Hello Verons,
I think we all were pretty impressed by our trip this morning to Vera. But what else were we? Since we don't have an official blog post-er this week, I thought I'd start a conversation about the many different ideas that were running through your head this morning (other than, can I actually take a second doughnut -- o.k. that was me). Did anything you learn help you figure anything out? Did it make you more confused? Are your internships this semester more the former or the latter? Any questions that you did not get to ask there that you would have wanted to?
As I said this morning, I was really struck by what a key skill flexibility is -- intellectually, personally, professionally -- and I wonder if you feel that you see that in your spinoff organization? Do you think that the things you are studying/doing are helping you develop that skill? And, in a nod to Professor Waterston, what kinds of larger conditions are necessary for people/organizations to be able to be flexible?
On a separate note, I will bring a thank-you card to seminar next week for everyone to sign, but feel free to shoot Tina an informal thank you at tchiu@vera.org.
Blog on!
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By now it is clear to me that most of my bosses, coworkers, and others we have met ended up in this field by accident. Comforting and scary at the same time. For those of us who have things "figured out" and know that we are interested in this field, what steps are we supposed to take to get where all of these other people ended up by accident? Other fields have pretty straight and narrow paths, academically speaking.
At nearly all of my jobs I have been surrounded by social entrepreneurs who have gone to law school but who are not practicing law. Several of the Vera speakers mentioned that they went to law school because they felt it would give them a stronger voice in the field. After a few years of hearing people say this I started wondering if I needed to go to law school in order to achieve more. Whenever I'm asked, "what kind of job do you want?" the follow-up question is always "so where do you want to go to law school?" Thing is, I don't really want to go to law school. I think I could handle it and maybe even like it, but I've never felt that law school is the type of thing that you put yourself (and your wallet) through if you are only slightly interested. I've never been interested in practicing law, which is another reason I've felt as though it wouldn't be the right decision. One woman at Vera seemingly expressed the same sentiment- saying that if you are going to law school then you should at least practice for a few years.
I have noticed that it's mostly women who have told me they felt they had to go to law school to be influential in the field. Men usually tell me they had always wanted to be a lawyer, and after practicing for some time ended up changing careers. I'm wondering if women feel they need to have that law degree behind their name to be taken seriously?
Then I look at people like Greg Berman, who, sans law degree, has managed to achieve so much.
I'm wondering if law school is slowly becoming the norm for people pursuing this field because it just so happens so many people in the field went to law school, not because it is a necessary to be successful. See- I'm simultaneously looking for template to follow and trying to get out of following the one that seems to be forming.
I just want to start off by saying that I really enjoyed visiting Vera. Just as Amanda has mentioned it was interesting to see how these professionals ended up in this area of work. One of my favorite parts was hearing the process with spinning off an organization. What struck me is how profit corporations will only spin off if they feel it will maximize their own profits. However, with these non-profit organizations we see that the main concern is the profit for the people they are serving. I enjoyed hearing how much Vera has put on the line for other organizations to be able to succeed. I feel that this internship experience is helping us with this key skill of flexibility. I feel that interning in a nonprofit organization both the staff and clients learn the skill of flexibility to see the points of others and learn to see issues from the perspective of others. Flexibility is defined as not easily being bent. This brings me back to the issue of burn out which we spoke about earlier in the semester. From what I see I feel that the work at CEO could be overwhelming because of certain clients not wanting to cooperate, the constant need of funding, etc. However if the staff members were not flexible enough to roll with the punches and rededicate themselves to their work we would have a much fewer number of agencies dedicated to the public sector.
Hearing how impress you all are, I presume I am the envy of the class…just kidding. When I first arrived at Vera, I was impressed with the architecture of the building, the milieu of the office, the diversity, and of course the professional experts. I was overwhelmed at first just being at The Vera Institute of Justice and wanting to make a good impression. I felt that everyone there had such vast knowledge and had at one point or another contributed to such great efforts: successful spin offs, The Commission Report and so many other important projects that have touched so many lives; that my contribution or my presence was so minimal. And to make matters worse, I was and still am going through a process of figuring out where in this world is my niche. So, you can imagine that it was also comforting for me to hear when these poised, intelligent, knowledgeable lawyers and who were all women conceded that they too at one point did not know where their niche were; that I felt some sense of reassurance…"no Kerry-Ann, it is not the end of the world that at this moment you do not know where you fit in”.
I have since opened up myself to only learn at Vera, not to impress.
I recently completed a review on Advocacy Evaluation for Tina, and she was very pleased. Tina is hard to please. O.k., so maybe I want to impress a little less than when I had initially arrived, lol.
As someone who is now considering both law school and graduate school, the meeting we had at Vera was actually very comforting to me.
