Sometimes there are bright lights which blaze for a season and then fade, fulfilling their task in their demise. One such bright light was the Kansas University's Pearson Integrated Humanities Program. One of the things which struck us in the description of this program was the way in which students "did" poetry: "groups of students met to memorize poetry, truly by memory, since no text was used, but conducted by another student who had himself the poems of the program in his memory." This reminds us of the end of Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 where people become their own books. We think SEC should try this with poetry for faculty and students.
Also, John Senior, one of the founders of the program has provided us with a call to clarity in our moral commitments as a college from his book The Restoration of Christian Culture.
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Monday, June 23, 2008
Van Doren on Eductional Vision
Mark Van Doren once wrote:
"The courage in the educator that makes him labor at the outline of his task will push him on, virtue being with him, to take the risk of action; he will not only see an outline, he will form his institution in harmony with the vision. This may involve mistakes, but he would rather make mistakes than linger in confusion . . . When educators do not labor at the outline, others who are their subordinates, whether students or teachers will. The one intolerable thing in education is the absence of intellectual design . . . Education with an intellectual design is liberal education" (Liberal Education, pp. 10-11) by Mark Van Doren 1959, Boston: Beacon Press.
We at SEC desire to have this virtue of courage giving an outline of our college in its early stages. We intend to flesh out what it means to be a college committed to the objectivity of knowledge, believing that we can really know what is good, true and beautiful, and that this knowledge is part and parcel of the Christian tradition as a knowledge tradition contributing to what we value and cherish in what is good in the West.
Friday, June 20, 2008
Higher Ed and Hard Work
We at San Elijo College are looking for market driven solutions to the high cost of higher education. One of the ways in which this seems to have been successful is through a robust work/study program. There are a couple of schools in the country with this model:
At SEC, however, we are not primarily focused on a specific region or constituency as is Berea, nor do we have the sizeable endowment which allows College of the Ozarks to pay their students directly, and while there are dairy cows, horses and chickens in Harmony Grove and Elfin Forest, just down the road, San Elijo Hills is not a working cattle ranch like Deep Springs.
Ideally, we want to fully endow each faculty position and have the college essentially tuition free. However, we recognize, from our own experience in college, that practical work experience is invaluable. While we admire the cloistered life of many colleges, we also recognize, as did Plato the value of "trudging down" to rule in the world. We believe that partnering with local business to employ SEC students will allow each student to have high ideals and an ethic that comes from hard work.
A friend of the College introduced us to the Cristo Rey model for work/study which allows students to pay for a great deal of their tuition through an innovative job-sharing and employee leasing program. We think that this might be a feasible program for the college to offset tuition or living expenses.
Thomas Sowell on Measuring Outputs
Thomas Sowell has an interesting article on measuring ouputs of student achievement in order to "rank" colleges instead of "prestige" based on inputs.
He writes, "The CCAP [Center for College Affordability and Productivity] study uses several measures of educational output, including the proportion of a college’s graduates who win awards like the Rhodes Scholarships or who end up listed in Who’s Who in America, as well as the ratings that students give the professors who teach them. Professor Vedder admits that these are “imperfect” measures of a college’s educational output, but at least they are measures of output instead of input."
Sowell goes on to add that an addition "output" might include the number of students who go on for Ph.D.s
One worry about both the USNWR and CCAP's approach is an empiricist leaning toward numerical and measurable quantification rather than in the role that universities play in shaping the soul's of their students.
Would it be possible to rank schools on the quality of the souls of the faculty, trustees and alumni? One output that is measurable would be something like, how many alumni give their lives for what they believe to be good, true and beautiful?
He writes, "The CCAP [Center for College Affordability and Productivity] study uses several measures of educational output, including the proportion of a college’s graduates who win awards like the Rhodes Scholarships or who end up listed in Who’s Who in America, as well as the ratings that students give the professors who teach them. Professor Vedder admits that these are “imperfect” measures of a college’s educational output, but at least they are measures of output instead of input."
Sowell goes on to add that an addition "output" might include the number of students who go on for Ph.D.s
One worry about both the USNWR and CCAP's approach is an empiricist leaning toward numerical and measurable quantification rather than in the role that universities play in shaping the soul's of their students.
Would it be possible to rank schools on the quality of the souls of the faculty, trustees and alumni? One output that is measurable would be something like, how many alumni give their lives for what they believe to be good, true and beautiful?
