Santos' University Blog

Liberal Education

2005-04-20T21:29:00.000-07:00

This reading discussed how students come into college hoping to find a career. The student hopes that basically the college will tell them what to do with their life and what curriculum to follow. It continues to say this is not the case however, all the different departments in the university are competing for students. This is not based on what the student wants or needs, the department is just giving a pitch to get the student to study in their specific department.
I believe this piece is trying to get across the message that higher education does not give students the answers or magically give them a career. The student must decide hor his or her self what they want todo with their life. Basically the university offers several things for someone to study, more than one could study in a lifetime, but it depends on what the person is looking for in thier life.

Mark Edmondson

2005-04-20T21:28:00.000-07:00

Mark Edmondson spends much time discussing evaluations, forms that rank a professor in the classroom. He explains that they are simply rating the instructor from one to five. Edmondson also explains how it sends him running from the classroom when the students get and fill out the forms. He says, “They’re playing the informed consumer, letting the provider know where he has come through and where he is not quite up to snuff.” He also compares the forms to the sheets sent out to find out what viewers thought of television pilot show. Edmondson says the forms should have better thought questions.
Basically Edmondson thinks the evaluation forms do not properly rate a professor. And by better questions I believe he means more complex and more to what the student got or learned from the class. Evaluation tends to cause many professors to teach aiming toward good evaluations and steering away from teaching the students so they gain knowledge.
Edmondson then turned his topic to how universities have softened grades and requirements to get students into their programs. This in turn is compromising how well the students learn and what they take from the experience. Allowing students freedom to drop a course because of a hard instructor in order to keep their grade point average high is only altering what the student is really learning and only allowing their knowledge to reach one point and then stay at a stand still.

Smarter Googling?

2005-04-14T12:15:00.000-07:00

Google

Here's a link to the Google engine I brought up in class.

LW&PN,
Santos

curtis on aronowitz

2005-04-14T11:59:00.000-07:00

I loved the part at the end when you say "practice the word higher education." You highlighted the fact that as we lose jobs in the labor force, we have slacked in gaining new admissions into universities. Despite the major pushing by parents to get to college, more kids are opting out and attending a jr. college and techincal school. Over the past year in my high school, the number of kids attending our vocatioal school doubled, which is evidence enough that students just arent' that interested in higher education.

Responding to Allisons

2005-04-14T11:55:00.000-07:00

I agree completly with allison and she made excellent points on how students at universites conform once they arrive. A university is to offer a chance to break out and instead, most students end up blending in. They become obiendient as allison put it and that is absolutely true. Most of us are too worried about getting a good grade that we don't want to step on anyone's toes, especially the professors. So instead we remain quiet and in that way, we conform

Edmudson

2005-04-14T11:46:00.000-07:00

I loved Edmudson's piece which is why the topic for my paper is slightly formed around it. I found it easy to read with a little humor and a whole lot of truth. I found myself agreeing to pretty much everything he offered. He was so right about students having no passion, because at times I find myself feeling passionless. I do think that students have too much control over the university situation. I think universities are partly terrified of the students simply because we can put them out of business. They cater to the students by providing easy outs of classes and less controversial professors. They have gone so far as to take away the creativeness and freedom that comes with teaching. I find myself now wondering if what the professors are teaching is really what they think or what the university has told them that's what the student wants? And if thats the case, then we as students are really kicking ourselves in the ass and missing out on true education.

Responding to j4cquelyn's Edmundson blog

2005-04-13T21:53:00.000-07:00

I can see your point on Edmunds piece; however a professor shouldn’t have to be like a clown or comedian and have to put on a show. Rather, a professor should inspire his students and there is a difference here. He should inspire them intellectually to think and to get involved and use their brain. There are ways to bring about things to inspire students and not make it a boring lecture. I believe there is a difference. Also what you seemed to describe is inspiration and not entertaining. Overall I do agree inspiration in and outside a classroom could bring a professor and student to a common ground of understanding.

Responding to Amanda's Readings blog

2005-04-13T21:41:00.000-07:00

Just like you I found the distinct connection of Bill Readings and Aronowitz with their universities becoming corporations. Also, I put in my paper about one characteristic of a university becoming a corporation is that they entice or appeal to you the consumer to come to their school just like a company would want you to buy their products. You also brought up a valid point on how the advertise with their pamphlets and brochures they send out. This blog tends to run along with my paper but also gave me some ideas I could use for my argument of a university becoming a corporation.

Repsonding to Allison's Aronowitz blog

2005-04-13T21:34:00.000-07:00

You made a good point on “the colleges are doing a poor job because the amount of students attending these universities each year is rapidly increasing.” However, I feel there’s more to the reason of why college education is worse. I think another reason is with the students attending increasing there aren’t enough college educated jobs to fill all the college educated people. Also, I think it’s the economic situation we are in that causes the limitation on high level jobs. Your points are really good and you came up with a few points I didn’t think of like young adults are pressured to go to college to retain their middle class status.

Readings

2005-04-13T21:30:00.000-07:00

I can somewhat see what he is trying to say about how the Universities have come to just build up our society. I can see what he trying to do in the main section when he discusses the word excellence. He is basically trying to say that all universities are looking for ways to use the term excellence in reference to any part of the school that they can prove as being worthy. He discusses how a university will find any way to make their statistics stand out from the rest. He also makes the connection between universities, economics and society. Just like Aronowitzs has done. Readings tries to make it seem like a university is shaped to society. For the most part their ideas were very similar.

Whitehead

2005-04-13T21:23:00.001-07:00

Whitehead begins his argument by narrowing down the general problems he finds with the Universities to the specific ones he believes he can discuss. He narrows it all the way down to the school of business with many universities which was a new thing during the late 1920’s and early 30’s. He believes that this school illustrates all that is wrong with universities. His main belief is revealed about half way through the document when he states “Thus the proper function of a university is the imaginative acquisition of knowledge”. This statement while somewhat confusing at first becomes clearer once you analyze a few of his earlier remarks. He really believes that a university is here to prepare us for an intellectual career. I think what he means by this is that we will learn are real life situations once we get there but for the time being learning is learning and no one should look at it any differently.
“Imagination is a contagious disease. It can not be measured by the yard, or weighed by the pound and then delivered to the students by the members of the faculty.”
This quote really stuck out in my mind because he finally points out that we can not be taught all that we need to know at school. Part of what we learn is up to for us to figure out. I personally believe that there is no way that everything we learn in school can be verbally delivered to us. It is up to us to learn some of life’s lessons and become imaginative to create things and get yourself out of certain situations.

Edmund

2005-04-13T21:23:00.000-07:00

Edmund was writing about something that has really been bothering him; the lack of passion he sees in students these days. He starts off by talking about evaluation day in class. He observes them sulking into class and slumping into their seats. He then hands out the sheets and they come to life. He talks about how he gets commended for being interesting and patient and how he hates it. He hates the “attitude of calm consumer expertise that pervades the responses.” Edmunds feels that today’s youth is badly lacking in the passion that used to be in learning and the liberal arts years ago. I can see this and how he’s frustrated because when I read this, I see some of these aspects today in the classroom. I see it in English in fact. We aren’t a talkative or passionate group we lack that. I most of all lack this in English and I know this. I’m always the silent one in the room looking calm and collect and I’m almost sure I fit into Edmund’s passionless category. Edmund fears that his function along with Freud and other professors past and present are “to divert, entertain, and interest.” I feel the same way because a lot of times college students just take blow off classes to get an easy A or something they will find interesting. Edmund also talks about too much freedom to change classes that students have and he finds this a problem as do I. I feel the same way as Edmund that we must be more passionate and caring about what we pursue in our studies.

Comment on Erin J's blog

2005-04-13T20:54:00.000-07:00

In response to Erin J.’s in class Florida discussion, I would agree that the person going from 1900-1950 would have the hardest time adjusting simply because of the rapid technological advances they would have to face. Going from using simple methods to having to learn all about the modern technology and how to operate machinery and other advances would be an overwhelming shock to overcome, and an extremely difficult situation to overcome. For those reasons I would agree that the person going from 1900-1950 would have the hardest time adjusting.

Comment on Allison's Blog

2005-04-13T20:45:00.000-07:00

In response to Allison’s blog on Florida I would have to agree that although we may never use some of the things that we learn in class, but it is the application of the knowledge in our jobs and day to day situations that will help us throughout our lives. By learning complicated things in class, it increases our problems solving skills and therefore we will be able to complete complicated problems and accomplish difficult tasks through learning this problem solving methods. So although some material will never be used directly, the problem solving methods will be evident in everyday life.

Comment on Liz's Blog

2005-04-13T20:09:00.000-07:00

I definitely agree with Liz’s response to why out of state students have to pay more to attend the same university and receive the same education. The sole reason is money, and the university as a corporation is seeking ways to accumulate more money by giving in state students an extra bonus for living in state, while out of state students instead of getting rewarded for attending a school not in their home state are forced to pay more money. I also agree that the education you receive while attending a university is worth every penny that you spend because without that education it would be impossible to find a decent paying job to support yourself. Today it is necessary to obtain at least a undergraduate degree to make a decent amount of money.

Readings

2005-04-13T20:06:00.000-07:00

Bill Readings talks about the definition of a university in the western world. Readings talks about the coporatization of today’s universities. He calls the steady decline of the value of education we get at a university a form of “Americanization.” Readings points out that today’s “Americanization” of universities is just a form of movement towards a corporate university. Also the lack of education we get is from decisions in Washington combined with the profit hungry universities to cut back the quality of education we get. Readings puts it bluntly when he says “”Americanization” that is, implies the end of national culture.” A university went from a place that teaches you culture and learning and being well rounded to a place of becoming a by product of a corporate university. Today’s university just tries to get a person in and out as quickly as possible with spending the least amount of money possible. Readings also hits a point of “dereferentialization” which is the jargon of excellence and university which are used too often in Reading’s eyes. He said “they no longer have specific referents” which means they have no real meaning anymore. No one knows or can define what the word excellence means. This truly bothers him, and he sees this as the further degradation of Cultural Studies and the university in general. Readings real point is that through the economic changes and through policies in Washington, the “Americanization” of universities has caused a huge lapse in Cultural Studies.

Aronowitz

2005-04-13T20:03:00.000-07:00

Aronowitz compares the education of universities and graduates today of the ones back in the forties. He points out in the economic height of America’s power, only about 3 percent of adults were enrolled into college. He then adds that over this economic prosperous period during and up till 1969 the amount of high school graduates going to college. On top of this more than 80 percent of today’s high schoolers graduate and then about 50 percent are enrolled in colleges. While this is all good news Aronowitz points out that since the stagnation of our economy since roughly 1969, we are not only losing jobs in the labor force, but we aren’t gaining very many more college educated jobs. What these statistics point to are more college educated generation and also the declining standards in our universities. Aronowitz also argues that starting back in elementary all the way through college; kids today are being taught to conform to society and not think for one. He argues that social sciences are pretty much “critical rather than positive.” He goes on to say that since the 1960s, along with national culture, our economy, citizenship in the U.S., social sciences have mad a rapid decline in value. Along with these social sciences has become a portal if you will into the classroom to have heavy political influence from conformed America to the young students. In other words social science has been the government’s way of brain washing young America into conforming with society. While I find this maybe a bit extreme, Arnowitz makes very valid points. I do believe that there are intense political undertones in the liberal arts as well as social sciences generally speaking. His message is loud and clear; to start thinking for ourselves as well as actually start practicing the word of “higher education.”

Readings

2005-04-13T19:38:00.000-07:00

Bill Readings, like Aronowitz, is emphasizing that universities can be compared to corporations, because they act like a corporation would. This is evident through the way that universities attempt to entice potential students to attend their university. They are acting like corporations that send out advertisements and brochures to potential customers to attract their attention, get the interested in their corporation, or this case in their university, and hope they purchase their product, or attend the university. By attracting “consumers”, either customers or students, they enlarge their profits depending on the amount of students they have attend their university. Money is the driving force of universities, as it is with corporations, therefore, one can see the direct link between the two. Like all corporations, universities emphasize their strongest attributes, whether it be the highest School of Engineering in the country, or the number one football team and all the great athletics that come along with a Big Ten university. A university will say whatever is needed, regardless if it deals with education or the social atmosphere, to attract students and collect their money. Readings also ties in with Edmundson, since Edmundson states that students are becoming more like consumers. Corporations would not exist without their consumers, and universities would not exist without the students that occupy the university. Although it is a little sad to hear that universities are acting like corporations simply to attract students to obtain money, it is the truth and very evident in today’s entire university setting.

Aronowitz

2005-04-13T19:10:00.000-07:00

Aronowitz compares the universities of today’s society to that of a corporation. He believes that universities should get back to a more general education, with students learning more science, technology, philosophy and literature, instead of focusing on classes that would pertain to our certain major. I do not agree with Aronowitz on this specific topic of going back to a more general education. It today’s society we need to focus more on what we need for our major and our jobs. While a general education may have been the best option in past years, now we need a more specific education. A general education would not be helpful once we get into the work force and have no background knowledge about our job because we did not learn anything about it, instead we learned about philosophy and literature. Aronowitz believe that “For the most part, undergraduate education in the United States may achieve what a decent secondary school was expected to deliver fifty years ago.” Maybe standards have slipped a little over the years, but I do not believe that there was a change as drastic to say that an undergraduate education in the United States achieves what would be equivalent to a decent secondary school fifty years ago. It would be impossible to teach all of the technological and informational advances that occur in the world today and all of the complex ideas learned in universities to a student in secondary schools. The only thing I seem to agree with Aronowitz on is how the university is increasingly becoming like that of a corporation trying to entice customers.

