Student Association's SA Day-Away - Burlington's Mayor

Senior Eric Jaukkuri - Co-Secretary of Programming stands with Director of Student Activities Grace Kelly and Marilyn Cormier, Director of Government and Community Relations in Contois Auditorium this afternoon just prior to a talk to the Student Association by Burlington's young and dynamic new Mayor Miro Weinberger.  The second picture has the Mayor and Michael Fay, the College's Student Association President.  The third picture is of all of the members of the E-Board and the Student Senate posing with the Mayor.  And, YES, he does look like one of our students :)

The Mayor spoke of his own internship in Washington, D.C. in the office of Senator AND SMC alum, Patrick Leahy.  He encouraged our students to get involved and to take advantage of the many opportunities in local government.  He is a very impressive young, new politician and it was wonderful of him to share his Saturday afternoon speaking with our students and answering their questions.  One of our students asked him about the plight of the homeless in this area and of the issues surrounding how our society AND our government can deal with the mental health issues of those who are less fortunate and who may find themselves homeless.  It was a GREAT question and I was, as usual, very proud of our students for not only their questions, but for how well they responded to the Mayor - Well done Student Association.

take care, be well and PLEASE, PLEASE, keep all of the members of our military and all of our veterans in your thoughts and prayers.

Dave

THIS is why I love to teach - - - -

Yesterday was one of those days in teaching that reinforces my LOVE for this profession.  My Sports Psychology class had to select their presentation topics for the semester - they have to work in teams of four and so yesterday they chose topics, established teams and selected dates for their presentations.  For them, it was chaos, for me it was ORGANIZED chaos where they were forced to work together, make connections with members of their teams, compromise, choose tasks within each team and then work with me to establish timelines - as I said, chaos for them - ORGANIZED and planned chaos for me.  One student commented "you love this don't you?" and I smiled and responded YES.  We then began looking at why some people are perfectly comfortable being GREEN CIRCLE skiers and others DOUBLE BLACK DIAMONDS - it was a fascinating discussion about how neurotransmitters may play a role in this and how the Central Nervous System levels of stimulation let one take great chances and another be happy with taking few chances.  We watched a YouTube video on cliff jumping and then moved on to even more extreme sports - check out wing suit base jumping on YouTube - watching the expressions on their faces as they watched seemingly sane people jump off of very high cliffs dressed in a wing suit and then FLY at 100 miles an hour right next to walls of stone left some with expressions of fear and voicing "I will NEVER do that" and others with looks of joy at seeing something that really speaks to them.  We processed all of those different reactions and they left the classroom talking, energized and saying "I never knew that before." - THOSE words warm any professor's heart....

My Theories of Counseling class met next and we talked about the chapter they had read for yesterday. After going through the PowerPoint presentation I had prepared based on the chapter on Medication(s) we watched the PBS Frontline show from 2008 entitled The Medicated Child - wow - each time I show this to my classes, they have a visceral reaction to scenes with 4 and 6 year old children who are on 8 to 11 different medications.  Since most of these students are also in a Practicum class, they will all have "clients" who are on some form of medication so it is important that they do some critical thought and analysis of their OWN views on medication.  Much like the students in Sports Psychology, these students also left the classroom talking with each other, energized and all riled up - again, things that make teaching so rewarding -

As I said, things that remind me why I LOVE to teach, even having done so since January of 1966......

Take care, be well, and please keep all of the members of our military in your thoughts and prayers as the War in Afghanistan continues to take the lives of OUR soldiers.

Dave

Practicum and the Psych Club

Just finished meeting with my Practicum class on this beautiful Labor Day.  Everyone (16 students) is placed and several have already begun their interships - others are waiting for their background checks to be completed.  One of my Class of 2012 Practicum students has an interview tomorrow for a full-time job at the same place she had her internship - she will rock it. 

I meet with the officers of our Psychology Club in half an hour - good folks with great ideas.  We will be contacting all of our majors/minors to see what things they want us to present this year.  The Psych Club is funded by the Student Association and has done a great job of raising awareness over the past couple of years.  We will have Chris Clary from Career Development come to talk about Graduate School and hopefully have Brian Cain, who is a Sports Psychologist come to speak - all of the Club activities are open to the entire campus - Brian spoke to almost 80 students the last time we brought him on campus.  The Club also collaborates with Psi Chi which is the National Honor Society of Psychology so this year looks like it will be a good one.

Take care, be well and please keep all of the members of our military in your thoughts and prayers - there still IS a War in Afghanistan..........

Dave

Orientation completed and classes begin

Yesterday morning we completed this year's Orientation for new students.  The picture below is a picture I took of all of the Orientation Leaders and in the front is Grace Kelly, Director of Student Activities and the driving force behind making what could be a difficult transition into a much more successful one. Grace is ably assisted by a wonderful group of Orientation Leaders who comprise the O-Board - they work for almost an entire year to ensure a successful Orientation - the picture above is of Grace and most of the members of the O-Board. From new students and Orientation Leader alike, the consensus is that this year's Orientation was one of the best EVER.  With construction disrupting the usual flow of families and students into our Residence Halls and making their way to the variety of activities sponsored by Academics and Student Life, it COULD have been a disaster.  Great planning and collaboration between all aspects of the College resulted instead in a very successful Orientation - Well done everyone.

