Elevate: Jason Chism

Timothy Webb: Thank you all for joining us today here on Elevate, Broadcasting from the Razorback Camper Sales Studio. This National Park College podcast highlights a different nighthawk with each episode. We'll talk about their journey, challenges, key moments of success, their moments of elevation, leveling up and overcoming. I'm Timothy Webb, your host, and I'd like to welcome to the program Jason Chism. Thanks so much for joining me today. Jason Chism: It's good to be here, Tim. Timothy Webb: Jason, we've talked a little bit in the past. You've had quite an interesting life. Tell us a little bit about yourself. Jason Chism: I teach English here at the college. I actually started out as a philosophy teacher here, years ago. All of my interest in research have been very interdisciplinary, both my undergraduate and graduate degree. I've looked at the intersection of language and literature with history and philosophy and all kinds of other things. My master's thesis, which I'll mention and we'll skip right over because it's like watching paint dry, it was actually on psycho-semiotics. It's a small group of people who care about that. I think it's really interesting. Semiotics, briefly, is a study of signs, This could be anything from rain cloud indicating rain to the most sophisticated system of signs, language. Every sound coming out of my mouth, we translate as a sign. Most of my writing and research has been on semiotics, but particularly how we create and understand signs. My thesis looked at the self as a particular kind of sign. It's a metaphor. I'm going to stop there because it gets really ... It's like watching paint dry for most people. Timothy Webb: Well, not for me in particular. I actually am a philosophy major, so that's pretty interesting stuff to me. Jason Chism: Oh, I didn't know that. Timothy Webb: Yeah. Jason Chism: We have so much in common. Timothy Webb: We really do. We really do. Jason Chism: Also, I should also mention, really the love of my life are my kids. I'm the father of two, one 10 and one 20-year-old. I've had a really wild life. I grew up in southwest Arkansas. I've lived all over, Austin Texas, Washington DC, briefly in LA, studied in London for a little while bit. Timothy Webb: Wow. Jason Chism: There's all kinds of stories along the way. Really got close to joining the circus at one point in my life. Timothy Webb: Oh my gosh. Jason Chism: I was going to be Ringling Brothers piano player for a minute. Timothy Webb: Wow. Ringling Brothers piano player, every 10-year-old's dream. Jason, right now, what's your current position here at National Park? Jason Chism: I'm a assistant professor of English. I'm also the co-advisor for Phi Theta Kappa, the International Honor Society. Timothy Webb: You said philosophy and now English. Which one's your favorite subject and why did you choose that subject? Jason Chism: That's a tough question. Timothy Webb: That is a tough question, isn't it? Jason Chism: I don't know that I could live without both. Actually, to answer the question, how did I choose that, I chose to major in English. One, I wish you the best of luck, but I was very concerned that a degree in philosophy would put me on a path to Walmart. Timothy Webb: Yes, I understand. I understand. It's a very particular- Jason Chism: It is. I think it is the first liberal art. It is the grandfather of all subjects. You're not going to get me to say anything bad about the subject. I think it's great. I moved to English, one, honestly because it's more marketable. Two, I found that as I am more and more interested in literature and got deeper and deeper, all of those interests that I had with history and political science and philosophy, they were all there. This is the study of literature, is the study of humanity and those ideas. In fact, I think sometimes some writers, not many, but some writers actually have been able to develop some explanations of the world and some philosophical ideas, even better than some philosophers can. As you know, philosophers can get a little wordy. Timothy Webb: I was once trying to explain to some people what I was having to read in class and I was like, "It's like reading lawyer documents from the 1600s. Jason Chism: Exactly, yes. Timothy Webb: It's very wordy, very jargon field. As us philosophers know, those particulars are important to our arguments. We're trying to be extremely specific. Jason Chism: Absolutely. You cannot get to anything of truth until you understand the words that you're using and how you're using those words, which goes back to semiotics. That sign. That word is a sign. We need to understand how we're interpreting the sign. Timothy Webb: Okay. Yeah. Jason Chism: I'll stop with semiotics. People are going to turn this off. Timothy Webb: No, I don't think so. How long have you been in National Park College? Jason Chism: As a full-time instructor, about a year and a half. This is I think my 16th year in higher education. I came from an institution that I had spent 11 years at, but National Park was actually the first college to hire me as an adjunct. This was my first job and that was as a philosophy instructor. I have been wanting to come back ever since then. Timothy Webb: Jason, you are the assistant professor of English here at National Park. What all does that position entail? Jason Chism: A lot of grading. It entails lecturing. There's a lot of work behind the scenes, including research and continuing to stay up to date in my field, because we are moving into a brave new world. It involves a lot of working with technology. I have taught online classes just about since I started teaching, but technology