Whitehead

2005-04-13T18:51:00.000-07:00

Throughout this article, Whitehead is stressing the importance of imagination in a university setting. Whitehead states that “The justification for a university is that it preserves the connection between knowledge and the zest for life, by uniting the young and the old in the imaginative consideration of learning.” He says that knowledge can be learned from textbooks, and real knowledge is conceived by bringing together young and old minds and exchanging intellectual information that involves creativity. The purpose of a university is not to just simply teach you facts about topics that you will memorize but to use your imagination in each situation and collaborate with your professors. “The task of a university is to weld together imagination and experience.” Once you have the facts that were given to you in class, Whitehead challenges you to take those facts, apply your imagination to them, and look at the ideas through the real world and then you will have gained knowledge. In his article, Whitehead also states that in order to be imaginative, one must be involved in research and that research is a key part of a university. Since the young students have active imaginations, professors should work hand in hand with these students and feed off their imagination. Whitehead fears that most professors in their old age have lost their imagination; therefore, with the help of the young, they can gain this imagination back.

Edmundson

2005-04-13T18:22:00.000-07:00

Edmundson writes about today’s culture and how it has affected college students. He starts out the article by describing the end of semester evaluation process for one of his classes. He feels as though students only believe they are at college to be entertained. It is the teachers job to “put on a show” in order to keep the students interest. The culture at universities is much like the culture in America. Consumer and entertainment driven, both key elements in the US today and therefore, they have both been expected in colleges as well.

College students sit in class and observe. There is minimal interaction between students or with the teacher. Edmundson writes about this lack of enthusiasm, and suggests that perhaps we are this way because of what we have learned is “cool” in the media. The media has continually put images in young peoples’ heads that it is only okay to look, act, and be a certain way. Many students feel that stepping out of this bubble that they won’t be accepted by peers and maybe even by teachers.

One thing that Edmundson touched on was the fact that today it is looked down upon to take a semester or two off to explore ones self. Everyone thinks that taking time to learn and grow as a person outside of the university is not important. Once this time is taken this person will be left behind, or never go back to college at all. I don’t think this is true. In my paper I am writing about the importance of creativity and imagination in a education. What would be a better way to learn creatively than traveling, or writing, or painting…? I think that this could maybe someday be an important part of a higher education, a semester off.

Aronowitz

2005-04-13T18:21:00.000-07:00

Aronowitz begins by comparing universities and grad schools to schools from 50 years ago. He believes that the universities do today what would have been done by a decent secondary school 50 years ago. There is a difference today in the fact that grad schools now perform the task of training students to enter a profession, rather than a four year college. The colleges are doing a poor job because the amount of student attending these universities each year is rapidly increasing.

He states that the two main reasons that attending college has become such a popular choice is 1) the pushing by parents into college so that their offspring will have a decent comfortable life, and 2) offers a large variety of options for careers in the future. He goes on to suggest that the time spent at college is just a delay in the actually choice of career.

The economy is one of the driving forces behind the increase in college attendance. Young adults are feeling pressure to continue their education in order to just have a job that keeps them at middle class status. Once in college, Aronowitz believes that conformity is a very large problem. He states, “College-educated people tend to vote conservative (and more often), are more aware of their obligations to the state, and routinely observe the tenets of basic morality, except perhaps, in business.” He continues to enforce this point by making a comment about students’ use of academic discourse and its correlation with a feeling of necessary obedience throughout the college years, which then follows students into their career. This is exactly the opposite of everything that Whitehead and Florida say that a university is for.

Creativity, imagination, and conformity? That just doesn’t make sense. Aronowitz is making this point for a reason; it is something that needs to be fixed.

Edmundson

2005-04-13T18:17:00.000-07:00

In his article, Edmundson talks about how university students are becoming most like consumers than students. University admissions offices are becoming more like “marketing departments”, by seeking to attract students by showing them how much “fun” they will have at that specific university and all the activities they have to offer. Admissions offices used to stress the importance of professors credentials, however, in today’s society, few pictures of professors, let alone their credentials, are listed in any brochures handed out to potential “customers”, incoming students. Universities do anything possible to keep these “customers happy”. Students now have the choice to drop a class simply because they don’t like the teacher, there is too much work, or the class is said to be hard. Also, if students request a recreational center, or other facility, the administration will jump at the chance to fulfill the students’ request. Throughout this first year, I have experience all of these attempts to put the students in control. Students run the classes and their courses. I have known people that drop classes simply because they don’t like the time, the professor, or the way he or she teaches. There is a lack of passion in universities that is seen through the students and their attitudes towards classes; however the university plays into this by putting the students in control.

Five Best Games, Ever

2005-04-13T14:51:00.000-07:00

1.Poker
2.Football
3.The Farmer's Game
4.Settlers of Catan
5.Euchre

What is a university?

2005-04-13T14:50:00.000-07:00

When I think about what a unversity is, the first thing that comes to mind is foundation. However, what is a foundation without its students and administion? As we went around classroom discussing the subjects of our upcoming papers, I began to think a little more about the "excellence" of Purdue. I heard objective points of view and subjective facts, all which I have never really sat and thought about. It made me sit back and rethink the subject of my paper. AT first I was just going to focus on the ban of smoking on campus. However, is that even close to being important compared to some of the other focuses of Purdue? Now, I'm leaning tward a paper on the effects of student governemtn and senate, both of which has astounding influence on how our unversity is ran. Through this subject I feel that I can touch base with about every thought brought up in class whether it be the debate on fraternities, liberal art classes, or being conformed through college life. There are so many influeces in life, espeically on a college campus that I can't even begin to explain how colleges are ranked by their importance. ARe they important because they are effective in their teaching, because they know how to make students all think similar thoughts, or because they're all required to take ALL science classes, or ALL liberal arts classes. Well its hard to tell but for me, it was just something to think about.

Addition to Aronowitz Blogs

2005-04-13T14:41:00.001-07:00

I've noticed several students positively responding to Aronowitz's reading. The more I read these long chapters from various authors, the more I begin to understand them. Aronowitz main edition to the view of unversities was the thought that simplicity is the best way to learn. By simplicity I dont mean the "easiest" way to learn, I mean the most effective. Aronowitz seemed to mainly focus on the knowledge we acquire in classrooms from students and professors. He emphasized interactions with other students is the best way to learn in a unversity. However, from personal experience I don't believe this is completely true. For example, I am a very social person; love to go out, meet new people, etc. however, I learn better by teaching myself than any other way. Sure, classrooms provide hands on activities and as far as experiencing other opinions from different students they are effective. But in class, I am more stressed and worried about getting work finished and perfecting it, than when I sit quietly at my desk and take my personal time to competley my work. Not one author can tell the whole world the most effective way to teach if its different for all types of people. Give me a complete text book and homework assigments and I feel I can learn just as much as other students, as long as I have assistance from the instructor in some way. I know I wouldn't get the socializing effect of the classroom but I would still learn in an effective way.

Five Best Games

2005-04-13T14:41:00.000-07:00

1.Baseball
2.Skee-ball
3.Price is Right
4.Tetris
5.Solitare

Aronowitz

2005-04-13T12:44:00.000-07:00

The sections from Aronowitz’s “The Knowledge Factory”, basically state his beliefs in why education is set-up the way it is in America today. He believes that all of the things taught to us are there to strictly prepare us for the industrial world ahead of us. The other thing he states is that even from a young age school is there to just make sure we start to fit into society. It says that it is there is discipline us and make sure that we are obedient to our elders. I personally see all of what he is saying as true, but I don’t think that it is a bad thing. If it didn’t teach us these things then what would its purpose be. He thinks it would only be there for us to learn real materials such as math, writing and other such fields. Then I sort of lost him when he started talking about how kids were rebelling and fighting the system. That whole section sort of lost me. I did like how in the final section he talked about how immigration has had an impact on the education system. Overall he did a good job of using facts and statistics to begin the topic of education and economics. The numbers really show how our education and economic growth were closely linked in growth at one point. Now it just seems that our education keeps growing a little bit at a time while our economy has sort of leveled off. Aronowitz talks about how universities today are similar to corporations which would agree with Readings. He talks about how students today should teach each other their own insight to become creative and imaginative. The positive side to having education in universities become a corporation throughout the world would be that it helps students to accuire the "skills" needed in society and also eases them into the economy. Education in a large university, especially one like Purdue, introduces thousands of students to various beliefs, traditions, and people. Education passes on one culture to another, and supports social and political integration. Having the knowledge of multiple cultures, beliefs, political viewpoints and also religions allows for better opportunities when it comes to finding a job. “Numerous sociological studies have revealed that increased years of formal schooling are associated with openness to new ideas and more liberal social and political viewpoints.” (Robin Williams) Sociologist Robin Williams states, “better-educated people tend to have greater access to factual information, more diverse opinions, and the ability to make subtle distinctions in analysis.” I disagree with what Aronowitz says about going back to focusing teaching on science, philosophy, and literature. The times have changed and education should prepare you for more than those basic subjects, especially with the variety of occupations out there. I think universities do a better job than what Aronowitz gives credit.

Florida

2005-04-13T11:51:00.000-07:00

Floridas idea for creativity as a resource is awesome, but there are a few things that i disagree with. I feel that there is like a bourgeois and a proletariant class when it comes to creativity today. The engineers and artists are thriving on creativity but the service working class has just given up. Its like the service class is blaming the creative class for themselves not being creative. I think thats bullshit. If the service class becomes more creative they will get the money that they deserve. Then they can classify themselves as that creative class. Florida states, “The service economy is the support infrastructure of the creative age.” I agree with that. Everyone has different talents, just apply your talents to your job and be creative. If you want these lower paying jobs to become more creative, to better society, then do you need to increase wages for this service class? NO. They should make it their own initiative to be creative, to better society and themselves. This is where i think Florida contradicts himself. He supports creativity, he states creativity will improve society, then why give a "free" handout to people who are not being creative on their own? This service class should step up and quit bitching about not being paid enough. Theyre using the fact that they dont get paid as much as an excuse to not be creative. Take the salon worker for example. A bunch of salon workers are underpaid because they dont take pride in what they do. But then look at the big salons, Mario Tricoci is freaking creative, the stylists get paid well and can eventually go on and do their own thing like being a celebrity stylist....or whatever. So if you want to be a kick-ass salon worker do it with some distinction, take some pride in your job and go balls out creatively and you should be fine.

comment on Evans blog

2005-04-13T11:15:00.000-07:00

Commenting on what Evan says about creativity, technology, and inventions. I believe that while technology is improving, todays amount of inventions are slowing compared to what it was over the last 50 years. I think this is caused by the lack of creative minds. This would make creativity in individuals minds very valuable. Students in universities need to think more creative to improve on technology. Florida would agree that through creativity, technology can be improved. I agree that when you look at the computer 10 years ago, it does not add up to what today's machines are capable of doing. That type of creativity improves technology tremendously.

Aronowitz

2005-04-08T09:33:00.000-07:00

Aronowitz discusses a lot of various topics to restructure the universities of today. He feels that they focus too much on vocalization and should get back to a more general education that would emphasize on science, technology, philosophy and literature. He wants to deconstruct the classroom and in its place have open discussions with the professor and work study groups where students help teach each other.

I think that Aronowitz agrees with Bill Readings that the University is a corporation. He refers to Readings in his book and discusses how universities have become coroporate in their curriculum. I think that Aronowitz is focusing on a different element of the universities structure. He is focusing on the knowledge that we attain through our education. Ultimately, he is saying in other words that the education we attain in universities today is worthless, he states “For the most part, undergraduate education in the United States may achieve what a decent secondary school was expected to deliver fifty years ago.” ……….Ouch!

I cant help but say that I am not a fan of Aronowitz. Maybe I feel this way because I have become a “cog in the capitalist machine” but, I do not think that his views and opinions are realistic.

Bill Readings

2005-04-08T09:32:00.000-07:00

I’m going to emphasize on Bill Reading’s belief that a University is a corporation. Unfortunately, I must completely agree. It is my personal belief that in exchange for the $112,000 that I’m going to pay to get my Undergraduate degree from Purdue, that I’m going to receive a much higher paying job and that my quality of life will be better with the knowledge and experiences that I attain. Therefore in a way I am purchasing a higher paying job and an education from Purdue University.

What Bill Readings is saying is that the Universities know what product they are selling and then market it to students. Universities around the country spend an enormous amount of money to market themselves. Is this right? Shouldn’t the University just sell itself with out all the marketing tricks? The university is selling us a product and making a profit, it is a corporation and what comes along with a corporation is marketing. They want our business (money), they want students who will make them look good and bring them more business (money) and so on and so forth. But to get a little of topic here….. I think that it makes sense. America is a capitalist country; we can’t expect that the Universities are going to keep away from money.

Here’s a question for you. Why are out of state tuitions so much high than in-state? All of the students are given the opportunity for the same education, why is it that out of state students pay way more? Money is the answer. Universities want to maximize their profits. But I still think that an education is definitely worth every penny. I hope that this made sense lol.

