Education The idea of what liberal education to be all about is being in the state of transition at present time. Basically, we talk of two cardinally different academic approaches conservative and a modern one, which we usually associate with changes that had taken place within society since sixties. These changes are too numerous to be all mentioned in present work, let us just concentrate on how idea of college education has been altered, because of recent developments. The authors, whose works are going to be discussed here, clearly belong to what we refer to as academic left. Theyre in favor of lowering certain educational standards; so unprivileged students can keep up with educational process. In my opinion, such approach wont benefit anyone.
According to recent surveys, it is possible to obtain bachelors degree, without taking history course in 30% of American colleges. In 38% of all colleges it is not necessary to study English literature, in order to get a degree. Students are encouraged to spend more and more time to think how to make world better, instead of studying. In order to avoid any prejudices, in needs to be remembered that the modern approach to a liberal education, promoted by such scholars as Shelby Steel, Mike Rose, Donald Kagan, Jennifer L. Croissant and Michael Sokolove, hasnt become something of a standard, accepted in all colleges and universities, although it tries hard. We talk of just one of ideas that has the right to exist, just as conservative approach. The idea of gaining education stands for obtaining actual knowledge. Let us analyze works of above mentioned authors, to see whether their vision of how process of education has to be organized, will lead to rising of an educational standards or to quite contrary its lowering.
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Mike Roses work Lives on the boundary stands as a fine example of this modern academic approach: a failed education is social more then intellectual in origin he states and tries to convince us in it giving numerous examples, that in his opinion, would prove his point. As a conclusion, he proposes to give more chances to those students who simply cant keep up with an educational process, by making it easier to study, thus introducing more equality. He stresses that obtaining education can only be effective if the process itself is entertaining. For that purpose, Rose suggests that reading classics of English by students isnt that necessary, because those books are too boring. Basically, Roses idea of college closely resembles the idea of kindergarten, as for me. Can this approach be beneficial? There are very good reasons to doubt that, but what cant be doubted, is Roses right to be able to express freely his thoughts on the subject. The Recoloring of Campus life of Shelby Steele is about analyzing recent changes that had taken place in students cultural life, because of policy of multiculturalism and diversity. Although many points of his work can be effectively argued with, still, in my opinion, authors understanding of what diversity should be about, is a proper one: Difference that does not rest on a clearly delineated foundation of commonality is not only inaccessible for those who are not part of ethnic or cultural group, but also antagonistic to them.
Difference can only enrich common ground (page 148).
Steele points out that it class difference between students is something that alienates them from each other even on much larger scale than the racial issue, but it is generally overlooked. Shelbys theses are somewhat unusual for the author, who clearly associates himself with an educational liberalism, for which the racial issues are the most important. He rightly notices: The racism is like a rush the more one scratches it, the stronger is itch. Can This Campus be Bought? of Jennifer L. Croissant deals with the problem is increased commercialization of educational process in universities and colleges.
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In her opinion, such commercialization is something that should be avoided or at least limited to a reasonable level. Yet, if we to waive classical standards of obtaining education, on which liberal academicians insist, we will inevitably face logical consequences of such actions. The increased commercialization of educational process is just one of such consequences. Another essay, related to this topic, is Michael Sokoloves Football is a Sucker’s Game, which deals with a problem of ever increased universities spending on sports, particularly football. Its not a secret that many students who play for universities teams, often go as far as to totally ignore attending lectures. Yet, they never get penalized for it, as they represent their Alma Maters on sport arena. According to Sokolove, the worst thing about universities being overly engaged in sports, is the fact that a huge amounts of money are spent on obtaining newer sport equipment and facilities, when in fact, itd be much wiser to spend these money on increasing quality of received education. Universitys football teams are also used for raising money, so it also poses an ethical question can it be allowed that in time, the universities main task of providing education to its students will be replaced with purely commercial one? If current trend stays, we will soon witness education process turning into an industry, just the way it happened to sports and music. We seem to have lost sight of the most basic and noblest purpose of liberal learning: to pass on to each new generation the heritage of freedom this is the main thought of Donald Kagans What is a Liberal Education? lecture. But in my opinion, passing the heritage of freedom is not primary function of colleges and universities.
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For this purpose there are political institutions that guarantee passing of such heritage, through enabling citizens to freely exercise their civil rights and freedoms. For educated person, understanding principals of democracy comes as self-evident. But one cant teach of democracy person, who doesnt know what that term is standing for. This is the main fault of modern approach to learning process it emphasizes on great many things, from which, obtaining actual knowledge, is not the most important one. To conclude this, we can say that modern approach towards liberal education, exercised by great many scholars, is not altogether faultless, like they would like us to believe. In my opinion, those who are strongly in favor in dropping the classical standards for how people are to be educated cannot foresee what such changes might lead us to in the long run. Formally, they are in favor of allowing more freedom, as an integral part of academic research, yet there are questions, that in their opinion, should not be addressed such as: What is justice? What is beauty? What is man? What is right and what is wrong…? Such questions might result in getting controversial answers, but this is exactly what is liberal education is all about the greater truth comes out of argument.
In my opinion, in order to provide the best standards of education for students of colleges and universities, the best has to be taken out of both approaches to corresponding issue modern and classical one. That way we wont run into a danger of dealing with dogmatism on academic level.
Bibliography:
Croisant, Jenifer L. Can This Camp be Bought? Academe http://www.aaup.org/publications/Academe/2001/01SO /so01cro.htm Kagan, Donald. What Is A Liberal Education? Eugene McDermott Lecture, 2001. Mike Rose, Lives on the Boundary: A Moving Account of the Struggles and Achievements of America’s Educational Underclass.
New York: Penguin, 1989. Steele, Shelby. Content of Our Character: Recoloring of Campus Life. Harper Perennial, Copyright 1990. Sokolove, Michael. Football is a Sucker’s Game. http://www.und.edu/org/iac/Documents/Football%20Is %20a%20Sucker’s%20Game.htm December 22, 2002..
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