behaviors that will tempt him throughout his life.

Driving cars or motorcycles just a little bit too fast. Dating girls just a little too fast. Alcohol, drugs, violence, pornography.

All of a sudden, my frustration over the messy Styrofoam, mixed-up toys and broken window seemed ridiculous. And I had the overwhelming urge to surround my son with Legos and spend the afternoon promoting the advantages of construction vs destruction. Maybe I should throw in a little Bob the Builder, just for good measure.

“Can we fix it? Yes we can!”

The Power of Forgiveness

The image of Silda Wall Spitzer is something I can’t forget -- a once mighty corporate attorney with a Harvard law degree wilting like a dying flower next to the man she once adored.

When news broke of now former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer’s habitual trysts with “posh” prostitutes, I went into search mode trying to find something that would explain it. An estranged marriage, a bitter wife, anything that might tell why a man who had everything, and promise for even more, would wreak such pain and devastation on his family and himself.

What I discovered made his actions even more senseless. All reports told of a happy marriage and family. All testimonials about his wife describe a woman who is extremely smart, kind, witty and fun to be around.

And pictures to support this portrait are plentiful – a beautiful wife beaming with pride at his side or looking admiringly at him. Smiles, smiles everywhere – such a contrast to the grim photos of her looking deflated and disheveled at his side while he confirmed for the world the truth about his numerous infidelities.

In a 2005 New York Times article, Spitzer talked about his wife’s “deeply held sense of ethics,” and said he relies on her very much as someone to talk to “in order to resolve a tough issue.” Too bad he didn’t talk to her about whatever “tough issues” were driving him to pay other women a lot of money for sex.

As I look at pictures of this devastated woman, I wonder if forgiveness will be possible for her. Is it possible to forgive such selfish and reckless behavior? A small part of me, I’m sorry to admit, hopes it is not.

I stumbled recently across an interesting effort called “The Forgiveness Project.” It gathers stories about forgiveness from people throughout the world – people who have endured horrific pain and injustice.

The organizer of the project has concluded that the idea of forgiveness causes dramatically different reactions in people.

Some, perhaps many, people see forgiveness as a weakness, a cop out, a way to let their enemies off the hook. To people in this camp, forgiving an awful deed shelters perpetrators from the justice they are due.

This project has created an exhibition about forgiveness. Its provocative title, “The F Word” is intended to speak to those who think forgiveness is a dirty word.

But others see forgiveness in the opposite light -- as the ultimate form of power. Mariane Pearl falls into this category. Remember her husband Daniel Pearl? He was the Wall Street Journal reporter who was kidnapped and subsequently beheaded by terrorists in Pakistan a few years ago. A video of his brutal murder was posted on the Internet for everyone to see.

Mariane Pearl said of her husband’s killers, “The only way to oppose them is by demonstrating the strength that they think they have taken from you.”

Archbishop Desmond Tutu is another believer in the liberating power of forgiveness. “Forgiveness does not mean condoning what has been done,” he told The Forgiveness Project. “It means taking what has happened seriously and not minimizing it; drawing out the sting in the memory that threatens to poison our entire existence.”

I like these ideas. Forgiving does not mean surrendering or crawling into a pit with the weak and timid.

Forgiveness is an expression of power – that’s why it’s so difficult to do. Remaining bitter and angry and oppressed is easy, natural. But to forgive? That requires strength. You must be strong to forgive.

This is the message of Christ at Easter – our most powerful role model of forgiveness. It’s a message of hope for Silda Wall Spitzer and everyone facing wrongs large and small that challenge us, in due time, to forgive and live.

Defined by a Word, a Pooh or a Shoe

When I was in college a friend of mine once declared, “Julie, if you were a shoe you’d be a plain, brown wedge!”

Those of us gathered at the time proceeded to have an amusing discussion about what kind of shoe best described each of us – a spiky patent-leather pump, a penny loafer, a running shoe, or perhaps a comfy slipper … We were able to capture each personality with a shoe type amazingly well.

My children recently hit me with a different kind of personality profile – this one had a distinct pre-school twist. “Mom,” they said. “You’re just like Rabbit in Winnie the Pooh.”

Rabbit? Grouchy, humorless, all-business-no-play Rabbit?

OUCH! This is considerably more troubling than being a plain, brown wedge. So, I responded defensively, “OK, if I’m Rabbit, what’s daddy?”

You already know their response. “Tigger,” they chimed in unison, as if I should already know that. I rolled my eyes and briefly wondered if they had premeditated the entire conversation to destroy my self-image as a mother. Then I remembered one of them is eyeing a career as Santa Claus and another still worries about falling down the toilet.

It could be worse, I thought, at least they didn’t call me Eeyore. I have since overcome this heartless assault by convincing myself this is the plight of all mothers. We are the schedule keepers and task masters. Daddies bounce in for fun and games – wrestling, chasing, and whipping everyone into a frenzy right before bedtime. Moms assume the thankless job of restoring order and calm, just like trusty ole, underappreciated Rabbit.