Florida

2005-04-08T09:29:00.000-07:00

Well first of all, I definitely think that Florida and Whitehead would get along really well. They both feel the same way about either, imagination or creativity. The connection I want to make is that imagination and creativity are very similar.

imag·i·na·tion

1 : the act or power of forming a mental image of something not present to the senses or never before wholly perceived in reality2 a : creative ability b : ability to confront and deal with a problem :resourcefulness c : the thinking or active mind : interest 3 a : a creation of the mind; especially : an idealized or poetic creation b : fanciful or empty assumption

cre·a·tive

1 : marked by the ability or power to create : given to creating 2 : having the quality of something created rather than imitated : imaginative 3 : managed so as to get around legal or conventional limits ; also : deceptively arranged so as to conceal or defraud

In each definition they mention each other, coincidence? I think not.

The way that both Whitehead and Florida describe them is the same as well. Both imagination and creativity are things that you can’t buy , they aren’t an article of commerce. Rather they must be attained through learning and discipline and they must be practiced and used regularly or they will be lost. The way Whitehead and Florida feel about imagination and creativity is the same as well, they both feel that attaining imagination or creativity leads to a true knowledge. Knowledge that can be examined, argued, and expressed in many ways, where facts are no longer bare facts.

In Florida’s case he seems to focus more on the economic side of creativity. He says “Human creativity is the ultimate resource”. He divides the economy into three sectors, the manufacturing, service and creative sectors. Florida makes a point to discuss how the “Creative class” makes half of all the salary income in the nation, which causes an inequality in the economy. The cities with the highest numbers of the creative class are making more money. Florida believes that other countries are harnessing their creative classes and that their economies are growing. So his solution is to increase the pay and fully tap the creative talents of the service and manufacturing sectors in order to gain a competitive edge. For instance, jobs that are considered service industry jobs, such as working in a salon or in construction have a lot of creative potential.

Florida

2005-04-06T14:52:00.000-07:00

Richard Florida discusses the great promise (as he calls it) that humanity lives in; a promise of higher living and opportunity in which we are not taking advantage. He tells of many ideas and better ways things can be done to help raise productivity and living standards. Florida says creativity is a resource and the United States is not using it to better our society. The creative class (engineers, artists, musicians…) is growing, but the service work which is essential to creativities growth is not. Since the work is not the actual inventing and creating it is deemed less important and therefore paid less. Florida does not agree with this; he said, “The service economy is the support infrastructure of the creative age.” He went on to say the work could become more creative, (example, a salon or construction) but should be better paid to promote growth. Florida spoke much about how many people say he is bias. This idea came because he said that gay communities de better creatively. This conclusion comes from his research and can be proven. He said this is because of diversity and tolerance. He finished by saying that creativity belongs to everyone and no one owns it. We must renew and feed or we will lose it.
I agree much more with Florida than I did with Whitehead. I also feel I could relate better with him. Creativity is left to few people and the people not taking part in it are leaving it to the rest of society. The low end jobs which Florida calls the infrastructure are looked down upon because they pay less. Raise the pay and more people will want to do them, thus they will grow and become more creative on their own. I also think that finding a place for living somewhere for a job; the job having been the deciding factor in your home. Hopefully the United States will get a grip on the idea of tolerance, creativity, and growth and our society will prosper and better its self.

Whitehead

2005-04-05T23:53:00.000-07:00

At first Whitehead states that universities shouldn’t be and have never been restricted to abstract learning. Since universities have been established they’ve been teaching technical skills in areas such as medicine and law. Whitehead states that business fits right in. One of the main points Whitehead makes is that the purpose of a university is not just an exchange of knowledge. You can access information through books; learning information is not what a university is for. Whitehead states the purpose of a university is to

“Preserve the connection between knowledge and the zest of life, by uniting the young and the old in the imaginative consideration of learning. The university imparts information but it imparts it imaginatively.”

Whitehead also gives us an idea about facts and how they should be considered. He distinguishes between separating a fact from a bare fact. I think that a bare fact is a purely informational and is more like data; Whitehead refers to a bare fact as a “burden on the memory”. I think that when Whitehead refers to a fact he means that the fact has been analyzed imaginatively and that many possibilities have been considered. Whitehead believes that in order to illuminate facts with imagination you must first analyze the “general principles” which apply to the facts and then investigate the alternative possibilities.

Whitehead also discusses the relationship of imagination between the young and the old. He states that in your youth you have a lot of imagination but are lacking in experience and as you age that gain experience and lose your imagination. Whitehead believes that in order to preserve imagination though out life that it must be “disciplined”. Another purpose of a university that he states is

“The task of a university is to weld together imagination and experience”

As for imagination in the workplace, there is no way to win. In order to become an experienced, dependable and knowledgeable worker you must be routinely trained and learn the technical aspects of your career. During this training period the essential qualities like imagination are not being practiced at all and you lose it. But it is imagination that is vital for a later stage in your career. Whitehead does give a solution to this age old problem and that lies in the university. He believes that, universities need to promote “imaginative consideration” of the various general principles underlying that career. Then as the youth pass through that training period in their career they can engage in connecting the detail of their technical skills with the general principles.

Lastly, I would like to relate my experiences here at Purdue with Whitehead’s theory of “passing down the torch”. I believe that what Whitehead was worried about, has happened. That universities have increased in number and activities so much to a point where the passing down of imagination from professor to student has become a rarity.

Creativity is needed

2005-04-04T22:32:00.000-07:00

In the Florida reading that was assigned for class, creativity is a word that is used often. I would like to discuss a simple point that was made by Florida. He writes that creativity is needed in the work force. I tend to agree that without this ability no one can complete there jobs. At some point, a worker is going to have to do something themselves to get the job accomplished. In other words they are going to have to find a means to an end. Can they accomplish this if they are not creative. I am sure that they could. I do not believe that it will be the best that it could be though. To become a good worker, creativity needs to be a part of your life.
To make a connection with Whitehead, I think that people need to use their imagination to be creative. I do not think that you can be creative without imaging a certain situation or possible things. I believe that the two must go hand in hand. Without imagining something can you create it? Without having the ability to be creative, can your imagination come to life?

Mass media influences students

2005-04-04T22:04:00.000-07:00

Edmundson's writing states that students have been affected by mass media, which created them to be consumers, and that this has influenced colleges. I happen to agree with him. He shows that professors have to teach how the students want them to or else they will be left without a class. He even says that he finds himself saying things to keep his students' attention. I do think that teachers have to do this. At the beginning of a semester, we shop for the right kind of class. If we do not like the teacher or the class might be too hard, we simply return it and go shopping for another potential class. This does happen with today's society and that is what Edmundson is getting at. Because of this, students do not fully come to comprehend their potential or their abilities. They are relying on the teacher to give them the knowledge that they need instead of searching for it themselves and actively seeking the information.
Teachers can take risks and simply say that this is how they are going to teach and if you do not like it then leave. However, this can leave them with no class and quite possibly no job. The mindset of today's society is completely consumer focused and, therefore, universities have changed themselves to fit the mold.

Excellence is just a term

2005-04-04T21:42:00.000-07:00

To begin with, excellence is just a term. It is a word and therefore is open to numerous definitions by different people. Everyone has there own ideas of what this word means and this is exactly what Readings is after. He is trying to show that excellence is empty. If something is excellent then why is it excellent and how is it that way. He is trying to get his readers to understand that they need to be exact with the wording that they choose. If something is excellent, state why it is excellent. The criteria needs to be listed. Without that, the reader will have nothing to base this word on.
Santos gave a great demonstration of this by having us use that word game. He all but led us to the conclusion that word choice is extremely important. Sanots and Readings both showed us that when writing our papers we need to make sure that we state exactly what we want and that we choose our words carefully. If we do this then our readers will be able to understand what we mean by excellence because we would have stated the criteria that we are basing it on.

edmunson reading

2005-04-04T14:03:00.000-07:00

after reading Jeanine's post on Edmunson, it helped me realize that i wasn't confused about his points concernign the entertaining of students in class, but Edmunson actually contradicts himself throughout this reading. First off i thought that maybe it was just me, and that i wasnt getting the message clearly, or understanding it accurately. Edmunson states in the reading that he feels professors should not entertain their students, but rather they should allready carry the passion to learn along with ambition and the integrity to better themselves. To an extent, this is true. People should have standards and goals for themselves throughout everyday life, and strive to better thses things, not only for themselves, but also, if it applies, for their families. That part i will definitely agree with. As for the fact that professors should not entertain their students, I believe that Edmunson couldnt be farther off. This is where he clearly contradicts himself. He states that professors shouldnt entertain their stduents, but then at the same time wonders why none of them feel like they should participate in class, or speak out amongst their classmates. I believe that professors should not HAVE to entertain their students, but they definitly shouldnt make class an everyday boring lecture. They shoudnt label class as a lecture, because now look, students refer to it as nothing but a lecture, a boring time when students just sit, listen, and take notes. Now, how can anyone be excited about that?!?! I will argue with Edmunson, and state that professors should indeed NOT refrain themselves from entertaining his or her students, for the fact that i believe it allows students to comment, which could lead into in-depth conversation in class, and if they took it further on a professional level - could lead to outside of class conversations. I know a lot of this may seem like a big chain, but just a simple entertaining comment (maybe even personal, or a preference) made by a professor could eventually lead to the development of an understanding between two people, rather two nouns, a professor and a student.

Bill Readings - Reading - haha thats a tongue twister

2005-04-02T14:33:00.000-08:00

In this reading, i liked and did not like certain points, but here goes my best shot to try and explain them. What i disliked about the reading was the fact that Readings tried to tie in the university of our choice with excellence. I feel that it should have been more intertwined with something such as a decision of preference. I also liked the fact that he tried to bring this arguement out through his reading by stating that universities try to "sell us excellence." Although this statement is proclaimed to be true, please remember that their is another side to every story. Even if universities are trying to sell us excellence, i believe that we dont buy any of it just right out of their hand. I believe that we as students "shop around" for the university that will suit our needs best. All universities try to sell their best program, or show prospective students their best assetts, and try to get them to attend their university through their way of showing excellence. As students, i feel that we sort things out according to our major, obviously. Why would i attend purdue university to obtain a degree in medicine or art when i know that Indiana University has high prestige for their medicine and art programs. It is just common sense, or as i like to call it, students shopping for universities. You see, not only do the universities try to use us for money, because yes my friends, we are money to universities, sorry, but get to know the reality. On the flipside, however, this scandal works both ways. To our benefit, we also use universities to make money ourselves. What i am trying to say is that in the long run, after we students obtain our degree from the university that best excells and suceeds in the major of our choice, we use this degree to our benefit, and say yeah, i graduated from purdue with an engineering degree, and i know thats a huge accomplishment, so reward me for it by showing me the green, and if you're lucky, i just may decide to work for you, and benefit myself, while also benefitting your company. See, its all but a big network corcle in which everyone is out to get their own, and is looking out for themselves. Hurry and reply to this, i am anxious to see what you have to say, mainly because i have so many ideas about this reading running through my head, and i just compiled it, and want to know if ti made any sense to anyone.

2005-04-01T17:03:00.000-08:00

In his own way, I think Aronowitz makes connections to each of the previous readings we have had in this class. He refers to universities as corporations, and refers to Bill Readings in his book. Aronowitz says “schools rob students of their individuality and, instead, train kids to become cogs in the corporate capitalist machine. He makes reference to “imaginative” and “creative” learning at the end of the selected reading for Aronowitz. He says that the “students could teach each other,” and the “instructors role would be to encourage students to perform the research needed to adduce these contexts … to help them acquire the “skills” of inquiry.”
He also offers his opinions on the huge increase in college enrollment. He says that students end up going to college because of the lack of fairly high paying construction jobs, manufacturing jobs, and factory jobs. Parents are pushing there kids harder and harder to go on to higher education in order to further increase there child’s versatility in the work force after they get a college degree as opposed to going into the work force right out of high school and highly limiting their job possibilities. Overall, I agree with all of the things that he says about our society. We are in a society today that is getting rid of or discouraging the entry level service jobs and manufacturing jobs and encouraging students to continue their education in college to make themselves more valuable in today’s workforce.

Edmundson Reading... or at least I thought that is what I was writing about

2005-03-29T18:21:00.000-08:00

According to Mark, professors should not entertain their students. Students have been brought up on television and being entertained. Students in today’s society want to blend in. Mark wants his students “to follow [their] interests and let them make him [or her] into a singular and rather eccentric man [or woman]” (2). Mark wants his students to be more enthusiastic about they education and not so laid-back (like they are watching a show). He does not really blame the students for their view on education, he more so blames the “cool consumer worldview” in American culture (2).

I think this is so true, especially here at Purdue where I can see it first hand. I expected college students to actually want to learn, but it seems like high school still. Only a few students would dare to speak out in class or ask a question for fear that their professor would make a spectacle of them. But I think students fear more what their classmates think of them. Students don’t want to be the one that everyone else snickers about because they are breaking the laid-back norm. No one wants to be “smart” or at least show that they are because it just is not cool. The entertainment world has shown us this and we have accepted it.

Another point Mark brings up is that “suddenly college has become a buyer’s market” (6). The university wants to attract and keep students because students equal money. Professors are expected to do what they can to keep students interested in class and Mark would argue that it is becoming a more difficult task as time goes on. More and more high school students go to college and this is because it has become necessary in order to ensure a successful life. College is becoming more and more “required”. Because this is a need, students “shop” for the best deal. These students are the ones that do not want to get anything more out of college then a degree. They do not really have a passion to learn.

Money is not necessarily the only factor; sometimes students want a “good” degree. But if a student wishes to receive an “excellent” degree (Readings would agree) this means there is a greater chance that student will fail. These are the students who go to universities that have tougher grading systems and also schools within the university that expect more of them. What makes these schools “excellent” is that they have fewer students that will make it through and therefore a more prestige degree to hand out. If a student is not really "smart" but really has a passion to learn, he or she will come out of college with a more developed "imagination" or "creativity".

