Poster Boy

Poster Boy 

Despite the fact that I collect cell phones from students as they enter the classroom I count myself as an enlightened teacher and administrator.  I realize there are a multitude of creative ways of implementing and utilizing devices in the classrooms.  I also know that by using student devices it is a cunning cost cutting means for schools to avoid funding computer labs by transferring the costs of software and ever changing  hardware to the student by permitting them use of their own smart phones in class for educational and other research purposes.  

It is a razors edge we trend as educators.  Now I find myself having my students writing personal position papers relating to screen time, gaming and social media and how it directs and influences their lives and impacts their quality of life.  After the traditional, but out of the box brain storming session students were still absolutely stumped, puzzled, baffled and confused as to how there could even be such a thing as too much screen time. How can one spend too much time gaming? How could there be a down side to social media. This was turning out to be a battle of Old School versus New Generation.  

Just today I had a very brave student come to my office asking me to explain my policies of no cell phones in the classroom.  I was baffled by the experience.  I thought he might pound on my desk.  Instead he was polite and quiet.  This student practically had to use sign language.  In fact that would have been an improvement.  He was so inarticulate, had trouble looking up from his lap to address me.  He simply sat there looking at me. Finally,  I asked him, “How can I help you today?” 

‘I’d like to talk to you about cell phones.”

Then he went silent.

When he couldn’t formulate a thought I jumped in to fill the silence and explained to him my policy and how I derived it. I told him that I feared the over use of cell phones and other electronic devices may rob young people of their natural ability to access and effectively use their power of persuasion in face to face oral communication and their ability to focus on an issue.  I elaborated for a few more minutes until his concentration and interest seemed to lag.

He spoke not a single word, then in eerie silence left my office.

I had no idea if I had been looking at the poster boy for my no cell phones in the class room ideology, or if simply I had just scared the speech out of him.  

Maybe I should text him?

My New Wallet

 My New Wallet and a Move to the Barter System with the Advent of Automated Tellers in a Reward Points Orientated Capitalistic Anti-Environmental Economic System and What Happened to Canadian Tire Money?

 

A few Christmas’s ago I got a new wallet that had no capacity for holding change but held infinite capacity for holding cards, especially credit cards and the ever popular points cards and gift cards.  Cash it seems is largely obsolete in today’s consumer society.  In fact every time I offer a cashier a cash payment I seem to startle and sometimes offend them. I’m beginning to wonder why we even use the term cashier any more as that too is also an obsolete word given the lack of currency in use today and the rise of automated tellers.

 

“Like what is this stuff?” As they reluctantly take bills or coins from my hand, look at me with contempt and handle the payment with reluctance.

 

I often cary a small amount of cash in my billfold and a few coins in my coat pocket for old times sake and nostalgia .  I like looking at the picture of the Queen.  I guess I still miss her. I often forget the money is even there, or that it serves as an authentic option in modern day commerce.  Somedays I have the impression that a barter system  would be more practical and more logical than an exchange of actual currency. But then I still miss Canadian Tire money and haven’t forgiven that corporation for dropping its usage. As a kid, next to monopoly money it was the first real cash I really ever handled.

 

I’m not one for investment and definitely not a business head; so it may not come as any surprise that the majority of my assets are tied up in gift cards and points cards.  I have come to the sad conclusion however that each of these consumer rewards systems are very flawed and I’ll tell you why.  Let’s start with points programs and their associated cards.

 

I must have at last count at least 13 different points cards cluttering my new wallet, from different retail stores, including clothing stores, drug stores, various groceries stores, many gas stations and then there are the airlines and on it goes.  I’m getting to the saturation point  such that when I finally face  a cashier and if they aren’t already ticked off at me for handing them cash, they are even more annoyed if I don’t have quick and easy access to their ridiculous points cards that they wish to scan in order to record my precious tally.  A tally that I seem to constantly accumulate but never use. 

 

The cashier is also quick to remind me that, “ Every 5000 points is equal to .05 cents of spending power. It adds up quickly you know.  The more you spend the more you earn.”  She says this like some corporate parrot automaton trained to speak on command.

 

I ask the teen-aged cashier, “How many points do I currently have?”

 

“Just a nano I’ll check”, she says, “337 000 is your total sir.”

 

I do the math in my head and then realize I can’t do the math in my head and using my cell phone calculator conclude that equates to less than $5.00.  I think that I have been faithfully saving these points for years, carrying and producing this card to annoyed and irritated cashiers for what amounts to a $5 bonus pay out. Stellar!

 

Later in the day I find myself filling my tank up at a local gas bar at 1.66 a litre only to discover that I am less upset with the cost of gas which apparently relates more to inefficient clogged supply chains, ongoing war, corporate greed and government taxation and all the other normal things in life. I am more perturbed with all of the print ads surrounding me at the pump, including on the pump handle in my hand, all related to the redeeming of precious and glorious points.  I have finally become jaded. 

 

I made a similar discovery about the value of my gas related points that after purchasing the mere equivalent of a tanker truck load of gasoline my point accumulation will now buy me a case of bottled water. 

 

I further calculate that my own carbon footprint from the gas I consume and the litter from the plastic from the bottled water I purchased, using my points, results in the realization that I am doing more than my part in the denigration of the planet.  The point reward system is just a friendly way of speeding global warming and environmental destruction I conclude.

 

I could go on with similar examples but suffice it to say why can’t we as a society make consumerism a little more simple, or at least more user friendly and instead of luring customers with points  why not simply just offer the best price and maybe the best service possible.  Maybe that’s just science fiction and another way of chasing our consumer tails. For example, we could start with who has the most polite and friendly automated tellers.