"Can I have my drugs now?"

After so many years of writing for the Daily Bruin, I wrote my final column a few weeks ago about the culmination of my research to date.  Below is my version, which I think the editors tweaked a little (and made up their own (inferior) headline) for the version found online here:

http://www.dailybruin.com/index.php/article/2011/05/student_use_of_stimulant_drugs_unavoidable

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Four years ago I started researching students who used drugs like Adderall and Ritalin for academic purposes.  Maybe you’ve seen my flyers around campus or have a friend who was actually brave enough to sit down with me and let me interview them.

This project became my dissertation, which is almost finished, as is my time at UCLA.  But if I could summarize the culmination of my graduate education into a single bold statement/prediction, it would be that college students really like their drugs, and see no compelling reason to stop doing anything that they see as potentially enabling their success.

Before I go any further, I want to apologize in advance to anybody who reads this and was previously unaware of the dilemma of cognitive enhancement.  It’s the kind of topic that makes any prevention-oriented research self-defeating, since the idea alone of a drug with academic utility is bound to be virally appealing in fiercely competitive climates like UCLA.

In other words, how can I, or any researcher, talk truthfully about cognitive enhancement in the name of prevention or “responsibility” without making it sound appealing to anybody?

It’s not for everybody.  Stimulant medications are controlled substances with physiological, psychological, and legal risks.  But the truth is that many college students feel that the associated risks are far outweighed by the academic benefits of use.  What’s even more problematic is that research doesn’t completely disagree.

Concern over collegiate “cognitive enhancement” is nothing new, but higher education has done little since ADHD-diagnosed students first began bringing their renewable Ritalin prescriptions to college in the mid 1990s.  Word quickly got out that there was something “better” than coffee.

National databases on collegiate substance abuse put non-medical use of stimulant medications at around 8%, which doesn’t include the approximately 7.5% of American students diagnosed with ADHD.  Independent studies conducted on college campuses report illicit use prevalence at 25% and as high as 34%, with over half of upperclassmen and students in Greek life having used prescription stimulants.

From The Beatles and Elvis to JFK and Hitler, speed scares are not without historical precedent.  Desoxyn and Pervitin were used heavily by both allied and axis military soldiers in World War II, (Provigil and Adderall are still used today by British forces and Air Force pilots).  The then over-the-counter stimulant Benzedrine allowed Jack Kerouac to pen “On the Road” in 20 days, while domestic use of amphetamine pills were immortalized in the Rolling Stones’ song “Mother’s Little Helper."

Two things separate this generation of stimulant use from the past: medical sophistication and the advent of ADHD.  Today’s drugs are better, and we’re vastly more knowledgeable about what they do.  Leading clinical researchers and bioethicists have recently started conceding that these drugs may actually work, leading to real gains in concentration, memory, and sustained cognitive performance.

ADHD is a different kind of game changer in that it medically legitimizes the everyday use of amphetamines for a relatively broad swath of the population.  This separates our current dilemma with prescription amphetamines over controversies in past decades.

Despite skepticism from conservative pundits, the Church of Scientology, and my dad, ADHD is a real condition with real genetic determinants.  It is about 70% heritable, which is as much as height, or blood pressure.  But this doesn’t mean that our diagnostic system isn’t flawed.  Many savvy, opportunistic students and parents have been known to feign ADHD symptoms just to seek medications.  This is called “doctor shopping.”

I certainly saw some of this in my own research, but it was surprising to see how the situation with unstoppable drug-seeking behavior mirrored the burgeoning medical cannabis scene that erupted throughout Los Angeles over the past several years.

I recruited students who used “any drug” for academic purposes, and to my surprise, many inquired about using marijuana and salvia (which is currently legal) for creative purposes.

Whether you find the premise of creativity-enhancing drug use plausible or not, there is an historical precedent for that too.  Literary greats generally preferred booze, but prolific drug using artists and intellectuals included the beat poets and bebop jazz generation, Francis Crick, Aldous Huxley, and again, The Beatles.