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Plato's Republic and Types of Colleges
In Plato's Republic Book 8 and following, Plato describes the five types of cities and souls:
The Aristocracy: the rule of goodness
The Timocracy: the rule of honor
The Oligarchy: the rule of wealth
The Democracy: the rule of the masses
The Tyrrany: the rule of the tyrant
We think that American Universities and Colleges can fit into these type as well.
The Aristocratic university is literally one that is ruled by Goodness itself, as Plato puts it, when we see the Good, it "is also inferred to be the universal author of all things beautiful and right, parent of light and of the lord of light in this visible world, and the immediate source of reason and truth in the intellectual; and that this is the power upon which he who would act rationally either in public or private life must have his eye fixed."
We at San Elijo College believe that our students can see the Good! And that seeing the Good enables true success in every endeavor in life, private and public. Our graduates can even put that on their resumes! e.g. Skills: Able to see the Good and act rationally.
Are there any Aristocratic universities left? We believe that there are a few, and San Elijo College stands with them on this.
The second type of school is a Timocratic one. This school values honor. Honor is a real value, but it is not the sole value, and as Lewis puts it in the Abolition of Man, when you isolate one value from all the others within the natural law, you can swell it to madness in its isolation. Publications, research grants, presentations at academic conferences, tenure, great football or basketball teams, fancy buildings, a good reputation, high rankings in US News and World report; all of these things are honorable. But the cannot be the sole values for a college. Without objectivity of value, these things are hollow.
The third type of college is a Oligarchic one. This school values money. It encourages its students, as Plato puts it to make "reason and spirit sit down on the ground obediently on either side of their sovereign, and [teaches] them to know their place, he compels the one to think only of how lesser sums may be turned into larger ones, and will not allow the other to worship and admire anything but riches and rich men, or to be ambitious of anything so much as the acquisition of wealth and the means of acquiring it." These colleges emphasize only the acquisition of wealth and focus their energies solely on their student's ability to do so.
The fourth type of college is the Democratic one. This school values, well everything equally. Relativists U! Plato says, "if anyone says to him that some pleasures are the satisfactions of good and noble desires, and others of evil desires, and that he ought to use and honor some, and chastise and master the others -- whenever this is repeated to him he shakes his head and says that they are all alike, and that one is as good as another ... life has neither law nor order; and this distracted existence he terms joy and bliss and freedom." This is reflected in the curricular irrationality of the majority of American universities and in most dormitories on a typical weekend. Colleges have always been places for the young to be young, but only the recent moral relativism in higher education allows for the approbation of all conduct and thought as equally praiseworthy.
The final type of college is the Tyrannical one. The Tyranny is of course, for Plato with respect to the city the rule of one from the masses at the expense of all others, e.g. Kim Jung Il. We are not sure if there are any tyrannical colleges today; individual departments at schools, maybe, but we have not slid this far down in higher ed today. We seem to have mostly oligarchic and democratic schools today. Plato, however, seems to think that the slide from democracy to tyranny is an easy, wide and natural downhill road.
San Elijo College seeks to stem this drift by focusing the minds of our faculty and students on the Good, the True and the Beautiful.
The Aristocracy: the rule of goodness
The Timocracy: the rule of honor
The Oligarchy: the rule of wealth
The Democracy: the rule of the masses
The Tyrrany: the rule of the tyrant
We think that American Universities and Colleges can fit into these type as well.
The Aristocratic university is literally one that is ruled by Goodness itself, as Plato puts it, when we see the Good, it "is also inferred to be the universal author of all things beautiful and right, parent of light and of the lord of light in this visible world, and the immediate source of reason and truth in the intellectual; and that this is the power upon which he who would act rationally either in public or private life must have his eye fixed."
We at San Elijo College believe that our students can see the Good! And that seeing the Good enables true success in every endeavor in life, private and public. Our graduates can even put that on their resumes! e.g. Skills: Able to see the Good and act rationally.
Are there any Aristocratic universities left? We believe that there are a few, and San Elijo College stands with them on this.
The second type of school is a Timocratic one. This school values honor. Honor is a real value, but it is not the sole value, and as Lewis puts it in the Abolition of Man, when you isolate one value from all the others within the natural law, you can swell it to madness in its isolation. Publications, research grants, presentations at academic conferences, tenure, great football or basketball teams, fancy buildings, a good reputation, high rankings in US News and World report; all of these things are honorable. But the cannot be the sole values for a college. Without objectivity of value, these things are hollow.
