Paul Smith
Thank you for your generous welcome Deputy Chancellor, Pro Vice-Chancellor, Academic colleagues, special guests, ladies and gentleman, and most importantly graduands of 2013.
I would like to begin by saying that it is an absolute honour and a privilege to have been invited to join you here today for the esteemed University of Western Sydney Graduation Ceremony.
The first and most important thing I would like to say today is congratulations to each and every one of you on completing of your degrees at the UWS. To all the family members and carers, you can all be very proud of what these graduands have achieved. This graduation ceremony and testamur you have received today attests that you have acquired a body of socially useful knowledge in each of your chosen disciplines.
I have traversed many a career path throughout my life and I can confidently say that you are all about to embark on one of the most rewarding careers you can possibly imagine. Just last week I attended the year 12 graduation ceremony at Kingsgrove High School. When you see one of your student’s faces who struggled through school, one who you nurtured along the way, that smile and sense of achievement they have written all over their face is one of the most rewarding feelings you get as a teacher. This is something that you all will look forward to experiencing in your future career.
We teachers often receive bad press especially with the old idiom of ‘those who can do and those who can’t teach’. That would have to be one of the greatest misconceptions that I have ever heard. Let me tell you of a story to illustrate my beliefs here. Many years ago I was the head chef of a London restaurant and had, by then trained many apprentice chefs. My sous chef (that’s the second in charge) had asked me for the weekend off. I said “sure but train your replacement well.” Well my understanding of well taught clearly differed from my sous chefs. He had no concept of the art of pedagogy. Although my sous chef was capable of creating great food, he lacked the required skills and knowledge on how to instruct others.
It was about that time that I became aware of my enjoyment of teaching and in pursuing this as a career and my sous chef became aware of his lack of future weekends off. So it really just goes to show that those who can might do, but they can’t necessarily teach.
This is where you people will shine. You have graduated after many years of studying the art of pedagogy at the UWS which is renowned for its high level of academic rigor and the high calibre of its graduates. I have no doubt that the knowledge and skills that you have each obtained while undertaking your studies here will provide you with a solid platform in which to fulfil your universities motto of ‘bringing knowledge to life’ for the future generations of this country.
“Teach and make a difference” was an advertisement for a teaching scholarship that I read one day in a newspaper. I was a little dubious when I read this but it wasn’t long into my teaching career that I realised what a difference we teachers make. I would like to share some lessons that I have learnt along the way.
Embrace failure – I can’t remember how many, what I thought were well planned lessons failed with students walking out of my classes with a smug “yeah nice one” expression written all over their faces. Only after an evaluation of the lesson and another attempt & evaluation can you create something worthwhile. It is these failures that keep you learning and eventually leads to success.
Employ and encourage the philosophy of being a lifelong learner. This is an incredibly powerful concept. Despite all the curriculum content we try and instil upon our students, we as teachers generally only get 6 years to accomplish this within a year group, but if we model & encourage our students to become lifelong learners then well and truly after they have forgotten our names, the richer their lives will become.
Challenge them because they’ll sure as hell challenge you. Although you will find some students just wish to be given the information without the need to think, always try your best to encourage critical thinking. Some of my favourite lessons are ones where I would be deliberately contentious just to encourage critical thinking. The students would be there furiously beavering away, researching on their little laptops just in the hope of proving me wrong. And many of them did which was the whole point.
Be respectful always, no matter how challenging the student and you will find it reciprocated. Although we do our best to get to know the learning style of our students over time, you are not always fully aware of the student’s home life. Students come to us facing challenges from various cultural, socioeconomic and blended family backgrounds. You will at times come across students who see you as the singular constant in their life. When their whole life appears to be unravelling before them, you are often the only grounding influence they have. Goethe once said: “Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them become what they are capable of becoming."
Be firm, be fair, be consistent and maintain a sense of humour. I had a student in a Year 10 food tech class, quite a talented student, a delightful young lady, but every day was a new drama. She would complete some excellent class work for me one day then follow it up with a lacklustre effort with an assessment task. She was not shy of challenging a teacher if she felt any injustice has occurred.
At the end of year 10 she presented me with a little gift. She said to me ‘I got you this because you’re my favourite teacher; although you were always busting my chops, you always cared and you didn’t treat anyone any differently. I opened the present and it was a little donkey. She said to me with a wry smile “I got you a donkey could sometimes I thought you were such as ass”. I still have this donkey on my desk today.
I know you will leave the university today happy in your memories and proud of your achievements. In future years I hope you look back on this day with fond affection as proud members of the UWS alumni.
I will finish with a quote from Forest Witcraft, an American scholar, teacher and scout leader as I think this is a true testament of a good teacher and what keeps us doing what we do:
"A hundred years from now, it will not matter what kind of car I drove, what kind of house I lived in, how much money I had in the bank...but the world may be a better place because I made a difference in the life of a child."
Congratulations and good luck graduands of 2013. Go out and make a difference. Thank you for listening.
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