As seen with medical cannabis, some drug policies seem to be in flux, or at least newly reopen to public debate.  Distinguishing what’s legal or illegal, however, isn’t as important as what’s “responsible” or “moderate,” and it may be moot if anybody can get what they want, whenever they want.  We may be there already.

4-20 Special: Why ADHD meds are better than weed ... to deal

The following is an excerpt from my "Discussion/Conclusion" chapter.  It being April 20th today, a doobieous day for so many college students, I thought it appropriate to post some of my findings related to cannabis use.  This piece discusses the financial incentives for a prospective dealer of ADHD medications (controversial!), and concludes that if you're a weed dealer on a college campus, you're in the wrong game (even more controversial!).  Enjoy.

There are several advantages to quasi-licit use achieved through doctor shopping. First of all, it’s legal. Second, it’s safe; you know what you’re getting. The “safety” of dealing stimulant medications is not a concern to begin with, but several illicit users had concerns about what they were taking. This is not to say that illicit drug diversion can’t be dangerous or “sketchy.” As seen with “operation sudden dawn” and “operation Ivy league” with the experiences of several participants, dealers of illicit medications may be the same dealers who peddle more dangerous street drugs. Sometimes interactions can be unsafe, or the products can be of questionable. Getting it from a doctor is cheaper, more convenient, and certainly safer.

Another advantage is simply having a consistent, reliable, and price-controlled source. Especially with health insurance, nootropic medications obtained directly through pharmacies are much cheaper than typical WCU illicit market prices. Looking closely at the specific price differences, it’s easy to see why savvy or entrepreneurial students would consider feigning ADHD symptoms for profit, rather than (or in addition to) primarily for their own personal use.

For example, student patients with the WCU student health insurance plan can fill a prescription for 30 20mg pills of generic methylphenidate or dextroamphetamine for $15; $30 if they choose the drugs by their respective name brands, Ritalin and Adderall (citation omitted). Considering that illicit users seldom discern what they take, let’s assume that the profit-motivated hypothetical dealer opts for generics: $15 for 30 pills. Students quoted many prices for a single Adderall or Ritalin pill, depending in part on potency (mg) and release formulation. Just to control for this hypothetical example though, an oft-quoted average price was $5 (even though Mike reported selling Adderall at peak times for as much as $30 for a single pill). A student could therefore resell his/her $15 prescription for $150—a ten-fold markup. A patient could refill this prescription monthly, bi-weekly, or even more frequently, depending on the patient and prescribing physician. If you factor in higher prices for higher dosages or extended-release formulations, or varying market dynamics (read: finals), diverting ADHD medications in college can be extremely lucrative.

This study echoes earlier research callings to urge student health centers to exercise extreme caution, both when diagnosing ADHD, and when prescribing treatment medications (Harrison & Rosenblum, 2010). With on-campus pharmacies at many large universities offering even better price discounts, dealing could hardly be more convenient or profitable.

Being college students, cost is a huge barrier for many. A lot of participants found the prices of Adderall prohibitive; for many it was the same with weed. Unlike stimulant medications however, most insurers do not cover medical cannabis, and the illicit market value of marijuana is nearly identical to its store price (at least it’s nothing close to the approximately 1000% markup hypothetically outlined). This offers relatively little financial incentive for prospective dealers to consider diverting medical marijuana over ADHD medications, and considering that medications are small, concealable, logistically easier to divert, with very little perceived concern among dealers getting caught. All of this amounts to arguable advantage for licit users, who include doctor-shoppers-turned-dealers of ADHD medications.

“Limitless” ... the movie review this blog has been waiting for.

So apparently there’s a full length motion picture about my research.  It’s called “Limitless” and it stars Bradley Cooper and Robert DeNiro.  It hit theatres last week to consistently lukewarm acclaim (currently 66% on Rotten Tomatoes).

