Training a generation

This year has been busy! Of the seven weekends that have come and gone, I’ve had University business on five of them and currently we’re waiting for our train to depart Union Station, Chicago after an hour’s delay due to the need to replace a faulty car on the planned assemblage.

On the way down, Amtrak celebrated a one-year anniversary of being able to travel at 110 mph on part of the trip – only problem was that we couldn’t careen at that speed on this particular trip due to a backup involving a freight train. Cake was distributed anyway and some ho-hum huzzahs expressed.

Some cursory research reveals that Amtrak loses about $1 billion annually – roughly $32/per passenger (for an in depth discussion of Amtrak’s financial situation, check out this article: Link

The Heritage Foundation presents a bit more data:

In the United States, passenger rail (Amtrak) is the most heavily subsidized of all passenger travel modes, requiring a federal subsidy of $237.53 per 1,000 passenger miles, compared to $4.23 for commercial aviation and $1.50 for intercity busses. Rail subsidies in Europe are just as high, if not higher.  (See Link)

Many argue that these subsidies are essential to avail travel to a broad economic spectrum of riders, that rail travel is better for the environment, and a number of other justifications. Others raise alarms that these subsidies are nothing more than tax payer bailouts for an inefficient service. I’m somewhere in the middle, but acknowledge that it is a values question.

Speaking of values – and working weekends – a recent Saturday morning student mentoring session (I did say Saturday morning – we meet at 7:45 am, business attire, one Saturday a month – yes, I am that mean!) was focused on values based decision making. It was a good session with lively discussion of the worth of a personal mission statement or other articulation of values and the surprises the students found while trying to express their values on paper.

Some discovered that their finished product was much different from their early drafts; others found how difficult it was to distill a values statement from the fruit of their busy lives. The conversation moved to making decisions based on values and its application personally as well as professionally. The old timers in the group (me and a couple of the College’s associate deans) told some war stories from our professional and personal lives.

It was a valuable session for the students (I hope) and for me. It reminded me of the clarity that knowing one’s values brings to life and to remember that not everyone shares the same values as me. That last point makes life interesting – and perhaps frustrating at times. I think I’ll replace “what do you do?” in conversations with “what do you value?”

I do know that right now, I value that the train is finally moving!
 



Clip art reported to be in the public domain and available at:  Link