Speaking of the Great White Northern Thinkers, here’s a two-fer day in my ‘gator. Rick Schwier has this tremendous post about the greatness of universities.
A small reflection on the greatness of universities
Universities are one of only a few institutions that have endured over centuries. Universities exist for the dual purpose of creating and sharing knowledge. In the service of these goals, we don’t always get it right, and universities sometimes lose their way. And yes, there are some pretty cheap knock-offs calling themselves universities today that don’t deserve the label. But in the larger scheme of things, universities flourish because they are places where learning and truth are the only things that are held sacred. We can–and should–ask anything, risk anything in the service of learning and discovering truth.
As we think about Education, I think it’s important that we keep in mind that there’s not some monolithic ideal of education but rather a continuum. Rick reminds me of this.
April 16th, 2008 at 4:19 pm
So why are universities the only place where this happens, why not our public school system? Is my school a place “where learning and truth are the only things that are held sacred”? Public schools are a part of the continuum. Am I missing something here?
April 16th, 2008 at 10:49 pm
A great thing about this post is the mention of the purpose of universities…to create and share knowledge. This is certainly different from the purpose of public education. In fact, it’s a completely different attitude associated with learning. Public education (in my opinion) truly lacks the freedoms mentioned in this post.
April 16th, 2008 at 11:03 pm
One more thought about this…
As teachers we are constantly preparing our students for the next level. Elementary teachers are preparing students for middle school, middle school teachers are preparing students for high school, and high school teachers are preparing students for college. How well are we preparing students to enter the culture of the university? For years, we are held accountable so we hold the students accountable as well. Creativity gets stifled, thinking is rushed and compliant, and projects lack relevance and originality. Then enter the university and all of a sudden students are expected to turn on the creativity, the independent thinking, the relevance, and so on. I believe we spoon feed students throughout school which makes transitioning to college very difficult.
April 17th, 2008 at 11:48 pm
[…] in the Phaedrus blog about the Greatness of Universities, I think that Rick Schwier is a prime example of the word […]
April 25th, 2008 at 9:50 pm
I agree with the spoon feeding theory. Students have a hard time doing critical thinking activities. They can’t explain how they did something or how they solved it.