Mark Dobbins on “Higher Education”

My good friend Mark Dobbins has been publishing his thoughts on society at large on the web for quite a few years. These pages are updated relatively frequently and contain, in my humble opinion, vast amounts of thought that are becoming more and more essential as the pages’ of modernity turn. While the design and layout may be threadbare, the concepts contained within are invaluable.

Mark Dobbins on “Higher Education”:

What is Higher Education?
The human experience starts in childhood. Childhood is when the being is molded from a biological potentiality to a human actuality. Once a mature human, whatever that may mean, finds its way out of childhood higher education should be there to offer whatever knowledge and skill will help it push itself and its society forward. In any society that values freedom, truth, and beauty “offer” is a word of primary importance. One of my main criticisms of our modern education system is its unnecessarily restrictive and demanding nature. Not demanding in the sense of challenging, but externally demanding. It is full of requirements and structures that only serve to limit freedom and minimize the possibilities. I understand the argument that all students should know some part of literature, or history, or science. But understanding cannot be forced. Understanding must be sought. If we live in an age of uninquisitive minds, then that is the fault of childhood, of primary education, and it would be best to deal with the problem there, and not attempt to bandage it by limiting freedom and possibility in higher education. Furthermore, these unnecessary limits breed not only totalitarianism and conformity, often the two things that the required courses are meant to deter, but also inefficiency. The walls of rules that maze higher education make it more expensive, more prone to politicking, and lead to power being held not by the customers, not by those eager to learn, but by administration, by authority, as if the school was paying the students. As you will hopefully come to understand, I am not belittling the very necessary organizational tasks of administration, I only strongly question the place of administration as a commander, or perhaps a demander. To simplify, I believe there is a more free, efficient, and inexpensive way to conceive of and structure higher education.

To say that the creative capabilities of children are, for the most part, being squandered away in public education systems is an understatement. Whether or not this is the fault of any supposedly accountable person, people, association, council, agency, etc is not for us to judge or concern ourselves with. What is most important at this time is steadfast solidarity. We must demand of ourselves and our hierarchical superiors support for all children. Every generation that is created without an intimate understanding of the creative tools at their fingertips will become another generation of adults without the imagination and compassion to create progressive, pragmatic tools for change.