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.

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