Technology Comes to the Dismal Humanities Market

Technological innovation in the Academic Humanities? It's happening, if we can judge by "Rebooting Graduate Education in the Humanities" from The Chronicles of Higher Education. And just in time--because the job market is dismal yet the graduate students deluded:

"A 2011 Survey of Earned Doctorates shows that 43 percent of doctoral recipients have no employment at the time they receive their degree. But Rogers presented an SCI survey indicating that 74 percent of respondents entered graduate school with the expectation that they would become professors, and 80 percent reported “feeling fairly certain or completely certain” of achieving that outcome. At the same time, only 18 percent were satisfied with the preparation they received for careers besides being a professor."

I can only hope these students, who've invested considerable time and treasure, can find clever new avenues for their knowledge that will benefit us all. 

Lecture Fail

A debate is raging in The Chronicles of Higher Education regarding lectures. There are many laudable points on both sides.

However, I'm chagrined at the faculty members who aren't asking: do we know the optimal way for students to learn? What are the principles? What do we know about human development, and how is that relevant to our problem? What skills do these students need to benefit from the way we're teaching?

What's most unrealistic to me is the faculty member's belief that what students need to do is concentrate for 90 minutes on her lecture, i.e. apply their will. That's the solution?

It seems as if faculty favor lectures for a variety of reasons. I won't visit the non-productive ones, such as the fact that it may be a lot less work for a professor. Let's just look at positive reasons. A lecture can skillfully condense the essentials the student needs to learn about a subject, and faculty are often concerned that students learn what's fundamental and essential.

It's also personally satisfying to many faculty members to demonstrate their superior knowledge. And faculty are often the kind of people who really enjoy sharing knowledge with others. But most students aren't necessarily motivated to do so, or to be the recipient of knowledge summarized and shared, rather than acquired by first-hand experience. In the latter types of experience the student can enjoy the feeling of gaining competence - "look what I did myself!"

What the Flow research highlights is the limits of attention. It takes huge amounts of mental energy to concentrate, i.e. to pay attention, to information that arrives in a form which is difficult to mentally ingest. Here are some of the reasons:

1. Abstract ideas generally take more energy to attend to because they don't engage the senses or body or, often, the listener's deepest motivation. Instead, on their own the listener has to come up with imaginary objects or instances to embody what the lecturer is saying. That's why aids such as visuals or demonstrations are good to use. And, unless the listener is naturally interested in the subject, he has to cheerlead himself into continuing to pay attention. In the case of most students and most lectures, I'm betting they must cheerlead with a stick ("I'll fail!") rather than a carrot ("This stuff is cool to know!").
   
2. Listening while sitting still in a seat is extremely difficult because it doesn't engage the senses or the body.
   
3. If the listener gets confused, or stops paying attention for a bit of time, he or she has no opportunity to ask questions or re-start the lecture; the rest of the presentation may be worthless or, at the least, less than optimal as a learning experience because it can't be followed well.
   
4. Optimal human attention span is about 20 minutes (in other words, the length of TED talks) - 90 is almost impossible unless it's a full-body-and-mind engaging activity, like a sport or watching a movie, in which the emotions are engaged. OR unless it's a Flow activity for that person. Lecturing can easily be a Flow activity, especially if the lecturer finds the material interesting.
   
5. A good listener has an internal dialogue with the lecturer, pondering the truth of comments, asking questions about what is said, and trying to find the data in memory to answer them. Some people do this naturally, but the vast majority have no natural skill: they need to be taught how to "actively listen." And they're not getting that in the lower grades - so no wonder they're abyssmal at it in college.
   
6. Neither are most students in lower education given the activities, materials, or opportunities to learn how to concentrate. And then they're expected to figure out how to do it on their own when they arrive at college? (Developing the ability to concentrate is something Montessori classroom do well, because the materials are designed to trigger Flow for students. )

See the summary, student comments, and faculty responses and videos here.

Why are there Shadow Scholars?

This week the Chronicles of Higher Education featured an article that's been widely read around the internet: "The Shadow Scholar":

"In the midst of this great recession, business is booming. At busy times, during midterms and finals, my company's staff of roughly 50 writers is not large enough to satisfy the demands of students who will pay for our work and claim it as their own.

You would be amazed by the incompetence of your students' writing. I have seen the word "desperate" misspelled every way you can imagine. And these students truly are desperate. They couldn't write a convincing grocery list, yet they are in graduate school. They really need help. They need help learning and, separately, they need help passing their courses. But they aren't getting it."

"It is my hope that this essay will initiate such a conversation. As for me, I'm planning to retire. I'm tired of helping you make your students look competent."

Searing words.

My question: why is this happening? The author puts some blame on professors who can't/won't judge what's going on. Yes, that's a problem, but part of a bigger issue.

My hypothesis: this is a long-term effect of progressive, egalitarian education and  the degree inflation caused by government-financed education. Progressive education teaching methods have left teachers incompetent and students ignorant.  Now that "everyone" must have a college degree to get the most basic of jobs, many academically incompetent students are trying to graduate college, or even get graduate degrees.

For many, many students, learning has very little to do with going to college - getting through and getting the degree does. The Shadow Scholar is one solution.

Many of the ESL students he mentions could be very bright and even succeed in business or other fields that don't require mastery of English. In the big picture, going to college may be a complete waste of time and money for them, as well as other students, except for the fact that they need a degree to get most less-than-basic jobs.

Evidence in the article to support my thesis: business is booming in the recession. Why? The Feds are pouring money into student loans so out-of-work people can "go back to school."

It's a sorry, sorry situation.

Employers want 18th century skills

 New data reviewed by Mark Bauerlein in The Chronicle of Higher Education which argues for getting a high-level liberal arts education.

Hattip to Laurie Morrow.

Professors Teach Little, Students Learn Less

Check out this article by George Leef at the John W. Pope Center for Higher Education Policy about the unwritten pact between slacker professor-teachers and students.

More political correctness

June 1st: "A professor at Florida Atlantic University says she may end her 40-year membership in a professional association, Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, because it requires people who seek to present papers at its annual meeting to sign a disclaimer promising not to “insult the rightful dignity and social equity of any individual or group.”"

From a Robin Wilson article at the Chronicles of Higher Education.

Yet, again, forcing "social justice" down everyone's throat.

Hat tip to Sara Pentz.