changes, the world changes. I think we're all still in the middle of learning how to effectively teach online. There's a lot of time spent on how to improve my online classes. I'm one that it would probably serve my mental health to stop this, but every year I rethink how I teach my classes. I restructure the classes. Part of it is to keep it fresh for me, but language is an alive thing. It's changing all the time. With my composition classes, I need to stay up to date on that. Even things that look like they should be set in place, like literature, well our students change and we have to find different approaches to reach the students that we have. There's a lot of behind the scenes work and a lot of grading, a lot of papers. Timothy Webb: A lot of grading. To touch on one of your points as a current student, it takes a lot of online classes. I know each subject is different, but it would be nice if at least in each college that the online layout or format would be the same. Jason Chism: This is a soap box of mine. Timothy Webb: Each instructor does it their way. In particular, I had a class this last semester we're finishing up now. We use Blackboard on all our other classes. This particular instructor decided he doesn't like Blackboard; he's going to use Google Classroom. It was a totally different layout from what I was used to. Then even in Blackboard, the philosophy classes are taught way differently than say, the history classes, the layouts, just how you get the information. Jason Chism: Yes, that's been a soap box of mine. I'm very conscientious about how I structure my class, but I've had two this semester that could not make heads or tails out of how my class was structured because they were used to something else. It is very frustrating when you spend weeks and weeks and weeks really thinking about how to structure your class, and then it is not intuitive because they're used to something else. I'm fine with adapting, but I need to know what that looks like. Timothy Webb: What's the format going to be across campus? Jason Chism: I completely agree with you on that. Timothy Webb: We touched on this a little bit, but can you mention some of the challenges you face as a professor, or assistant professor in English? Jason Chism: Pretty much anyone education, right now, if you get them talking long enough, Covid is going to be brought up. This was, I think a particularly rough semester as a teacher, probably as a student as well, because I was going in very excited that Covid is over, but found out very quickly that we still have a lot of residual effects of Covid. I think on both ends, it's hard to stay motivated after these last two years. The students particularly this semester, didn't show up. They didn't turn in assignments on time. I think a lot of this is after effects of Covid. A challenge from the very beginning of teaching I think is one of the greatest challenges. I think it's the mark of a good teacher, is being able to ask yourself, "Why do I understand this? How do I understand this?" Most of the time when we go into a field, we're probably good at it and it was probably natural to us. I think one of the hardest things to do, but one of the most vital things to do as an educator is to deconstruct how you know this, why you're good at this. Somewhere along the line, something made sense to you and you put in the back of your mind. I've constantly tried to do that, ask, "Why am I good at writing? How do I understand this? How did I learn to do analysis?" That's a constant question because you're constantly learning more about yourself and how you think. You're constantly trying to find a way to translate that. Even when you start to get your hands around that, you have a different group of students, a new generation, and all those answers that you had before are out the window now because you're dealing with a different population now. Timothy Webb: Everybody's really good at something, I think. I've came across individuals that would make ... to me, it was the most absurd logic fallacies, but they're brilliant in another way. I don't understand why your intelligence doesn't translate over to these other subjects. Jason Chism: We're going to have to have a talk after this. You're hitting on every ... I tell you this: that's kind of connected. That's one thing over the last year that has changed dramatically in my composition one class, is I have tripled the amount of time that I spent on logical fallacies. 10 years ago I would mention it in passing, basically. What I'm seeing more and more of is this inability to recognize your own faulty logic. I think probably next year, I'm going to add more time to that, because I think it's one of the most important things I do now. Timothy Webb: We do appreciate you adding time to that. Are there any common myths you'd like to clear up about being an English teacher? Jason Chism: There's quite a few. Usually, most of them have to do with the work that we do. This idea that we have the summers off. I have often not taught classes during the summer, but I have never had a summer off. This is where we do research. This is where we prepare. There's a lot of work that goes into the summer. Granted, I get to do it in my pajamas with a cup of coffee at home, but I'm still working, sometimes even harder than I would in the normal semester. Along with that, this idea that whatever hours we post on our door are the hours that we work. On average, whatever time they have me on campus, you can add 20 hours a week to that at home, because I will be grading at home when the kids go to bed. We put in a lot more hours than it looks. I don't know of any other field