What I have learned through this semester is that I am much more interested in "the law" than I had previously thought... it is not that I was not interested previously, but more so that "law" had been this big, scary entity that appeared unembarkable unless something that one had been considering for years.
I have realized that if my goal is eventually to do research on the courts (juries, witnesses, defendents, etc), then what better way to gain exposure/knowledge in this area than through being a lawyer first. However, I also feel as if law is a career I may want to practice for longer. Exposure to this world through my internship at NDS has really made me consider the field now only because I find it extremely interesting, but because you're not sitting at a desk all day; you're meeting people, you're going from place to place. I think this is something that the field of experimental forensic psychology does not really offer (however, I have very little to base this assumption on). I will take away from our meeting at Vera the message of flexibility; that it is o.k. to have only a general idea about what you want to do (social justice work), but not a concrete career choice.
Overall, the meeting at Vera was an enlightening experience. It comforting to me that agencies like Vera exist, and are filled with all the bright, dedicated people we met.
I left Vera with mixed emotions last week. Perhaps I’m stating the obvious, but the lives and decisions of college students are complicated, layered and confusing.
We have so much ahead of us. It is very exciting but, also extremely frightening. We have all very real tangible responsibilities (work, school, personal lives), but there’s also this omnipresent weight of figuring out the purpose of all those tangible responsibilities - finding our vocation. In finding a vocation we must not only consider spiritual and emotional fulfillment and well-being but also practical and financial concerns.
It was somewhat comforting to hear that even successful people struggled with the same issues. I agree with Amanda that there is a strong, perhaps unnecessary allure to law school. For me it’s about security (everyone says there’ll always be jobs for lawyers) and empowerment. However, law school seems like a tremendous commitment for people who aren’t necessarily passionate about law. On the other hand we know flexibility is important, maybe the skills that law school arms students with allow them to be flexible and agile.
Job Path had Job Developers whose job it was to go out into the field use their contacts and actually carve out a position for disabled person with a specific set of skills or capability. This practice strikes me as fitting in with Vera’s philosophy very well. Job Developers had to be creative, open-minded, and passionate. And the arrangements they made were often extremely efficient and beneficial to both parties involved.
Although we may not be able to craft the ideal career path for ourselves as actively and literally as Job Developers, we can certainly use a similar principle. By assessing our skills, interests, and talents, developing them through our experiences and then comparing them to the world we can hope to find a good fit. Unfortunately this process requires not only flexibility, but patience and hard work and is much easier said than done.
I'm so interested in this conversation, not only because I've lived it (my husband is a reluctant lawyer) but because all the comments reveal such a level of thoughtfulness, self-knowledge and humility -- such rare and attractive qualities!
I recently got my husband a t-shirt that said "Not all who wander are lost." It was partly a joke -- he has been quite the determined and successful person since I met him freshman year of college -- and partly b/c it was on sale (it's a recession, people!). But it was also partly to recognize the courage it took for him (son and brother of many doctors, Type A personality) to think outside the "template" (to use Amanda's words). He was one of those good college students who it was assumed would go to law school. He was a college journalist and applied to law school thinking he'd eventually cover legal issues for some newspaper. Of course, financial issues were determining (writing for newspapers does not pay well, particularly at first, and he had the great misfortune to fall in love with an English teacher) as well as the ubiquitous advice to "practice for a couple years." To make a long story short, he worked for a firm, clerked for a judge, again worked for a firm and was not terribly content. But he took a chance on a few opportunities that came seemingly randomly from friends, a few moves to support my career, and finds himself now quite content practicing a wide variety of law for a financial company. It is not his dream job, but he good at it and he has made each decision in relation to a set of factors that he could not have known at your ages (kids, spousal job, economic pressures, larger family issues). No one -- even those white males whose lives seem so much more predictable, who seem to have their hands on all the ropes -- can write a script at your age and follow it without changing. Everyone has to compose a life; thinking of yourself as the composers of your life rather than subject to all your stakeholders' steep expectations will liberate you to make the best decisions possible and to have the strength to make those decisions the right decisions. I remember an anguishing year trying to decide whether we should move back to NY for his job or stay in MO for my job. I kept waiting for The Right Decision to show itself. It didn't. For months. And then I realized, in the big questions, there aren't any right decisions. There are just decisions and they become right or wrong depending on how hard we work to make them so.
Walking away from Vera last week left me incredibly motivated and energized. I too am facing an indecisive phase. Law school or job? Temp job or real job? Can I find any job other than a temp job? The endless questions usually freak me out and I’m left without any answers. Unfortunately ignoring this whole issue hasn’t helped. I’ve always wanted to go to law school; the power of the law having an influence on everything that we do is what first appealed to me. The only obstacle in my way is the feeling of just being done with school and ready to move onto the “real world”. Getting the opportunity to see that such successful people struggled with the same issues as I did is incredibly reassuring.
