Comments on Friedman Roundtable

The CTE's discussion group on Thomas Friedman's THE WORLD IS FLAT has concluded.

Here are some comments from some of the faculty that attended:

Mike Substelny, Engineering

As I discussed in the group, enrollment in the Engineering and Engineering Technology programs in which I teach has dropped sharply in the last seven years. This semester enrollment is so low that 100% of the classes I am teaching are independent studies. As no program can survive on one or two students per year, I expect the handful of remaining students to have serious problems completing degrees as their classes, degree programs, and academic departments close their doors.

This affects my answers to all questions in two ways:

1) Friedman stresses the importance of engineering and technology, despite America’s recent aversion to these careers. A flat world does not care whether America produces engineers, but I do. Thus I will increase my efforts to inspire children to pursue engineering and technology. I now believe that events like the Lego Olympiad make a bigger difference than any change I could make to lessons in engineering classes which are certain to be cancelled.
2) I also teach one math class, statistics, which is never cancelled due to low enrollment. This class offers my opportunity to change my teaching because of globalization.


What are 3 specific pieces of content you plan on introducing in your classes because of globalization?
• I will test students on the creation of histograms (in the past I only tested on interpretation of histograms because creating them takes so much time). This will be part of a broader strategy to deepen their communication skills.
• I will add lessons on advanced hypothesis testing. This is a critical decision making tool, and a flat world will be run by the people with good decision making skills. It also raises the bar.
• I will end the class with an advanced critical thinking assignment from current events. Students will use their knowledge of statistics to draw a conclusion about a political poll, drug test, etc. This will push their critical thinking skills, again raising the bar.


What are 3 specific ways you plan on changing how you teach because of globalization?

• I will improve efficiency by helping students learn to use their statistical calculators. In the past I left students to learn their calculators on their own (though I would help one-on-one during office hours), with the theory that they would all own different calculators. But in practice 95% use the same calculator and I could make their learning more efficient by devoting some class time to that calculator.
• I will reduce waste by de-emphasizing the rote mathematics of the class. There is limited value in learning to calculate a standard deviation by hand or memorizing the formula for margin of error for a sample mean. But there is great value in being able to calculate these electronically and make good decisions based on the results.
• It seems like a small thing, but because of globalization I will run the class in metric units.
• Tenative: I would like to add some gaming aspects to the class. Students would compete individually or in teams to make a series of decisions based on statistical analysis. They would earn points for their decisions, not for their calculations.

What are 3 specific ways you will approach your own professional development differently because of globalization?

• Frankly, this experience has shown me that I may be in the wrong field. I was attracted to engineering by the siren song of a guaranteed lucrative career for just two or four years of college. Back in 1982 no one told me I would need to be a lifelong learner. If they had, I would have gone into something else (I definitely should have studied a foreign language). Now that I am a lifelong learner I will broaden my horizons.
• I know I should become more entrepreneurial, but I do not know how to do that.

Larry Worden, Business

In our group discussion and study of the book: “The World is Flat” by Thomas L. Friedman many things were discussed and learned. I would like to share just one area that the world will see more of in the future as companies use their power in controlling their supply chain. Many companies today do not produce their product but purchase the parts and pieces that go into it. Therefore, they become the assemblers and sell the product with their name on it. This name becomes a means of distribution to the world in brand name quality products. General Motors at one time strived to be an automobile manufacture that produced 60+% of their car parts. However they discovered that they could not control the quality as well from the inside as procuring their parts from the outside where they could set the standards for compliance. Thus I share this brief thought:

A positive about globalization:

A society benefit for globalization is that by using the big players in the market field they can enforce a “socially responsible food supply” from global markets. McDonald’s is in such a position as they encourage better management of fisheries to conserve water, energy and waste. Glenn Prickett, senior vice president of Conservation Internal says this: “So what we look for are partners who can put their purchasing power behind a set of environmentally friendly practices in a way that is good for them, works for the producers, and is good for biodiversity. In that way, you can start to capture so many more decision makers… There is no global government authority to protect biodiversity. You have to collaborate with the players who can make a difference, and one of them is McDonald’s”.

Another positive occurrence for globalization is the new HP-Dell-IBM alliance that decided they wanted to see a label on every electronic good stating whether the supply chain that produced it is in compliance with the standards they sat down by it’s alliance. Quoting from Thomas L. Friedman’s book, “The World Is Flat” on Page 299, he writes: “The new Electronics Industry Code of Conduct includes bans on bribes, child labor, embezzlement and extortion, and violations of intellectual property, rules governing usage of wastewater, hazardous materials, pollutants, and regulations on the reporting of occupational injuries. Several major electronics manufacturers who serve the IBM, Dell, and HP supply chains collaborated on writing the code, including Celestica, Flextronics, Jabil, Sanmina-SCI, and Solectron.”

As a concluding point Thomas L. Friedman writes: “…this use of supply chains to create values – not just value – could be a wave of the future.” “We have the power to transmit global governance to our universe of suppliers and employees and consumers, which is a pretty broad universe.” The reason being that companies “…have leverage and are in a position to set standards and [therefore] you have a responsibility to set standards.”

Thnaks to all who attended any of the sessions. It was a lively and informative discussion.