* Graeme Harper, Dean of the Honors College at Oakland University

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
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Speaker 2 (00:21):
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Speaker 1 (00:25):
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He's heard from the beaches of Lake Michigan, to the
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Patrick Shield.

Speaker 2 (00:36):
Patrick Shields is on the air.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
Good Morning World.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
So if you saw the movie Animal House, you remember
Dean Wermer told Bluetowski the terrible news that his grade
point and average was zero point zero. And we're laughing
about that. Graham Harper is the dean of the Honors College,
I'll say it again, the dean of the Honors College
at Oakland University here in Rochester, Michigan. It's Michael Patrick Shields.

(01:02):
I have no business being in the room with an
intellect like you, Dean, but it's an absolute pleasure to
meet you.

Speaker 3 (01:10):
Oh, it's a pleasure to be here. Indeed, well fabulous.
I'd love to talk about honest college things all the time.

Speaker 2 (01:15):
So, yes, what grade point average do you need to
get into Oakland University and then therefore into the Honors College.

Speaker 4 (01:22):
Well, to get in the Honors College.

Speaker 3 (01:23):
To get into Honors College, you can automatically be admitted
with a three point seven GPA.

Speaker 4 (01:28):
It's pretty impressive.

Speaker 3 (01:29):
You can also apply from a three point three upward,
and we'll look at the application. It comes with a
number of recommendations and so on. But three point seven
is the thing to think about.

Speaker 2 (01:38):
Is it all about the numbers getting into college?

Speaker 4 (01:42):
You know, it isn't.

Speaker 3 (01:43):
And I think one of the things we've always looked
at is, even though we use that as a guideline,
we often meet with students and parents and so on
along the way and get a sense of what else
they've done. You know, I had somebody ask me some
years ago, is there any point in doing service in
the community when I'm in high school because it's not
going to help me get into college?

Speaker 4 (01:59):
And I said, it's not the case.

Speaker 3 (02:00):
It is the case that we want to look at
folks that are interested in doing well academically, but also
kind of they're broader contribution to the world. Frankly, and
so it does make a difference to have something other
than the GPA.

Speaker 2 (02:14):
What would be one value if someone's listening right now
and their young person as a freshman in high school,
what is something they would need to do other than
pile up points?

Speaker 4 (02:25):
You know?

Speaker 3 (02:26):
I think the main thing is to be pretty broad
based in terms of interest, even if you've already got
a pretty good idea of what you want to go
into as a profession, just to have a sense of
what else is out there. I mean, you see this
all the time with folks thinking that if they concentrate
early that they'll get better at what they do and
so forth. Sure that's probably true. But on the other hand,

(02:50):
if you don't have some sort of broad based education,
you find it really hard to actually take leadership roles
and kind of progress with folks that are not of
the same mentalities. So I would say, get widely educated,
Get get into things that are not necessarily things you
expect to do professionally, but just enjoy learning things, and
that's going to help a whole bunch.

Speaker 2 (03:10):
I heard you and Brian Bearley talking about grade point averages,
and you suggested I was joking around about the zero
point zero in the movie. But on the other end
of the scale, you two were talking about the highest
grade point average you'd ever seen.

Speaker 3 (03:23):
Yeah, well again, weighted averages and so forth, and just
looking at the way in which you know, some of
the students that come here come with incredible GPAs up
in the five point threes and so forth. That weighted
averages that just are mind blowing. But yeah, certainly we
have an average grade point a grade point average for
our freshman class that's usually above a three point nine

(03:44):
to five for the average for the whole class. So
you know, you kind of think of that in terms
of a strength of academics. It's incredible, you know, to
achieve that is incredible.

Speaker 2 (03:55):
But how do you go over a four point Oh
this is a dumb question. How do you get to
a five? Meant something?

Speaker 3 (04:00):
Well, again, that's weighted, right, but I mean at the
same time, even you can't wait that enough to get
it low, it's still impressive unweighted.

Speaker 4 (04:09):
But yeah, that's what we look at. We look at
the weighted average.

Speaker 2 (04:12):
Are you born smart?