Similar to Job Path, C.E.O Job Developers go out and create jobs for our clients. It takes a lot of effort and dedication to cope with uncooperative clients and employers. I would think that law school instills that dedication, making it easier to deal with burn-out later on in our careers. I agree with Greta that we can take the skills of our co-workers and apply them to our own lives. Being flexible is another key lesson I picked up from our visit. These women have moved from job to job, trying every opportunity before finding the perfect fit. I think it would help us all if we stopped looking for the ultimate perfect job and instead just focused on what satisfies us and allows us to work towards our goals right now.
I love this week’s blog because it’s so rare that we get a chance to have this kind of conversation in the academy even though it’s SO important. I love what Professor Reitz wrote about how we ALL have to construct and reconstruct our lives, and there is no particular map that guides us exactly along the way. And thank goodness for that or else it would be so boring!!!
At the same time, I do understand the angst and anxiety that goes with uncharted territory, with the unknown. It’s only now, after I’ve gone way past “middle age” that I feel I can start to relax and have a sense of where I’m going—because I know where I’ve been.
I’d like to share, in list form, what I’ve learned along the way and who helped me too.
1. My mother taught me to “follow my heart.” While I didn’t always do that, I did do so for some major things—and it was great advice. When I discovered anthropology in my late 20’s, I knew it was something that would never go away, and it hasn’t. While everyone all around me was settling into their “careers,” I launched a new one, became a poor graduate student (starting with the master’s degree) while pregnant with my first child. And during my first semester in grad school (for the PhD), my husband left me!! I had a baby, a part-time job, and a full-load grad program. It was the beginning of the winter, and I had no family nearby. But I stuck with it, and was the first among my cohort to graduate. I had to work two jobs (at times I worked three jobs) to stay in school. I look back at those years (my 30s) as an amazing, awesome time. Matthew, my son, was my companion, my buddy, and he and I have a very special bond because of all those years when it was just him and me (he’s now 29 years old and an incredible person—I’m very proud of him). I wouldn’t trade those years for anything.
2. I’m Jewish, but not religious, though I strongly identify with aspects of Jewish history and culture. When I was a teenager in Puerto Rico, my parents couldn’t stand the people who attended the conservative synagogue, so they and some other families started a reform temple. Friday night services were held in people’s homes, and when there was a reform rabbi visiting PR from the states, he’d come and lead the services. That was the ONLY period in my life when I enjoyed attending “religious” services. The rabbi (whose name is escaping me now, I can’t believe that) once said to the congregation: “The only sin in the Jewish religion is if an individual does not fulfill her or his potential.” I took that message to heart. It has guided me, compelled me to be a driven person, to fulfill my potential. The message is very powerful. It forces you to look inside yourself to discover your passion, and once you do, you MUST follow it. I did and feel that I have, in fact, fulfilled most of my potential, and continue to strive to accomplish my goals.
3. I just remembered his name: Rabbi Schulman! And his wife’s name was Rose.
4. When I look back at my life, I see that I’ve done something different every decade: in my 20s, I was married, a school teacher and lived in Brooklyn; in my 30s, I was a single parent, graduate student; in my 40s, I was a PhD in Anthropology, started a business, remarried, had a second child (something I thought would never happen again once I was divorced at 30-something); in my 50s I became a full professor with tenure, enjoying seeing my two children grow into adulthood. Along the way, I’ve published 4 books, several articles, etc. etc., and have a pretty strong reputation in my field!!
5. When I was in my 20s, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. I became a schoolteacher by default because I just didn’t know what else to do, what else was out there. At that time, I also dabbled in pottery and painting.
6. I yearn to paint again, and learn how to throw a pot on a wheel once again. Someday.
It’s an amazing journey. It’s hard and scary. I hope you will trust in yourself. Have faith, have confidence. That’s key. I doubted myself so many times. It’s probably inevitable to do so (do women doubt themselves more than men do?) but it’s important, I think, to try to overcome doubt and develop that confidence. It’s just a process, and it all does work out.
It is so powerful to hear everyone's aspirations and the paths they have taken in their lives to get to where they are. I must state that going to Vera only reaffirmed my aspiration of going to law school. Honestly at Safe Horizon when I step into the court room or I look at clients, the attorneys are the most powerful actors. Advocates provide moral support and play a pivotal role in providing services to domestic violence victims. However, there is a strong validation and a sense of justice when domestic violence victims get something legally.
