A Reflection of Changes Based on Work - Personal Statement Example

Michael Markey of the Concerned 9 October 2008 A Reflection on Work Based Change Society is a gargantuan entity that often wields a tremendous influence over individuals and the people who cannot think or prefer to avoid thinking, often become helpless victims of socially encouraged habits and ways of reflecting. One often tends to assume that the education system in the contemporary Western civilization is democratically oriented. Infact, nothing could be far from the truth. The fact is that the education system in a majority of the developed countries is surreptitiously dedicated towards indoctrinating and encouraging students to be complacent workers and consumers (Karier 29). The students and the youth are made to believe that the generously doled out narrow perception of reality is valid and reliable. This often takes a severe toll on the budding critical faculties of the would be adults. Danny Weil (2000) rightly remarks that, "The business agenda for public schooling views education purely as a domesticating act- one that legitimizes current political and economic realities in the interest of the corporate elite (129). When I reflect on my school days, I strongly tend to agree with Miller (1997) that the current education system represents a highly standardized form of social engineering that is designed to circumvent the democratic ideals and norms (27). When I left school in 1984, I had the opportunity to study Archaeology at Stirling University. However, I was also offered a job in the Bank (TSB). It was a time when the unemployment rates were soaring high, a time when jobs were at premium and higher education for a working class boy like me was not considered the be all and end all. The social rankings and aspirations of the working class (my father was a labourer and my mother worked in an office) in the eighties were limited to getting a job and one preferably for life. I was 18 years old and though I loved History, the pressure from the home front and the dire need for hard cash was too strong. So I declined the place at Stirling and took the bank job. This was an early example of how I conformed to the popular perceptions and opted for the easy way out. Despite being young and intrinsically ambitious, I made a decision which would apparently make my life more comfortable and subsequently less challenging. In a Brookfieldian context, my schooling simply failed to influence my juvenile decision, considering the fact that the socio-political environment in which I was immersed at that time, gravely restricted my range of options and thus had a deciding influence on the resources that were available to me (ETC: A Review of General Semantics 7). My upbringing and social standing goaded me to aspire for things that were not in my best interest. I choose to hide behind the conventional values and debilitating social perceptions to justify my choices, instead of contemplating on a bold leap forward. In other words, I somehow failed to challenge the assumptions snubbing my growth by unquestioningly bowing before them. There is no denying the fact that critical thinking has more to do with a, "free-wheeling mental speculation where you fly all over the intellectual universe and look at things in novel ways (ETC: A Review of General Semantics 8)." However, the nature of my immediate experiences was such that critical thinking was simply not a part of my cognitive framework. In retrospect I think the predominant socio-economic assumptions of those days impeded my full growth as an individual. Whatever education I received at school, failed in the sense that it did not prepare me to "look critically at previously accepted beliefs", a trait that constitutes the hallmark of the philosophy of noteworthy educationists like Dewey (42). I somehow failed to gauge the ramifications of my decision in a larger social, economic and political context. Unluckily, my locus of control was externally placed and oriented, though there existed faint murmurings of ambition and enterprise in the deeper recesses of my consciousness (Web Survey). My inability to take cognizance of the assumptions that moulded my thinking made me opt for a path that ran contrary to my aspirations and true potential (Privett). However, my chance meeting with one individual brought a sea change in my attitude and way of thinking. That individual was Bill McKenzie that facilitated the voluntary engagement, which made me aspire beyond my institutional mode of learning, to affect a deeper understanding of the assumptions that enveloped my mindset (Brookfield). I met Bill in 1991. By this time I had been with the Bank for 7 years. I was literally comatose and was somehow bearing with the daily drudgery and frustration. The price of safety had taken its toll and life had become incredibly boring. Anyway I met Bill in October 1991 at Financial Services Recruitment