Speaker 3 (04:15):
I don't think so. I think you've worn with the
ability to do just about anything. But the point is
the environment and the support becomes really significant.

Speaker 4 (04:22):
So, you know, I'm fairly confident.

Speaker 3 (04:24):
I've always believed that, you know, with the right kind
of support and the right kind of you know, ability
to connect, you'll achieve anything.

Speaker 4 (04:32):
But there is a lot of effort that's involved.

Speaker 3 (04:35):
And I think one of the things that sometimes gets
thrown out there it's somehow there's this sort of elite
selection that goes on.

Speaker 4 (04:42):
I don't think it's elitism.

Speaker 3 (04:44):
I think what it is is folks that have put
in the effort, that have built up that kind of
notion of how to do things academically.

Speaker 4 (04:50):
But also, as I say, are willing to push themselves
a bit and have the support to be able to
do it.

Speaker 2 (04:57):
So not to oversimplify it, you're saying it's nurture not nature.

Speaker 3 (05:01):
I'm saying it's probably more nurture than nature, for sure,
And I think ultimately that the nature of that nurture
is one of the great accomplishments that we can support.
How do you get that to work for everybody, you know?
And I think that that's the difficulty. How do you
actually give everybody the opportunity to be nurtured to a
point where they're able to succeed you know, that's the

(05:21):
big question.

Speaker 2 (05:23):
And I think it's even more of a difficult question
these days when I wonder how is the most effective
way to engage your kids in the curiosity of the
world and learn when it's not books maybe anymore, it
could be some sort of electronic device.

Speaker 3 (05:43):
The idea of what reading involves connects with that really well,
because I think you're onto something there.

Speaker 4 (05:48):
I mean, I'm still a big book person.

Speaker 3 (05:50):
I think a lot of the students that I meet
are coming to the honor scholars You're very interested in
books and reading in that very sort of Oh yeah,
they are definitely interested. But having said that, the notion
of how you read the world is a really interesting
concept of what you know, how we broaden that idea
of reading out so do you how do you read

(06:11):
visual images?

Speaker 4 (06:12):
How do you how do you read sounds? How do
you read the weather?

Speaker 3 (06:15):
You know, there's a whole bunch of different versions of
what reading means. So I think in the contemporary world,
it's how do you engage you know, how do you
actually sort of come to investigate, understand and come to
some conclusions about things.

Speaker 4 (06:28):
And that's not all traditional book reading.

Speaker 3 (06:32):
And I think again, depends on the field you're going
to go into as to what elements are more significant
than others within that broad spectrum of what what reading means?

Speaker 2 (06:40):
Do you need to know? Well, let me do that. No,
let me let me do this, because I'll forget. I've
better I have a butterfly mind. Do you need to
know what you're going to be when you come to
college or is it just an expensive place to figure
that out?

Speaker 3 (06:56):
You know, for what the value of it is overall,
it's not an expensive place to figure things out. I
think it's the one point in your life where you
get to immerse yourself completely. And I think that's what
is so fascinating about it is that you've kind.

Speaker 4 (07:09):
Of got four years to explore.

Speaker 3 (07:11):
Something that's kind of resource rich. I mean, it's rich
with people resource So you're going to meet experts across
pretty much every campus in so many different fields.

Speaker 4 (07:20):
You've got access.

Speaker 3 (07:22):
To so many resources that you're not going to get
out there in the commercial world very easily.

Speaker 4 (07:27):
You've got all that going on.

Speaker 3 (07:28):
So I think ultimately, you know, it's a place to
explore an experiment, and it hasn't changed that much in
terms of how important that is. Despite the fact we've
got a lot more people perhaps these days, saying what
is the point. The point is that immersion doesn't happen
except any university clash college environment. And that's why it's valuable.

(07:52):
I mean, it's so valuable that you get to do that.
And the fact that you do get to do it
and get to explore that much means that you can
come in not necessary knowing exactly what you want to do,
because that's part of the point.

Speaker 4 (08:02):
You know.

