Living the present learning the past

After reading Packer & Ballantyne "Zoos and Aquariums," I not only realized the importance zoos and aquariums have in educating the community in being environmentally conscious, but also how museums are perceived as more educational than the zoos and aquariums, which are perceived as a source of entertainment.  But it made sense after I thought about it because zoos and aquariums are living beings that we would rarely have the privilege to see up close, swimming, and climbing (notice the active verb tense).  Museums are artifacts of the past with meaning, a form of symbolic representation, embodied in the figure of the person that created it, inspired from the time she or he lived in.  Artifacts reflect human culture, a history of man, while animals represent life and the present moment.

Comparing class to BBOs

The Ellis & Scott article, “Community education as a citizen organising for democratic accountability,” was very insightful and gave the makeup of the vehicle for change that is needed in a democratic society.  Being the first to lead a discussion this semester I felt unsure about how to facilitate discussion, but the discussion and threads took on a life of their own once classmates started blogging.  Although I was the facilitator the class took the reading and the questions I presented and made sense of it through their posts.  As I reflect on the article and this class I begin to see similarities that this online class has to broad based organizations (BBO).

This class can be looked at as a BBOs described in the article because the syllabi is the source of the information and there is a person that organizes the course so that the course objectives can be addressed so that people learn adequate information needed for the future.  The discussions allow students to voice their opinions at a time table suitable to their availability and discussions can be asynchronously replied to with seamless break in dialogue.  The class posts information to continue dialogue and shows understanding and different perspectives on a topic, not only increasing the writer’s knowledge base but also that of the class.  This is in essence what a BBO is, a group of people exchanging information and addressing their concerns through perspective, in hopes of bettering the community as a whole, not just self-fulfilling desires.  By coming together in a centralized manner topics and discussions can be had in a routine manner so that when an issue presents itself it can be quickly addressed.  When the organization addresses the issue they can be proactive in addressing minor current concerns and be proactive in addressing future possibilities, thus moving from the current day to day struggles.  In relation to the online class students can be proactive by reading ahead so that they aren’t stressed from having to read for the week.

C&C Erin Brockovich and Soul of a Citizen


Compare

“Stepping out on nothing, hoping to land on something.”  The book and film touched on many situations in which people took a leap of faith with no guarantee that everything would be okay.  In the film Ed talked about the pressure he faced pursuing the case stating that it was going to take $100,000 a month to finance and he would have to take out a second mortgage for his house to help cover the costs.  Ed didn’t have money to invest but depending on what road they took, PB&E could prolong the dispute so that Ed’s business could no longer afford to pursue the claims, because PB&E are a 28 billion dollar company.  Ed took a leap of faith by trusting Erin to find documentation that PB&E corporate knew about the chromium six plums that the factory was producing so that they could pressure the company.  Trusting that Erin would find that proof Ed took a financial risk that could have burdened him with the losses.  Without him taking that risk and Erin following her convictions, thus inspiring Ed to trust her, the case would not have the far reaching affects it had. 

Contrast

In Soul of a Citizen they can’t go into detail about the intricacies that the people who help change their community go through.  In the movie, Erin Brockovich, faced many uncovered problems when trying to do the right thing and bring justice to the people of Hinkley, CA that Soul of a Citizen couldn’t go in depth about. Some of her struggles were caring for her children, making ends meet, being respected, having to educate herself to find the resources/documents to further the case, balancing a relationship,  and most evident not being there for her youngest daughter’s, Beth’s, first words.  Although the fight for justice was tough she was very passionate about justice being served like those stories in the book, but the movie showed a descriptive summary of justice, not just the conclusion, which shows that changing the community/society in which one lives in or is a part of is hard work, but well worth it at the end.  It’s not worth it because of the monetary gains, but because it gave life to the community that was unaware of the wrongs being done to it, Erin became respected by people that looked down on her, her children may not understand now, but what she did will help them down the road because she made herself a better person because she was given an opportunity by Ed who knew she wasn’t qualified but knew she had a lot of heart.  As a result, everyone learned from one another and environmental concerns are taken more seriously as a result, altering the path of the world and future generations.