Education

Amid all this frenzy in the schools about testing, testing, testing, I have been struck by something someone sent to me.  It read, "The best teachers are those who show you where to look, but don't tell you what to see."  (Discussing this, I was given a book to read, a kids' book, Duck/Rabbit.  It is a very relevant book.)  I think that was the essence of my college education.

Oh, without doubt, I didn't understand that, not at all then.  It took me many years later that this dawned on me.  Some years back, but not many, one of my college buddies and I were talking about Amherst.  He related, "About five or six years after graduation, it clicked!" he said with great enthusiasm, even then.  "I said to myself, 'I get it!'"  I answered that I had the exact same revelation, although mine came a bit later, maybe eleven or twelve years after graduation.  (I'm a slow learner.)

I'll use the courses/classes I still teach as an example.  It's my job to test and grade students on the material in my class.  (I don't go overboard with exams, generally giving a mid-term and a final.  In between, I assign a good number of short essays.)  So, I give tests with the expected questions.  But, as I now realize, who other than me remembers what happened in, say, 1437 or 1805?  And who recalls many/most of the names of many/most of the people?  I would hope some dates, such as July 4th, 1776 and some of those who really made big differences and the differences they made are remembered, such as Lincoln, but......

This leads me back to Amherst.  We always suspected that many of our professors gave us grades based on our overall GPAs.  That is, if my average was a C+, some of my professors would give me a C+ for the course.  I don't think this was dishonest.  I don't recall many, if any, exams that were what might be considered "objective tests."  No, I think most of them were far more subjective.  I never had a multiple-choice test.  My professors certainly weren't lazy; far from it.  They often wrote more on my papers than I wrote myself.  It was something I eventually learned from them:  comments on papers aren't just for evaluation, but are teaching tools.  But I suspect my professors knew something about the purpose and the value of an education.  That, frankly, tests and grades aren't important in the overall scheme of things.

Yes, grades open doors.  They can be indications of future success, but not always.  Part of my ideas here stems from a discussion of several weeks ago.  In discussing our college days, I revealed that my GPA, upon graduation, was a B-.  Jaws dropped.  "You mean you didn't have a B [average]?"  No, I didn't and I never earned an A at Amherst, not one.  I guessed, from the silence at the table after my revelation, that those others were thinking one of two things:  Either I was lying (But why would I lie to make myself look worse; people lie to make themselves look better.) or I was a complete goof off in college (I admit I wasn't a bookworm, but I did work hard, far far harder than in graduate school; I remember, more than once, returning to campus from ball games on Saturday evenings and, before heading back to the house party, spending a couple of hours in a vacated classroom studying--on Saturday evening!)

As I noted above, it took me quite a while after graduation to figure what my education was all about.  I wonder, to this day, at the graduation ceremony what my professors might have been thinking as I walked to get my degree.  Did they just shake their heads, at least in their own minds, or did they know they had planted seeds that were yet to germinate?

Perhaps the politicians and corporate-types who are driving the test, test, test frenzy really haven't figured out education, its purpose and value.  Maybe they don't realize that the most important things to be learned in education can't be tested.

It's one of the deep concerns and criticisms I have with American education today.  The teachers and  administrators, who should know better, have acceded, indeed have surrendered, to those who don't.  But in the face of criticism, it's far easier to go along than to challenge, to fight back for what is right.

Gee, as I read through this, I hope I get my point across.  I'm not sure I have.