Speaker 3 (08:03):
We always say to the students to join the honest
college who are still deciding what they.

Speaker 4 (08:06):
Want to do. Is all around you.

Speaker 3 (08:08):
There are people that are in the top five percent
academically in their particular interest areas. Now, if you just
gravitate towards engineering, then talk to some of the folks
that have already decided to be engineers. We'll talk to
some of the nurses if you're planning to be a nurse.
But you don't have to know for certain when you arrive,
you know, use the opportunity to meet all these folks,
and not just professors but fellow students. So yeah, I

(08:31):
think you can be undecided. In fact, maybe it is
sometimes better to be undecided.

Speaker 4 (08:35):
When you start.

Speaker 2 (08:37):
We are with Graham Harper, the dean of the Honors
College at Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan. Back in a
Flash with Michael Patrick Shields, Professor Graham Harper, dean of

(09:11):
the Honors College, I hope the university. Would you name
two or three books that you think are essential for
a human being that's educated?

Speaker 4 (09:23):
Wow?

Speaker 2 (09:24):
Two or three? I couldn't say one, because you know,
I give you three.

Speaker 4 (09:30):
You got me on the spot there.

Speaker 3 (09:32):
I really I immersed myself in snippets of things to experience.

Speaker 2 (09:37):
What could you read Don Quixote if you wanted to?
Are you that intelligent to figure that out?

Speaker 4 (09:43):
Yeah? Again, I think is it the is it the classics?
Is it a combination of the classics and the contemporary?

Speaker 3 (09:51):
You know, we read a book with the Honest College
a couple of freshmen years ago, so about twenty twenty three,
called The Cartographers that I really it was popular fiction
in many ways, but it was also an exploration of
the New York Public Library and the way in which
it works. It was a fantasy, and it was a
sort of book where I'd say, hey, have a look
at this and get a feel for how you can

(10:12):
understand the library world and the world of map making,
for example. And at that point I thought, wow, this
is a book that everybody should have a look at,
you know, and it was really reasonably conte, was very contemporary.
I look back through, you know, authors that I enjoy,
I like Nimbokoff and various fiction writers that write in
the lyrical fashion.

Speaker 4 (10:31):
And I always say everybody.

Speaker 3 (10:32):
Should have a look at a book where the author
appreciates language just to just to enjoy it. John Updyke,
for example, always surprises me, you know, just because it's
the sort of work where somebody can explore language poetically,
but it's pros it's narrative, it's it's you know, it's
a story, it's a story being told, and yet at
the same time it's it shows you what you can

(10:52):
do with language, you know. And those kinds of books,
I think, and there are so many choices, the sorts
of books that everybody should at least have some experience
of to understand that.

Speaker 4 (11:01):
Language can work in that way, you know.

Speaker 3 (11:03):
So I would I would collect those together in a
group way bigger than three and imagine that these are
sorts of things to expose exposed people to but if
you've never seen Shakespeare on the page, you should.

Speaker 4 (11:13):
Have a lot.

Speaker 3 (11:14):
If if you don't really understand what a film script
looks like on the page, have a look. It's what
makes a great film.

Speaker 4 (11:19):
You know.

Speaker 3 (11:20):
These are things I'm not sure we always teach in
terms of the making of books and the making of story.
We often teach the end result, but we don't necessarily
always talk about how it came about.

Speaker 2 (11:30):
So did you see Hamnett the movie?

Speaker 3 (11:33):
Or no?

Speaker 4 (11:34):
I okay.

Speaker 2 (11:35):
I get sometimes so lost in alliteration that I feel
trapped when I'm writing, because I pick my head up
and get some air, because it feels like a like
a prison. You will one of your books be in
the list of books that you would recommend to your
honor students.

Speaker 4 (11:52):
Never. I never recommend anything I've written.

Speaker 3 (11:54):
I've written a bunch and edited a bunch more, and
I never put it out there. I mean, I enjoy
I've just about I've got a new short story collection
coming out, surely and again, I won't be telling anybody
to buy it, but hopefully they will.

Speaker 2 (12:07):
Well, what will it be called? And when can we
get it?