The third type of college is a Oligarchic one. This school values money. It encourages its students, as Plato puts it to make "reason and spirit sit down on the ground obediently on either side of their sovereign, and [teaches] them to know their place, he compels the one to think only of how lesser sums may be turned into larger ones, and will not allow the other to worship and admire anything but riches and rich men, or to be ambitious of anything so much as the acquisition of wealth and the means of acquiring it." These colleges emphasize only the acquisition of wealth and focus their energies solely on their student's ability to do so.
The fourth type of college is the Democratic one. This school values, well everything equally. Relativists U! Plato says, "if anyone says to him that some pleasures are the satisfactions of good and noble desires, and others of evil desires, and that he ought to use and honor some, and chastise and master the others -- whenever this is repeated to him he shakes his head and says that they are all alike, and that one is as good as another ... life has neither law nor order; and this distracted existence he terms joy and bliss and freedom." This is reflected in the curricular irrationality of the majority of American universities and in most dormitories on a typical weekend. Colleges have always been places for the young to be young, but only the recent moral relativism in higher education allows for the approbation of all conduct and thought as equally praiseworthy.
The final type of college is the Tyrannical one. The Tyranny is of course, for Plato with respect to the city the rule of one from the masses at the expense of all others, e.g. Kim Jung Il. We are not sure if there are any tyrannical colleges today; individual departments at schools, maybe, but we have not slid this far down in higher ed today. We seem to have mostly oligarchic and democratic schools today. Plato, however, seems to think that the slide from democracy to tyranny is an easy, wide and natural downhill road.
San Elijo College seeks to stem this drift by focusing the minds of our faculty and students on the Good, the True and the Beautiful.
Thought on Larry Arnn's Article
Larry Arnn, President of Hillsdale College, in his Imprimis article (November, 2006) recommends two soloutions to the current problems entrenched in higher education today:
We at SEC agree with Arnn about these two things. We agree that private colleges should take no federal or state aid at all. We fear for like minded private colleges, especially those with religious, especially Christian commitments. Private religious colleges which are on the government dole, and which are tuition driven will likely, maybe even in the next presidential administration, be faced with a dilemma: compromise their missions or lose federal aid.
San Elijo College hopes to avoid this dilemma from the beginning by commiting to avoid entanglement with government bureaucratic encroachment on academic liberty.
We at SEC also agree with Arnn that the way to have a great college, which preserves the best of Western culture and the American experience the west has produced is to master the history, languages, science, philosophy, and religion which produced it. We hope too that this study will allow us to effectively critique problems within the western tradition, while maintaining a clear objectivity to knowledge. This is what CS Lewis calls "alteration from within" the tradition.
In the Abolition of Man ch. 2, Lewis writes "Those who understand the spirit of[natural law, the western tradition] and who have been led by that spirit can modify it in directions which that spirit itself demands. Only they can know what those directions are. The outsider knows nothing about the matter. His attempts at alteration, as we have seen, contradict themselves."
To repair all this and place the education system on a better footing,
there are two things that need doing, neither of them proposed so far during
this reauthorization of the Higher Education Act. The first is that we should
return control of college to private people to the utmost extent possible. The
federal government should do what Reagan suggested: go back to the things it has
the constitutional power to do ...Or even go one better: Let taxpayers keep
their money, if they are prepared to spend it for something so vital to the
public interest as education.The second thing is to recover the tradition
of liberal and civic education that has helped to keep us free by teaching us
the purpose of our freedom. To do this, we will have to be willing to take
positions on subjects that are “controversial.” We will have to organize our
colleges to study the great documents of the American past and those upon which
that past was built. This will involve us—gasp—in the study of the Western
canon. This is not merely a good thing; it is “urgent.”
We at SEC agree with Arnn about these two things. We agree that private colleges should take no federal or state aid at all. We fear for like minded private colleges, especially those with religious, especially Christian commitments. Private religious colleges which are on the government dole, and which are tuition driven will likely, maybe even in the next presidential administration, be faced with a dilemma: compromise their missions or lose federal aid.
San Elijo College hopes to avoid this dilemma from the beginning by commiting to avoid entanglement with government bureaucratic encroachment on academic liberty.
We at SEC also agree with Arnn that the way to have a great college, which preserves the best of Western culture and the American experience the west has produced is to master the history, languages, science, philosophy, and religion which produced it. We hope too that this study will allow us to effectively critique problems within the western tradition, while maintaining a clear objectivity to knowledge. This is what CS Lewis calls "alteration from within" the tradition.