I first caught wind of this development about a year ago, when my roommates Erik and Conrad got teamed up with Andrew Howard for 9 holes of golf at Griffith Park.  (Howard played an Eastern European goon, arguably the movie's main bad guy).  He told them about his current project at the timve—a movie about a miracle brain drug that grants super cognitive powers and turns lives around.

They came home and said “Dude, I think they’re making a movie about your dissertation …”

And sure enough, the film is pretty much right on target.  Let’s get something straight: it is fiction—almost science fiction.  But it’s set in the current day, and any scientific leaps are well disguised so that credibility isn’t an issue where it affects the enjoyment of the movie … (except for perhaps a couple places that I will NOT mention, but I research phenomena specifically related to neurocognitive enhancement, so I might be a tough critic when it comes to the science behind some of the fiction).

A week ago at the NASPA conference in Philadelphia, I played the trailer for “Limitless” off YouTube as people were sifting into my session.  I’ve never seen a presentation NASPA or any other conference with movie trailers, but it seemed to go over well.  I couldn’t claim that the movie was any good or not, just that—based on the trailer—there seemed to be a 99% chance that it related to the ensuing presentation and discussion.  And indeed, it did.

After seeing the movie this morning, I give “Limitless” a solid 6/10 just as a movie experience to a lay audience.  Not groundbreaking entertainment, but enjoyable.  If you are not a 30-something social science researcher and drug behavioralist, that’s about what you will think of this movie.  I wish I could give it more because I want everybody I know to see it.

Because for me personally, I absolutely loved “Limitless” and give it a 10/10.  I tend to strongly root for any media product that pushes my topic more toward the mainstream, and “Limitless” is the ultimate manifestation of the modern “enhancement” dilemma.

Not just is it totally about my research, but there were serious moments where I thought that this movie might be about me, specifically.  It’s set in New York, where I was recently and have an affinity for.  Bradley Cooper’s character Eddie Mora is a stressed out writer with medium-length hair, stubble, and insecurities about his career and relationship prospects. [1.]

Then he gets the drug.

The drug in “Limitless” is something called MDT, a brand-new prototype designer drug originating from a foggy confluence of the pharmaceutical industry and street chemists.  Whatever the source, the small pills are translucent and look like the tiny, rubber tabs that you stick on the insides of IKEA desk drawers to keep them from slamming.

The effects of MDT—which I would swear was NCT or NZT when the actors talked about it, yet according to IMDB, it’s MDT—last about a day per pill, and it is awesome.

Theoretically, MDT represents the ultimate nootrope.  On it, users can recall any information they’ve ever seen, instantly grasp concepts, harness complete creative control—basically perform any mental function perfectly and quickly.

The pusher in the movie claims that the human brain normally operates at only 20% capacity (I’d like to see a footnote on that …), and that MDT allows the brain to access the optimal 100%.  In high school I took Ritalin and felt a little bit more alert and confident studying for AP Bio, but nothing like a five-fold increase with photographic retention and recall.

A single dosage of MDT is worth $800.  Adderall usually goes for around $5 on most college campuses.

Side effects of MDT include: awesomeness, violence, balling out of control, occasional prostitute murder, severe psychological dependence, severe withdrawal and crash, sickness, and death.  It may or may not also make you sort-of a ninja.

I really can’t say anything more without spoiling the plot, but since I haven’t really talked about the plot at all, I think we’re safe.

From a psychological research perspective, I love this movie because it does a great job of laying out all of the key devices in a way that effectively comes to represent the ultimate existential crisis we face neurochemical enhancement technologies.

In other words, there are real psychological constructs at play in this movie, particularly psychological dependence/reliance.  Are we the same people when we’re on drugs?

We tell troubled addicts that they are not the same when they’re on drugs.  This can be dear friends, family, or just people we know.  Alcohol and drugs are a problem for them.  And they know it’s a problem for them—neither they nor others want them to be on drugs because it’s a problem.