Speaker 4 (12:09):
It's called Robots and other People, And that'll be out in.

Speaker 2 (12:12):
January Amazon or how do you worry on Amazon?

Speaker 4 (12:15):
Yeah, it's a collection of short.

Speaker 3 (12:17):
Stories, one hundred and one hundred and eighty pages of
various stories, but playing a little bit between the contemporary
and contemporary fixation on technologies and AI and so forth.

Speaker 4 (12:29):
And then people, what are people actually doing you?

Speaker 2 (12:33):
Are you publishing through traditional publishers or how do you
do it? You are stuff?

Speaker 4 (12:37):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (12:37):
I mean again, I find that interesting. We're still pretty
hung up about how things get out there, and so
I think one of the things to think about is,
in the contemporary world, if you want to be writing
things and getting things out there, what's going to make
you most happy? You're really looking for your book to
be represented by an agent and published by a mainstream
New York publisher or are you really thinking I just

(12:58):
wanted out there? So I think people can go various
directions these days, and they shouldn't feel like any direction.

Speaker 4 (13:04):
Is better than any other one. But you know, you
don't know what you want to do.

Speaker 3 (13:07):
So I published quite traditionally with academic presses and so forth,
and then with a small press with my fiction because
I enjoy working with the editor.

Speaker 2 (13:15):
So, yeah, what is your masterpiece.

Speaker 4 (13:19):
What is it that's the one next, the next one?

Speaker 2 (13:22):
And now you sound like Enzo Ferrari, but you must
have a well, pick a title that's available this moment
that somebody could go right now and read your work.

Speaker 4 (13:34):
Mine.

Speaker 3 (13:35):
Well, you've got to have a look at robots and
other people. But Releasing the Animals was fun. That came
out in twenty twenty three. It was set kind of
around a zoo that doesn't look dis similar to Detroit Zoo.

Speaker 2 (13:48):
So yeah, interesting, would you mind giving us your pathway
to Rochester, Michigan because that's not a Michigan accent.

Speaker 4 (13:57):
It's not in Michigan accent.

Speaker 3 (13:59):
That we've been working on it for fourteen years, so
maybe it's getting closer, but I think people would argue.

Speaker 4 (14:03):
The point on that one.

Speaker 3 (14:04):
So I was in North Wales at University of Wales
there and then was at the University of Texas Medical Branch.
So it was in Galveston for a while, in Alabama
for a little while, and then eventually ended up here.
And it's a bizarre story, but I am so pleased
that I ended up here. And you know, it's one
of those things that you can't plan ahead on and
he has to say. So really, officially I was in Wales,

(14:27):
but I was sort of on the way here in
many ways because I was doing these short term positions
in Alabama and Texas. But way way back I was
in Australia. So yes, there's a little bit more history there.

Speaker 2 (14:38):
Well, yeah, let's go back to the origin story if
you will.

Speaker 4 (14:42):
Okay, yeah, we'll go in that far far that back
back that far. I should say.

Speaker 3 (14:47):
I was raised in Australia, so northern New South Wales
and on the coast, on the beach, and then ended
up in Britain at the University of East Anglia because
they do have a fabulous and they still do have
a fabulous program in in writing and so forth in
American studies. So that was where I ended up through
the mid parts of the nineteen nineties and then, as

(15:08):
I say, ended up here eventually after being at the
University of Wales for some time.

Speaker 2 (15:12):
Do you read any Ernest Hemingway.

Speaker 3 (15:15):
Not on a regular basis, although I've read, and everybody
must at some point, so I think that's one of
the things is have a look at some of those
that have been influential. So obviously everybody looks for Hemingway
for the strip tramp down pros and the journalistic style.

Speaker 4 (15:28):
So absolutely, yeah, how.

Speaker 2 (15:30):
Long since you've been in Australia and do you go
back often?

Speaker 3 (15:33):
Two thousand and nine and I guess the answer therefore
was no, it was, but no, I've got relatives there,
but we don't call back back.

Speaker 4 (15:41):
All that off.