that requires so much education and pays so little. Then I guess the only other thing, just personally, particularly with English, it's a little bit of a pet peeve of mine. It's so common that people ask me, "What do you do?" "I'm a college English teacher." "Well, I'll watch my grammar around you." "We're not like that." I don't speak proper English always, and I don't judge people or hear it most of the time. Timothy Webb: You're still a person you, aren't you? Jason Chism: I'm still a person. Timothy Webb: You do probably write better than most. Jason Chism: Hopefully. Timothy Webb: Hopefully. Jason Chism: I will judge you on Facebook for [inaudible 00:12:22] grammar. Timothy Webb: For your posts. Jason Chism: Yeah. If you've had time to think it through and type it out, then you should get it right. Timothy Webb: I'm sure we all go through this. Me in particular, I cringe at some of my posts from 10 to 15 years ago. cause I'm like, "I can't believe I let my grammar slip. I didn't even capitalize "I." Jason Chism: Yeah. That happens on even for English teachers. Timothy Webb: What are some of the biggest obstacles you've had to overcome to get to where you are today, Jason? Jason Chism: The first thing that comes to mind, it wasn't until recently in my life that I realized how big of an obstacle it was and how much it played into my self-identity. I came from a small town in southwest Arkansas, from a very poor family. Those obstacles with poverty, with parents who weren't able to go to college, navigating through college, being able to go to college and then navigating through that. There were ... just the smallest things were big challenges for me in the first few years. It took a while to learn that. Then after I did, particularly in grad school, I suffered greatly from this imposter syndrome, which I have since learned some of the smartest people I've known, and some of the smartest people I went to school with had the same thing, that you get there, "They're going to find me out. I don't belong here. I'm not smart enough." I suffered greatly from that. I realized though in life that true dummies, never ever fake that. Timothy Webb: We're going to get into the Dunning Kruger effect here. For our folks that don't know, the Dunning Kruger effect is: if you're really good at something, you're always questioning that you're maybe not that good at it, and if you're not good at it, you think you're great at it. Jason Chism: Exactly. Timothy Webb: Can you tell us how it felt when you overcame that imposter effect? Jason Chism: Yeah. I think it impacted me profoundly on two levels. One, it was how I overcame it is I worked harder than everyone else because I didn't think I belonged. Now, this was very different from my undergraduate. I might not have belonged then. I have a very checkered undergraduate degree. I don't want any of my students to get ahold of that transcript, but I worked hard. For instance, my master's thesis, first of all, I picked psycho semiotics, which is a little over the top. Then, my gosh, I think the thesis ended up being 130 pages. It was way over what was required, and all that was insecurity. I was overcompensating for my own inadequacies. What happened is: over and over and over, I achieved and I produced things that were at the top. Eventually, even someone who is as hardheaded as I can be, especially about myself, you start to build evidence that a dummy couldn't have done this. Timothy Webb: Right. Jason Chism: There's got to be something to you. Eventually, that's what happened. Then once I accepted, "I'm pretty smart," in a sense, it was the opposite of what you would expect. First, there was this freedom. I felt that monkey off of my back. I guess the opposite of what you would expect is, and maybe I'm psychoanalyzing myself now, but maybe my fear all along with that was that if I accepted it, that it would come across as egotistical, and I don't want to be that. The opposite happened. I've felt so humbled from that. I accepted I'm pretty smart. I'm pretty good at this. I felt more confident, but also very humble because it helped me to identify with what other people go through and how little we make ourselves. In a way, it connected me to other people and their struggles. Timothy Webb: Sure. Yeah. What are some of the achievements you're most proud of? Jason Chism: Well, I would say just academically, the work that I did do in graduate school. In my career, I've been put into positions and recognized for different things. I could talk about that, but that honestly really doesn't bring me very much pride. If I'm going to be honest about that, really when I feel like I've achieved something in my life, it's more those moments, and oftentimes I don't realize them when they're happening, that I've taken the time to provide support, encouragement, sometimes criticism to a student that made a difference, and they've done something with it; they've become something. It's not taking credit for their achievement, but it makes me really proud when I've heard that at least for a moment, I was able to be present and say the right thing to a student that had a ... To me, probably insignificant, but I've had several that have come back and said that this is a life-changing moment for them. I'm both very humbled and extremely proud of those moments. Timothy Webb: Yeah, absolutely. That's what being a teacher is about, I think, isn't it? Jason Chism: I hope so. Timothy Webb: You touched on this a little bit, but you grow up and what was it like there? Jason Chism: I grew up in a small town in southwest Arkansas, Mineral Springs. Timothy Webb: Wow. Jason Chism: Do you know Mineral Springs? Timothy