When I was teaching back at a lovely working-class, commuter college, a community college in Northern California, students would confide in me about their dreams, plans, and career choice dilemmas. For often, their dream jobs were quite disparate from the career choice their parents had long decided upon for them. It is probably not necessary to give you an example, but here, anyway, is Paul. He is American-born to Chinese parents. He is driven to work hard in school, do numerous extracurricular activities, do volunteer tutoring, and keep his eye toward that parental dictum that holds his career choice is made for him: he will be a doctor. But Paul wants to be a writer. The challenge for the instructor, in this case, me, is to respect his parents issues and values and rationale but somehow give this young man—who is a stellar writer—hope for freedom of creativity and imagination.
March 11, 2009