Dans tout le débat sur les frais de scolarité des dernières semaines, j’ai le sentiment qu’on passe à côté de quelque chose. Le gouvernement parle de faire payer leur juste part aux étudiants. Les étudiants parlent du rendement supérieur en impôts d’une personne avec un diplôme. Des deux côtés, on ne s’écoute pas : on planche à faire valoir la rentabilité de sa solution.

Ce n’est pas le bon débat.

Le coût de l’éducation, ce n’est pas une question de rentabilité. Ce n’est pas une question d’impôts payés par les détenteurs d’un bacc en philosophie au lieu d’en administration des affaires. Ce débat-là est une œillère à la vraie question.

Le financement de l’éducation, c’est une question de valeur.

Ça n’a rien à voir avec l’argent. Avec combien ça coûte.

Si transposait l’idée en santé, le débat ne serait même pas permis. Est-ce qu’on va se mettre à débattre qui est plus rentable pour la société, un cancéreux ou un diabétique? Non, en matière de santé, on a choisi comme société que tous nos citoyens auraient droit à des soins de santé, peu importe leur condition financière.

Alors pourquoi est-ce que l’éducation serait différente? Pourquoi est-ce que l’éducation devrait être rentable? C’est n’est pas un placement financier, encore moins une ligne de produit d’une entreprise. Avant tout, c’est un choix, une valeur de notre société québécoise, qui motive l’accès à l’éducation, qu’elle soit secondaire, collégiale, universitaire ou technique.

Ce n’est pas une question d’argent.

La santé prend presque deux fois plus de place dans le budget du gouvernement québécois que l’éducation (29MM VS 16MM). Pour les universités et Cégeps, le gouvernement dépense moins par année que le service de la dette (5MM VS 8MM, la source est ici).

Comme société, on veut quoi?

C’est ça la vraie question. C’est quoi la valeur de l’éducation dans notre société québécoise? C’est quoi l’importance d’offrir à tous nos citoyens l’accès à une éducation supérieure, pour nous les québécois?

À mon avis, si on réduit la conversation à une question de dollars, on ne répond pas à la question.

It's 2012 already and I feel like I completely missed out on 2010 and 2011. What was I doing on January 1st, 2011? Catching up on my readings for classes that were starting again a few days later. This year, on January 1st, 2012, we spent the afternoon cooking what turned out to be a nice family dinner.

(Me) To do this program, you need two things. First, you need to be unaware of what you're really getting into. Because if I had known how much work it would be I am not sure I would have chosen to do this program. Second, you need pride. Strong pride. The kind that keeps you from giving up because you just can't look all your loved ones in the eye and admit that you failed. That it was just too hard.

(My friend) You know, some people would call this courage.
 

1. Ignorance of the true challenge that lies ahead
2. Pride to keep you going when you're just too tired to care anymore
3. Courage to wrap it all with a nice bow

It's been a while since my last rant. So here goes.

What if, as a people, we decide to honor Jack and honor his memory by demanding change in our politics? I’m not talking about political ideas here. I’m not suggesting we all go orange in the next election. What I’m talking about is bringing back decency in the House of Commons. Bringing back positive campaigning. Eradicating personal attacks between politicians. Making it wrong for a political party to launch a smear campaign against an adversary.

Any political idea that is good enough should be able to stand on its own. It should not need to bring down the character behind the opposing idea.

Ideas should be debated. Not dress style or coffee preferences.

In Jack’s memory, let us Canadians show the world that politics can be a clean fight too.

I am getting to the end of my Master’s degree (only 5 months until the end of classes!!!) and it’s now time to think about our team project. The Global Business Project is a team assignment that must be completed outside of North America. It’s a project that must be done for real (for a real organization). This project can be “market entry into a new country, by a Canadian company,” or “market entry into Canada by a non-Canadian company.” It can also by a consulting project, such as “how to organize team” or “reviewing and proposing a new compensation system.” Essentially, it’s pretty open. The project includes a 5-day trip to a country outside of North America.

We are 9 members on our team: I in Quebec City, 2 members in Montreal and 6 in Ottawa. We have a total of 675 hours to invest in the project, at no cost to the organization. Our team includes a wide range of specialties: sustainable development, video game localization, public relations, change management, consulting, business leadership, sales, and marketing. We are a complementary, very efficient team that can bring a lot of value to the organization that will choose to trust us.

Do you know a business or non-profit that would like to explore international opportunities, but does

n’t have the resources or the time to move forward? A great project that would be perfect for a team is professionals about to finish one of the best-ranked MBA programs in North America, Cornell-Queen’s Executive MBA?

Please contact me!

Thanks for forwarding this message to your network!

Here's more about our team members: 

This is our team:

I've been thinking about this for a while now, but I didn't know how to present it without looking like a masochistic, pain-seeking, crazy woman.

Then I watched this TED video. It's about being wrong. How it feels when we're wrong and we don't know it, how it feels when we realize we're wrong, and how society teaches us that being wrong is bad.

I've been thinking about being wrong for a while, using the pain angle. I love to bike. I love to hike. Unfortunately, I don't have very good coordination. This results in regular falls. I trip on roots in the trail. I loose my balance when I try to turn on wet pavement and get thrown off my bike. Hell, after 3 days on the GR-20 trail in Corsica, my legs looked like this:

So, one solution to this "problem" would be to stop hiking or biking. I could go towards softer sports. I could avoid situations where I could get hurt.

Here's another way to see this. It's NOT a problem, it's just a by-product of doing things I love. I am not afraid of hurting myself. I don't do it on purpose. I don't enjoy being hurt. I don't seek harmful situations. I just go about my life, and one of the consequences of that is a pretty good collection of bruises and stories of the improbable ways in which I got them.

OK, here's the point.

If I decide that I don't want to have bruises anymore, then I will only do sports in the gym where it's safe for me. I will no longer explore. I will no longer expeirence the joy of biking and hiking and rock climbing.

Being hurt is not always physical. If I try something at work to get more clients, I could succeed or I could fail and bruise my reputation. If I live in fear of hardships, I'm not sure my life will be worth living - it will be a predictable, boring life.

It's not about the pain.

It's about doing what we think is right, wihtout always planning for a mattress to fall on. It's about knowing that a life worth living comes with some bruising. A career worth advancing comes with some painful parts.

We can't live life without the pain. It's not either/or.

No changies.

Now even the most perfectest person can get on our nerves. It's normal. And no one wants to leave these issues unattended, since they tend to only get worse.

Or do they?

My colleague at work is very tolerant. He lets bygones be bygones and that makes him quite the diplomat in the team. He learned about tolerance when he worked on a submarine. Here's how he explains it:
"When you're stuck with 60 other people in a metal box at the bottom of the ocean, things are different. You can't leave, you can't get out. It's very small, and you have no privacy. You can't go for a walk to cool off. You can't isolate yourself. So you learn that a lot of things are not important. You learn to let go of many things that you would not if you were in the city. You can use the same principle at work: what is really important? Is it worth picking a fight over it?"

This struck me. And now, when I have a problem with someone, I ask myself: it I was stuck in a submarine with him for two months, would I let go of this issue or would I address it?

It helps me become more tolerant, and it helps put things in perspective.