But therein lies the dilemma with enhancement.  Outwardly, nobody knows if there’s a drug “problem” because the problem manifests in success with work, school, or relationships.  Nobody cares if you’re the same person on drugs or not, because that person kicks ass.

Only you know—or wonder—if you’re the same person on drugs.  Maybe you even think you’re a better person on drugs.

Most of the drugs I study (mostly stimulant meds like Ritalin and Adderall) are strong enough that they create this dilemma among users.  And most college students who participated in my study are young, still developing their identities, and sometimes don’t know where to attribute their academic successes: to the self, or medicated-self?

“Limitless” represents the ultimate existential dilemma of enhancement in society, partly because MDT represents the ultimate drug.  The life of Eddie Mora is the perfect stage for these drug-related tradeoffs to play out.

SPOILER ALERT:  My only problem with the movie is that the answer to every crisis or every plot pickle is … more drugs!  Need to finish that novel quickly?  Better take drugs.  Thugs chasing you through Central Park?  Drugs!  Goons crashing your apartment to murder you?  More drugs!

[End spoiler alert ... probably].

However, as a society, our increasing pharmacological reliance is also problematic—we have better drugs to help us from worse drugs, and more drugs to alleviate more problems.

So as a movie, I wish that MDT wasn’t the solution to everything.  It’s too much like the invincibility star in Mario Bros. or like spinach to Popeye—once it’s on, it’s on—goombas and Bluto stand no chance.  No surprises, ever.

The only suspense seems to come when the panacea is no longer available.  Then what?

That was probably the most difficult question I asked stimulant-using college students: “when do you plan to stop taking Concerta?  What would happen if you suddenly no longer had access to Focalin?”  There are drawbacks to feeling limitless.  And as a movie making a statement about the limits of enhancement, I really enjoyed “Limitless.”

10/10 for me personally ... 6/10 for everybody else.

Correction (3.28.11) : I had previously, erroneously, reported that Erik and Conrad's fateful golf pairing was with two production assistants on "Limitless" ... I received very prompt clarification from both of them, that it was instead key actor Andrew Howard, who turned in a fine performance as—essentially—Niko Bellic from Grand Theft Auto IV.  Still waiting for the correction from Mr. Howard that they swing a golf club like Charles Barkley.

1. Nobody else?  Just me?  Is somebody in Hollywood reading my dream journal?  At the early-bird matinee of the Century Redwood City 20 this morning, I even had the coffee pangs, stubble, and corduroy jacket of a pre-superdrug Eddie Mora.  The similarities were comical.  I laughed many times out loud at inappropriate moments, much to the bewilderment of the dozen or so other thrifty moviegoers in the audience with me.

My results chapter is bigger than Jupiter

... but you know what they say about a guy with a big results chapter?  ... Probably that he'll never graduate, seriously, I don't know.  What do they say?  Well, mine is clocking in at around 100 pages so far (single spaced), and according to my outilne, I'm like half done with it.  A lot of that is thanks to the participant briefs that I've been posting on this blog (41 of them!).

But I haven't posted any actual results snippets, or my own analyses ... until now.  Out of the 102 pages to-date, these are probably the 3 best.  Enjoy:

Access to nootropics as an issue of social equality and fairness

Several participants felt that prescription stimulant use was more frequent among certain ethnic student groups on campus.  Many even had theories on why that was the case, speculating that socioeconomic class standing also had something to do with observed prevalence disparities, which included both illicit and licit use.

Kyleen felt that her parents were out of the ADHD-loop because they held a different cultural regard for psychology and pharmacotherapy (she identified as Vietnamese): “I don’t think Asian people really accept that [ADHD] is a disease sometimes, because they’re not really aware of the more social diseases, I guess … I think it’s just coming from a country that’s less developed.”

