Culture & reentry shock

A friend of mine went to Chile as an exchange student and he talked to me about this before I knew what these processes were called. He only went there for six months, so things happened really fast. He explained to me how weird it was when he first got there. How he felt homesick and missed his friends, and how he struggled to understand Chilean ways and how he sometimes felt lonely, although he began enjoying it and feeling at home sooner than he thought at first. It took him a short while but he finally began enjoying and feeling comfortable there. He made lots of friends, learned many new things and visited beautiful places. This is when he wished it would last forever, but time was running out. He told me that he was having the best time when it was time to return home, and that that made him anxious all over again, that right when he was feeling the most comfortable, it was time to leave. Then, when he got back to Guadalajara, he really missed Chile and his new friends, and felt miserable at home, even though everyone was happy to see him again. It did not last long either, since going back home might be hard sometimes but that feeling never lasts too long. Although thinking about those six months he spent, and then the couple of months that he spent trying to get back to normal seem emotionally exhausting. But I guess the intensity is worth it. After all, it helps people learn lots of things about their culture and about themselves that they probably would not have learned otherwise.

Activity 8: interdisciplinarity

The text seemed to go around with words a lot before getting to the point, when interdisciplinarity is actually something really simple to understand, and also, the word explains itself. Interdisciplinarity is as simple as the combination of components of two or more disciplines. In my opinion, it is actually hard to think of something that can be thought of as a 100% pure discipline. The way some dance moves apply both for ballet and jazz, like the pas de bourrée, or the way geography always gets involved with history. Interdisciplinarity is the most natural thing in the world. Education must be a reflection of this reality, so of course interdisciplinary education is a product of common sense.

Activity 1

Chang's article was very interesting because it illustrates well how the process of strategic planning in education. To me it always seemed like that sort of thing had always existed. I had never stopped to think about all the steps involved in the planning of education. I thought the article explained all of them clearly and helped the reader make sense out of them, although the Policy Simulation chapter was a bit difficult for me to understand, after the discussion in class the last piece fell into place and the text seemed to round up and reiterate the importance of strategic planning and each step of the process.

Activity 4. Obstacles in contemporary workplace

What obstacles do you feel your generation has to face in order to meet the standards of the contemporary workplace? Nowadays we live very synchronized with technology. It makes life easier that it was before. Things get done faster and easier, but some things have gotten more difficult, too. Before, one would go to work and sit in one's workplace and that meant they were working, even if not much got done. Today, technology allows us to work from home, from a café or from a park. Today, one's performance is measured not by the time spent at the workplace but by the actual work done. This sounds a lot more effective, but it requires a lot more discipline and good time management. This also makes workers more dispensable, because they don't occupy space and that means they require less attachments to the company or workplace. Competition is thus a lot tougher. Other than these, I think the rest of the obstacles have existed for many other generations.