Two students struggling. Two conversations. I'm struggling to help
each of them
motivate themselves, to see the motivating "why" of getting an education, to
understand
the relevant meaning and purpose of an education to their lives. I ask them,
"Why are you
here?" One tells me that the only reason he is at the University is, "To make
money. I
was told by everyone its the only way to get a high paying job." The other
looks at me
incredulously and says, "I want to play on a championship team and get picked
in the draft
for a fat contract."
Those two replies took me back fifteen years to when I wrote a Random
Thought I
called "What Is It We Are Paid To Do?" Today, I'm still asking what is so high
about our
institutions of higher learning? Now, I don't want to get into $1,500,000 to
$6,000,000
contract buyouts for collegiate football coaches, or how institutions of higher
learning
have become educational Jabez Stones by selling their souls for incomes from
both
lucrative television contracts as well as from outside foundation, corporate,
and
government research grant money, or how academics and administrators fight over
money
generating patents for technologies and inventions created under institutional
auspices.
No, I just want to say that the way you hear most people talk, education is
fused to the
dollar sign. Parents, politicians, recruiters, professors, administrators, and
students
alike are making institutions of higher education more and more into white
collar
vocational job training centers, professional farm clubs, or, in the palatable
parlance of
jargon, "career centers." Sure, in catering to that word "higher" we call such
jobs
"professions" or "careers," but a job by any other name is still a job. It's a
wonder
that over the entranceways of our campuses there aren't eye-catching neon signs
flashing
in vivid colors that would be the envy of any Las Vegas casino proclaiming:
JOBS....JOBS....JOBS....
DEGREE....SALARY....SUCCESS
. JOBS....JOBS....JOBS
DEGREE....SALARY....STATUS.
Now, there's nothing wrong with that--as far as it goes. But, the
meaning of
getting a higher education in today's world doesn't go far or high enough.
Higher
education must have a higher meaning than merely getting a fatter paycheck.
Sure, it is
important that we teach and the student learn the subject material; sure, it's
important
we teach and the student learn what we call certain critical thinking skills.
But, for
what purpose? Just to get a grade, satisfy a requirement of a major, receive a
diploma,
and make a living? We live in a three dimensional world, but our institutions
of higher
education too often live in a two dimensional one of developing intelligence
and getting a
job. Where's the third dimension, the often ignored "human and social
dimension?"
I say that being intelligent and skilled is not enough. I asked,
"Where are our
educational Daniel Websters to do battle with our collegiate Mr. Scratches?"
Without
helping a student develop emotional skills and people skills, higher education
doesn't
fulfill its entire mission, or what is professed to be its entire mission as
written in
the myriad of poetic institutional mission statements. What makes higher
education
"higher" is more than being a third state of job training or a third level of
vocational
schooling. A baccalaureate education's focus is supposed to be broader than
that; it
supposedly has a character focus on learning how to live rather than just the
technical
consideration of how to make a living, on developing emotional and social
skills as well
as vocational and intellectual skills, on developing communication and
cooperative skills,
on helping each student open herself and himself to herself, himself, and to
others. Let
me paraphrase Theodore Roosevelt: to educate a person in the mind but not the
morals, is
to train a menace to society. Ain't that the truth. I'll put it my way: the
heart must
control what the mind creates. We see all around us the grim result of character
flabbiness: staggering greed, unprincipled selfishness, and gross
irresponsibility that
has brought us to the economic carnage around us. Many of us academics are
part of the
problem in that so many of us too often are concerned only with graduating more
informed
and more intellectually skilled people, but not necessarily better persons.
Too many of
us scholars live and work inside a large, opaque academic cocoon, strengthening
our old
habits and telling each other things we already agree with. The result is that
too often
we have given diplomas, honors, and recognition to highly intelligent and
skilled people
who have proven to be moral drop-outs.
Now, we can be part of the long range solution if we are purposefully
and
consciously concerned with helping each student learn how to live the good life
as well as
how to earn a good living; if we help a student tone up her or his value system
with an
ethical fitness program of self-discipline, self-confidence, self-worth,
integrity,
self-respect, respect for others, honesty, commitment, perseverance,
responsibility,
pursuit of excellence, emotional courage, creativity, imagination, humility,
kindness,
trustworthiness, fairness, authenticity, caring, compassion for others and
citizenship.
So, why do we exist? What is the purpose of higher education? Think I
live in
opaque, dreamy clouds? Well, stop smirking. Listen to Warren Buffet. He
certainly has
his feet on the ground. He told us: "In looking for people to hire, look for
three
qualities: integrity, intelligence and energy. But if they dont have the
first, the other
two will kill you." There are the three dimensions of higher education. Our
mission
must be to educate both the mind and heart, to develop both skills and ethics,
to
cultivate good professionals who are good people. Our purpose must be to help
each
student grow in her or his intellect and character, to help each of them to
learn how both
to do things right and to do the right things, to help each learn what is
necessary for
both a productive livelihood and a productive life.
Make it a good day.
--Louis--
Louis Schmier
http://therandomthoughts.edublogs.org/
Department of
History http://www.newforums.com/Auth_L_Schmier.asp
Valdosta State University www. halcyon.com/arborhts/louis.html
Valdosta, Georgia 31698 /\ /\ /\ /\
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