In the Abolition of Man ch. 2, Lewis writes "Those who understand the spirit of[natural law, the western tradition] and who have been led by that spirit can modify it in directions which that spirit itself demands. Only they can know what those directions are. The outsider knows nothing about the matter. His attempts at alteration, as we have seen, contradict themselves."
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
People who've taught us: Victor Davis Hanson
We all have teachers.
The founders of SEC have had several currently living teachers who have inspired us in many ways.
One of our teachers is Victor Davis Hanson.
His commencement address from St. John's College in 2002 was particularly inspiring as we researched the academic and curricular foundations of the College.
San Elijo College inspires to be, as Hanson states, "Like Euripides, you are hunters of beauty, which Socrates reminds us is really the The Good and The True—what the Greeks call aletheia “that which cannot be forgotten.”
The founders of SEC have had several currently living teachers who have inspired us in many ways.
One of our teachers is Victor Davis Hanson.
His commencement address from St. John's College in 2002 was particularly inspiring as we researched the academic and curricular foundations of the College.
San Elijo College inspires to be, as Hanson states, "Like Euripides, you are hunters of beauty, which Socrates reminds us is really the The Good and The True—what the Greeks call aletheia “that which cannot be forgotten.”
Willard Lecture on Moral Knowledge and the University
Willard has an excellent talk on the nature of moral knowledge in the university. It's well stated, although a bit grainy in the audio. The lecture can be found here as part of the Veritas forum: “The university no longer offers a body of moral truth, the closest you get to it is freshman orientation."
San Elijo College believes that there is a body of moral knowledge found in both natural law, as defended in C.S. Lewis' "The Abolition of Man" and by the majority of the great writers of the West. In addition, the College believes that the Christian tradition, as stated in the Nicene Creed, is a knowledge tradition, and in that knowledge tradition, there is a clear body of moral knowledge that regulates human life.
San Elijo College believes that there is a body of moral knowledge found in both natural law, as defended in C.S. Lewis' "The Abolition of Man" and by the majority of the great writers of the West. In addition, the College believes that the Christian tradition, as stated in the Nicene Creed, is a knowledge tradition, and in that knowledge tradition, there is a clear body of moral knowledge that regulates human life.
Monday, June 16, 2008
Dallas Willard's Papers on Higher Education
Those of us founding SEC have been deeply influenced by Dallas Willard, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Southern California (www.dwillard.org)
This entry will highight a few quotations from Dallas' papers on higher education and then show how SEC will fulfill those ideas.
Willard has a nice paper on Jaques Maritain's views of higher ed: "How Reason Can Survive The Modern University: The Moral Foundations Of Rationality."
Willard states: "The life of reason is not generally speaking, self-sustaining. The values inherent in it are not by themselves enough to secure its institution and perpetuation. This brings out the pointlessness of teaching logic as part of a liberal education without illuminating and emphasizing our duty to be logical. Only a strong moral commitment to being a reasonable person can effectively produce routine conformity, or will to conform, to truth and logic in action and assertion. We see such commitment in outstanding examples such as Socrates, Jesus and Spinoza, and certainly Maritain."
We at San Elijo College agree. We intend our college to have a strong communal commitment to the life of reason and the life of a just soul.
Here is another quotation by Willard from his paper, "The University's Responsibility for Moral Guidance"
"We cannot simply return to the Christian past of the universities; the honest, critical inquiry which the university at its best has always aspired to must prevail. The university must forsake its reactionary position against the worldview from which it arose and devote its attention to an open and free-minded scrutiny of the claims of Jesus Christ, placing them alongside the alternatives that now try to tell us who we are and what we ought to be."
San Elijo College begins with the Christian past and strives for the ideals Willard discusses.
Here's another quotation from and interview of Dallas Willard entitled: "Happy Graduation from Amoral University."
tts: Has the university abandoned "capital T truth"?
DW: Yes! The university has explicitly abandoned the project of the search for Truth--despite remnants that suggest the contrary such as Harvard's seal that sports the Latin word for truth ("Veritas"). In fact in an address to entering freshman at the University of Chicago, John Mearsheimer made it clear what were and what were not the goals of the educational institution. The goals were: to encourage critical thinking, to broaden intellectual horizons, and to encourage self-awareness. The NON-AIMS were equally explicit: "Not only is there a powerful imperative at Chicago to stay away from teaching the truth, but the university also makes very little effort to provide you with moral guidance. Indeed it is a remarkably amoral institution" (149, Mearsheimer).
tts: Does this sentiment permeate secular universities in general?
