And so we spoke of the unexamined life

I met today with a a summer general education class. I like gen ed classes. They provide the greatest potential for reaching students. They also present challenges when a goodly number of the seats are occupied by students who have a commitment to a strict path to a degree that satisfies a yearning for money or another life desire.

With first-year students a discussion of what could happen to the in four years' residence. For so many students the first year of college is the thirteenth grade, something they do because a college degree is what comes next. Parents think so, friends are on board, somebody told them that a college degree is worth money in the world of work. Do not overlook the prospect of independence and fun.

Ask about any one of the usual reasons, ask if that is what put them here, and one notices a hesitation, as though the student is thinking about the reason for going to college for the first time. In thinking about the usual answers some students exhibit some embarrassment, as though the list is not impressive and even if it is true the reasons are selfish even by today's youth standards.

I will return

Pannapacker at MLA: Digital Humanities Triumphant? - Brainstorm - The Chronicle of Higher Education

Pannapacker at MLA: Digital Humanities Triumphant? - Brainstorm - The Chronicle of Higher Education: "I wouldn’t worry about community colleges. Although two-year schools sometimes show little interest in theory, they have been ahead of the rest of us in using new technologies, at least in pedagogy."

That is a comment by Henry_Adams on Pannapacker's post in the Chronicle. The comment is right on target. I made the same observation when I was directing a tech center for faculty (some years ago--during that fuzzy time between Web 1 and Web 2). The two-year faculty had pedagogical question but mostly they had questions about how to stretch capabilities of common software--from presentation media to web work. As Blackboard made its appearance at the four-year campus, the community college regulars asked for accounts. I gave permission and even assisted in moving content from their WebCT LMS to our Blackboard system.

The reasons? I find them embedded in the post and the comments. The community college faculty members had teaching as their primary assignment and seemed to like the situation. While my local faculty members found themselves tied to the triad of professional responsibilities, and teaching ranked low at most levels of faculty evaluation, the community college faculty members knew that their evaluations would be linked to good teaching.

However, I do not think that all the two-year faculty members were after points in the academic game. Most of my contacts were with people who liked technology and believed that technology could be an aid in their profession. They were professional teachers.

What I did not do then was to try to find our of our community college transfer students if they brought superior technology skills to our campus--compared to our four-year students. Having skills does not predict student preparedness, but having tech skills that might be higher than our regular junior students does suggest good preparation.

Much of this has changed in recent years. The four-year "mission statement writers" finally discovered that students needed a grounding in those tech skills demanded by the employment market and so insisted that professors include tech skills as part of the expectation for students enrolled in our classes.

And that is the saddest part. The community college experience gave students a grounding in technology as a communication aid. I fear that my four-year institution's demand for tech skills is more directed towards knowing spreadsheets and presentation software and whatever other skills of the moment attach to a major. As most of us interested in a deeper view of technology know, the up-to-date skills of the classroom will be not-so-useful in the world of work.

I find satisfaction with the work I did several years ago. I am also grateful for the examples I saw among community college teachers. Those examples remain an inspiration.

The Children Will Go to School Because the School is Warm...

The weatherman predicted freezing temperatures for the region, a swath of land in the impoverished black-belt. My friend teaches in a consolidated school for the region. He said to me, "We will have a full house tomorrow; the school is warm; and the students will get something to eat."