Alexis, a student of Middle-Eastern descent who was diagnosed with ADHD, thought that both licit and illicit ADHD medication use was less common among her Asian peers (she was in engineering, which, as she said, is largely Asian), and more common among white students:

Alexis:             I would say more white kids are doing drugs than the Asian kids.  There’s a lot of Asian kids in my department.  It’s a little different.

Interviewer:            Why do you think white kids, is that just an observation?  Or are there reasons that you think that might be the case?

Alexis:            Yes, for economic reasons.  We can afford it.  We’re kind of bored.  It’s a little cultural.  You’re not going to see many drugs in the Asian cultures.  You’re just not going to see it.  They don’t really use it.  They don’t go crazy.  I don’t even see them drink that much coffee because they have that discipline.  My family really frowns on medication.  Well, not medication but drinking and stuff like that.  So that’s why I am the way I am.  But some of the families that I have seen that have taken medication for ADHD haven’t sought any alternative.  The ones that I’ve seen have all been white.

            So in addition to ethnic and cultural factors, Alexis saw a correlation between economics and ADHD-medication prevalence.  But—not to be overlooked—it’s also boredom.  It may seem like a trivial, or perhaps-cynical thing to say, but boredom actually was a recurrent data theme in terms of why participants felt that certain types of students are more likely to use prescription drugs[1].  Said Alexis:

I particularly avoided going to a white school really, for high school.  Just because the amount of drugs was way higher for some reason.  I didn’t understand why, maybe it was money, or cause they were bored, that’s what it seemed like most of the time.  And then I went to an intellectual high school and they were doing drugs for more creative purposes.

It is interesting to note for later discussion that Alexis felt that the “intellectual” atmosphere in her high school was more prone to creativity-oriented drug use, but for the sake of explaining the convergence of with class, boredom, and drugs[2], Kelly agrees:

I grew up in a town where everyone’s rich and all the kids don’t have anything to do.  All their families are rich so they don’t have any motivation to do anything special with themselves.  I didn’t like my town, so I had motivation to get out and do something for myself, but there were those few times …  That’s basically where all my drug experimentation comes from, it’s like, “Well, I’m bored.  Let’s fuck around.”  So we had just gotten piercings, and my friend was like, “I have some Adderall and I’m kinda tired; do you want to try it?”  And I’m like, “Okay.”  So we really just tried it for fun the first time, just to see what it was like, and it was just a little perk.[3]

Ryan, who identified as mixed Latino and Irish descent, had a long, rich dialogue with the researcher about the socoeconomic parameters that he felt influenced this specific type of academically-oriented prescription stimulant-seeking behavior in college.  It is a long excerpt, and Ryan speaks with an urban inflection—both the length and vernacular were minimally edited in order to contextualize the authenticity of the subject.  Here Ryan starts by describing how the “urban community” regards ADHD symptomology:

Interviewee:            Basically how I like to put it, in society it's like, in the urban community, when you had energy and you think a lot and all this process, your parents say to go outside and play, go kick rocks, go play with your friends, whatever's clever for the parent to utilize that … because there's not really any money for funds for healthcare for anything like that—for Adderall—for a doctor to diagnose you and take care of that. 

Interviewer:            Is it about the money?  Or is it about kind of like the knowledge to get that going?

 

Interviewee:            It's both.  It's both, because the parent also doesn't understand 'cause she never grew up.  Nine times out of ten, the parent that grows up in the community stays in the community, because she has that "the world is flat" type of idea.  And so the only way they know how to survive is to follow the parents' tracks.  And it's sad, but that's the reality.  Now if they grew up never knowing, and when they were all hyper and everything, they're going to do the same thing to their children.  The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, exactly.  So when it comes down to it, it's the parent that doesn’t' know.  Then when they [the kids] get to college, or for whatever reason, they get somewhere to a different area, you learn just like I learned, this is like cheating.  You take Adderall – you take this medication for all my thoughts, and you control it, and you have this outburst come out, and I'm like constantly just thinking about it.  I'm like, this is great.  It's unheard of.  And then when you come up to the, I want to say, suburbs, or well-off people—as we say in [my neighborhood], "the people on the hill"—basically they have the knowledge.  Their parents are educated.  They know what it takes 'cause they've already been through the whole history – through the cycle to know what their child needs to continue to grow and learn.  So I tell people, this whole Adderall thing is the white version of cheating.  You want to get good grades, you want to do everything – you want to know why you has a 4.3 GPA, or whatever, and he does all of that?  There's a reason.