The Pooh personality test is an entertaining exercise. With a little generalization, just about everyone can be cast as a character in Pooh. Hillary Clinton is quintessential Rabbit -- purposeful, policy-oriented, serious. Barack Obama personifies Roo – young, energetic and optimistic. George Bush could be Pooh – friendly and affable. John Kerry was Eeyore – negative and naysaying. John Hoeven is Christopher Robin – deliberate and astute, like an older brother.

The book “Eat Pray Love” by Elizabeth Gilbert briefly explores a similar notion, that people and places can be defined by a single word. For example, New York City’s word is ACHIEVE. Los Angeles is SUCCESS. John McCain is SURVIVE.

I’ve enjoyed trying to find the perfect words to define people and places near me. Fargo is AMBITION. Bismarck is HOME. Dickinson is RESOURCEFUL. My mom’s word is FAMILY, while my dad’s is clearly PROVIDE. My husband is PLAYFUL.

As for me, I’ve somewhat begrudgingly accepted that my word is SENSIBLE. I tried hard to find a more captivating term, but ultimately sensible is what I am. I love a good bargain, a meaningful conversation, and saving time and money. I live for schedules and lists, although I certainly am not ORGANIZED. I enjoy going out but rarely have “too much fun.” Suffering ill consequences the next day is just not sensible.

Interestingly, my friends essentially pegged me with this term 20 years ago when they called me a “plain brown wedge.”

This begs the question, how much can we change our basic nature? Can Bismarck become “hip?” Probably. Can I? Probably not. But I can appreciate others around me who embody different words, shoe types or characters from the Hundred Acre Wood. I need Tiggers around to make me step out of my sensible, plain-brown wedges from time to time.

Patience: Zip It Up, Let it Go

Proverbs 15:1 “A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.”

We recently acquired a puppy that is so cute his tiny face makes me melt. This soft, adorable little creature also has me examining my sanity on a daily basis. Potty training a two-year-old child and a two-month-old dog at the same time is not something I recommend to anyone, even people I don’t like.

We were on a roll earlier this week – there were several days in a row that I didn’t have to clean any “solid” accidents of the human or canine nature off the carpet. Today I have not been so fortunate.

These exercises in potty and house training have me thinking about a quality that is all too elusive some days: patience. Why do some people have the patience to see past a tornado in their living room, and others lose their cool over something like, well, a turd on the floor?

As consumers, we are not very patient. We can buy just about anything years before paying for it – cars, furniture, homes. We can cash out paychecks well in advance of actually receiving them. We like fast food, fast computers, fast roads, fast results. I actually found myself saying yesterday that I run (for exercise) because I’m not patient enough for walking. It takes too long.

We have successfully eliminated the need for patience in many aspects of our lives. But our drive for everything instant has many of us juggling so much that our patience is in short supply for the times when need it the most: parenting.

I recently offered 20 moms a list of five parenting challenges and asked them to rank them in order of most to least difficult. Thirteen of them ranked “having patience for their kids” as their top challenge.

Patience is certainly an admirable virtue, but is it a personality trait like being shy or funny, or is patience a choice? Can we wire ourselves to be more patient? I believe we can and have two observations.

One of the most patient people I know is my sister-in-law Julie. She rarely raises her voice and encourages vast amounts of creativity, exploration and independence in her kids. I believe her abundant patience comes from letting go of many concerns that ultimately have little real value – things like maintaining strict schedules, following conventional wisdom, or acquiring trendy material possessions.

Letting go of immaterial matters liberates her to focuses on issues of character, kindness, and serving others that have lasting effects. It’s no accident her nine children are among the smartest, most considerate and well-adjusted young people I know.

I’ve witnessed the value of “letting go” in other parents I admire. My sister Sheila raised four children all of whom are good cooks. I asked her how she accomplished this. “If you want your kids to enjoy cooking, you need to put up with a messy kitchen.”

Putting up with a messy kitchen? Is that possible?

This leads me to my second observation for boosting patience: zip it up. Rather than badgering her kids to “be careful,” “don’t spill,” and “clean up that mess,” my sister bit her tongue and let go of her desire for a shiny, tidy kitchen.

In sign language, “patience” is communicated by moving your thumb down across your closed lips. In other words, patience equals shutting your mouth. I try to remind myself of this sign when I want to blow a gasket because my kids aren’t listening or are acting all together too childish.

This can also be an effective tool when dealing with husbands, clients, co-workers or any frustrating situation.

It really works. The simple act of choking back the cutting comment or command before it leaves my mouth somehow defuses an emotional or frustrating situation and makes way for a patient, reasoned response.

I still blow the gasket much more often than I’d like. But there is no denying, peace and happiness reign supreme when I manage to just zip it up and let it go.

Lessons in Leadership from Ed Schafer

Some like to believe that the only way people succeed in this world is by birth right or by reaching the top through unscrupulous manners. I reject this notion.

I prefer the “cream rises to the top” theory. Sure there are cases where people deceive others and manipulate themselves into positions of power and wealth, but generally I believe you reap what you sow. Most people who rise to high leadership positions do so because they are outstanding – smart, loyal, and fair people who readily embrace hard work.