Alright, so there are a lot of ideas crammed in here… I kind of forgot what I was trying to say…

Excellence

2005-03-29T17:59:00.000-08:00

In class the other day, we began discusssing the definition of excellence. Although we questioned its true definition, which I dont think we can yet completely define, I feel that almost everyone has a general understanding of it, even when Readings was discussing it within our reading. Sure, there are tons of different interpretations, but a basic one is common knowledge, something I feel the Readings was urging us to discover within his writing.
When discussing excellence within a university, nearly every prospective student is immediatley drawn to this word. Of course, we all can conclude excellence means top grades within schools, great faculty to student ratio, outstanding administration, improving GPAs, etc. We already can conclude this. However, was Reading encouraging us to find our own excellence within Unviersities and not just the general one that is common knowledge? For example when I hear excellence, I immediatley think of reputation. To me, its one of the most important things when desciding the future of my education. As long as my grades are decent but I attend a repreable school, I'm almost garanteed a job. However, for my parents, when they hear excellence, they think GRADES. Completely different, but these opinions are based on personal importances.
Clearly we all have completely different qualities of excellence, but discovering our own is very worthwhile. I really feel Reading was encouraging us to discover these factors. Finding personal satisfaction is definatley a signifigant issue throughout our educational experiences.

Whitehead thoughts

2005-03-29T09:47:00.000-08:00

What is useful? The dictionary describes useful as something having beneficial use. Whitehead said that the Universities usefulness could be destroyed, but what is useful and who decides if it would be destroyed or broadened.
Whitehead said that universities are schools of education and research; both of which he claims can be learned through books at a cheaper price. I do not feel that you can learn all of the knowledge you get from a university on your own by simply reading a book. Calculus, for example, takes someone showing you how to do it. If you read, how many people do not understand are simply more confused. Also, how do you know if you are right or wrong and where you did go wrong if you are wrong?
Whitehead moved his discussion from why we do not need universities into what they are needed for (or at least that is how I understood the reading). Imagination is what Whitehead focused on. He said, “It (university) preserves the connection between knowledge… and imaginative consideration of learning.” Whitehead thinks of a university through imagination. Any learning in a university is imagined. He later says if social connections are not make then the university more of less failed. I never thought of a university as a mere social ground. I see it as education first and socialize later.
Whitehead believes universities teach routine, young people doing much disciplined work and losing their imagination. He thinks universities should teach students for an intellectual career and be able to use their imagination and facts slowly. I think universities have begun to do that. We are encouraged to have ideas and opinions in school and in our careers.
The reading made me believe that the young teach the old imagination and the old teach t he young knowledge. Universities link these two pupils and allow them to teach one another. I also feel like he was trying to tell us that everything in life relies on everything else. The last thing that I pulled from this piece is that you must keep your knowledge up, keep learning, in order to stay with the progress of life.

Bill Readings: The University as a Corporation

2005-03-27T19:52:00.000-08:00

Bill Readings focuses partially on how many universities are beginning to look more and more like corporations. He claims that business’ attempt to portray universities as if they were business’ when they rank them according to various standards (ironic huh?).

Bill used to work at Syracuse University. He states that “Syracuse is an aggressive institution that modeled itself on the corporation” (10). Bill further explains that the school logo was changed to look like a more “corporate” logo. Universities advertise to high school students because they want a large pool of applicants to choose from. If Universities can then choose students that don’t need any financial help (ultimately increasing their profits). They persuade the students to go to their school with pamphlets, CD’s, statistics, visit days, etc. Students “shop” to get the best value. Schools that offer them the best deal get the student. Students are consumers.

Bill gave a great example of this on page 11, about how students view college as more of a passing through and not an important milestone in their life. At Syracuse “the percentage of alumni who gave gifts to the University was considerably lower than at comparable institutions” (11). Bill explains this as students who see themselves as consumers and not a part of the college community.

The Five Most Important Games of All Time

2005-03-25T14:16:00.000-08:00

This is an experiment. A playground. An arena? Perhaps not--arenas have high stakes and here we play for fun and games. Fun and games? Sounds great!

I challenge you--throw down the gaunlet we might say (but then we would need an arena) to bring your "A" game and compose a little list:

What are the five greatest games of all time?

Since I never assign anything without first doing it myself, I begin:

1. Chess
2. Billiards
3. Poker
4. Monopoly
5. Everquest

Happy listing. Our eventual goal will be Survivor like, k? From many to one-- or from potentially 165 to 10. So we need to keep this conversation together: just keep responding to this post. And remember,

Play Nice

A Tough Task

2005-03-25T11:55:00.000-08:00

I already wrote this post once and it got lost somehow when I was publishing it so this one probably won't be as long or good cause I am not in the mood to do it again, but here it goes.

For class this week we were assigned to read exerpts of Bil Reading's book The University in Ruins. The parts that we read discussed the university's shift from a cultural place for learning to a business like entity that "sells" its product to students. Also discussed was the idea of excellence. I liked what Readings had to say about the use of the word excellence, and will concentrate the rest of the post on that subject.

The use of the word excellence over the last few days has become annoying to me. It is everywhere, and is applid to everything. You know how if you say a word over and over and over again it eventually starts to not sound like a word at all? Thats the way i see the use and application of the word excellent; its overuse has greatly diminished or even wiped out its meaning. I still believe it can have meaning and impact but only if used in the right context and with the right perameters.

Readings says "Today all departments of the University can be urged to strive for excellence, since the general applicability off the notion is in direct relation to its emptiness." He is saying here that it is impossible for all of the separate departments who teach different subjects and ideas all together to strive for the same thing.

Readings is for sure a lot smarter than me so I am assuming that he has some in-depth application to this discussion of the word excellence. Here is my attempt to uncover that. I could very well be way off the mark, but there is at least some correlation to what we have been talking about in class.

Just as the strive for excellece can not be the same for each part of a university, it can't be the same for each person. This is why I am apposed to House Bill 1531. Each person has their own excellent university, or program or job, due to the fact that we all have different backgrounds, experiences, beliefs, morals, etc. It would be rediculous to try and create a university to cover all of the angles. It would be impossible in fact, and the attempt would create a university system incapable of providing the depth of knowledge now available.

So there is my idea, hope it made some sense... I'm out...
Keep it real,
-Wraley

So What Is "Excellence"?

2005-03-24T21:19:00.001-08:00

Today in class the question of excellence was the main topic. It would be fine except I feel like we completely walked around the answer and I left class feeling a little confused. I believe that the reading was trying to present the fact that there is no set definition to excellence. For example, Santos questioned our perception to simple words such as cat and bat in class. Everyone pictures different things for different words, one of them being excellence. Just as everyone sees different something different in a piece of artwork.
Universities pride themselves on their "excellence", but how would excellence be defined? I believe that excellence is a word purely based on opinion. I believe that Purdue is "excellent" in engineering where as Parson's is "excellent" in design. They are placed in the category of excellence due to their number of successful graduates produced. For example, Purdue's pharmacy graduates are highly skilled in what they do and often find good jobs right after graduation. Parson's students often find art or design jobs right after graduation also. These two schools are known for their excellence, but in very different fields. I think that the qualifications and standards to get into a certain school help build a good reputation. So, thus said "excellence" is a word that describes something as great, but it is interpretated in many different ways.

Bill Reading

2005-03-22T19:31:00.000-08:00

In the Bill Reading for this week, the author talks a lot about the transformation of universities from “Universities of Culture” to “Universities of Excellence.” The author constantly compares modern day universities to corporations, something that is totally different than universities “linked to the destiny of the nation-state.” Talking about the transformation of universities, the author states that “the university is becoming a transnational bureaucratic corporation, either tied to transnational instances of government such as the European Union, or functioning independently, by analogy with a transnational corporation.” Examples are given later in the book from Syracuse University. In able for Syracuse to help “sell” their school to future college students, they changed their university logo from the academic seal to a more corporate logo. For reasons such as these, the author identifies universities as “consumer oriented corporations.”
In the second chapter of the reading, the author gets into the issue of excellence. In the reading, the author explains excellence as a word that is almost completely meaningless. The author describes excellence as something “we all agree upon because it is not an ideology, in the sense that it has no external referent or internal content.” Universities as a corporation constantly use excellence simply as a way to drive up the price of their services compared to another university in the context that excellence a standard of judgment, but a comparison in relation to something else. Taking this in mind, the author states that “the question of the university is only the question of relative value-for-money…” Once again a reference to how a university leans more towards being corporation. They have certain internal measurements against its competition, and find it justifiable to increase their tuition because if you expect to get a “higher quality product,” then you will have to pay the bigger dollars.

What Do You Want Society to Be?

2005-03-22T15:50:00.000-08:00

In the reading we had from Richard Florida's book, I found a lot of viewpoints that go along with what Whiteheads ideas. Florida expresses how society is changing and his opinions about why this is happening. The idea of this rise of the creative class seems to be sound, but he does admitt that there is no "magic bullet" to improve the inequal levels of cretivity throughout society.

It is definately interesting to look at the different eras that these two articles have been written in. I do believe the general idea of developing creativity from schooling is an overall productive guideline, and agree with most of what both pieces outline. The one part I want to focus on in this blog is in the preface on page xvii. The thing that i find most interesting is the focus on evening out the social fabric. It seems like he wants to bring everyone to the same level. I agree, that situation would be ideal and neat and nice, but it doubt it will happen. I think there is always going to be a sort of "learning curve" in this area; that there is no way to allow or teach everyone to tap into their creative side. Florida is aware of this possibility but has a lot more hope than I think is appropriate.

I agree with his notion to advocate greater respect for those in so called lower end jobs like hair dressers etc. I see no reason to look down on the people who hold these jobs, because as Florida also points out they are an essential part of our economy and society. We need people to fill these jobs so that the higher paid and possibly more highly eduacated people can do their jobs. I want to say now that the "higher" people have no right to look down on the "solon" workers because otherwise, their jobs would not be there, and many times the same amount of creativity is being used in both lines of work. I agree that the service workers deserve better pay, but ,refering to the above paragraph, I don't think that option is very plausible.

As I wrap this up, I want to again note how the two articles play off of eachother, one speaking to the importance of teaching creativity and the other discussing how the intoduction of more creativity into our culter, society and economy will effect those entities. The equality that Florida is desiring may be warrented, but i think that it is rather far fetched, even though the service economy is the "support infrastructure of the creative class."

Peace Out

-J Dubya

Give me Imagination or Give me Death

2005-03-21T15:52:00.001-08:00

In Whitehead's Universities and Thier Functions, he outlines the importance of imagination in the new business schools of that time, and in education in general. More importantly he outlines how the introduction of imaginative thinking and teaching is a reflection of how someone can improve the way they live their life. Whitehead uses somehwat of an uplifting tone to excite and interest the readers. It almost seems like Whitehead is speaking to a roup of close friends giving them some inspiring tips and pointers. This all adds up to improve the impact of this article. The part of whiteheads article that I will be focusing on is the fourth paragraph of part two. In this passage, Whitehead creates an interesting puzzle. He points out the inbalance that is typically experinced by humans as they grow older. The picture he paints suggests that we are fighting to maintain a balance between the "zest of life" and the experience needed to succeed in the real world. In the last line of the paragraph, he says "The task of a university is to weld together imagination and experience." Throughout the rest of the article he has points that directly supposrt the point discussed above, but from our lives we can see this battle taking place as well. Stereotypically, children are curious, ambitious, and persistent. As we age, those charachteristics change to selfish, burned out, and stressed, but we also gain intelligence, responsibility traits, and the ability to communicate efficiently. The cross-breeding of these charachteristics in the right way is what Whitehead is calling universities to cultivate. This point may seem elementary, but it is often looked past. How many times do you see this combination in today's world. When you do see it, it is impressive, but at the same time is usually not the doings of a university. Sad but true. Maybe this is why we see so few of these charachters in society today. I think this is what Whitehead is getting at. Obviously, you reap what you sow, but Whitehead is challenging the universities to create the oportunity.

Response to J4quelyn's interp.

2005-03-20T12:16:00.000-08:00

I agree with J4quelyn to the extent that knowledge should be welded with imagination in order to achieve a form of success. I don’t believe that Whitehead stated in his address that the elderly changed knowledge because of their imagination. I feel that Whitehead made it clear that the elderly lacked imagination therefore they looked at everything through a very one sided, non-analytical view. Although, I do agree with the idea that she stated that, “the youthful people will then apply and reconstruct these ideas into their own using their new imagination.” J4quelyn also makes a meaningful point when she claims that this newfound fusion of imagination and knowledge will ultimately be put into play in “real life.” It will have the power to save society from turning into a community of mindless robots that go through mundane office work day after day. Innovators and intellects will emerge if universities are successful in collaborating imagination with knowledge.

Whitehead

2005-03-20T11:53:00.000-08:00

After skimming through Whitehead’s Universities and Their Function a second time I remembered that his address focuses mainly around the relationship between imagination and Universities. Whitehead states, “The universities are schools of education, and schools of research. But the primary reason for their existence is not to be found either in the more knowledge conveyed to the students or in the mere opportunities for research afforded to the members of the faculty.” He makes it clear that Universities are not built for the purpose of simply feeding facts and information to students. It seems clear that he does not believe this is valuable learning. Whitehead believes that it is the responsibility of universities to pass on information, but it is also the universities’ responsibility to pass it on imaginatively.

