RE: 1987

From: Phillip Capper (phillip.capper@webresearch.co.nz)
Date: Mon Jun 04 2001 - 18:19:30 PDT


In 1987 I was the research director of the New Zealand high school teachers'
union. I was given the task of writing major policy papers on (a) the role
of teacher unions, and (b) the transition from high school to work or
tertiary eduction, in the light of the coming tsunami of educational and
workplace reform that we had predicted in 1984 (correctly as it turned out)
as being 4-5 years away.

In those pre Internet days the best way to do an international study was to
travel. So I did. My employer sent me to 14 countries in East Asia, Europe,
and North America. I built all my back leave into this trip, travelled for
four months, and took my then 12 year old son with me. I learnt most from
the latter happenstance, and the experience transformed both our lives (but
that is another developmental story for the book of CHAT parables).

The contacts I made during that trip (and the failure of my employer to take
any notice of my policy papers) led to a research fellowship at the
University of Illinois at Chicago (five years later!), and the office shared
with Linda May Fitzgerald while there introduced me to CHAT (or rather
rubbed my nose in previously peripherally observed CHAT), and that took me
to how I now work.

Despite the pivotal nature of 1987 for my career path and intellectual
development, it remains above all 'the year I went round the world with
John'. Now 26, far more travelled than I am, and a resident of Spain
(university semesters) and the USA (otherwise), he still sends me Emails
which say things like 'do you realise that 13 years ago today (16/09/00) we
listened to the choir rehearsing at Vezelay?' And I can always answer 'Yes.
And do you remember the town hanging above the morning mist, and the
swallows twittering, and ducking and gathering for the migration south, and
croissants in the morning sunrise, and not a single tour bus in the car
park?' There is nothing I have done, or could hope to do, or could imagine
doing which could make life more satisfactory than the satisfaction gained
from being able to have conversations like that.

Ah yes! 1987!

Phillip Capper
WEB Research
PO Box 2855
(Level 9, 142 Featherston Street)
Wellington
New Zealand

Ph: (64) 4 499 8140
Fx: (64) 4 499 8395



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