Interviewer:            So you think these things are a real advantage?

Interviewee:            Yes. 

Interviewer:            And you think that urban families are sort of missing out? 

Interviewee:            Yeah.  It's like, you know, they say George Bush took a few days to get to New Orleans after the hurricane [Katrina] … if they find out about it, okay, we'll meet their needs, but until then, they're still dumped on and they do not know it. 

Interviewer:            Interesting.  And this is based on your experiences throughout like, lower school?  High school?  When did you start to notice or become aware of this?  I mean, was this after you found out about Adderall yourself?

Interviewee:            Well, I've been through foster homes as a child.  I've been through juvenile hall.  I've been through different associations with family members, and growing up in different communities all throughout California.  So it's like I've been in all these different settings and I've seen these different kids and how they react, and then when I get to college, I get put into this rich environment of Santa Barbara, and it's like the drug alcohol-friendly area.  And then my mind is just –

Interviewer:            You mean Isla Vista? 

Interviewee:            Oh, yeah, Isla Vista, and – yes.  I spent many, many days in Isla Vista.  [Laughter].

Interviewer:            Okay. 

Interviewee:            Yeah, being drunk as hell.  But, yeah, and they introduced me to Adderall, and the next thing I know I'm writing a ten-page paper, and never knew I could write ten pages.  … I call that the white version of cheating.  That's like, quote-unquote. 

Interviewer:            But that's interesting.  Then why do you think it's cheating – specifically?  Or the white version of cheating? 

Interviewee:            'Cause like – well, I've definitely grown up in many urban societies, like poverty-stricken to the fullest extent, and there's definitely no people of my skin color in that area.  And my skin color is light and it's like, okay.  And then I go into Santa Barbara where it's 65 percent white, and then it trickles down.  It's like 2.8 percent black people, and 3 percent Asian, and like 10 percent Mexicans.  It's pretty crazy.

Interviewer:            Sure, sure.

Interviewee:            So basically I go there and I learn about the drug.  And off the top I learned it from a couple people who I – really, I never grew up with too many white friends, and then I go to Santa Barbara and I have all these white friends.  It's pretty amazing.  Like, I didn't know you guys act like this.

Interviewer:            Right, right.

Interviewee:            And I learned the drug, and it's was like, okay, that's the white version of cheating. 

Interviewer:            Do you think that it’s cheating if they have attention deficit disorder?

Interviewee:            It's cheating 'cause they got the help – well, no, I can't call it – that's something I definitely cannot do.  I can't get mad at the next person for what they had the benefits of.  Like, that's envious, and I'm definitely not envious of what's been.

Interviewer:            And these are, again, the students who have been diagnosed with something – 

 

Interviewee:            Yeah, right.

Interviewer:            –  and they're given it for that?

Interviewee:            Yeah, I definitely don't think that – like I don't envy 'em at all. 

Interviewer:            Okay, even though these are the kids who are also selling it to you and other people?

Interviewee:            Yeah, I mean, if you find $100 on the ground, it's up to you if you're going to share it with the next person, or you're just going to spend it all on yourself. 

---

[1] Availability is also an obvious precondition.

[2] Pop-cultural footnote: it seems like the teenage drama “Skins” is built entirely around the formula that boredom + youth = drug use (especially prescription drug use).  This show became popular in America and Britain as a BBC series.  The jury is still out on the even-more-recent American adaptation produced by MTV, but my current high school students say the Brits did it better (like so many other shows).