It is quite difficult to define imagination in the way that Whitehead would have defined it in his address. In order to aid readers, Whitehead wrote a whole paragraph defining what imagination should mean to universities. To simplify the paragraph as efficiently as possible, I believe he sees imagination as a way of identifying a fact from every angle possible and coming up with ones own conclusions just as long as they are in the boundaries of possibility. It is amazing that Whitehead made a simple word turn into a complex method.

Whitehead makes it clear and imperative that universities are useless unless they are fusing imagination with experience. He believes that the young are filled with imagination, but they have no experience or facts to work with, and at the same time the elderly are overflowing with experience, but they come short when it comes to imagination. He considers this “the tragedy of the world.” To whitehead the world is overpopulated with fools and people who pay uptight attention to textbook learning. It has come to me that Whitehead is a man that looks solely at the past in order to correct the future.

in class florida discussion

2005-03-09T19:29:00.000-08:00

Since yesterday, I've been thinking of the in class discussion of Florida's writings. The argument was basically over whether a person could beome more adapt to live in the 1950s if they were origionally from the 1900s or whether a person in 1950s could become more adapt today. Well, they way I see it is that in the 1900s there was practically no technology. Everything was labor work. To advance to the 1950s would be the hardest transition technology speaking. Going from no technology, to millions of new and innovative ideas is a huge step for a person trying to understand life. Going from nothing to everything is a huge shock. This would be a much harder way of life to adjust to rather than someone adapting to present day life from the 1950s. Just like the 1950s, we have technology today, althought more of a wide range and more advanged, at least living in the 50s would somewhat introduce a person to life in the future. However, the one huge different here would be culture. In the past twently years, changes in political positions, media, morals, and education has changed from a strick culture to a more liberal one. I believe the present day would greatly dissapoint those American's from the 1950s however the technology shcok from the 1900s would be a huge struggle to overcome as a way of life.

Florida

2005-03-08T14:10:00.000-08:00

I also feel that Florida and Whitehead are on the same track when they state that imagination nor creativity can be taught, but are expressed. They can be expressed through many ways such as art paintings/drawings, and through ways such as music, etc. Now, this leads me to my next idea. I feel that although creativity cannot nor imagination can be taught, i feel that how they are expressed can be taught. Some people may choose to express themselves through music, such as playing the piano or even conduct music, and more often than not, these people have to learn how to play the piano, and how to conduct music, such as which way to move their hands in order to instruct the musicians to play a certain sound. Knowledge, after reading these two articles, i feel is gained. Knowledge is taught whether you gain it throuhgh buying it, or throuhgh working your way "up the ladder." Either way, it is obtained through teaching. You can choose whether or not to get the degree, and buy your knowledge thorugh attending a university, or you can choose to start out at the lower end of the scale, such as maybe a delivery person at a local pizza place, get to "know the ropes" and then move your way up the ladder to eventually manage the pizza place. Either way you chose, you are learning through obtaining experience, whether it be paying for the hands-on experience, or jumping into a job to learn the hands-on aspect right away. The only difference is your starting position, which i think you can tell from common knowledge that a college degree will get you to the higher end right away, or faster than working "up the ladder," and being a college graduate at the higher end of the ladder is going to give the person with the college degree a higher salary for the longer period of time also. May i also remind you that the person at the lower end of the ladder isn't going to have to pay off student loans for a number of years either. It is all about choices, and the effects of these choices.

Florida in-class discussion

2005-03-08T06:32:00.000-08:00

In a recent class the question of how well a person from the 1950's would adapt to the world now, and vice versa came up. I believe that Florida's version of the 1950's person would be lost in the world of today. In class we discussed the difference in technology, the 9-5 work day, and the push for creativity. We also questioned technology itself; is technology slowing and creativity taking over? When considering technology from the 1950's to now there is a significant increase in innovative technologies, or is there? I believe that technology is not what's slowing, more so then inventions. In the 50's there were cars, toasters and radios. Those are still around today but they have been expended apon. Yes, creativity is more valued because that is what makes old technologies better. For example, the computer seems to be a completely new machine from ten years ago. It is still the same concept, but it has just been innovated and made more technological. So, the answer to the question to whether technology is slowing, I believe, is no because it is just being expanded apon. However, creativity is much more valued today then it was in the 1950's.

Florida Reading

2005-03-07T15:04:00.000-08:00

In a way, I think Florida’s book is kind of an extension of Whiteheads essay. In Whitehead’s essay almost predicts that society will shift towards imaginative learning. I think Whiteheads “imaginative learning” is a direct relationship to what Florida talks about the Creative Class. Our American society today wants to push technology so much and want to push technology and creativity onto the younger generations in the United States. In Florida’s book, he states in 1980, less than 20 percent of the work force in the United States was in the Creative Class, however today, almost a third of the work force are in it now. The government is willing to give students money to go on to higher education, and the students are getting even more motivation from companies that are willing to pay 100,000+ thousands for these few extra years of schooling.
Florida also talks about cities that are thriving. He gives the credit for these cities success to their ability to show these creative people coming out of college that the city is an accepting place and is open to different people. He focuses a lot on the acceptance of gay people, artists, and writers. He says this factor into the attractiveness about these cities. Overall, this exert from Florida’s book is just an overview of the explosion of technology and the push for creativity and individuality during the past 20 years or so, which I agree with most of his theories on city growth and the U.S. economical focus.

Florida

2005-03-06T19:55:00.000-08:00

Florida conveyed the idea of creativity and tolerance as the most important element of building and maintaining a successful economic system. The tone of the writing is serious, but not as serious as the Whitehead reading. I might just think this because the Florida reading is from 2002 so it just doesn’t seem quite as serious. The purpose of this reading is to make people understand the importance of acceptance and creative thinking in an economic world.

Florida originally started researching the location choices of high-tech industries and talented people. He met a doctoral student, Gary Gates, who was researching the location choices of gay people. When the two lists of locations were compared, the lists looked very similar; this made Florida think that there must be a correlation between the two. There are many different companies that have been leaving the towns where they were founded and moving to towns that had skilled people. So basically, companies, therefore jobs, are moving to find people instead of people moving to find jobs. He also decided to compare his high-tech list with a ranking of places with high densities of artists, writers, and performers. He then implies that because there are creative people in a certain location, businesses do well.

I think that this applies to what we are discussing with universities a great deal. Just like Whitehead said about imagination, Florida is saying about creativity. He believes that in order for people to be competent in their jobs, they must be creative. From reading this and Whitehead I am starting to develop the idea that learning facts and definitions in a university isn’t the most important thing. People go to college to develop a way of utilizing their knowledge so that they can apply it in real life situations.

The companies go to areas with creative people because it is those people that can ultimately advance them. There is statistical proof that in these towns companies grow and prosper. Florida and Whitehead agree on the idea of using imagination and creativity to learn and work. It is the most efficient way to use what you know. Being book smart is one thing, but if you are not capable of applying that knowledge then is it basically useless. I feel that being able to apply knowlegde is the same as being able to think creatively.

I stated in class last Monday that I believed that while we may not always have the exact same problem to work out in life as we did on an exam or homework assignment, we are still learning ways of working out problems. I can't see myself ever using calculus again after I finish this semester, well until the other day in class. We did an application problem that involved figuring out the amount of a drug still in a person's blood stream after so many hours. It is the application of the knowlegde that is important, not just the memorization of a formula or equation.

Florida Reading......

2005-03-06T18:01:00.000-08:00

Florida emphasis is on the “creative class” that has newly emerged in America. He believes these people will be responsible for economic growth. Economic growth comes from technology, talent, and tolerance. He believes that by encouraging diversity there will be an increase in creative work and therefore a boost in the economy.

Florida’s emphasis on creativity seems to relate quite a bit to Whitehead’s imagination. Florida describes creativity as “something essential that belongs to all of us, and that must be always fed, renewed and maintained – or else it will slip away,” (xxvi). Whitehead would defiantly agree because he states that “the learned and imaginative life is a way of living,” (5). Creativity cannot be taught. It has to be acquired through experiences and thinking. Creative people never let their minds rest, they are always questioning things. Florida brings up the fact that Americans are working longer days and bringing work home. This may be because as college students we spend much of our time studying and not much time relaxing. College is not just 9-5, it is 24/7. It trains us to always be working!

Both writers feel that imagination/creativity is not something one can trade or buy. Florida writes that people’s “creative capacity cannot be bought or sold,” (5). Whitehead agrees because he says that “the learned and imaginative life . . . is not an article of commerce,” (5). One cannot go out and buy creativity because it is not tangible. It must be acquired. Knowledge can be bought, because we pay for it. Our creativity only develops if we allow it to.

The problem that Whitehead brings up about routine work dulling the imagination, on page 4, relates to Florida’s “working class”. Florida’s “creative class” has escaped routing work by living in a stimulating environment, maintaining individualism, and valuing creative work to stability and money. These are the people he sees as successful. Whitehead would agree because their imaginations have not been dulled. The difference is that in Whitehead’s time it was the norm for a college grad to live and work in un-stimulating environments. But in Florida’s time college graduates work and live in stimulating environments. Florida’s “working class” typically are not as highly educated and they never get the chance to use their creativity. Florida feels that if these people are encouraged to escalate their creative potential they will reduce the gap between the creative and working classes. He feels our society rewards creativity with higher salaries.

2005-02-28T22:40:00.000-08:00

i think that Whitehead was trying to say that imagination needed to be welded to or with common learning and knowledge in order to be truly successful. When he says that "the connection between knowledge and the zest of life, by uniting the young and the old in the imaginative consideration of learning." WHat is meant by this is the fact that the older people will have facts, but have altered them due to their imagination, and will share their ideas with the youthful people. The youthful people will then apply and reconstruct these ideas into their own using their new imagination. The true welding of the knowledge and imagination that they have encountered while being at a university will be applied throughout their life by using their imagination to apply new concepts and ideas. Not only will these ideas be implied on the job, but also in common, everyday life with things such as work, play, both intimate and aqquantance-related relationships, at home chores, and maybe even parenting. Without new ideas, people in general would never progress in life, there wouldn't be any new inventions, nor any "easier" ways of doing things in everyday life. This only emphasizing the importance of Whitehead's theory of welding together knowledge and imagination.

Whitehead

2005-02-28T12:47:00.000-08:00

I believe that Whitehead’s main purpose of the article is based on the fact that universities are established to make the imagination of learning possible. He states, “uniting the young and the old in the imaginative consideration of learning.” This shows that he believes that imagination plays an important part of learning. The teachers (old) pass the knowledge down to the students (young) in a process which involves imagination. Through this, they are connected and the education is passed down to the younger generation. The university creates an imagination of learning into its students. While college makes us ready for our future jobs, those careers require the use of knowledge. Whitehead states that “the proper function of a university is the imaginative acquisition of knowledge.” Throughout his article, imagination is the key ingredient of universities and must be in place for them to hold that title.

2005-02-28T10:55:00.000-08:00

Whitehead believes that universities are meant to bond knowledge and imagination. To further explain this, he makes a clear distinction between the “young” and the “old”. He feels the young students that come to universities are full of imagination, but have little knowledge. On the contrary, sometimes old professors are hired that have a lot of knowledge, but lack imaginative thought. Imagination seems to be the ability to question bare facts and to develop new ideas.

Whitehead mentions “pure abstract learning”. This seems to be something that he supports yet admits does not truly exist. What he means by this term is that students should learn on the basis that everything is theoretical and debatable. This intern ignites their imagination. What I gather is that Whitehead feels that if professors teach everything they know as absolute truth, society will never progress because ideas will become static. Whitehead would encourage students to think freely and spend time expressing their own opinions. Whitehead feels that professors should not simply pass on knowledge to their students, they should pass on ideas.

Whitehead gives an example of a young, new graduate man that goes to work for a large corporation. This man is immediately sent to the bottom of the line in a routine position. Being stuck in this job causes the employee to loose his imagination, because he is not using it. When the man finally gets a promotion and needs to use his imagination, it is lost. Whitehead argues that this custom “dulls the imagination”. Whitehead wrote that “The learned and imaginative life is a way of living,” and must be practiced throughout life and not lost as one ages. He believes the best members of a university’s faculty are the ones that have not lost their imagination.

Whitehead

2005-02-28T10:35:00.000-08:00

Whitehead talks about a nation’s progress in technology primarily lying on universities abilities to convey knowledge imaginatively. He states universities were set in place for education and research, but later goes on to show the true purpose is not found in the knowledge given to the students or in opportunities for faculty members to research, but rather to maintain a connection between the knowledge of the professors and the zest for life that the students possess. If universities were just to create a student body that just regurgitates knowledge to the students year in and year out without affording their students the opportunity consider the knowledge imaginatively, then the world would be in a stand still with technology. Whitehead states, “The task of a university is to weld together imagination and experience.” Whitehead expresses a direct relationship between a nation and all types of progressive elements, which university play a big part in these progressive elements.

Espen Aarseth

2005-02-28T09:00:00.000-08:00

Digital Textuality

Anyone interested in Hayles' discussion of Aarseth might want to check out a site I was working on last semester. I never finished the rest of the site, but I did get a lot up there on Aarseth. This link goes to a discussion of Aarseth's textonomy (the basic categories he develops to explore a text's properties).

I once vowed that no one would be allowed to look on these pages, but perhaps they are worth sharing. Just, please, recognize that they are my first attempts at web design and should be treated like a kindergartener's first finger painting...

