We are about to embark on our decennial self-study that is
required for membership in and accreditation by the Middle States Commission on
Higher Education. The process should take about two years and we are just in
the “design” phase at this point. One of the first tasks of the Self-Study
Steering Committee is to come up with a theme that will guide us and frame the
context of our self-examination. After
some deep thought and deliberation, the committee has agreed on the theme “Lincoln University: Honoring the past –
Charting the future”.
We talk extensively about legacy at Lincoln, probably
because, as the nation’s first HBCU, this institution has educated numerous notable
people who went on to impact our country and the world. It is easy to be proud
of our past – and I think we should be. But we also need to look beyond the
present and understand what it means to chart a viable and vibrant future for
our institution. We need to be an institution that does more than honor its
legacy; we need to actively transform that legacy into greatness now and prominence
for the future of both Lincoln and for all the students
that are being and will be educated by us. To chart the future can be both exciting
and humbling; it is a tremendous undertaking, yet we do it every day in our
classrooms. In small or great ways, we collectively help to plot the future for our students. With this blog post, I’m hoping to tap
into that collective wisdom of the Lincoln faculty community to find out what
charting the future means to us and to you.
You can read more about my thoughts around this topic, or,
without further influence, go to: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/83ST26K
to answer the question: What does “charting the future while honoring the past”
mean to you? How do we, as faculty, chart a future for both our students and
for the institution? How is this work anchored in the Lincoln legacy?
My hope for the future Lincoln student experience includes
more experiential learning across disciplines. I think we are at the cusp of
breaking out of the traditional three hours a week classroom monotony to enter a world of learning that is less scheduled but more relevant to the world for
which we are trying to prepare our students. Experiential learning encompasses
all types of schooling in which the students are active participants, or learn
through experience and then reflect on their learning. This can take many
forms; we could add service learning projects to more of our classes and have
our student body contribute to the planning, designing, resource allocation etc.
of running a university. Pre-nursing students could shadow in health services,
the business students could analyze resource allocations and help fiscal
affairs find savings, environmental science students could work with Aramark to
implement more sustainability practices, computer science students could
contribute to IT. We could take service learning outside the gates of the
University and become more involved in the surrounding community
organizations and schools. Experiential learning can also take the form of research
projects that contribute to knowledge generation through publications. Science
students have several opportunities to participate, both through classes and independent
research projects, in experiential learning. To give student more time to work
on their research projects we have had to re-think class scheduling to include
longer but less frequent blocks of time in the classroom. This model may not
work for all subjects, but it does lend itself to field-trips and interactive
learning projects that take the students out of the classroom and into the real
world, where students have a greater chance to learn through experience. Charting the future may
mean that we need to push some boundaries and become a little uncomfortable,
but in the end, we would honor our past by continuing to produce graduates that
are well-prepared to take on the world.
What are your hopes for the future of Lincoln and how are those hopes anchored in the past?
My hope is that we focus on education; and, by that, I mean literacy in the form of reading, writing and critical thinking at the college or university level. That, in my opinion, is the best way of “charting the future while honoring the past;” because the future keeps changing and, often, is unpredictable with any specificity. It is literacy, particularly higher education, which has been crucial in the past and, I believe, will continue to be important in the future.
ReplyDeleteSafro Kwame
Kwame, lets marry the fundamentals of teaching literacy and critical thinking with exercises that allow our students to practice using their skills to solve real-word problems. Literacy will always be important, as will critical thinking. But you can teach and practice both literacy and critical thinking in many different ways. Today's - and probably tomorrow's - employers are looking for applicants who can solve real-world problems and work collaboratively to do so. I think we need to teach our students to read, write, and think critically through experiential learning that allows our students to collaboratively apply skills to real-world problems. In doing so, I think we may better help our students chart their futures.
ReplyDeleteAnna, a person who cannot "collaboratively apply skills to real-world problems" is not a critical thinker and, probably not highly educated either. A critical thinker "can solve real-world problems and work collaboratively to do so" or, at least, should be able to! What is your idea of a university or higher education, and definition of critical thinking?
ReplyDeleteSafro Kwame