[3] Subjectively, Kelly’s anecdote completely sounds like an episode of “Skins”

Smokin' on mistletoe: the holiday post

Were Santa and his reindeer just a drug-addled hallucination?  Conventional wisdom holds that the red and white Santa Claus as we predominantly know him was a Coca-Cola concoction from Madison Avenue, but a recent NPR report seems to think: maybe shrooms had something to do with it.

Keep in mind that Harvard has a famous history with formalized, ostensibly empirical shrooms research.  Remember the Harvard Psilocybin and Harvard Psychedelic Research Projects (both under the guise of Timothy Leary)?  It looks like fair Harvard has kept with this tradition, especially for the holidays:

http://www.npr.org/2010/12/24/132260025/did-shrooms-send-santa-and-his-reindeer-flying

I'm the CBEST: tales from the classroom

So in addition to slowly completing my dissertation, many of you know that I also teach in the classroom.  It's been a slightly harrowing process to become a certified sub, but a big step included passing the CBEST.

This was probably the easiest hurdle of the whole substitute-teaching credentialing gauntlet.  Sentence structure, usage, how to use a table of contents.  Random passages invoking 4th grade history or science.  I think I actually signed an NDA to not leak questions and answers, but to give the gist of my experience, it ranged from “Shit! Nobody told me I’d have to convert units of measurement!” to a sort of sad-appalled-rage, like: “CBEST, I am at least a graduate of an accredited high school in the United States of America.  How dare you ask a question like that, CBEST? How dare you?!?

Whatever, I passed.

Or at least I’m pretty sure I’ll pass.  It was a computer based test, and so my instant scores were initially disconcerting (58 writing; 64 math)—then the lady at the CBEST explained that it’s not a 100-point scale, much to my relief. 

See, it has 3 sections, with 80 points per section, and I have yet to get back the writing section, you need a 123 to pass.  And if you can’t figure out what that means for me, then you may not be qualified to teach in the states of California or Oregon.

Bottom line: you get 20 points per section just for showing up, so I’ll likely get > 1 point that I need on the writing section[1] in order to = 123.  I passed.

On the CBEST scale a 64 apparently means that I answered “most” of the questions correctly, and a 59 means I answered “many” correctly.  I don’t know how good that is or if it says anything about me on the smart-dumb standardized testing trajectory since the SAT and GRE both long ago, but I’m not surprised considering that I went in to this one cold with little or no preparation, and I did slightly better in math than verbal, and I passed comfortably.

With that, I have gained the ability to become compensated in exchange for my substitute teaching.  This will only lead to more amusing anecdotes and high school hijinks, such as the following highlights of teaching so far:

- 10^th grade chatter before class, a student’s fantasy football team name is “Raw Dog,” a friend laughs, asks “who’s team Raw Dog?”  [Everybody tells him student’s name, laughing.]  Girl: “what’s Raw Dog?” Me: [interrupting] “something no young woman should ever say. [To boys]: Guys, come on, stop laughing.”