DW: Yes!
SEC is founded on the objectivity of knowledge and truth. It is our core philosophical commitment.
This entry will highight a few quotations from Dallas' papers on higher education and then show how SEC will fulfill those ideas.
Willard has a nice paper on Jaques Maritain's views of higher ed: "How Reason Can Survive The Modern University: The Moral Foundations Of Rationality."
Willard states: "The life of reason is not generally speaking, self-sustaining. The values inherent in it are not by themselves enough to secure its institution and perpetuation. This brings out the pointlessness of teaching logic as part of a liberal education without illuminating and emphasizing our duty to be logical. Only a strong moral commitment to being a reasonable person can effectively produce routine conformity, or will to conform, to truth and logic in action and assertion. We see such commitment in outstanding examples such as Socrates, Jesus and Spinoza, and certainly Maritain."
We at San Elijo College agree. We intend our college to have a strong communal commitment to the life of reason and the life of a just soul.
Here is another quotation by Willard from his paper, "The University's Responsibility for Moral Guidance"
"We cannot simply return to the Christian past of the universities; the honest, critical inquiry which the university at its best has always aspired to must prevail. The university must forsake its reactionary position against the worldview from which it arose and devote its attention to an open and free-minded scrutiny of the claims of Jesus Christ, placing them alongside the alternatives that now try to tell us who we are and what we ought to be."
San Elijo College begins with the Christian past and strives for the ideals Willard discusses.
Here's another quotation from and interview of Dallas Willard entitled: "Happy Graduation from Amoral University."
tts: Has the university abandoned "capital T truth"?
DW: Yes! The university has explicitly abandoned the project of the search for Truth--despite remnants that suggest the contrary such as Harvard's seal that sports the Latin word for truth ("Veritas"). In fact in an address to entering freshman at the University of Chicago, John Mearsheimer made it clear what were and what were not the goals of the educational institution. The goals were: to encourage critical thinking, to broaden intellectual horizons, and to encourage self-awareness. The NON-AIMS were equally explicit: "Not only is there a powerful imperative at Chicago to stay away from teaching the truth, but the university also makes very little effort to provide you with moral guidance. Indeed it is a remarkably amoral institution" (149, Mearsheimer).
tts: Does this sentiment permeate secular universities in general?
DW: Yes!
SEC is founded on the objectivity of knowledge and truth. It is our core philosophical commitment.
Alan Kors' Article on Higher Education
Alan Kors has very telling article on the state of higher education today. We believe that San Elijo College will as Kors states be a "model of higher education that offer[s] a prestigious degree, high admissions standards, a superb and rigorous education, a faculty that was truly and usefully intellectually pluralistic, and a climate of individual rights and responsibilities (joined with rights of voluntary association)."
We also believe with Kors that such a model will as he puts it "sweep the field."
We also believe with Kors that such a model will as he puts it "sweep the field."
Saturday, June 14, 2008
Welcome
Welcome to the blog for San Elijo College: www.sanelijocollege.org
We will be posting thoughts and reflections on the college, on higher education, great books, classics, philosophy and other related topics. Mostly, the point of this blog is to keep college supporters updated on our progress.
San Elijo College is in its embryonic stage. During a recent lunch with a supporter of the college, We were reminded of this truth. Alan said something that really stuck in our head. He said, "Your website says things like the college "will be" a great books college, or the college "will be" a classically oriented college .... but the college already is a great books college and it already is a classically oriented college." He reminded us that San Elijo College although in its embryonic stage is just what a college looks like at its beginning. We are already a college, at its earliest stages of development.
We will be posting thoughts and reflections on the college, on higher education, great books, classics, philosophy and other related topics. Mostly, the point of this blog is to keep college supporters updated on our progress.
San Elijo College is in its embryonic stage. During a recent lunch with a supporter of the college, We were reminded of this truth. Alan said something that really stuck in our head. He said, "Your website says things like the college "will be" a great books college, or the college "will be" a classically oriented college .... but the college already is a great books college and it already is a classically oriented college." He reminded us that San Elijo College although in its embryonic stage is just what a college looks like at its beginning. We are already a college, at its earliest stages of development.
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