I was
attending a tech training event when someone asked me what my goal as a
professor was. Since he was probably
expecting me to say something like - I want to teach them how to develop
creative briefs, he was shocked when I said that my goal was to make my
students better people.
When I
began teaching 17 years ago I realized that I was lucky if I remembered one
thing from any of the classes I had taken in college. So I asked myself - if I want students to
remember one thing what would it be?
Since I was teaching advertising the answer was - Does it make me want
to buy something? Given the tendency to
evaluate advertising as entertainment, just this simple reframing opened the
door to new observations.
I'm
not sure at what point I began to realize that my students were in fact
children. Perhaps it was after a few
years of fielding their creative excuses for not doing their assignments. My favorite: "The cruise ship didn't
have Word."
Therefore,
I wasn't totally surprised when I learned that the human brain is not fully
formed until age 25. I adjusted
accordingly.
I
realized that simple things like explaining that deadlines don't change because
you are having trouble meeting them, matter
Likewise,
making them understand that granting exceptions for one student is unfair to all
the others may be one of the most important concepts I teach.
More
recently my emphasis has shifted to helping them to recognize fake news and distinguish
facts from opinions. (Hint: Don't ask
Siri.)
I hope
that I have created enough ripples at
this point for my goals to have had impact not only on my students, but also on
their friends, families and colleagues.
Time
management, fairness and being able to recognize what's true and what isn't are
all far more important in the long run than writing a terrific creative brief
is.
And
who knows? Maybe they will remember the
rule of threes too.