Why a democracy NEEDS literature, and why colleges need general education

"Paradise Lost seeks to create 'fit readers,' not just to preach to them.  The hope is that those who pick it up will, through reading it, be able, for example, to see how tyrants gain their power and, perhaps, next time, stand firm against tyranny.  Paradise Lost therefore both demands and creates readers who will be alert to all its complexities, able to appreciate its ironies, able to share its anger and its compassion." 

-- Anna Beer, Milton: Poet, Pamphleteer, and Patriot (347-348)

Four reasons why working in a university is the best job ever....

In the past two days, I:

1) lunched with and heard a talk by John Crockett, former diplomat and cultural attache in Italy (and other places) where he was a neighbor of Nobel-Prize-winner Eugenio Montale, where he brought Allen Ginsberg to meet Montale, and at whose apartment Thomas Mann took a nap, and that's just the beginning of his stories;

2) heard Steve Forbes give a lecture on financial policy;

3) read selections from Ava Gardner: Touches of Venus, as well as from Eliot and Tennyson in a poetry marathon, as part of CCSU's celebration of National Poetry Month;

4) and graded papers by and conferenced with students from China, Korea, Poland, Ghana, Colombia, Venezuela, and Egypt.

That's a job to have.

Only number three?! What the #@!$%! is up with that?

College Professor: #3 on the CNN “Best Jobs in America” list:

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/moneymag/bestjobs/2009/snapshots/3.html

“Drawbacks: Low starting pay and a big 50% salary gap between faculty at universities and community colleges. If the position is at a four-year university, you'll probably have to relocate, and you'll be under pressure to constantly publish new work to sustain career momentum.”

Upside: a seemingly unlimited supply of events with bagels!

That's EVERY kind of man!

Robert M. Franklin, president of Morehouse College, has spent considerable time since taking office at his alma mater in 2007 talking about what it means today to be "a Morehouse man." He has focused...on the importance of "five wells." Franklin wants his students to be "well read, well spoken, well traveled, well dressed and well balanced."

From Inside Higher Ed (3/31/10)

"Blended" Learning seems so 1950s...

Hell, my decades-old, hand-me-down, "Dual Range" Osterizer "Pulse-matic" has many better settings than "blend."

Consider, among others:

Chop

Whip

Puree

Frappe

and my all-time favorite

LIQUEFY!

"Liquefied Learning," now THAT has a 21st-Century ring to it!

Serendipity, or How pop songs sometimes reflect committee work

You can make it your own hell or heaven
Live as you please
Can we make it if we all live together
As one big family?

"We Are London"
Madness, The Liberty of Norton Folgate

But, remember, folks, you can be inspired to all sorts of action and accomplishment by a good teacher and a great book...

From today's Chronicle of Higher Education

Social Change Tops Classic Books in Professors' Teaching Priorities

By ROBIN WILSON

A new national survey of faculty members shows that the proportion of professors who believe it is very important to teach undergraduates to become "agents of social change" is substantially larger than the proportion who believe it is important to teach students the classic works of Western civilization.

According to the survey, 57.8 percent of professors believe it is important to encourage undergraduates to become agents of social change, whereas only 34.7 percent said teaching them the classics is very important. Observers say the difference results from influences as diverse as conservative criticisms of curriculum and Barack Obama's call for social activism during his presidential campaign.

The survey found that, on the issue of classics and change, professors' opinions also vary by rank. Full professors are more likely than assistant professors to say teaching the classics is important, and assistant professors are more likely than full professors to say encouraging undergraduates to become socially involved is important.

A report on the survey, "The American College Teacher," was released Thursday by the University of California at Los Angeles's Higher Education Research Institute. The institute questioned 22,562 professors across many disciplines at 372 colleges and universities in the 2007-8 academic year about their goals for classroom instruction, and asked them how they spent their time and how satisfied they were with their jobs. The institute completes the survey every three years (The Chronicle, September 16, 2005).

Sylvia Hurtado, a professor of education at UCLA who directs the research institute, said the gap between those who value teaching Western civilization and those who value teaching students to be social activists reflects a shift in emphasis from the abstract to the practical. "The notion of a liberal education as a set of essential intellectual skills is in transition," she says. "It's also about social and personal responsibility, thinking about one's role in society, and creating change."

Cary Nelson, president of the American Association of University Professors, says he believes faculty members should teach the classics. "I teach American literature all the time, that's what I do," says Mr. Nelson, who is a professor of English at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

But he says that to many professors, teaching the classics has become part of a "conservative agenda" that they don't want to be part of. Conservative critics of academe, he says, "have poisoned the well for these subjects because they've gotten politicized and become symbols of a reaction against the progressive academy."

But Peter W. Wood, president of the National Association of Scholars, attributes the gap between Western civilization and social change in part to the influence of Barack Obama's campaign. He suspects that many professors have long believed that teaching students to be agents of change is more important than teaching them to value the classics. Few, however, have openly acknowledged that, he says. "There used to be something a bit shameful for a faculty member to take such an anti-intellectual position," he says.

But the 2008 presidential campaign, he says, changed that, giving "a sense of legitimacy to the idea that political action could and should trump traditional forms of intellectual inquiry."

The survey found other evidence that professors are increasingly interested in helping students develop morals and in helping them get a well-rounded education and form a commitment to their communities. In particular, 72.8 percent of professors think it is important to instill in students an appreciation for the liberal arts—nearly 15 percentage points more than said so three years ago. About 56 percent say it is important to instill an appreciation for community service—a nearly 20 percentage-point increase—and 71.8 percent say it is important to enhance students' "self understanding." About 70 percent say it is important to help students develop "moral character," 13 percentage points more than said so three years earlier.

The report says the shift may reflect the fact that faculty members are more aware of their role in helping students with "psychosocial" development in the wake of the murders at Virginia Tech and on other campuses.

"Faculty are just more attuned to looking at the whole student than they might have been before these incidents on campus," says Linda DeAngelo, assistant director for research at the Cooperative Institutional Research Program, which is part of the institute and which administered the survey.

The survey of professors also found that:

Female professors are more likely than male professors to say they spend 13 or more hours a week preparing for class, while men are more likely than women to say they spend 13 or more hours a week doing research and scholarly writing.

Younger professors are more supportive than full professors of offering remedial education for college students, and women are more supportive of it than are men.

Male professors are more likely than female professors to include students in their research projects.

Only one-third of all professors believe they have a healthy balance between their personal and professional lives.

A summary of the report is available on the institute’s Web site

But, remember, Frank Sinatra's recording career pre-dated theirs by 20 years and outlasted theirs by another 20!

From Inside Higher Ed (3/4/09)

Master's Degree in Beatles Studies

Liverpool Hope University has announced a new master's degree program: The Beatles, Popular Music and Society. The university believes that the program is the first Beatles studies master's program in the world. A statement from Mike Brocken, senior lecturer in popular music, said that 'there have been over 8,000 books about the Beatles but there has never been serious academic study and that is what we are going to address." He added that the program marks "a seminal advance in popular music studies" because "for the first time in the UK and possibly the world, a postgraduate taught course is offered to research into the Beatles, the city from which they emerged, the contexts of the 1960s, technology, sound and songwriting and the industries that have set up in their wake to capitalize on tourism in the city of Liverpool." University officials said that they expect significant interest from American students.