RWL Newsletter #101 - school's out!
I always think of Jackson Brown's song, "The Load Out" at the end of the semester: "Now the seats are all empty/Let the roadies take the stage... But when that last guitar's been packed away/You know that I still want to play/ So just make sure you got it all set to go/ Before you come for my piano." Teaching is really a privilege. Unfortunately, now all that is left is the grading, which is the price you pay for that privilege. I'm looking forward to next semester, but now it's time to shift gears and go back into research mode. I've got a couple of papers I'm going to try to get out during the break, and a few projects that I need to move forward. A big thanks to the readers of this newsletter who have participated in the military transition study I am doing!
Read
What: Shirley Manson: The First Time I Cut Myself, New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/03/arts/music/shirley-manson-garbage-the-first-time-i-cut-myself.html
Why: Mental health issues are difficult to comprehend from the outside, and often even more difficult to comprehend when confronted by a friend or family member experiencing them. I have always struggled to understand the phenomenon of cutting. Manson does a nice job explaining how she started and why, and what triggers make it tempting for her to go back to it. I think we, as healthcare professionals, are only now coming to understand how mental health plays into the determinants of health.
Watch
What: Nature, Paralysed woman moves robot with her mind (4 min)
https://youtu.be/ogBX18maUiM
Why: This just blows me away. Having grown up as a sci-fi fan, I've been waiting for things like this my whole life! I just wonder when it will be possible to operate these waldos. Seeing work like this being done is really inspiring, and makes me sometimes wish I had gone into the sciences.
Listen
What: HBR After Hours Podcast, The Student Debt Crisis, and the FIRE Movement
https://hbr.org/podcast/2018/12/the-student-debt-crisis-and-the-fire-movement
Why: I'm working on a series of papers about the school to work transition based on research I did following a cohort of students from my program as they made their way into the workforce. The amount of student debt they graduated with played a significant role in many of the choices they made. Several of them had to live at home because they couldn't afford to live in an apartment and pay their debt. This hampers the development of independent adult identities. According to the podcast, the median student debt is $17,000 at graduation, but the average is $32,000, which implies that many young people are graduating with much more debt. This is problematic for workforce development, especially for early careerist administrators who do not command high salaries early on.
The FIRE movement is really interesting, and aligns with the advice I give my students at the end of my first semester finance class each year.
Bonica's Rules of Personal Finance
1.Max out your retirement the day you are hired • Do it right away so you don’t get used to having more to spend. • Do it even if it means taking longer to pay off your school loans. • Matching funds are a 100% ROI – can’t get that kind of return legally 2.Create a cushion savings account – • start with 1 month’s pay - eventually want 3 months 3.Pay yourself 10% of your take home • Once you’ve done 1 & 2, start paying down your debt as fast as you can • Debt is a chain and will hamper your freedom 4.Don’t rush to buy a house – transaction costs, single asset • Ties you down geographically. • Repair/maintenance expenses are always more than you expect. 5.Remember a car (and other possessions) are tools.
“A man is rich in proportion to the number of things which he can afford to let alone.” - Henry David Thoreau
Thanks for reading and see you next week! If you come across any interesting stories, won't you send them my way? I'd love to hear what you think of these suggestions, and I'd love to get suggestions from you. Feel free to drop me a line by e-mail, or you can tweet to me at @mbonica .
Also, if you find these links interesting, won’t you tell a friend? They can subscribe here: https://tinyletter.com/markbonica
Have a great weekend and do amazing things!
Mark
Mark J. Bonica, Ph.D., MBA, MS
Assistant Professor
Department of Health Management and Policy
University of New Hampshire
(603) 862-0598
mark.bonica@unh.edu
Health Leader Forge Podcast: http://healthleaderforge.org
"I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavor." - Henry David Thoreau