On a personal level, I always personally struggled in how could I bring some sort of lasting change within my home country. Prior to coming to the ISP program, I thought that in order to get rid of corrupt leaders, we need to kill them. Part of this was However, until I took a course on Ethics, Killing and War, I realized that violence begets violence and you probably end up with even more corrupt leaders. Therefore I stated that I would probably use the law as my weapon. If wielded the right way, it can bring some landmark changes. My deepest concern is that in trying to change the system and the laws, I hope the system does not end up changing me.Therefore I truly took from VERA the lesson of humility becuase that keeps you grounded and to surround yourself with different opinions and to actually listen and pay attention.
It's my dream: a little group therapy in the classroom! Well, in cyberspace. It strikes me how heavily these decisions weigh on each of you and yet, how backwards reflection does not-at least not in the cases of the professors here-yield evidence of any great regrets. I would echo strongly Professor Reitz's comment that there really are not good and bad decisions so much as difficulty in taking what we have and seeing the good in it. In the population we are all hoping to work with, there is such a deficit of support for finding people's strengths and working towards them, for creating-as discussed in Travis' reading for this week-a "redemption narrative." I'll offer a brief synopsis of my own background because-on paper at least- it seems quite regrettable, although I do not feel that way at all. In fact, I feel quite "redeemed."
My father served some time in prison and died when I was young. My mother struggled with depression most of her life. I dropped out of school and left home in my early teens. I have had every kind of job-savory and unsavory-that you can imagine. I got my GED in my thirties, went to college, and then to graduate school, getting a Ph.D. in 2000. I had my two kids while I was in graduate school. Was all of this terribly hard? Yes, but also exhilarating. And I would not change anything except, well, I forgot to learn how to drive. (That can be pretty handicapping.)
I try to draw on my own experiences when I listen to offenders, students, colleagues, my own children. Psychologists have a fancy word for it-countertransference-but it is really the totality of one's feelings about, and for, the other person, based on their consciousness of both the current "reality" of the relationship and the awareness of how the backlog of one's own personal experiences shape their perception of that reality. It is in that peculiar relational space that I find my empathy. The experiences I have had are a great gift in this way.
To whatever degree you can find people who will listen to you as you struggle to figure things out-rather than make suggestions to you, or offer their advice-the more likely you will be to find a path that feels organic and true to the self, rather than being a response to external demands about who you should be.
WOW.
I'm really glad I waited to post, because I got to spend time reading everyone's reactions and have some time to think.
Like Kerry-Ann I was thinking PRAISE ZEUS-- I don't need all of the answers right now. The idea that I have the freedom to create my future is a new one for me-I had been taught that my future was in the hands of what ever business I sold myself to, to "do my time" and retire.
And Professor Stein and Professor Waterston, I had no idea that you both weren't born with your PhDs, thank you both for sharing some of your personal history. I am so easily intimidated by people who I see as much smarter or accomplished than I am, sometimes I forget that doctors are people too.
Only very recently- the past year or so- did I get excited about continuing my education past a B.S. The past couple of days I've been thinking about the message from Vera and some of the things going on in my own life, and took a step BACK from fantasizing about more and more school.
I worry about what Darakshan talked about. I am fortunate that right now I know why I am here on our lovely little planet and I cannot lose sight of that. It is not to get a law degree and it is not to jail myself in a job I hate. To be successful, my life doesn't have to include more school.
In Greta's terms, I think I am taking away how the folks we met at Vera are their own "Job Developers". They create their path, no one else. If I know where I want to go, Imma go there..
Last week visit at Vera Institute of Justice was a great experience. I was pleased to see that there are enthusiastic people working to make our criminal system more just. The main reason I applied to John Jay was to pursue a career in criminal justice. I have always wanted to be part of a group that fights to make systems around the world fairer. This may have been driven by the fact that I was born and raised in a communist country. However, I have never thought to become a lawyer. And, I still don’t. But then I asked myself if there is going to be any place for me that will be suitable for what I want to do in life? Yes, Greg Berman is an example. But, how many like him are out there? That’s why, I felt a little disappointed when I left Vera. Even though none of the speakers bragged about their education, a comment was made that “being a lawyer gives you more authority.” This sounded for me that you may try to do a lot of thinks but without being a lawyer, people may not listen to you.
I am totally amazed with the work that Vera does, from creating, to implementing and then spinning of a new program. The only part where I noticed a disconnection is in the post spinning relationship. The relationship between Vera and its spin off was described as a parent-child one. However, it seems that after the spin-off agency is capable to function on its own, the relationship loosens (that’s why both CEO and Vera compete for the same title).
Overall, it was a great experience, and I would like to have the opportunity to learn more and be able to further support their work.
I was actually born with my PhD.
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