Some thoughts...
I don't how "true" this is, but I think I used to feel that the academy had the "authority" to tell incoming students, and therefore parents & guardians, what the academy's standards are.
I'm mindful that having to prove one's worth is a defensive position. Sharing what we do and why we do it doesn't have to sound like making a sale.
I don't think we have to be different, but if there are ways in which we are different, we shouldn't hold them back. Also, there are ways to be distinctive and diverse (among ourselves), without having to resort to a feeling of rank among institutions.
Personally, I am fascinated these days by looking at an analytical/critical mode of being on the one hand, and an experiential mode on the other. This is directly applicable to learning about one's self in creative work, but also in all kinds of activities, including academic work. Maybe one way we (?) might be different from a stereotype of classroom learning is that students learn to know, use, and contextualize themselves and others in the A&H at WWC, rather than being empty vessels waiting to be filled with (useless?!) knowledge... and then there is the virtue of small classes related to that experience...
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(Ron, I'm going to try commenting rather than a new post--don't know if it helps or hinders the conversation)
ReplyDeleteYes, I agree that we don't want or need to adopt a defensive posture--last thing (hard to avoid when we talk marketing?). No reason why we can't talk about what we do without some kind of implicit or explicit ranking.
Your analytical/critical and experiential distinction is exactly the kind of thing Sam is talking about, I think. And "...know, learn, and contextualize themselves and others in the A&H at WWC" is very much on the right track, I think.
I'll say more on a new post.
Yeah--I'm not sure whether new post
ReplyDeleteor comment to the old works best.
The Play's the thing, yes?
An old time music jam--variety]
of instruments and degrees of
experience and a good time's
had by all on the back porch. Always. It's the play, damnit.
This conversation splits between
doing it on the one hand, justifying our love and selling it on the other.
My experience is that the latter,
(pushing, selling, dealing) is
what we SEEM most concerned
with. The Practical Uses of
Liberal Art so as to attract
the mommas and the poppas and
their off-spring. ADVANCEMENT
concerns.
This is always the case.
Always will be. Never not. We
blather about critical thinking,
service to others, greeing the
environment--none of which is
why we fiddle and frail and
thumb on the back porch.
Sam