The Boreal Beetle

After many years of postsecondary education, there came a day in the Convocation Mall at Simon Fraser University when a hood was dropped over my head, I shook hands with my graduate supervisor, and I was given the right to refer to myself as Dr. Huber. Getting to that point was no small feat. It meant spending more time in school and living in general privation than many of my friends who chose different career paths. It meant periods of high levels of stress (candidacy exam, I’m looking at you). It meant taking on a career where landing a job was in no way a given. And it meant hours, days, weeks, and years of intense study.

On the other hand, I was studying subjects that fully intrigued me. I was able to spend large amounts of time doing field work in the forests of southern and central British Columbia that I love so much. I made lifelong friends. I received, and continue to receive, amazing mentorship from some incredible scholars who I’ve met along the way. And many of those people have become close friends as well. I wouldn’t trade the experience for anything.

The moment I was given the title “Dr.” I knew that it represented all of those things. The hard times and the good. The failures and the successes. The friends I had made and would made. The continuation of my journey as a scholar. Because of all of that, I took the title seriously then, and I take it seriously now.

Some folks reading this will likely currently be thinking “elitist.” And I hope that I don’t come across that way in this post. If you know me personally, you will also know that I work to stay as far away from that charge as possible. If you don’t know me, please bear with me for the remainder of this post and see if your mind is changed.

Why am I writing about this now? Well, thanks to one of my friends and excellent colleagues, Bill Owen, I read a great piece by Katrina Gulliver entitled “Too Much Informality,” and it really hit home because it’s exactly what I have said and thought for a long time. I would like to support her excellent and comprehensive thoughts and perhaps add a few of mine.

So, I’ll start with this: In the academy, professors with PhDs or MDs (or similar) should be referred to by undergraduates as “Dr.” Other instructors with varying academic qualifications should be referred to as “Ms.” or “Mr.” This includes, I believe, TAs.

And, while I have been completely remiss in doing this, Dr. Gulliver points out that it’s a two-way street. Professors and other instructors should really be addressing undergraduate students as “Mr.” or “Ms.” as well. While it’s too late for this semester and precedents have already been set, I plan to think about this more and potentially implement it in upcoming teaching semesters.

I should note that I have spent time, as a student, in just such a system. For a period in 1989 my family lived in what was then the final days of the entity that we knew as West Germany. I attended “gymnasium,” which is pretty much the equivalent of what we call high school in North America. There we called all of our teachers “Herr” or “Frau.” In return they addressed us a “Fraulein” (“Miss”) or “Herr.” I don’t know if this style of classroom address is still in practice in Germany, but if it is I am guessing that 25 years later “Fraulein” has chaged to “Frau.”

While, to a North American, it seemed rather stiff and formal at the time, I also saw a level of two-way respect in my classrooms that I had never experienced in high school back in Canada. Some time thereafter I completed my undergraduate studies in zoology at the University of Calgary, and we certainly called all of our professors “Dr.” back then.

Then there is today, and the pendulum has swung all the way the other direction. In fact, even my 5-year old son in preschool is asked to call his teachers there by their first names. This amazes me, and I’m not sure that it is the best thing, because from preschool to the senior year in university, the classroom is a place of professional activity and a place where respect is required to flow in both directions.

What are the main reasons that I prefer to be called “Dr.” in my undergraduate classroom?

Privilege – Dr. Gulliver outlines this reason well, so please read her piece. It is easy for those of us who are privileged by gender, race, or various accidents of genetics or birth to not notice the struggles that our fellow professors and instructors go through. Respect comes to us easily, but not always to our colleagues. When we downgrade our own title for the sake of fostering a more informal atmosphere in the classroom – as noble as the intent may be – it has knock-on effects for others. It’s not possible to force anyone to use a title that they would prefer not to use, but it would be good for some of us to think about the effect that not doing so has on others. Of all of the arguments, this is the one that carries the most weight for me, and is the one that I hope others contemplate the most.

