Monday, November 4, 2019


The Rapp is back:

It's been over a year since I updated this rambling blog.  I'm going to note a few bullet points now, to come back to with more detail about what can happen in a year.  Hopefully I'll come back to them later with details which will likely cause my real or imagined readers to run screaming to the exits "Will He Ever Stop".  I do tend to exhibit verbal diarrhea at times.  My intent is to not let another year go by without burdening someone with my rambles.

We'll get back to these points later:

2018

  • my Engineers Without Borders (EWB/Los Angeles) partnership project with the U.S. Forest Service goes on "hold until further notice"
  • Cameroon gets embroiled in separatist conflict between English and French post-colonial zones, putting my EWB team's project there on "hold until further notice"
  • my experiment with the teaching profession leads me to the Preliminary Career Tech Education (CTE) teaching credential programs
  • my networking with schools about learning how to be a teacher leads to a contract with a central LA high school to teach an Intro to Engineering class
  • I launch into the teaching credential clearing process, teaching full-time and taking classes
  • My EWB/LA buddies travel to Guatemala to start a new water systems project for a small community
2019
  • I "survived" teaching in my own classroom for a full school year 2018-2019, then re-retired
  • a bit of travel - Jun/Jul - my 1st trip to Alaska - Anchorage
  • an almost routine trip to Tucson, AZ - time with family and a bit of personal business
  • old age creeps in, and I relaunch the plan for Red Cross platelet donations
  • work on getting our EWB Cameroon project on a remote support track
  • received my 2nd Mitch Rapp advance copy novel, by writing why I should get one
  • networking with schools in my area, for possible classroom visits
  • continue supporting the Encorps STEM teacher recruiting program, which got me into this teaching "mess"
  • too many doctor related events, some familiar, some not
  • completed required teacher credential courses and U.S. Constitution test online
  • visited high school classrooms, then middle school classrooms
More to come, in some excruciating detail:

Wednesday, June 20, 2018

I'm going to start posting some updates to this url, since my old "finefoodorfodder" page from my South Sudan timeline is awkward for posting new information.  Google + has links to both url's.  Maybe I'll get the hang of posting again, after a long hiatus.

I wrote some introductory remarks today in preparation for my upcoming long weekend in Oakland (Jun 22-24, 2018) for the Encorps STEM teacher recruiting program 2018 Summer Institute, to be held at Cal State East Bay.  I'm scheduled to corral and assist 12 attendees in my so-named "Plugged In" Small Group.  I'll attend the newbie orientation program on Friday afternoon, then stick with my Small Group during much of the Saturday and Sunday activities.  Here are some things that I'd like to talk about with the group:


Some random thoughts about teaching:

Does anyone think that class content is more important than classroom management?   Hmmm!  If so, sheer delusion !!!

From a year of volunteering at Tennenbaum Tech High School, my sense is that these kids (mostly freshmen and seniors, with a smattering of sophomores and juniors) are almost all hopelessly lost in the delusional world of teenagers.  Occasionally a few will actually focus on learning and show an interest in doing so, but if that's the case, it's because the teacher was able to grab them with trickery, humor, sarcasm, loud noises, etc.  That's Peter Kim's style (my host teacher through the Encorps program).

I think the biggest challenge for teachers (aside from keeping a lid on noise, posturing, texting, video watching, sleeping, etc) is to determine how to get actual information into the brains of a very diverse group of students - from self-motivated - to eager listeners - to English Learners - to IEP's.  There's no magic bullet, as the phrase goes.  It's about establishing mutual respect between teacher and student, with rules that students know explicitly and are actually glad to have, and ruling with fairness mixed with compassion.

I think it's good to ask students at the beginning of the year to be honest about which ones want to be in your class, which ones would rather not be in class at all, and which ones are willing to follow the rules that you, the Master of the Classroom, set for them.  My view is that there is not currently any such thing as a Benevolent Dictatorship, but your classroom should be the closest thing to that reality.

