Hello, I was catching up on my TIPS reading this morning, and I have to chime in to the discussion on the purpose of education. Admittedly, I am still a new faculty member, so perhaps my views will change, but here are my current thoughts:
I know that since we have remained in academia we are rarely considered "typical" in terms of our performance in school and perhaps our love of learning (that kept us in school), but I have a hard time accepting that community college today (or any school) is just to help students get better jobs. I know that is why many of them are here, but I became an academic because I was inspired by teachers that made me realize the scope of possibility that exists in knowledge. Certainly, we are not going to inspire all of our students in this way, but shouldn't we still keep that as our goal -- to make students want to learn (not for an 'A' - which is what I often saw when teaching at the University of Chicago) or to get a better paycheck (which might be what I'm seeing at MCC), but because knowledge can be inspiring and change your entire view of the world? Yes, we do need to make sure students have the basic skills to make it out there in the world, but I'd burn out in a couple of years if that was my only goal. It's making students care about learning that keeps me excited. But that's what makes it so difficult for me at the moment -- my students seem engaged and motivated in class, but then do SO poorly on exams. It is clear to me that I do need to emphasize skill building more, but I'm still not giving up on the higher goals of learning (at least not yet). And I don't think that the ultimate goal needs to change because of the community college setting. In fact, one could argue that it is even more important at this level -- although, obviously, skill building also needs heavy emphasis. (But again, students at the University of Chicago also had a hard time using spell check and writing complete sentences, so some skill building needs to go on there too.) Christine L. Grela Instructor of Psychology McHenry County College [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