Santos

Comment on Whitehead for Allison

2005-02-28T07:52:00.000-08:00

Whitehead conveys to the reader his views on how a University should function. Through imagination and discipline our education can be strengthend. He explains to the reader that education cannot be based on simply professors handing over knowledge to students, but more that the students and professors should interact and learn old information in a new, creative, and imaginative way. I agree with allison when she talks about how there needs to be a "freshness" when dealing with teaching in a university.

Whtiehead

2005-02-27T20:48:00.000-08:00

Throughout the article, Alfred Whitehead highlights that the proper function of a university is the imaginative acquisition of knowledge. The article carries a serious, yet enlightening tone. He highlights both strengths and weaknesses of a university’s ability to foster imaginative learning, as well as the way they should proctor education.

He starts by stating that the primary reason for a university’s existence in not found in just the knowledge conveyed to the students or the opportunities for research available to the faculty. To him, the whole point of a university is to bring the young under the influence of imaginative scholars; a university preserves the connection between knowledge and life by uniting the young and the old in learning. He believed that imagination strengthened by discipline can be preserved throughout life. One strong passage he uses to describe this states, “Education is discipline for the adventure of life; research is intellectual adventure; and the universities should be homes of adventure shared in common by young and old.”

In society, a university who fails to impart information shouldn’t exist. In history, universities have trained the intellectual pioneers of civilization. Whitehead believed that imagination is the torch that is passed from hand to hand; this analogy was used to correlate the relationship between students and the members of faculty. Imagination can only be communicated by a faculty member who is also using their learning imagination. Part of this requires that professors excite their students’ curiosity by presenting old knowledge in a fresh, new way. This is something I, as well as any other student, can relate to and agree with. In Allison’s paper, she also believed this when she gave the example of dreading going to classes where the professor could be described as “efficient pedant and dullards.” Whitehead stated that it would the greatest mistake to estimate the value of a faculty member by the printed work with his name. I believe that is one of the universities weaknesses in providing imaginative learning.

For professors to be imaginative they should be encouraged to research. They should be surrounded by the young at their most imaginative period of life, the college years. One of the problems Whitehead sees in university education is having faculty lose their imaginative spark because of the growing populations on university campuses. Today, all universities can relate. Universities, including Purdue, must decide if they should sacrifice imaginative learning, and at what cost.

The Whitehead Reading

2005-02-27T16:03:00.000-08:00

Whitehead attempted to define the purpose of a university as being a place where knowledge and facts are combined with imagination throughout the learning process. The tone throughout this paper is serious and authoritative. When writing a paper such as this one, the proper way to get this point across is by using a serious tone. If this paper had been written on a more informal level the message would not have seemed so important. The purpose of this writing is to help people understand the way universities are intended to be structured and how they are meant to function. Whitehead believes that the main idea behind a quality university is to combine learning with imagination. Another major point that he touches on is the importance of related to the present. He finally touches on the importance of the faculty and how it affects the university.

A university should be a place where factual learning is coupled with imaginative learning. According to Whitehead, these two things together require leisure, freedom, and many diverse opinions. I think that the diversity part plays a major role in continued education because we learn from each other. We may not be learning truth at all times, but we are learning how to interact with each other and deal with others views.

I completely agree with him when he said that, “For successful education there must always be a certain freshness in the knowledge dealt with.” This was also the point in the reading when he made the fish analogy. I know that when I am learning something new I like it to pertain to my life in someway; even if that only means that I heard about it on the news. I have always felt that the best teachers and learning experiences I have had have kept my interest by using up to date information and tactics.

He briefly touches on the importance of a quality faculty at the end of his writing. He believes that it is important for the faculty to be imaginative as well. If he believes that the students should be imaginative then so should the professors that are working with them or the system will fail. To me, this just makes logical sense. I would like to point out a comment he made about creating a faculty made completely of “efficient pedant and dullards”; I feel that there are many professors that fit this description and to be completely honest the classes with those types of teachers are usually the ones that I dread attending.

His overall point that he carried throughout his entire writing was the importance of using our imaginations while we are at a university. It is the way that the students at the university relate what they learn with what they will someday do in the working world. It is not only important to the others at the university, but it is important to our country as a whole. How people with college degrees learn and apply that learning has the promise to someday affect everyone else as well.

Education vs. Training

2004-11-08T06:27:00.000-08:00

Now days the controversy of "higher education" and what it really means is becoming more complicated. It is now said that we are possibly no longer providing education, we are providing training for young students who will become our work force. This could be true considering the circumstances that I have encountered here at Purdue. The learning proccess is more or less professors providing information and us as students proccessing the information. I know that the way I learn is I take in what I am taught until it is time for a test, then I forget what I have learned because I am then being told new information to remember for my next test. That is a little like how "training" is. You are told how to so something and unless you are sctually doing it in everyday life, you will forget. I do not think that this is the way we should go about education. The more that we are trained on what we are supose to know the more we are likely to forget. Unless we are educated on what we are to know, we will not benifit from what is being "taught" to us. Training and education are two very different ways of learning. Education to me provides long term learning. Training is more of a moment type of training, you know the information for the period of moments that it takes before you are tested over it. Education should become more of an issure rather than training the students for our work force.

Response to Mike's Cliffs...

2004-11-03T10:04:00.000-08:00

I think someone might have said this in class but, “The American culture is simply to take other countries cultures and change them all around and totally fuck them up. We don’t have a culture of our own so we just criticize and critique every one else’s’ because we are pissed because we don’t have our own.

I think you hit the nail on the head with your definition of excellence. Excellence is bullshit because there isn’t anything to measure it up against. You can have an excellence shit and an excellent Thanksgiving dinner! And they are both excellence.

To many graduates measure the excellence/success on the grades they received in college or the amount of time it took them to graduate. But that’s complete bullshit. Because grades are over rated, you study for what they are going to test you on, nothing more. You don’t study to learn, you study to get a good great because that’s what everyone in society considers excellent. You can’t measure the success of an individual in college on grades alone, I’d rather have a doctor who got D’s and knows what he is doing than a doctor who got A’s and has no fucking clue what’s going on.

Bill Readings

2004-11-01T06:14:00.000-08:00

I do not agree with Readings when he says that Universitys are excellence. They may have excellence, but they are not excellence. I do agree with him though when he says that they all try to achieve excellence. Every University that I have looked at is trying to be that one perfect University to beat out the rest. It will never happen because there is no one perfect university.
All of the Universities state there mission statements and have really good main points and reasons as to why you should go there, but thats just it, they all have good reasons. So how do you choose or even define what really makse the University excellent.

Universities

2004-10-31T20:24:00.000-08:00

Well, after reading and researching all about typical "universities". I've come to the conclusion that every different person has a depiction of a university and input on it. If you summed up all the opinons and analysis on it, you would have one big mess. I feel universities can be both good and bad. I really think that it doesnt matter. Yes, you get a degree it will help, but it wont "make or break" the quality of life you have. Success isn't the hardware you show, it's the inner-self that you grow upon. Just my opinions though.

Readings "Excellence"

2004-10-29T15:35:00.000-07:00

I must say that if I understand Bills feelings right, that I completely agree with his standpoint. Today's universities are striving for a status of "Excellence". This competition and driving force for the perfect or excellent image has changed if not destroyed what the university was meant to be. The creation of universities within America is what gave birth to a true sense of American culture. In the early stages of universities they were used for the pure teaching of sciences in order to simply give education to society. Americans wanted more however, they wanted more to be available within the university along with the natural sciences. They wanted the humanities to be readily available within the university as well. Readings feels that this was, in a sense, the downfall of the university.

It was at this point that the university could no longer add to what it had, so had to begin on a track of better itself. Readings feels that ever since, the essence of the university has been depleting. So with this problem occuring it is directly affecting a nothing major problem, we are losing our American culture. The universities' strive for excellence is causing to much competition, not only within America but worldwide. This is becoming a problem for American culture due to the constant adopting of ideas and policies from foreign sources.

Along with the destruction of American culture, this constant effort to better itself is harming and stunting the growth of the smaller universities within America. The smaller universities are struggling to gain funding in order obtain better equipment and facilities. This battle of appearance of excellence is simply allowing the good to look best and the mediocre to look worse.

All in all the university today has become a business in a sense and has become a pawn of the wealthy society and big business. Though the knowledge is still taught, the experience that shapes the lives of young individuals will never be the same.

Are Universities really "unique"

2004-10-27T19:42:00.000-07:00

After being thoroughly confused by everything Bill Readings said, I sat down and looked over some notes I took. I'm still confused, but hey, I'll give it a shot.

I tried to relate some of his ideas to things we did in class. Like when he said Universities mission statements described their "uniqueness" but all the Universities said basically the same things. Going back to when we looked at mission statements online, I started to agree with him. They all had the same underlying theme.

Purdue, Clark, and Boston College all basically said that they wanted to do the same things. All three Universities mentioned three main topics. They all wanted to produce contributing citizens, advance knowledge and create challenges which would advance our society.

I never thought that I would agree with someone so extreme like Readings, but I agree with him on at least this one issue.

Bill's Readings

2004-10-26T13:01:00.000-07:00

I found the readings quite difficult to follow. I feel that the author is trying to bring out the word "excellence" involving a university. Is there a such defined version of "excellence" in a university. The author feels that in order for a university to acheive success, there should be criteria to define an "excellent" student. After reading for a while I feel the author feels that there is no such criteria for a student to evaulate themselves by. If there isn't such a criteria is there success in a university? I feel that after I read this article my mind questioned why I am here at Purdue. Do I know what actually can make me acheive "excellence". I guess some take the word "excellence" in different interpretations as others. Some feel that "excellence" through a university is determined after one graduates and expands it's knowledge given to them. In my opinion, to be a "excellent" student I must acheive self-success. I feel i got a grip on what the readings stated and where the author was going.

Readings Americanization

2004-10-25T07:26:00.000-07:00

Readings talks a lot about "Americanization" and "Globalization". In one section of the reading he states that "Americanization, that is implies the end of national culture". By this I think that he is trying to say that America is so concerned with being "the perfect counrty" that we are destroying our counrty because we are not looking at the little things. We just want everything to be perfect or "Americanized".
So while everything is changing one thing that we can not ignore is the changing of a University. Readings says that we can not ignore how the institutional form of the University is changing. What does he mean by this? I think is means that no one really knows the purpose of a University, they may think that they know, but know one really does. People have changed so many times what the meaning of a University is that there really is not one anymore. But now Readings is looking at the University as an institution. He said to look at the wider socail role of a university but I think it is just another reason to come up with a theory of what a University really is once again.

How to Recognize a Good School

2004-10-25T07:01:00.000-07:00

This book was written by Neil Postman and Charles emigrating. The book talks about the history of schools, what is a school, and what makes a good school. In the past many people blamed the problems with the school system on John Dewey because of his thoughts on progressive education. Later, everyone blamed the Cold War and that generation of people.

Postman and Weingartner say a school is a place that is interested in student interaction and their time spent in school. It's a place where students are sent to find out about the economic and social truths of the world. It identifies the students needs and helps them in order for them to survive. In order to decide what makes a good school, Postman and Weingartner made a list of ideas that they thought would help. They made several categories with a couple of points per category.

Time Structuring: Classes shouldn't be forty-five minutes long, but geared toward how much time the child actually needs, or what is necessary for the course. Students should be allowed to work on their own time and not one set for them. Activity Structuring: Where the activities are not mandatory or based on tradition. Defining intelligence: Schools shouldn't just accept that students are smart, but push them to get involved and search out truth rather then memorizing what's been told to them. Evaluation: When a school reinforces the students and teachers and moves away from the production line setting and more towards a human approach.

Supervision: When it realizes that students work better when they collaborate with the teachers rather than being told what to do. Another way to make the school better is to let the students supervise themselves. Role Differentiation: When teachers make the leap from lone educator and authoritative to student and learner. When the teachers aren't all the same product, but when each have their own flavor and style. Accountability to the Public: When the school trys to increase the community participation and family and school relations. Accountability to the Future: An idea of gearing those things that will effect the future, or using the ideas and concepts that are oriented towards the future.

While this sounds rather boring, and useless, this will come in handy when I am writing my paper. My paper is going to have the ideas and thoughts of a future teacher laid into it, so I decided to use Postman because he is well respected in the Education field.

Billy Bob Readings

2004-10-24T17:31:00.000-07:00

I hated Readings at first because he wrote a lot and obviously not to tired overworked students, but to someone who has all the time in the world to sit and read. Right. But I like him now because he talked about Michael Moore. Hooray! I guess I’m just easy like that. He mentions Moore’s movie about what happened to his home town of Flint, Michigan, going from a rich town to very dirt poor when companies moved to more profitable areas. Moore also talks about Flint in Bowling for Columbine. Hooray! Readings discusses how this relates to “Americanization.” I’ve heard that discussed before this class and if I could remember what was said or where I heard it, this is when I would discuss it. But I don’t remember.

Readings says that Americanization is globalization, and that it is the end of national culture. Is this like what we discussed earlier in the year about McDonald’s being everywhere? Even in India for Buddha’s sake! And it’s also in the spell check, that’s creepy. Companies don’t think nationally anymore, they think globally.

Later Readings says that there is the sense that “it means nothing to be American, that ‘American culture’ is becoming increasingly a structural oxymoron.” I think I understand what he means by this, but I’d like to discuss it in class because I think it’s interesting. Well, I’d like other people to discuss it, I’ll listen. He also says that America is “a nation defined by a suspicion of state intervention in symbolic life, as expressed in the separation of church and state.” He claims that culture no longer has a specific content and that everything can be or become culture.
A university needs to get back its lost truth.