Professional distance – When I visit my physician, I always refer to him as “Dr.” I know his first name. Academically we are equals. But it is a situation of a power imbalance. And it is a situation where he may need to be completely frank with me about my health or a treatment plan. We are not buddies, and it is a a professional relationship. In the same way, while I really do like my students and often have a great time in class discussions with them, we are in a professional relationship in that situation. Ultimately I need to assess their proficiency in the subject matter, and I need to do it without bias. We, too, are in an imbalanced power situation. Students also need to respect the time that I spend preparing for class, and should show that they are prepared as well. Referring to each other as “Dr.” or “Ms.”/”Mr.” reminds us all that, while learning is a complete rush, there is serious side to it as well.

Signal of maturation for later-stage students – You may have noticed that I have been writing in the context of undergraduate students. When I arrived in graduate school instead of calling professors “Dr.” we were encouraged to call them by their first name. It was a signal that we, as graduate students, were seen as maturing as scholars and on a road toward becoming scholarly peers with our professors. In the same way I ask graduate students to address me by my first name. My policy goes even a bit further than that – I encourage undergraduates working in my research group to call me by my first name as well. That is because such work is a first step beyond their undergraduate lives and into the uncertainty and reward of scholarly pursuit.

Respect – I do my utmost to show respect to students in my class. I am sure that I could do better, and I work on that at all times. But when I receive an email with the salutation “Yo Dez!” (true story), I do not feel that respect is being reciprocated. In fact, I feel just the opposite. And, getting back to the idea of privilege, I am sure that others run into much, much worse than “Yo!”

I know that this post is not going to be popular with everyone who reads it. Some of you probably still think that I’m an ivory tower elitist. I simply ask that you think about it, and feel free to discuss it in the comments below or elsewhere. Perhaps those of us who think this way are wrong. Opinions and practice always vary, so I’d love to hear from anyone who feels that substantial informality in the classroom is the best policy. Until I’m convinced, though, I prefer to be called “Dr.” in a professional setting.

Either I’m over two months late in writing this little blog post, or else I am 9.5 months early (only 292 shopping days left). You pick. I’ll take the latter.

At Christmas I’m generally the kind of guy who’s happy with some new wool socks, a glass of egg nog, and watching the kids play. This year, however, by far my favorite gift has been a book entitled “Natural History: The Ultimate Visual Guide to Everything on Earth” given to me by my lovely wife. This book is completely epic. It was put together with help from the Smithsonian Institute’s National Museum of Natural History. And it is stunning. Just plain stunning. There is not a page of this book that you can turn to where you won’t be completely amazed by the amazing diversity, color, and various facts about life (and other things) on earth. If you want to see for yourself, head over to the Amazon page for the book; there are a few sample pages there.

“Natural History” covers everything that you can imagine; the claim of “everything on earth” is not far off of the mark. There are excellent sections on evolutionary and geological history. There are impressive phylogenetic trees (the details of which I’m sure everyone will argue about). There are well-written essays about large-scale topics, and there are pages and pages and pages and pages of stunning photography. The book covers minerals, rocks, fossils, archaea, bacteria, protists, plants of all types, and a ton of animals. If it resides on our planet and you can imagine it, it – or one of its close representatives – is there. Besides the many pages covered in photographs and facts, there are also focus pages that feature one particular species of interest. One of the really amazing things about this book, if you think about it, is that even as massive a tome as it is, it doesn’t come close to covering what we know about the world, let alone what we don’t know or don’t even know that we don’t know.

And yes, this is a massive book. It’s not the sort of thing that you can comfortably read while sprawled on the sofa. Nor is it written to encourage linear reading, which is a good thing because the size would be prohibitive. I like to think of it as a nightly trip to a fantastic museum, and indeed, upon entering its front door I feel as though I’m browsing around the Smithsonian. I tend to open it up either randomly or to some group or topic that I happen to be interested in, and just see where my reading leads me. Each “specimen” has a short blurb of information associated with it. Often those little bits of information have prompted me to do a bit of deeper digging (PDF) on things that catch my eye, and in that way this book has taken me on some really interesting trips into nature.

Winter is coming to an end here in the northern hemisphere, and we’re all going to get out a bit more in the coming months. All of the animals and plants that we love will be making their annual reappearance. I’m guessing that my copy of this book will see a bit of an hiatus in use over the next while, but it has been a great companion during these past winter months, reminding me of all of the life that’s been sleeping under the snow and waiting to greet me soon.