So it is with great satisfaction that I’ve watched Ed Schafer reach the pinnacle of his career – exceeding even his own wildest dreams to become a United State’s Cabinet Secretary.

Every effective leader offers certain strengths. Here are some valuable qualities I observed in Ed Schafer.

Everyone matters: Ed respects the people cleaning his office as much as a dignitary with a fancy title. He and Nancy always paid a visit to the cooks in the kitchen at community events – and often helped them work. We joked that some of Ed’s closest advisors were the people at the gas station where he bought his daily Big Gulp. His sincerity and fondness for people has earned him loads of good will throughout our state.

Have faith in individuals: Hire good people, discover their strengths and then allow them to do their job. Ed Schafer trusts the advice of staff people (even if it occasionally proves to be wrong.) More than that, his faith in people is the foundation for his belief that the best solutions to society’s challenges rest not in government but in the creative minds and ingenuity of individuals.

Be positive: Ed Schafer is more likely to see possibilities than problems. He isn’t afraid to pursue big ideas, and his optimism is contagious. When Ed was elected governor, North Dakotans were down on our luck and our future. What a contrast to today, when hundreds of North Dakotans stood up to defend our state against a shallow and biased picture painted by the National Geographic. This turn around in spirit began with Ed Schafer.

Don’t take yourself too seriously: It’s okay to laugh and have fun, even at your own expense. And it’s certainly okay to break with tradition. In his campaign for governor in 1992, Ed Schafer was the one who started walking through the crowds of parade goers rather than waving stiffly from the back end of a convertible.

A favorite memory that illustrates both his and Nancy’s good humor comes from their “Capitol for a Day” program. I still chuckle when I think of Nancy Schafer running down the streets of Wilton in her business suit and high heels, pushing a twin bed that held a helmet-wearing Lt. Governor Rose Marie Myrdal. Nancy was determined to beat Ed, who was pushing an opposing team’s bed right beside her.

Leaders like Ed Schafer inspire loyalty and good will, make you want to do more and be better. They rise to the top of their game, and bring others with them. They leave a lasting impression on the organizations and people they touch.

We can all learn from the examples set by Ed Schafer. The people at the USDA will certainly benefit from their time with him.

Wisdom in Being Bored

Last weekend we piled our kids and mounds of stuff into our van and drove to the Rocky Mountains. Whenever mentioning a road trip like this, the first question people ask, even before inquiring about your travel plans, is “Do you have a DVD player in your car?”

Car DVD players are to road trips what a nap is to a new mother. Heaven. They break up long trips, help pass time more quickly, soothe restless kids and give parents time to talk and reconnect. My parents really could have used one back in the ‘60s when they packed 7 kids in a station wagon and traveled from Williston to California for a month in a popup camper. (What were they thinking?)

Car DVDs are among a long line of tools and trends that help us pacify, occupy and entertain our kids from the second they take their first breath. Newborn babies lie in vibrating seats, go to sleep to ocean noises and watch cleverly named videos we think will make them smart. TV, video games, organized sports, activities and all-day kindergarten are creating much more structure and stimulation for kids at increasingly young ages.

Between the shuffle of these schedules and the irresistible appeal of electronic media, children can go for days without any real downtime. A number of psychologists, educators and parents believe this hyper-stimulating environment is causing kids to be more restless and agitated, to have lower attention spans, to be dependent on instant gratification and less able to solve problems or complete projects on their own. These experts are actually exploring the benefits of boredom.

A private elementary school on the East Coast has incorporated a radical solution into their curriculum. The entire school, kindergarteners and all, starts the morning with 30 minutes of silence. The principle argues that kids need uninterrupted time to think in order to learn how to solve problems.

Our recent trek to western Montana was a case study on this theory of boredom and problem solving. We don’t have a DVD player for our car. If we thought our kids could handle one in moderation, we might relent. But moderation is not in their vocabulary. We would be dogged with requests for “Sponge Bob” before we reached the end of the driveway.

So, on our latest journey, they faced one big problem: What to do for 10 hours while confined to a car seat. They did a fair amount of typical car activities – coloring, listening to music and stories, snacking, tormenting each other and asking if we were almost there. But they also concocted some intricate games involving dinosaurs, Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker, multiple imaginary dams and a bookstore.

We counted freight trains, sang Yankee Doodle Dandy (no fewer than 39 times), and saw five bald eagles. And we talked. A few movies could have been in the mix of activities, but no one suffered much without it. I enjoyed seeing them immersed in a make-believe world of their own design rather than being pacified by the product of someone else’s imagination.

Ultimately, those hours on the road were a nice break for our family from all the noise, gadgets and distractions of the everyday world.

I’m not sure how long we’ll maintain our DVD-free travel policy, but I do know this. If a little downtime is good for my kids, “boredom” is one craft project even I can handle. Next time my kids say, “Mom, I’m bored.” I can say cheerfully, “Excellent! That’s good for your brain.”