Classes began this morning and I meet with my Practicum class this afternoon.  These are all senior Psychology majors who will be spending this entire academic year together in this class.  They will be out in our community for 8 - 10 hours a week and back in class with me for two and a half hours each week.  This course provides them with supervision on-site and a chance to process all they are doing with their peers in this class.  Tomorrow I meet with Sports Psychology and Theories of Counseling.  Even after 46 years of teaching - YUP, 46 years - I still am excited for classes :)

Take care, be well, and please keep all of the members of our military in your thoughts and prayers -

Dave



They're BACK............

I am in the office on this great Sunday afternoon getting ready for a couple of workshops this coming week for members of the Residence Life staff (Diversity and Inclusion) and then the Orientation Leaders (your role is crucial in helping our new students transition to SMC).  We also have a Cruise on Tuesday night and I get to take a LOT of pictures AND then the ONE thing that Orientation Leaders love more than anything else - RELAXATION exercise.  This is a fun and exciting time as new students arrive on Thursday, RA's returned yesterday and O-Leaders arrive today and tomorrow.

I am excited about classes this semester as I don't know very many of the students who are enrolled BUT it has also been fun communicating via email over the past couple of weeks.  We have secured some new placements for Practicum and since these students are with me all year and not just one semester, we will get to know each other well.  Sports Psych will be fascinating as we talk about the psychological implications of the Olympics and yes, continue discussions about the scandal of Penn State.  Theories of Counseling class will utilize our Developmental Laboratory again as students get to watch themselves "counsel" through the wonders of technology.  All in all, an exciting time of year.

Off to do some kayaking - went yesterday and am going again today as it IS a beautiful Vermont afternoon.  As always, please take good care, be well and please keep all of the members of our military and our veterans AND their families in your thoughts and prayers.  The number of deaths recently in Afghanistan is staggering -

Dave

TC was in the HOUSE :)

Those of you who are fans of the Boston Red Sox know who TC (Tom Caron) is - TC is on NESN for each broadcasted Sox game and is also an alum of SMC.  I was over in Alliot yesterday waiting to meet someone when there was TC standing with Buff Lindau, our Director of Marketing.  I have met Tom on a number of occasions as he has been a loyal fan of Saint Michael's College since his graduation.  I went over and re-introduced myself and as we were standing there talking a tour from Admissions walked past - as the group went down the hall stopping in front ot the MOVE Office and their guide was explaining things, one father, who had noticed Tom kept watching us - Tom and Buff left and headed over the the President's Office (Tom and his family were in Vermont at Smuggs for a family vacation) this one father walked back to me and before he could ask, I simply said "yes, that is Tom Caron" - the father was quite excited as he "thought" that he had recognized TC but wasn't sure - this was just one of those fun moments around here.

We are all getting ready for the new students to arrive and for our upper-class students to return.  With the construction well under way, they are making sure that there will be access to all of the buildings in the Quad for MOVE IN DAY on the 23rd.  We have been working with the Orientation Leaders and the members of the Residence Life Staff for months getting ready for this and I get to do workshops with these students the week of the 20th.  Diversity and Inclusion are strong and important parts of our community and providing these students who VOLUNTEER to be Orientation Leaders or who are employed by the College as members of the Residence Life Staff with a chance to better understand ALL of the issues surrounding acceptance and diversity is both challenging AND rewarding - they are good people.

Speaking of good people, today Allison Sherman and Rich Gardener are getting married - Allison is an alum and works in our Office of Alumni Relations and Rich is an amazing young man who volunteers his time and energies to Camp Ta Kum Ta which is a Camp for kids with cancer.  Rick is also a realtor and builder and as wonderful a person as Allison is.  Everyone here is so excited for both of them - we ALL wish them the very BEST.

Take care, be well and please keep all of the members of our military and all of our veterans and their families in your thoughts and prayers - with the sad news of several deaths in Afghanistan today they all need our prayers AND gratitude for their service to our country,.

Dave

NEW York City here I come AND the Olympics is providing great discussion topics for my Sports Psychology class.

I leave tomorrow morning for a quick down and back trip to NYC.  My wonderful sister/brother-in-law made a contribution to the STAR Program in CT and "won" four tickets to the Daily Show which they gave to me for Christmas.  We are finally getting our schedules together and tomorrow night my sister Sue, my brother-in-law Jim and my wonderful niece Maggie will all show up at the theater at 4:30 for the taping ot the Jon Stewart show - he is an amazingly creative and clever comedian and I am looking forward to this.

This morning I was over in the Student Activities Office and Grace Kelly, our very efficient Director of Student Activities, was meeting with some members of the Orientation Board and the E-Board of the Student Association.  Since I teach Sports Psychology and they all know me, they had a few questions for me - we then had an amazing conversation which ranged from dressage to the size of the suits worn by the women, but not the men, in beach volleyball.  A couple of the women in our discussion were appalled that this IS 2012 and the women are forced to wear skimpy suits but the men aren't - it is so about the marketing.  The men had no clue!!!!  We talked about how someone who has spent their life getting to the Olympics can lose their dream because their foot went outside of the prescribed lines during floor exercizes in the women's gymnastics.  All of these issues and so many more will be great discussion topics for my Sports Psychology class in just a few short weeks.

With less than a month before classes begin again, please enjoy yourselves, take good care, be well and please keep all of the members of our military and all of our veterans and their families in your thoughts and prayers.

Dave