Liberal Education Survey

2004-10-24T17:22:00.000-07:00

Atkinson, Swanson, Reardon. “The State of Liberal Education Part II: Assessing Institutional Perspective.” Liberal Education, Vol. 84 Issue 2, Spring 98

The purpose of this article is to assess current academic thinking about liberal education by survey research. Separate groups were surveyed: freshman, graduating seniors, faculty, and administrators. The areas addressed were conceptual foundations of liberal education, the phenomena and assessment of liberal learning, curricular approaches to liberal education, the role of liberal education and institutional mission, and the status and relevance of liberal education.

The surveys showed that students don’t know much about a liberal education, but have a high level of interest. Also, those surveyed thought of the community’s view of the status of a liberal education as low. Even the faculty themselves thought of the status as low.

Most people in all the groups indicate that no one has explained the value of liberal education to students, and that the commonly held belief is liberal education will not help students get a job. This agrees with several authors we read in class.

The article states that for an institution to design an educationally meaningful undergraduate experience, it is necessary to first find what the faculty means by such goals as liberal education. I think this means you can’t successfully teach something which is so loosely defined. The article also makes the observation that freshman enter college with opinions about liberal education very different from those of faculty but emerge as seniors with opinions similar to those of the faculty.

The End of Education?

2004-10-24T13:15:00.001-07:00

In The End of Education by Neil Postman, he talks about how schools need to focus on the students rather than developing better teaching methods, and how there are five narratives to help make a new school. He uses the narratives to help students want to continue in their quest for education. He calls this his "prescription" to schools.

Postman talked about how children get taught that if they just pay attention in school, and do the well on tests and homework then they can get a good job later on, but what he wants to stress is that not everyone gets this. Not everyone will in the end get this desired result, which makes this statement in the schools totally useless.

His narratives are supposed to help with students and their motivation. He wants children to get involved more with everything from their home towns to even their own schools. He says to do this students should be taught astronomy, archeology, and anthropology. He says that they need to do this in order for the students get in tune with their community, the earth, and an a sense of human difference on the earth. He says another thing to do to fix the problem in schools is to take away all of the textbooks, which he calls the enemy of education.

This is going to be helpful in my paper because I'm an Elementary Education major and what I think a university is pertains to my major. Every time I think of a University I think about my major, and Neil Postman is well respected in the Education field, which will help with the paper because that's what we're writing about, what we think a university is.

Cliffs - The University in Ruins

2004-10-21T01:24:00.000-07:00

Americanization is the end of a national culture
This is brought up in the introduction of the article. It means that if something has been “Americanized,” it has been stripped of its nationality to suit our world of political correctness. If a person, or an idea is Americanized, it is now part of the borg.

Excellence – common denominator of good
The term actually means nothing since a plane and a boat can both be excellent.
Excellence has different criteria for everything it attempts to evaluate, and therefore when universities call themselves excellent, no one knows what that means, since excellence has no set criteria.

Total quality management – This is what Universities really mean when they say excellence. They are just trying to make sure that all facets of their school are desireable. Just as Ford makes sure it is not wasting any money, a University has many thoughts on how only necessary problems need to be focused on.

Universities are evaluated incorrectly. Using criteria like how many people graduate in four years is crap, how long does it take to become educated? It takes however long it takes. If one is to get a degree in four years or the same degree at the same school in five years, it is possible that the five-year student will retain more knowledge.

US News and World Report was the periodical that annually ranks Universities by their excellence. This is probably why we see “excellence” in everyone’s missions so often.

Excellence is also being evaluated with efficiency in mind by USNAWR as welll. How cheap of a school can you go to to learn what you need? How much smart can I get for my dollar?

Piece of Paper

2004-10-20T22:05:00.000-07:00

Madden, Russell. “Lower Education.” The Laissez Faire Electronic Times, Vol 1, No 36, October 21, 2002
This article had a decent amount of information to sort through, although a majority of that information was the author ranting and raving on how messed the entire education system in the United States actually is. Towards the end of the article/essay, he gave reasons why the University is failing, many of which I’ve experience just in my short college experiences. This author is fed up with the deteriorating conditions of education, and wants to change the current trends of education.
The author refers to the secondary education system in the United States as the “blind leading the blind.” However the author doesn’t blame just the professor or the “whiners, the complainers, the weak of spirit and mind [students], for the failure of the University, he states that both share equal responsibility. He ends with a strong statement,
Higher education vanished in this country when reason, logic, and objectivity became dirty words. What we have now is "lower education," a race to the bottom, an appeal to the lowest common denominator that betrays the very people it purports to help.
According to him the reason why education stinks is that because no one cares on what they are learning, they just care about the piece of paper they receive from the University.

Liberal Arts Education

2004-10-20T21:17:00.000-07:00

Crowe, Terrence. “We should still value a traditional liberal arts education.” Journal Sentinel. 24 May 2003
I was skeptical when I first saw the title, but this article is full of great ideas and concepts on how Universities have strayed away from their purpose. After reading the “great authors” and their opinions on how a University needs to change, I discovered all of them had appeared in this article in one way or another.
In this article there wasn’t an overwhelming amount of information stating why a Liberal Arts Education is a good way to educate an individual, it just explained the past and present trends of higher education—and where those ideas might have gone wrong. It talked about the “selling of a University,” referring to students as clients, and how Universities have now turned into a business. Towards the end of the article it did preach on why and how a Liberal Arts Education develops a better, well-rounded student.

The Rankings

2004-10-20T16:25:00.000-07:00

Morse, Robert J. "The Rankings." U.S. News and World Report 2003: 79-119.

This article I found interesting because it ranks 1400 of the colleges in our nation based on "widely accepted indicators of excellence." Peer assessment, retention, faculty resources, student selectivity, financial resources, graduation rate performance, and alumni giving rate all factor in to the universities' rankings.

I found the college rankings somewhat amusing. I personally believe than one can't really say a university is excellent based on some of these factors. For example, the graduation rate performance is not a valid factor. If more people graduate, they consider it to be a better school. Could it be though, that the school with the lower graduation rate is the better school, because the classes are more challenging and only those who really know their stuff graduate? According to the article, a high alumni giving rate contributes to a university's excellence. But what if the school just has extremely high tuition, so those who go there are likely to have more money, and thus have more money to give back to the school.

In conclusion, this article brings some new ideas of how people might judge a university or accept its role to be. It also ranks the schools in categories, liberal, doctoral, etc. It might be useful if anyone needs some statistics for his or her paper.

The Twurkulator?

2004-10-20T07:49:00.000-07:00

What the hell is a Twurkulator???
Okay, this may not be a source written by someone with any intellectual skills whatsoever, nor did I find it in a University or Library. Instead, this source came out of Best Buy's rap section, under Y's. The Ying Yang Twins, America's newest rap duo that's sweeping the country with their lyrics that say, quite literally, nothing except "Bitch's need to shake their ass while niggaz get tipsy off Henesy and throw dollar bills at them if they do a good enough job." That's it. I've looked at the lyrics to multiple songs of theirs, and it's all I can find. Oh, and the occasional "It's time for you to let me fuck you." They actually say, "You wanna fuck I wanna fuck so why you fakin' it?" Fakin' it? When was the last time a girl who didn't want to have sex faked it?
How does this apply to Universities? Well, for starters, this a group whose songs are played at school dances and college frat parties nation-wide. Of course, the school dances are edited, but anyone in High School intsantly converts the edited parts to the real words subconciously. These are kids still in High School, getting ready to go to college, and this is the impression they get of what to do at parties. So when they go to college they get these false impressions of girls and parties. Girls now dance by humping the floor, humping the walls, humping other girls, and humping other guys, all while holding onto a beer or three. They "get crunk" by doing "the twurkulator," aka getting drunk while grinding anything or anyone they see. Guys drink beer and stand on the dance floor while the girls hump them. And we as a society deem this to be fun.
My point I'm trying to make is one we discussed in class. The false impressions kids get about college before they even get there, so they don't know how to act when they get there. The Ying Yang Twins support sex, drinking, and degredation towards all women.
What shocks me even more is how women will listen, and DANCE to the music, exactly the way they're "supposed to," which is according to the lyrics, where they're supposed to "Shake it like a salt shaker," if that even makes sense.
In general, these songs, and this rap group, can be shown as a direct example how the media affects the teenager's view on college. I mean, all you need to do is go to one frat party and observe. The girls are always allowed in, and the guys can only get in if they know someone on the inside. When inside, the girls completely abase themselves in the way the songs describe. This is proof that the media has a direct influence on the way people act, specifically in college.

University Survey

2004-10-19T23:47:00.000-07:00

Alexitch, Louise R. “Education Orientation and Students Perceptions of a University Education.” Guidance and Counseling 17 (Fall 2001): 8-15

This article is about a survey taken by 148 first-year undergraduate students about their beliefs on the purpose of a university education, their perceptions of university life, and their general academic and career goals.

Overall students believed the purpose of a university to be concerned with learning and career preparation and the environment to be impersonal and costly. Well that’s obvious.

It also discusses other research done and authors opinions on the subject. Researchers say that many students arrive at university unprepared to meet the demands and their expectations are wrong. The result is that students have difficulty adjusting. Researchers also found that most undergraduates have little appreciation for a liberal education and that students frequently choose majors not only on interest but also based on its use as a career.

Universities are often criticized for being elitist (i love that word but never get to use it, yay!) and alienated from communities. The effect is they are estranged from the problems of the non-fake, non-university world. (I didn’t say the dreaded phrase!) But is this even a bad thing? I think it is a very bad thing. Students will graduate selfish, unconcerned, and unconnected to the world and humanity.

Several studies have shown two types of students. One type is a learning-oriented type, focusing on personal growth, the process of learning, intellectual competence, the philosophy of life, and social justice. The other type is a grade-oriented type, focusing on grades, status, competition, and recognition. They are mostly concerned with preparation for a career. (a.k.a. Mike :-)

The learning-oriented students said the purpose of a university was education and that it was important to succeed in life or to help others. The more grade-oriented students felt it was important to look after yourself first and to succeed financially or in business.

Students said that more personal contact with professors would be beneficial. Many students thought that professors are responsible for students’ academic success saying that they should ensure that the student pass and should make sure that the students know the material. Wow, that would be nice. But is this the teaching to the bottom 80% or whatever the numbers were? It does seem that in some of my classes they don’t make the material easy to learn. You have to work hard, actually read the book, attend lectures AND recitation, and basically learn on your own. But help is available if you’re willing. But this is probably how it should be. It’s how we really learn and bla bla damnit they’re right. Students are just getting lazy.

Research conducted in 1981 had shown that most students saw higher education in terms of its ability to provide a meaningful philosophy of life. The current survey’s students endorsed financial and business success as main goals in life. What the hell happened? The article doesn’t attempt to answer why this change in students occurred, just that this is how it is. Maybe Edmunson’s right, that television, entertainment, media, and the consumer culture have warped our little minds. I hate to think that we are so weak, that we are so easily influenced and that whatever changes occurred in our sheltered little worlds would totally skew views on the purpose of a university.

The realistic model of higher education

2004-10-19T20:46:00.000-07:00

Bailey, D., and Beneath, J.V. (1996). The realistic model of higher education. Quality Progress, 29 (11), 77-79.

This article was written to show how colleges have turned strictly into a place to train for a job. According to Bailey and Beneath, many people have mistaken a four-year college with vocational training. In the article they try to explain that this is not the case.

They also talk about how employers have now become customers; "...the majority of the over 1 million four-year college graduates each year are looking for jobs. This emphasizes that the future employers are the customers." They say that the colleges and university where their students get the best jobs attract the best students.

They wrote to explain that instead of acting as simple a place that a student trains for a job by learning only what they will need to know and use, they should design their curriculum around the academia of learning.

Like Edmundson, Bailey and Beneath believe colleges don't have Admissions offices anymore, they have recruitment offices or marketing departments. They "selling the quality of their programs and students to future employers and students."

2004-10-19T20:45:00.000-07:00

Leedham, Andrew. Whose Universities Are They Anyway. 17 Dec. 2003. Unknown Location.
http://www.buzzle.com/.
This article captures positive input on universities. The author, Leedham, states that university research has helped out our nation with many issues. He also says how bigger businesses are beginning to overdue universities though. My input on this whole situation is that I feel universities can better our country with all the research going on. I feel that there are positive aspects that come from universities. The topic on finding a cure for cancer always is being tested throughout universities. Whether that will happen or not, no one knows. I feel learning experiences are a key in universities. Learning is important to gaining success in life. Success can be defined through an experience at a university. Everything links together and the feeds off a purpose in life. I feel all the critics on universities are expanding things way too much and are forgetting what life really is. Its an individual opinion on what life really is and also what success is. My opinion is learn to succeed and everything will flow from there on.

Universities Of Staffing Problems

2004-10-19T20:39:00.000-07:00

BBC News. Universities warn of staffing problems. 9 May. 2002. United Kingdom
http://news.bbc.co.uk/.

This article is summarizing problems with finding professors to teach at universities. The article stated, “One in five universities said they had problems "most of the time", while 8% said they had daily problems retaining lecturers and professors, up from 2.2% in 1998.” I feel that that can affect a lot of learning that goes on at universities. I think that this also reflects on what Edmunson talks about by saying professors arent helping the students. This also can involve Whitehead, as well by relating the student and the professor. Without professors that want to help there is no university.

Is Greco-Roman the way to go?