Fair in a Glasgow hotel. By October of that year I had already been looking for a new job for 12 months, yet the security blanket of the bank had led me to turn down several challenging opportunities. I had seen the advertisement for the recruitment fair, while scanning the job sections of the papers. Bill worked for CIS, the cooperative insurance company that had agents all over the UK at the time. I walked into this fair and this man with a beard bounded towards me, thrust a leaflet into my hand and asked, "Do you want to change your life" "Yes" I said. Today, when I think back, it was really like a bad tele evangelist moment that makes me laugh even now. The fact that this guy (Bill) wanted to change my life seemed surreal, but caught me off guard for a moment. Bill took my response as a call to action and said, "You said yes, so let's talk and let's look at how we (CIS) change your life and make you some serious money." The words "change your life" combined with "serious money" made me stop. Over the next hour I stood with him as he explained to me the merits of leaving the Bank with salary albeit a fairly small one and joining CIS on commission only. The very thought of leaving a safe job, a job for life, a job with a pension horrified me. I had also recently bought a flat with my girlfriend (now wife), taken on a joint mortgage with the Bank at a preferential rate. At that time, the very fact that I was having a conversation with a man who wanted me to give up all this seemed absurd. However, looking back I think that I was simply ready to go off and needed someone to pull the pin. The more I talked to Bill, the more he convinced me. He told me his story. He had trained to be a Bio Chemist but got disillusioned with it. He liked to go out and about, he liked meeting people, he liked the buzz of helping people and making a good living at the same time. He sold me the whole concept of the cooperative moment, the fact that one could make money and help people at the same time. Bill certainly taught me how to make money, but it was also about taking a RISK and this was the biggest concept that he got over to me. Life is all about the risks one takes everyday, the decisions one makes and the consequences of those decisions. The more we talked, the more I empathised with him. The very fact that I perceived Bill as one in the same boat dispelled my initial impression of him as being a dodgy salesperson. The most incredible concept that Bill taught me on that propitious day was that, "no matter what decision you make, you are never wrong." Brookfield rightly said that, "when adults teach and learn in one another's company, they find themselves engaging in challenging, passionate and creative activity (1)." Bill finally succeeded in opening my mind to the possibilities that lay ahead. According to Donald Schon, reflective practice enables a beginner to trace consonance between one's personal attributes and those of a successful practitioner (Ferraro 1). Bill was that blessed person who imbued me with such a reflective state of mind. I joined the CIS within a month of meeting Bill and worked there for five years before moving on to be an IFA. The very presence of Bill as some sort of a role model made everything seem hassle free and simple to a young man with some star dust in his eyes. Bill not only gave me an opportunity to enter the Financial Services, but also armed me with a philosophy of life and Business that I still use today. It was Bill who taught me that challenging assumptions and taking risks is good, both in professional and personal life. Sometimes it may work, other times it may not, but there is no right or wrong risk and one leans every time one makes a mistake. Boud rightly said that the true test of maturity lies in having a broader base of experience to which one can always attach new skills and ideas (Ultimate Adult Learning) Total Words: 1540 Works Cited Dewey, J. The child and the curriculum. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1990 Ferraro, Joan. M. "Reflective Practice and Professional Development". BNET (2008). 9 October 2008 "Interview with Stephen Brookfield". ETC: A Review of General Semantics. 22 March 1994. 9 October 2008 Karier, C.J. Business values and the educational state. Chicago: Rand McNally, 1973 "Locus of Control". Web Survey. (2008). 9 October 2008 Miller, R. What are schools for Holistic education in American Culture. Brandon, VT: Holistic Education Press, 1997 Privett, Don. "Assumptions". Adult Education Research Website. 2008. 9 October 2008 Stephen, Brookfield. Understanding and Facilitating Adult Learning: A Comprehensive Analysis of Principles and Effective Practices. California:Jossey-Bass Inc., Publishers, 1986 "Ultimate Adult Learning". 2008. 10 October 2008 Weil, Danny. "The civilization of subjectivity: The privatized curriculum and the marketing of American education in a postmodern era". Taboo. 4.1 (2000): 123-130 Read More