It’s not a cattle call
10/3/2005
Lots happening here. Last week we hosted a faculty team from another university who came to learn how we designed and maintain our Core Curriculum. A reunion of last summer's El Salvador study abroad students elicited a moving conversation on the transformational insights these young people gained from their experience of analyzing human rights, public health and globalization firsthand. Several of them will present their analyses at an upcoming conference. Homecoming Weekend with athletic games, a dance and more followed some interesting conversations with our Board of Trustees on exciting Dominican initiatives including a new academic building that will get started in the spring. This week I'm meeting with the Honors Program director as we clarify all the things Nobel Laureate Leon Lederman will be doing when he's on campus next semester (besides teaching his class on "Science, Technology and Education in the 21 st Century").
On Tuesdays and Thursdays I get to teach and it's so much fun to close that door and get into it. The first book we read in my Freshman Seminar this semester was Soren Kierkegaard's Purity of Heart is to Will One Thing. In it he speaks of the rare but precious authenticity of individual conscience and decision as opposed to the superficial, uncritical parroting of whatever "the crowd" does. SK goes to extremes (as is his habit) and he even says, "the larger the crowd, the more probable that that which it praises is folly…" I'm not sure that correlation is always automatic as I am a White Sox fan at least this season and there's fun but no folly aboard that bandwagon!
Still, one of my students took SK's point to heart in writing a paper and she made an interesting connection. She wrote about the process of selecting Dominican as her college. She reflected on the fact that some of her friends never heard of this school, and they chastised her for the decision. But coming here was indeed her thoughtful decision and she was most intentional about avoiding the superficial mimicry SK decried. When one mimics the desires of others, she said, one doesn't think for oneself. Instead, she chose to come here because in her depths she knew this place was right, even if it's not the most popular or well-known within the massive higher education industry. She cited her decision to come here as an illustration of SK's call for willing the Good, with personal integrity and according to one's own best lights. It was an amazing analysis not only of a complex text but also of her own experience in light of SK's theories.
SK said that when he wrote, he imagined that genuine individual who stands out from the crowd, that person "whom with joy and gratitude I call my reader…" I tend to feel the same about the awesome students who choose to study with us at Dominican. We keep the cattle with the cookies in the cafeteria (veggie options available).
Lots happening here. Last week we hosted a faculty team from another university who came to learn how we designed and maintain our Core Curriculum. A reunion of last summer's El Salvador study abroad students elicited a moving conversation on the transformational insights these young people gained from their experience of analyzing human rights, public health and globalization firsthand. Several of them will present their analyses at an upcoming conference. Homecoming Weekend with athletic games, a dance and more followed some interesting conversations with our Board of Trustees on exciting Dominican initiatives including a new academic building that will get started in the spring. This week I'm meeting with the Honors Program director as we clarify all the things Nobel Laureate Leon Lederman will be doing when he's on campus next semester (besides teaching his class on "Science, Technology and Education in the 21 st Century").
On Tuesdays and Thursdays I get to teach and it's so much fun to close that door and get into it. The first book we read in my Freshman Seminar this semester was Soren Kierkegaard's Purity of Heart is to Will One Thing. In it he speaks of the rare but precious authenticity of individual conscience and decision as opposed to the superficial, uncritical parroting of whatever "the crowd" does. SK goes to extremes (as is his habit) and he even says, "the larger the crowd, the more probable that that which it praises is folly…" I'm not sure that correlation is always automatic as I am a White Sox fan at least this season and there's fun but no folly aboard that bandwagon!
Still, one of my students took SK's point to heart in writing a paper and she made an interesting connection. She wrote about the process of selecting Dominican as her college. She reflected on the fact that some of her friends never heard of this school, and they chastised her for the decision. But coming here was indeed her thoughtful decision and she was most intentional about avoiding the superficial mimicry SK decried. When one mimics the desires of others, she said, one doesn't think for oneself. Instead, she chose to come here because in her depths she knew this place was right, even if it's not the most popular or well-known within the massive higher education industry. She cited her decision to come here as an illustration of SK's call for willing the Good, with personal integrity and according to one's own best lights. It was an amazing analysis not only of a complex text but also of her own experience in light of SK's theories.
SK said that when he wrote, he imagined that genuine individual who stands out from the crowd, that person "whom with joy and gratitude I call my reader…" I tend to feel the same about the awesome students who choose to study with us at Dominican. We keep the cattle with the cookies in the cafeteria (veggie options available).