Many of them can and should be given a chance to show their own leadership abilities in assisting you with class management.  Stella (an Encorps volunteer, with us on many Fridays) and I were part of several Career Tech and Earth Science lab sessions where students were able to see how well or how poorly they worked in groups (peer groups bring out the best and worst in them).  Breaking up and mixing groups is a good tool for the Benevolent Dictator, when used judiciously.

I was not pleased to see how everyday language of teenagers has degenerated to the most coarse level that they can get away with - apparently many of them get little indoctrination into civil discourse at home or in previous schools.   You as a teacher may not be able to curb this behavior, but you owe it to them to impart to them the fact that a higher level of communication is what they'll need to really succeed once they leave high school, regardless of whether they go on to further studies.

There are usually counselors who are trained to deal with behavioral issues, learning impairments, home environment, but teachers do what they can to understand what the kids are dealing with, or in some cases - in.  There were Xanax issues in the past, both middle school and high school.  It's a lot to ask a teacher to try to interpret students' lack of energy, sleep and attention, but that's part of the job.   Follow school protocol and try to stay objective.  Protect yourself with documentation for everything which varies from your plan.

Take the opportunity to help with individual catch-up tutoring after school (a part of typical requirements anyway), communicate with parents, document endlessly, and keep at least one confidant (teacher or counselor) for things which concern you, and things which will keep both of you informed.

There are always social/political issues floating around among teachers - not everyone will be best buds.  Attend Professional Development sessions and study the environment thoroughly, deciding what's best for you as well as for the students.  Decide for yourself how to comply with State metrics for your lessons and for grading.

Your real job is to make your subject matter interesting and attention grabbing for as many students as possible - hence using stunts, props, analogies, videos, etc. is crucial to success.  Don't assume that presenting what's interesting to you will be by default interesting to them.

We had students who were somewhat social misfits, sometimes picking fights, or just needing to be the center of attention.  I only had to put myself between 2 students once in the classroom, but the experience of having the other students thank me for raising my voice and shutting down the "posturing" was worth the frustration in my mind.  That's where your Benevolent Despot role comes into play.  I'm sure you know that it's not just boys who get into these confrontations - we had quite a few girls who made it quite clear that they were not to be messed with, and even a few who got into fights with each other, but not in class.  I've listened to other teachers who worked in much rougher schools than ours.

None of this is news to people who have been teaching for a few years, but it might seem a bit daunting at first to some.  Basically, just have your plans clear in your head, and have backup plans for contingencies.  Remember that the students can be your best assets for making your classes work, if you recruit their skills.  And by the way, put together some fascinating lesson plans !!!

Tuesday, November 21, 2017

11-22-17 time to revitalize my old blog, with some new adventures; so much has happened !!!

I submitted quite a bundle of posts to this blog when I started working in South Sudan in 2011, just months before it became officially the newest country in the world on July 9, 2011.  Then when I and many others had to leave the country because of renewed political and military conflict, the blog came to a halt.  I tried to get myself to restart it in mid-2015, but didn't persist in the effort.

Now I'll see if I can play a little catch-up for the span of a few years, and just maybe make it a habit.  I'll also see if anyone reads it.  That would be fun.  I'll try a link on my Facebook page for starters.

Don'y change your channel and don't panic - this is just a test.

I see that my new posts appear through the link (https://finefoodorfodder2016.blogspot.com/) , so I'll add the original link (https://finefoodorfodder.blogspot.com/) at the beginning of any new posts, so that anyone can see all posts which go back to 2011, if they're bored and want to see old news from South Sudan.

As I noted on Facebook, I'll see if anyone cares about all this tripe that I'm writing.

Time will tell - so says Will Rapp

Thursday, May 26, 2016

May 26, 2016 regrouping with a new blog site

May 26, 2016

I recently started looking at the blog features of LinkedIn, and found that people are posting some well thought out observations, via links to their blogger pages.  I had been posting to my blog "finefoodorfodder.blogspot.com" while in Juba, South Sudan, up until July of 2013.  Things just got hectic for a while; then we had to leave the country as soon as possible after intense fighting broke out on Sunday, Dec 15, 2013.  I didn't post to my blog again until April and May of 2014, from my home in Los Angeles.  At that time I was commenting on the South Sudan peace agreement discussions underway in Addis Ababa. 