2004-10-19T20:16:00.000-07:00

Walsh, Joseph J. "Newman's Idea of a Classical University." Renascence v. 56 no.1 v. 56 no. 1. Fall 2003: 21-41.

Joseph J. Walsh writes about JohnHenry Newman and his book, "The Idea of a University". The basic concept that Newman had was classes in universities should be taught from the "Classics" or literatry work from ancient Rome and Greece. He felt that even today, these ancient stories could advance societies intellect of virtue.

He admits today's changing society and importance of research and progress. He sees that students today attent college to obtain finanical security. But he also thinks that it's a sad fact that "Just Do It," has become a more familar saying than "Know Thyself."
First suggesting that a liberal education is "impractical", he corrects himself later arguing that "liberal arts are the most effective path to achieving that habit of mind, that perfection on the intellectual virtue.

With a liberal education you'll learn to function in the public office, but you'll most importantly learn to function in a private one. Its good to know how to solve for answers but it's more essential to know why the questions exsit.

university thought of the hour.

2004-10-19T19:49:00.000-07:00

Duderstadt, James J. “New Roles for the 21st-Century University.” Issues in Science and Technology 16 (1999/2000): 37-44.

This article brings up the change in recent meaning of a University.

The change from early land-grant institutions, like Purdue in the early years as an agricultural training facility to what it is today.

Things that have influenced this change are the knowledge revolution, like the industrial revolution of the 1800s, we are now dependant on a new technology, and University is the location where we learn about it.

The article brings up how people are now more advanced before as adults, but are still born the same, so more teaching is necessary for our race to maintain such an academic level.

Universities would not be necessary if people never died.

This is a totally new concept that was just too simple for me to see before. People just need a way to continue where the dead ones left off. If Einstein was so smart, and it took him 20 years to figure out what he knows, we cannot take another 20 years to learn that shit again, so we need a facility where the knowledge can be transferred. FAST.

This is the reason for university as far as I am concerned now. The facility where knowledge is brought to young people.

application hypocracy (just read the end)

2004-10-19T19:13:00.000-07:00

Fallows, James and V.V. Ganeshananthan. “The Big Picture”. The Atlantic Monthly. October 2004.

I stole this from Emily, It seemed to have a good different view on Universities than we have been taking. More on admissions, and less on purpose. I think I can draw quite a bit out of it though.

It can add to the thoughts I have already developed by entertaining the fact that University may not be so deep.
The purpose of University may just be to get money, as a business. As Emily said, the article explains how University may just be looked on like an insurance company. It is beneficial to its clients, but not America as a whole.

I do see this view as slightly askew though, since if it was not for University young students would have a hard time getting motivated to do anything in high school. Not as a main point, it was brought up in this article that University may just be another step in keeping our society educated. By giving post-secondary students a place to learn, and by giving high school students a goal to work towards.

“[M]any college deans told us they would like to see applicants who are less tightly wound and overprogrammed than many of today's students.” This was an interesting quote from the article; it means to me that Universities want students with open minds. This seems odd when they are the cause of nearly all intellectual pressures placed on secondary students. I guess Universities will have to rely on the massive pools of applicants they get to make sure they can continue to be selective.

The University as Discourse Community

2004-10-19T19:12:00.001-07:00

I know the titles arent original...but hey.

The University as Discourse CommunityBy Judith Rodin

Rodin states that the university IS about furthering the intellectual development of those that go there, but she also mentions that it is defiantly NOT the only thing that a university is for, but that universities are there to “bridge communities, cultivate leadership, and model effective public discourse.” She also mentions that the purpose of a university is to better the life of the communities around the campus, and eventually, the life of further reaching areas. She also mentions how college life builds the individual as a person, by increasing their ability to socialize with others and break away from their parents.

This could easily be used in my paper because most, though not all, of this information I agree with. She makes a lot of points that I have been thinking and then backs it up in a way that I believe I can use to help me write my paper.

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Rodin, Judith. “The University as Discourse Community.” Gazette Feature. 2003. University of Pennsylvania. 19 Oct. 2004

http://www.upenn.edu/gazette/1103/rodin1.html

The Idea of a University

2004-10-19T19:12:00.000-07:00

Modern History Sourcebook: John Henry Newman: The Idea of A University, 1854

In this reading Mr. Newman touches on many aspects of “what a university is.” Like what most people think when a university is mentioned, he also believes that it is mainly a place for “Universal Learning.” He mentions that it is a place where different people with different interests and backgrounds come together as one. A University is a flavor of many levels of intellectuals and different races. He is very big on the actually using literature for learning. Seeing as this piece was written back in 1854 I’m sure that some of the disciplines that we now have and some of the references we use were non existent. But, ideally the University should not have changed very drastically from when this was written. Other than a university being a place for “universal learning” he also touches on some other aspects. He goes as far as saying that the University is the “center of trade and the supreme court of fashion.”

This could be useful in my writing because many of the points he makes is valid today as it was when it was written. Most of the aspects, minus the literature, I agree with. This writing could be used to reinforce my point in many different ways.

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Essays, English and American, with introductions notes and illustrations. New York, P. F. Collier & son [c1910] Harvard classics ; no.XXVIII.

This is the bib info off of the website…

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/newman/newman-university.html

Liberal Education Post- Modern

2004-10-19T18:49:00.000-07:00

Kennan, Elizabeth. Liberal Education in a Post- Modern World. 1989 In the book New Perspectives on Liberal Education.

“It present the possibility of a core program for the first two years of college” said in the article. What is presented? It goes on to say “liberal” is presented. Which leads to liberal education is the possibility of a core program that is set up for the first two years of college. So by that she is saying that it is for two years, were is the other two years? Or I might be taking that a different level then intended.

She states that “ from the beginning, the student was at liberty to choose” what he or she wants to study and how and where to study it at. And does that still remain? That is the question that I want to ask. Does anyone know the answer? To me it remains un-answered.

She said, “We must have an intellectual clearing in order to operate.” That is stating that our mines need to be clear in order to take in knowledge.

Finally Figuring Things Out

2004-10-19T16:59:00.000-07:00

Congratulations Professor Santos! In the last few weeks I have questioned more things around me than any time in my life. Questioning who I am? Why am I here? Is this even what I want to do with the rest of my life? I don't have all the answers, but I am starting to make sense of some of these questions now. I know that I love college, and am glad I have this opportunity to increase my “worth” as an individual. And my ideas are going and changing every second, with every new experience.
When I first came out of my controlled environment, "the womb," I was excited for what I thought college was ready to offer me. Different cultures, different point of views, things I've never experienced before. I didn't think college was going to be easy, I knew it would have the constant "bumps" in the road, and I was ready--so I thought.
In the beginning I thought a University was a place to get a great education, meet new people, develop your own opinions about things, and much more. And it definitely is, but my University will always be different than someone else’s. My University will get me a job after 4 years, but will it change my mindset? I think that depends on how much I let myself be challenged.
I admire Jade and Mike, they have great concepts and incites on a variety of subjects, and they are the people who are going to make my University experience worth while. I'm not going to copy every idea they have, but I will think it over for a while, see how it might relate to me, and it the idea is "worth keeping" use it later. I came from a close-minded school in a close-minded town, so to hear so many different opinions on things is refreshing. I’m glad that the people I have class with will one day be out in society.
Do I know who I am yet?—no. I am guilty of having the “American dream,” and I don’t think there is anything wrong with that. I also don't think that there is anything wrong with the way that Jade and Prof. Santos see the world. Maybe they have experienced things that I have not, so their view of the world is different. I hope to become an "experienced individual" by the time I leave college too.

only fools rush in?

2004-10-19T15:00:00.000-07:00

What’s up everybody? Hope you all had a great homecoming weekend; know I did! I’m not trying to offend anybody by this title, just wanted something catchy. Anyway here’s my blog on Bloom.
In the very first paragraph Bloom talks about teenagers leaving home for the first time and having four years to discover oneself. Bloom also says these four years are the charmed years where one has the opportunity to become anything one wishes. Bloom then goes on to say that these four years are civilizations only chance to get to him/her. Perhaps this helps explain why our society is in such a rush to send their young ones into University right out of high school? It’s a fact that 95% of students are traditional ones, meaning they attend University straight out of high school.
Most of you probably don’t know, or care, that I graduated from high school in 1997. Since then I’ve worked on airplanes, cars and also have worked construction. All of these experiences contributed to my decision to pursue a degree in Building Construction Management. I’m not trying to say everyone should choose the path I followed, but I’m glad I waited to use my four charmed years until I had already somewhat discovered myself. I just don’t believe after thirteen years of school that if we jump straight in to four more you years you can truly discover yourself. Bloom talks about kids coming to school without any particular choice of classes and I just wish they didn't feel like it wasn't ok to take a break to figure it out. This mindset tends to make me think that maybe if civilization doesn’t get to us young we might actually be able to truly discover ourselves. Earlier I said I was able to somewhat discover myself, but I believe that may be just enough for me to find the right path and finish the job.
The best part of waiting to come to school is all the financial aid that is available. Possibly this is why civilization rushes us off to University? Unless your school happens to be paid for chances are you’ll be coming out of University in the hole. Perhaps this is the position where civilization wants you to be? The reason I say this is because the hell of it is, once you’re a hole it’s pretty tough to get out. I don’t know how many of you know this, but once you turn twenty four or get married or have a kid you qualify for hella financial aid. I’m not trying to rub this in anybody’s face, but there is a good chance that by the time I am finishing my career at University I will be getting paid by Uncle Sam just to come to University. I know I’m a few years behind, but coming out of this place with no bills makes me forget all about that.
See you tomorrow.

Colleges and America

2004-10-19T14:37:00.000-07:00

Fallows, James and V.V. Ganeshananthan. “The Big Picture”. The Atlantic Monthly. October 2004.

This article, taken from the Atlantic Monthly, provides many statistics about colleges. There are a few main points in the reading. They are the changing of the admissions process, finances, and colleges in America.

Looking mainly at the colleges in America section, I think it provides many good points. It states that Universities do not benefit America. They are supposed to be there to serve public interest, but they are not any different from an insurance company.

The authors also state that there is a loss of ambition with Universities and their leaders. They do not provide conditions that are up to the standards of Universities ten years ago. Robert Zemsky, another writer, states “colleges and universities are seen principally as providing tickets to financial security and economic status”.

This is another good article because it reinforces many of the main points discussed in class. It also provides statistics, which show that colleges are demanding more money and how that is affecting our culture, and how the admissions process is changing.

Preparing for a "world of great complexity"...

2004-10-19T14:32:00.000-07:00

Aronowitz, Stanley. The Knowledge Factory: Dismantling the Corporate University and
Creating True Higher Learning. Boston, MA. Beacon Press, 2000.

The authors’ main point throughout this reading was that academics are ignoring the concept of pedagogy. Teachers should be there to encourage their students to perform the necessary research. If students do the research, it will help them attain the skills of inquiry. Therefore, the mission of higher education should be to the development of our culture.

Aronowitz says that college is now becoming necessary because parents advise students to attend college due to the changing job market. It is also necessary because a college degree provides a cushion for the student when entering the job market. He also makes the point that Universities train students to enter a profession. Education should prepare the student to take their place in society as well as prepare them for a “world of great complexity”.

This is a good reading for the project because the main idea is similar to some of the readings we have already read. I think Aronowitz’s views are similar to Bloom.

Eliminate Ten Year?

2004-10-18T19:03:00.000-07:00

I am going to keep my thoughts on Edmundson very brief. The fact that his audience is professors brings to my mind a very interesting point. He blames the university for not letting educators do their job. With this I started to wonder if some of the blame might also need to be placed on the professor. We have all heard about those professors who get ten year and then don’t do anything ever again. Once they get ten year they no longer have anything to really work for, their job is secure. This really makes me wonder if a solution to allowing the professors to do their job would be to eliminate the ten year benefit. By doing this a professor’s job would always be in jeopardy, and the professor would have to actually share their knowledge. If they don’t they can be replaced. I know that those people that are currently working toward ten year would be highly opposed, but I can’t say that I would be any different if I was in their position. I think that Edmundson might agree with me on this because he states, “This is a culture tensely committed to a laid-back norm.” The norm, professors get ten year, and so we all just deal with it. This is really my deepest thought on the Edmundson piece. Let me know what you guys think.

Shaping Higher Education's Future

2004-10-18T19:01:00.000-07:00

In Shaping Higher Education's Future by Arthur Levine and Associates, the topic of demographic realities and opportunities is discussed. I only read the introduction, but this is what I got. Levine starts by using snapshots of different secondary education situations. He contrasts those that don't see college as an option to those that made an attempt. Perhaps the most important contrast to me was the successful college and the one that was floundering. He says that one is effective because they adapted their self to be what the students of that area needed, and the other changed slowly with resentfulness.
The idea that I am getting from this is that we should have universities that are directed at certain groups of people. This would make it so that there were many universities, and each would be for a certain type of person, such as low income or high intellectuals. Levine uses this idea to say that by making universities revolve more around what the people need it can improve what the university is. While I don’t agree that an education should be based on financial limitations, I really don’t think that the concept that he has would work or would improve the university. People are easily offended and so if you say, well you got “C’s” in high school so you have to go to this type of university, it would be the next greatest controversy. Not to mention if you start dividing racial groups because of language barriers then you completely eliminate the diversity of the current university. The idea of making the university centered on what people need makes it lose focus on the student’s preparation for the future. The university combines the diversity of people in one place for a futuristic educational experience, and by dividing it this way important experiences are lost.