Engaging Larry Summers

[Philip Coates]

"Lawrence H. Summers is former president of Harvard University and former secretary of the Treasury. This essay is based on a speech Dr. Summers gave at The New York Times’s Schools for Tomorrow conference."

The New York Times comments section just gave me an opportunity to engage this highly influential and important intellectual in a form of visible, noticeable debate which I would never have otherwise. Or I would have had to get entree to a conference and patiently stand in a question line and not been able to follow up or let people carefully reread the way one can in posted comments.

And there have been -no- comments so far at the time of my writing (usually they post them in batches though, so we'll see - at any rate mine is likely to be very prominent.)

Summers published this piece yesterday in the NYT:

http://www.nytimes.c...?pagewanted=all

And this is what I posted ===>

(") Larry Summers said: "For most people, school is the last time they will be evaluated on individual effort."

That is not true at all.

Larry Summers uses the example of the need for collaboration skills in a 'leading' investment bank. Banking in a large organization is not the job of most people. Think an individual artist, a performer, an inspiring teacher. Or on a more mundane level, a plumber, an airplane pilot, a salesman. Or a -small- banker or broker in a one-man shop or with a strong division of labor. Yes, they interact with others and their work day is spent collaborating to varying extents. But they are evaluated largely on their individual performance and skill: And properly so.

Even in a big corporation, it's possible to see who is doing the work and has the insights and is driving the process forward and who is dead weight, or is not pulling his. And if people know that only the group will be evaluated, it's human nature that they are often likely to slack off.

Yes, collaboration and people skills are important, but it would be foolish to discard any attempt to assess individual effort. And in my work life in several fields I've *never* seen that happen. (")

,,,,,,,,,,,

I forgot to mention in my comment how 'teacher evaluations' are in fact one area where individual evaluation is moving to the fore in recent years in this country and the idea that good vs. bad teachers has a massive impact is more and more widely grasped.

Maybe I'll add that in a brief follow-up post, especially if he's annoyed enough to try to argue with me. I've been told that I have the ability to get under people's skin.

I'm just recently realizing how powerful posting in a newspaper's online comments is and how

little barrier there is compared to the limited space of a letter to the editor. And how this is the? one way you can engage with famous or influential people if you are a nobody who writes or argues well**. Just yesterday I posted a series of comments on another education article and one of them got 13 thumbs up from readers in a little over an hour.

**If you are insulting or personal or 'ranting' or meandering, the NYT moderates comments and -will- delete you. So be calm, thoughtful, precise. And essential.

[Philip Coates]

> And there have been -no- comments so far at the time of my writing (usually they post them in batches though, so we'll see - at any rate mine is likely to be very prominent.)

For the first hour or so, mine was the only comment posted. Another hour or two later, and there are now two comments.

I guess the lesson is picking your topics if you want to stand out. Mine sometimes tend to be intellectual rather than everyday political. In the latter case, the NYT will often see -several hundred- comments in a few hours and then they will close the comments, as no one -- including even the reporter or author who has a strong interest in feedback -- is likely to read all of them. And they get repetitious and/or food-fightish. It's sort of like looking beyond the first page or two of Google search results.

[Philip Coates]

Good news about my "having an impact" worth the small time investment:

A week and a half after spending literally minutes rebutting Larry Summers' politically correct bromide, I have received 58 'recommends' for my comment**.

You don't see that often in the New York Times reader comments. That's an unusually high number of people taking the trouble to give my writing a thumbs up. And obviously that means a lot of eyeballs read the reader comments:

The former Harvard president and Treasury Secretary made a careless comment and I was able to drive a truck through it. Yes, people do make glib comments like his one-liner but they need to be held accountable for them. And this kind of fashionable remark is particularly widespread - and unchallenged - in today's culture which emphasizes the collective over the individual.

**You can decide for yourself if you think it's well-argued, too short vs. too long, etc.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Good for you, Phil Brown of Undefined.

Go for it more. (Seriously.)

Michael

[Philip Coates]

Thanks, Michael. For some reason it only occurred to me recently.

sincerely, phil brown of underfed

[caroljane]

Thanks, Michael. For some reason it only occurred to me recently.

sincerely, phil brown of underfed

Beef up, Underfed! There's lots of half-baked dialectic on the buffet table today.

Good job with the Times.