One technical note:  I had dozens of photos loaded into Picasa albums, and attached to my blog during 2011.  They all reverted in the blog to blank squares, and none of those Picasa albums from 2011 through 2013 show up in Google/Picasa albums now.  Only those photos from 2012 and onward still appear in my blog posts, which were linked to Picasa photos and uploaded under a different email address than my current Single Sign-In address.  Never quite figured that out.  Maybe one day.  Soon I'll try to import my old blog posts from 2011 through 2014 to this new blog.  I have no current access to the dashboard of my old blog.  Ah, woe is me!

Back to the update at hand.  In June, 2014, I took on a theme park type project task with LA ProPoint, for friends that I had known for a long time.  As with many projects, the time to devote to a blog just dwindled, you might say.  Right, it's now 2 years later, and the intervening events must make a lengthy list.  I kept my contacts with friends and coworkers from the South Sudan era, and just tuned in to a lot of news.  I finished the intense equipment development project with Universal Studios Hollywood/Fast & Furious tram tour show in June, 2015, then took a 6 week vacation in South East Asia (Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos), then officially "retired".  I started doing volunteer work with Habitat for Humanity in a local low-income housing project in the Fall of 2015, while I spent more time with my own local Engineers Without Borders/Los Angeles Professional Chapter (EWB).  I volunteered time to develop a design/project management pilot project for EWB in partnership with the National Forest Service, for upgrade to an Angeles National Forest park site.  I've also been supporting close-out efforts for an EWB/LA water project in Tanzania, and reviewing a new proposal for a water services project in Cameroon.

None of these volunteer projects take up a lot of time right now, but they provide a real sense of satisfaction, and they are not part of a "career trajectory", unless you think of retirement as a career.  I enjoyed my 9 years of LA area public school and water infrastructure development projects, and my miscellaneous 10 years of experiences in the theme park development industry (here in the U.S., plus Spain and Japan) and 7 years in the LA area defense industry were all possible because we live in this 1st world environment.

During this semi-relaxing semi-retirement, I took a 10 day vacation in Istanbul in February 2016, to join my nephew Joel, who has been walking from Sri Lanka to Los Angeles, without walking on water, for more than 1 1/2 years.  We were tourists in Istanbul for those 10 days, took hundreds of photos, and watched the movie "Deadpool" in a theater along the political demonstration zone, then Joel continued his trek westward.  Now I've been immersed in networking and in this political year circus, while planning my next vacation - 2 wks in Vienna.  I'll meet my nephew again, along with his parents and sister, and after that 2 wks of photos and touristy memorable experiences, Joel will continue westward toward England, and we'll return to our "peaceful" USA.

My point to this post, other than filling in a few gaps since 2014, is to reflect on what life teaches us if we're listening.  We so often don't take the time to observe and critique what goes on around us, or to think about how we can shift destiny, for ourselves or for others, for the better. 

Usually we're just into survival, or in my case I'm seriously considering what the remaining years that I have on this planet will be like.  In our own "little" 1st world environment, we seldom consider how different and diverse the rest of the world really is.  We take so much for granted that we expect the rest of the world to speak our language and share our values.  It's time to get over that.  I have friends and former coworkers who mean a lot to me, who are currently living and/or working rather far away in Japan, Australia, China, S/E Asia, the Middle East, Africa, Europe, and Central America (I'm not in regular communication with anyone in South America, but I'll try to remedy that one day).  They are opening themselves to other people's realities.  You, whoever you are, should try to expand your thinking beyond the daily drive for survival, and imagine how you can make things better for someone else, somewhere.
                                                                                                

Since this is another catch-up post, I'll end with the observation that I am in a position to work because I want to, not because I have to.  I'm fortunate that our own culture has allowed this old fart to take time to write, to try to relax occasionally, to travel periodically, and to work on things which are embedded with a sense of purpose.  I can tell you're impressed by my penmanship and witty repartee!!!  Or not !!!