Webb: I do know Mineral Springs. My school used to play y'all's school. Jason Chism: Oh, what school are you? Timothy Webb: I went to Caddo Hills. Jason Chism: Oh, okay. Yeah. Well, you're from a pretty small town too. Timothy Webb: Yeah, I'm from a small town. Jason Chism: One thing about Mineral Springs that I feel extraordinarily lucky, I feel lucky for growing up in a small town that. Didn't at the time, but later I did. In Mineral Springs, growing up it was the most diverse small town in that area. I wasn't aware of it. I had an experience of growing up, not having friends of different cultures and races. I didn't have a friend, a black friend, a Asian friend. They were my friends and we lived in each other's culture. Not anything that I was aware of as a child. It was just my upbringing. It wasn't until I was well into college, before I started realizing how exceptional this was, that I not only knew people of different races and cultures, but lived in those cultures. I think that had an incredible profound effect on who I am and what I value today, and I feel extraordinarily lucky. Timothy Webb: Tell us about an influential person on your life and how they impacted your life. Jason Chism: There are many. I've been very fortunate to know some incredible people. In fact, I just had a birthday this week. Timothy Webb: Happy birthday. Jason Chism: Thank you. Actually, that's what struck me, is to not only see just the number of Facebook likes and happy birthday wishes, but the extraordinary people who were on there. I just felt so lucky, the people that have been or are in my life. It doesn't take me long, when I start thinking about this, to bring up [Bill Gentry 00:19:14], who was actually the one who introduced me to philosophy. He was an institution at Henderson, maybe the most brilliant professor they'd ever had. He started the Honors College. He started the master of liberal arts degree, the one that I earned there. He taught generations of students here. The one story that you would hear about Bill Gentry over and over and over went something like this: I took him for philosophy of religion. You'd go in one week and you'd leave the class thinking, "Well, I didn't know that Dr. Gentry was Muslim." I'd go, 'That's surprising. I don't know how he became a Muslim." Then the next week you'd leave and go, "I don't know why he thought he was Muslim. He's obviously Hindu." Then the next week, "I don't know what I was thinking. He's clearly an atheist." He taught with such incredible knowledge, but also passion, that it wasn't you could not accept that a man who taught a subject with that much passion just knew it. He had to believe it. As a teacher, that is the most inspirational person in my life. We then became really close friends. I wasn't going to say this, but I'll share this with you because you'll appreciate this. Through his friendship, I saw I just had an extraordinary life. He was the embodiment of the examined life. When I knew him, he was in the early stages of Parkinson's, and we all knew that Parkinson's would take over eventually. We couldn't think of a worse fate for a man like this, for his body to go, but the mind to still be there. That's horrible. I had moved away to Austin for a while, and he was the first person I contacted when I decided to move back. In that time, he had been diagnosed with lymphoma, and his time was going to be very short. We had spent countless hours over the years discussing life and the meaning of life. We became close because when I was taking him in class, my mother was dying. I can go on and on about that, but what a special guy. He helped me through that. When I moved back he said, "I want to ask you for a favor. If you can't do this, it's okay." He says, "I've always appreciated your sensitivity and your philosophical mind, and I want to experience this like I've experienced life, to try to find the truth of it, meaning. If you're up for it, I want you to come over once a week and discuss dying." I got to be that guy, which is single-handedly the greatest honor of my life. It was a hard, hard thing to do, but it was such an incredible honor. His whole life, from how he lived it to how he ended it, everything about that man is an example to me, in the classroom and out. Timothy Webb: Wow. What an impact he must have had and what an impact you must have had on him. Jason, if you could give your younger self any piece of advice, what would it be? Jason Chism: Stay present. I spent much of my teens, twenties, probably half of my thirties, either regretting things that I had done or worried about what's going to happen. Looking back, I had the most wonderful experiences, some great moments in my life, that should have been a lot more joyful than they were. Only thing keeping me from experiencing that joy was I wasn't in the moment. I would just tell them, things are going to work out. They're going to be okay. Just enjoy the ride. Enjoy the moments. Timothy Webb: Other than National Park College, what hobbies do you have? What's your interests? Jason Chism: Well, Timothy, you know one. I think we met. My deepest love is music. I'm in part a teacher of English because a rockstar didn't work out. I love it. I didn't major in music in college. Actually, I could have got scholarships, but I turned those down because music is so personal to me that I don't think I could ever teach it. I couldn't deal with the frustrations of students not loving as much as I did. Huge fan of music. Tying back to my childhood too, I'm in love with culture. I love travel. I love seeing new places. Related to that, I've become a foodie. I'm a pretty darn good cook, and I love to