Speaker 2 (15:42):
Well, I'm glad to see you here in Michigan. This
is very intriguing. So you know, we buried the lead
a little bit that you're an author, and of course
the dean of the Honors College here at Oakland University.
If I will give you to Cliffhanger here, I'll ask
you the question, then we'll take the break for the answer.
If one of your students comes up and says, I've
got an idea for a book. I want to write
a book, because I hear that from time to time

(16:03):
from people, my answer is practical, and that is, go
ahead and put the book proposal together. What Yeah, you've
got a forty fifty page book proposal. We got to
flesh it all out. You see, if it's marketable. See
if you actually have an idea, they don't want to
hear that, and so don't give me that answer because
you with students are melding minds and so I'm sure

(16:24):
you're meant to inspire and we'll get the answer to
that question. Have you ever thought about writing a book?
Back in a flash at Oaklynn University, you can be
the leader you were meant to be in Rochester. And
we just have two and a half minutes left with
the Dean of the Honors College, Graham Harper. And the
cliffhanger I left is if I was a student and

(16:46):
I said I want to write a book, what do
you say?

Speaker 4 (16:50):
I say, why do you want to write it?

Speaker 3 (16:51):
And it's your starting point, Because if you want to
write it, because it's going to give you satisfaction to
write it, then I say get on and write it.
It's going to take not just minutes, not just days,
weeks and months, it could take years.

Speaker 4 (17:02):
But do it and just get on with it. I mean.

Speaker 3 (17:04):
The hardest thing, and it's come up in discussions of
writing for eons, is the idea if you don't start,
it's never going to happen. And I think it's so
true in so many ways. If you don't just sit
there and frankly laboriously do it, there may be days
that you get fifteen words done and at the end
of the day you cross them.

Speaker 4 (17:22):
All out metaphorically speaking.

Speaker 3 (17:25):
Often these days obviously, usually people are doing things, you know, electronically,
they're putting stuff in there and think, yeah, I've got
it done, and it disappears the next day because I think, now.

Speaker 4 (17:33):
That was all terrible. That's what it's all about.

Speaker 3 (17:36):
You know, you've got to start, and you've got to
be willing to let it all go if that's why
you want to do it. If, however, you're saying, Okay,
I need somebody to give me a contract, I want
to go through that process, and sure, you've got to
put together something that somebody's convinced by and.

Speaker 4 (17:48):
Get them to sign you up to do it.

Speaker 3 (17:49):
That's usually no guarantee they'll take it until you've finished it,
and even if when you do finish it, no guarantee
they're going to take it. So you've still always got
that question of unless you write, it's never going to
get done. So frankly, the overall thing is get on
with it, get on with it, and do it.

Speaker 2 (18:05):
When does your amuse come to you? What time of the.

Speaker 3 (18:08):
Day early and again I've written about this, you know
a few times actually about the fact that early morning
new brain stuff is essential. But again, if you're serious
about writing things, you can't say I'm only going to
write for an hour in the morning and that'll be it.
I mean, you probably aren't going to get anywhere fast
doing it that way, although there are authors, of course
they've done it that way.

Speaker 4 (18:29):
But I would say, yep, early is fabulous.

Speaker 3 (18:32):
Five o'clock in the morning, and then by seven or eight,
you know, maybe you're starting to think, okay, I've done
some for the day. But you know, you can sit
there from five in the morning till ten at night
and still not end up with more than fifteen words.

Speaker 2 (18:45):
It's just a fascinating thing, isn't it.

Speaker 3 (18:47):
It's an amazing thing that we want to do it.
But as I say, I think that's what's fascinating. Of course,
love with creative writing, but I think all kinds of
writings like that, the fact that we are so determined
to do this thing that can be so difficult, and
in this contemporary AI world, it's still something I think
that people want to do. They want to labor over,
you know.

Speaker 2 (19:07):
Open up your beans and bleed.

Speaker 4 (19:09):
Like this exactly it's exactly like that sometimes.

Speaker 2 (19:12):
Thank you very much, Graham Harper. I hope we meet again.
The Dean of the Honors College