The making of an effective professor-researcher

The making of an effective professor-researcher

Dr Abe V Rotor

Professor Rey Pedoche (Media), Dr Anselmo Cabigan (Biology and Agriculture), AVRotor
(Biology and Ecology), and Dr Manuel Martinez (Business and Psycvhology)

Here is a framework of a lecture on the subject, "What make an effective professor-researcher?" This serves as a guide to practitioners in the academe.

Ways of Researchers

• Hook and Line
• White Gown
• “Frankenstein”
• Entrepreneur
• Continuing

Stages of a “Sageing”

• The Age of Becoming (adventure and discovery)
• The Age of Overcoming (mastery)
• Age of the Forthcoming (Integrity and Harmony)

Risks and Rewards

• Youth – Blunder, also Opportunity
• Middle Age – Regret, also Fulfillment
• Old Age – Curse, also Wisdom

The ABH (Always Busy and in a Hurry) Person

• He is here and he is not here; anywhere but here.
• Often unhappy with what he has, with where he is.
• Imagines success, happiness and contentment to be external and distant
• Not physically, emotionally and spiritually involved.
• He is not living fully; he is Tomorrow’s Child.

The Control Freak

• He wants to be in control in everything and everyone.
• Deep inside he does not trust himself.
• Very organized but always worried.

The Cheerful Robot

• Afraid to take the initiative, drifts with the current
• Creature of routine
• Contented with mediocrity

Cynic (Frustrated Idealist)

• Incurable critic
• Always complaining
• Envious and jealous

The Hoarder

• He has insatiable want, forgetting what he truly needs.
• He is trapped in the fear of losing what he has.
• He needs to escape from the suffocating clutches of his possession

The Pleaser

• His self-image relies on public approval (KSP)
• He can’t say, NO without feeling guilty.
• He overburdens himself with promises he can’t fulfill

The Pretender

• He wears many masks he has forgotten his real face.
• A jack of all trades, a master of none.

The Addict

• He is excessively devoted to or burdened compulsively and habitually at something or someone.
• He is obsessed with alcohol, smoking, sex, TV, computer, money, and car - even religion.

What a Professor-Researcher should have

• Humility – sincerely accepting “who I am and what I am doing that I can, to become what God wants me to be.”
• Simplicity – focusing one’s attention on what truly matters in life.
• Integrity – (integer is whole) wholeness leads to holiness.

How to Live Life

1. Practice your religion. Religion is the most profound revolution.

• Life is a journey (We pass this way but once.)
• Life is beautiful (If you don’t see it, you will miss it.)
• Life is precious (Don’t miss the happy moments.)
• Life is short (If you don’t look around, you will miss it.)
• Breath, rest, take time out (Sabbath Day, siesta and holiday)

2. Don’t sacrifice your family on the altar of your career

3. Be prepared to experience the Crises of Limit

• Crucial periods and vulnerability
• Know the boundaries, borders and confines
• The Unfinished Business
• The crisis of bodily change. The body never lies.
• The crisis of effectiveness
• The crisis of death awareness

4. Learn from great men and women. Here are some useful quotations.

“Everyday I am doing something beautiful to God.” - Mother Theresa

“Totus tuus.” (Everything I do, I do for God.” - Pope John Paul II

“Don’t judge yourself with what you do, but the meaning of your work,” - Francis Thompson, The Hound of Heaven

Acknowledgment: Lecture presented by AV Rotor in a faculty seminar at the University of Perpetual Help Rizal, Graduate School in Arts and Education. This outline was gathered and organized from a seminar-workshop conducted in for the UST Graduate School professors by Fr. Rolando de la Rosa, current rector of the university. Note: I encourage the readers to write a full article based on this outline, and send a copy of the same for posting in this Blog, and for inclusion in the lessons of Paaralang Bayan sa Himpapawid.