go experience different foods, learn techniques, and make that part of my life too. Timothy Webb: Well, we look forward to your dish at the potluck for the holiday party coming up. Jason Chism: I forgot about that. This might not have been a good time to give that answer. Timothy Webb: Jason, what is it about cooking that drew you to it? Jason Chism: I think in the beginning, being from a small southern town, cooking's a big part of our culture, big part of our life. As a little child, my mother and grandmother started to teach me to cook. My mother would never label herself this way, but there was a feminist streak through her, and she wanted me to be able to cook, one, so that when I went off to college, I wouldn't eat just a bunch of junk, and two, when I eventually got married, I wouldn't make my wife do all the cooking. I guess it started with a connection with my mother and grandmother. Then in college, I was just so fascinated by new ways of cooking, new tastes. I was very fortunate to develop close friendships with people all over the world and learned early on that the best way, the fastest and most effective way to connect with someone of a different culture, is to sit down at a table with them. That is where culture and love is communicated. One of my dear friends in college, he comes from a culture that he used to cook for me often, and he comes from a culture who he said they believe that if you cook for a person, then you're not allowed to war with them ever. Timothy Webb: Wow. That's awesome. I wish everybody had that. Jason Chism: Honestly, I believe we could solve a lot of the world's problems if we just sat down at a table. There's a lot to learn from each other through food. Timothy Webb: That's some good stuff. Jason Chism: It just tastes good. You just learn to appreciate more. Timothy Webb: If you could talk to anyone from the past, present, or even future, who would it be and why? Jason Chism: Not only every day of my life could this change, but probably every few hours I would give a different answer. Timothy Webb: Who is it this hour? Jason Chism: Well, I suppose the one consistent answer would be, be able to talk with my mother again. I think my grandmother too, would be there. One, just to let my mom know that things worked out; they're okay. With my grandmother, she was a high school English teacher. The most intelligence person I had ever seen. I remember watching her watch Jeopardy, and never remember her not answering a question before the contestants did. Timothy Webb: Wow. Jason Chism: It was amazing. She could recite every single Robert Frost poem. She's just a wealth of knowledge and an incredible model of hard work for an education. I've often thought that it would be nice to be able to talk to her because she passed away when I was in high school. It would've been nice to have a conversation after I learned a little something. Timothy Webb: What are your future plans? Jason Chism: Professionally, there's couple of papers that I'm interested in writing. Maybe this summer I can finally have time to do that. Maybe not. We'll see. There are some areas of research that I'd like to contribute to. On campus, I've gotten involved with the honors program here. I am very excited about the potential there. I want to continue to help develop it and participate in it, and help it to flourish. I've also this year, taken on the travel abroad program. We've had incredible response. We are planning a trip May of 2024, to Italy and Greece. Really looking forward to that. In fact, if any of your listeners are interested, contact me at Jason dot Chisholm at np dot edu. I would like to see this program develop and be something we can rely on, that it's set in stone. We're going to have an international trip, if not every year, at least every other year. I'm really looking forward to working hard to make that happen. Timothy Webb: Wow, how exciting. That's awesome. Here at National Park College. Jason Chism: By the way, Timothy, staff and faculty can tag along. For a philosopher, I don't know there's a better place to go than Italy and Greece. Timothy Webb: I don't think there is. I think you're right. Jason, is there any advice or any quotes or mottoes you live by, you'd like to share with our listeners? Jason Chism: I generally try not to give advice. I learned that in my twenties. It could come back at you. What I would say is that I think the most attractive characteristic for a human being is authenticity. I think if there's any hope of finding real meaning and happiness in life, it can't happen without developing yourself as an authentic person. I believe that in order to do that, you have to make experiences happen for you. You have to say yes to things. You have to go places, talk to people, put down your phones, and make yourself uncomfortable. We don't grow when we're comfortable. I guess if I had any advice, it would be to adamantly fight for authenticity. You do that through taking advantage of the experiences around you and creating experiences when there's not. Timothy Webb: Awesome. Yes. That's some good advice from the non-advisor. Jason Chism, it has been awesome sitting down and talking with you today. I've really enjoyed it. Jason Chism: I have too, Timothy. I hope you can use some of this. Timothy Webb: I'm sure there's a lot we can use. Thank you so much. Thanks to all of you for listening to Elevate today from the Razorback Camper Sales Studio. New episodes are released each Thursday. Special thanks to National Park College and The Sentinel-Record for making this podcast possible. Until next time, this is Timothy Webb reminding you that every day is a chance to elevate.