I Suck At OSHA Training

tonight, karen and i had an impromptu training class at the south shore ymca in quincy where both of us still work part-time. as thursdays are my normal day to hang out with my friends (marc and kelley), i was quite displeased to find out that the training class was tonight. unfortunately, like many things at the south shore ymca, the training schedule for employees is poorly planned and managed.

anyway, the training class that both karen and i had to take was osha training. now i suck at osha training. truth be told, the south shore ymca actually sucks at osha training. although the instructor of the class did not come out and say it, i have a sneaking suspicion that the south shore ymca got into a little trouble with the occupational safety and health administration (osha). apparently, osha came by for a surprise visit and had made some recommendations to the ymca... hence, the impromptu need for karen and i to take the training class tonight.

needless to say, the osha training was... well... uninformative to say the least. the instructor of the class, who happens to be the vice president or something of human resources at the south shore ymca, generally seemed disinterested in teaching the subject and pretty much glossed over much of the subject matter. of course, i was not complaining because the quicker the class ended, the quicker i could go hang out with marc and kelley.

interestingly enough, while i sat in the conference room of where the training was being held, i noticed the big "maximum occupancy: 38" sign by the door. naturally, my curiosity led me to start counting the number of chairs in the room. let's just say that the number of chairs... were definitely more than 38. i attribute this oversight to typical south shore ymca management (or lack thereof).

it should come as no surprise that the more and more i visit and/or work at the south shore ymca, the more and more i become displeased with the organization. i can't even tell you how many times (and how much money) have been spent and wasted on something as simple as the method for employees to punch in... from having a device scan membership identification cards, to hand recognition devices, to whatever the new contraption is. i don't even bother to scan in anymore. it's just simpler to tell my boss how many hours i worked rather than learn the new punch in method for the month.

since the south shore ymca has become more like a "business", things have definitely gone downhill. i'm surprised people still go to the south shore ymca because the organization definitely seems to have gone away from upholding its own four core values of caring, honesty, respect, and responsibility... and more toward nickel and diming individuals (staff included). i won't even get into how much of a pain it was for me prior to attending to the training class to get my identification card renewed to show that i even worked at the ymca. it's those little things about the south shore ymca that annoy me.

needless to say, i was happy to be done with the osha training class... even if i learned nothing about safety itself. the only good that came out of class, however, was that i now have the opportunity to receive a free hepatitis b vaccine series of shots complements of the ymca. thanks osha!

from there, all was good again in my world because i got to hang out with marc and kelley. i look forward to hanging out with marc and kelley because, aside from them being great friends, the get-together breaks up the week.

as marc made dinner (pasta with meatballs... which as usual was delicious), the four of us watched the latest episode of "lost". due to time constraints, we were only able to watch one episode of the greatest tv show ever: buffy the vampire slayer following "lost". nonetheless, the shows were quite enjoyable.

for anyone curious, while i think the faith character on the show is a great character, karen... not so much. i am guessing this will influence her decision to watch "dollhouse" with me tomorrow because the show stars the actress who plays the faith character... massachusetts's own... eliza dushku. "dollhouse" is from joss whedon, creator of buffy.

anyway, one of the things that also came up tonight (in addition to my venting about the south shore ymca's headless chicken management) is the state of students these days. i think this may be a sign that i am indeed... old... because i refer to the good 'o days now.

basically, we were discussing how students these days have it so well. for instance, back in the day (see... i'm old) we had to use microfiche or find textbooks to write papers. today, people can just go online. with everything so easily accessible, students now seem to have a sense of entitlement. they don't have to manually take notes anymore as things are already printed out for them. they don't have to... well... do anything anymore. heck, they don't even have to learn.

karen was mentioning how a particular student basically asked her for the answer to a case study question rather than use independent thought to ascertain the answer to the question. similarly, marc who is mentoring mentioned how students do not even care to show up for class or fail to respond when contacted.

needless to say, i thought it was an interesting topic... the state of students these days. i almost have a sense that students these days don't have to work for anything and that's a shame because i think effort correlates to some degree with knowledge. (thus, if you put in little effort, then you learn nothing... if you put in a lot of effort, then you probably will know a lot or more about that topic.) it's almost like all these advances in technology have made students lazy.

either that, or they are just plain dumb... which i would not be surprised about because i generally think on a whole that the population is dumb... d-u-m... dumb. not that i am being an elitist or anything. but heaven help the future generation if this trend continues. sheesh, i am getting old.