Lower Education

This semester, I've been confronted with some rather troubling views on higher education. Naturally, I'd like to achieve a better understanding of this through a survey. I realize responses won't be anonymous, but I cannot imagine that would stop my more opinionated acquaintances! It's not a scientific poll, anyway...

Respond to each statement using the scale:
Strongly Disagree--Inclined to Disagree--Neither--Inclined to Agree--Strongly Agree

And feel free to elaborate on any of your responses, of course.

1. Paying tuition for higher education is the same as paying for any other service.

2. Higher education is an investment in yourself.

3. When you are paying tuition, especially out-of-pocket, institutions should follow the "customer is always right" rule.

4. There should be no consequences for missing classes, whatever the reason.

5. There should be no due dates for assignments.

6. You should spend at least 3 hours of out-of-class work per credit hour of class.

7. A degree is earned, not given.

8. It is unfair to offer a makeup exam because it gives that student more study time than his/her classmates.

9. It is the teacher's job to make the subject interesting for students.

10. Enrollment is a choice, and completing coursework is the student's responsibility.

11. Everyone should have at least a bachelor's degree.

12. Higher education is a privilege.

Thank you for participating! I'm no Bill O'Reilly, but I hope I'll be able to compile some results and share interesting opinions about education today.

purpose

Movies that most people wouldn’t waste their time on are one of my few vices. The others include Coca Cola and sleeping in. So, if you needed further proof of my lack of wildness, there you are. One of those movies is Ever After, and I bring it up only because one line has been repeating in my head for a few months now: “I used to think, if I cared at all, I would have to care about everything...and I’d go stark raving mad.”

That is rather like how I feel right now. Maybe not the stark raving mad part, but the anxiety about finding a “purpose.” I’ve been honing in on something to do with my own journey beyond southeast Ohio and back again, but that makes me wonder if I should keep piling on the purposefulness. Do I care about poverty? Hunger? Child abuse prevention? Sure. I wish I could solve it all.

I have trouble letting go. In effect, I let go of the Heifer Project for some complicated and silly reasons that no one has thus far directly asked me about. I completed a term in AmeriCorps, but chose not to pursue another. In all fairness, that decision came at the same time I was asked to add a second art history class to my schedule. The field I obtained two degrees in of course takes precedence. So letting go feels good. It’s a relief, in many ways, but it is also...sad isn’t the proper word. Bitter is too strong. Disappointing, perhaps?

One of the major criticisms of my generation—and the next one—is that we’re wayward. We flit from job to job, from interest to interest. But isn’t that a more natural way to live? Apart from the nuts and bolts of it all: eating, sleeping, socializing; can one really dedicate their lives to one thing, or one realm of things, and stick to it? Maybe not in this job market. One of the few good things about my crooked path is where I am right now, teaching. It’s growing on me. That’s not to say I’ll be a professor from now until the end. But I’ve found a realm I’d like to stay in/near/vaguely adjacent to.

That realm is difficult to define. Not simply “the arts,” not just “academia.” I want to be involved in the literacy movement as well as art history. I want to keep trying to broaden the views of people who have never seen the value in looking beyond Ohio’s borders. Or even the county’s. I’ve already let this drive me a little crazy, taking it personally when one student or another doesn’t see the value and might never see it. That’s the caring about everything, or everyone, part.

But, did you read up there, “I want to be,” not “I am”? I still feel like I am in flux. Not settled. Not like I’ve found my place. At what point do I become just a talker and not a doer. Am I already there? Looking back on the past three years, I wonder why I haven’t already reached maximum purposefulness. Yet while I say I’m in flux, am I really where I am meant to be? Where is the line between passion and waywardness? Because I seem to be dancing on it.