- “Hot Seat,” and “Marry, f--k, kill”:  Apparently “hot seat” is a game that an advanced journalism class is allowed to play during a dead day the first week of school.  I’ll just say I didn’t start this, the teacher I sub for is VERY comfortable with her student-led class (newspaper).  Even she loves this game, and lets them play it periodically on field trips to keep them together and entertained.  The rules of hot seat are simple, the class begins to yell a consensus name, and that person has to go on the “hot seat,” which is actually a red stool in the middle of the room.  The class then gets to ask said student ANY question.  She or he can answer any question, but can also say “fuck you guys,” and storm off without penalty (but this will likely elicit boos).  They then get to pick the next on the hot seat (but that can sort-of be overridden by the crowd if person selection is lame).  About 90% of questions concern hookups, like, with other students IN THE ROOM.  This is where I’ll say that the “teacher” left the room for the period, leaving me in charge to let this game play out for the rest of the period (about 30 minutes).  I was shocked by the candor of what they were disclosing.  I felt like when I saw the movie “Kids” for the first time.  Inevitably, the question becomes who would you “Marry, f--k, or kill,” again (a game I’m familiar with in my formative college days), only this is high school, and with students IN THE ROOM.  Some guy was asked what happened with “that girl in the sleeping bag.”  [Sudoku? Tweeting? I don’t know! What?]. A dating couple IN THE ROOM, were asked about sexual experiences WITH EACH OTHER.  Okay, I’ll say I was not AS shocked by the candor as I was with the comfort of the entire room.  There was not a single wallflower, nobody seemed at all embarrassed or uncomfortable.  These are high school juniors and seniors on the first week of school.  In that moment, I was so proud of my high school student newspaper.  This class has clearly gelled.

- One of our activities is reading the local weekly rag.  This is impossible for sophomores to do when there are writers named “Jocylin Dong” on staff.  I apologize in advance to Jocylin if she reads this blog (your local news coverage is syntactically flawless and concise ...)

- I have discovered that whereas I have always considered myself to be a hip-20-something educator with a full grasp on popular culture, and that I am that guy or specifically that teacher who knows about shit and actually wields this pop-culture knowledge base as a weapon—a teaching weapon.  Unfortunately, I have discovered that a surprising cultural gap has emerged between me and, at least, my English class of 14-year old freshman.  (I know, my cat is older).  Anyway, our vocabulary word was "marauder" and for anybody familiar with A Tribe Called Quest's "Midnight Marauders" album, you will know that defining the word "maraud" is literally a track interlude.  I could not pass this up.  "Maraud? Wow, this is amazing, hey, so do you guys know A Tribe Called Quest?" ... Nothing.  Crickets.  I was a little bit ashamed, but I don't know whether to direct this shame inwardly at my inability to identify this shocking generational chasm, or at my class' ignorance of one of the most fundamental groups in hip-hop history (and in my hometown!).

- I don't fucking get Justin Bieber.  I just don't.

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[1] I wrote the shit out of that section.  I read a study where a guy taped a bunch of SAT writing section essays to a wall across a large room and predicted with something like 90% accuracy the scores of each essay.  The reason?  Word count and length are huge predictors of total score.  He could just look at how much text was there and tell.  There was a 600 word limit on the CBEST, I was pushing words like weight, son.

Obviously, I’ve now determined that cursing in blog-footnotes is completely on limits.  In fact, blog-footnotes are ideal curse-spaces.

Data Analysis (least exciting blog title EVER!)

I've had a few "oh shit" moments over the past few weeks where I'll feel pretty overwhelmed with the task at hand.  Anybody who's ever done one of these things (or maybe just any huge, colossal project) can probably relate.  It's that feeling when you're just starting something that you know is massive, and you're finally deciding how to grapple it.  For me, that's data analysis.


I have 41 participant interviews.  Those are students who use drugs or medications for academic purposes.  Each interview is about an hour, usually a little bit less.  The good news is that I got a grant to get all those interviews neatly transcribed.  The bad news is that each transcript is about 35 pages, and I have to "groom" them by listening to and coding each one as I go along.  I thought it'd take about two hours to do each one thoroughly.  So far, it's taken considerably longer.


Part of the problem is just deciding how you're going to go about taking such a large quantity of abstract, raw data and organize it into something cohesive.  There are books on this.  I wanted to be half-done by now, and finished by the end of November.  So far I've done 4/41 thoroughly.  That's where the "oh shit" comes in.  The bottom line is that I have to start saying "no" to people, friends, and be the hermit that Joan Bolker wants me to be (see 1st blog entry).  The good news is that my method is iron-clad, as I get better at my own process I think I'll get faster to the 2-hour-per mark, and most importantly, the data I'm going through is pretty good.