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Waiting for the fog to lift
misty fog had nestled into the campus by the time I arrived federal dollars being spent to try to keep the American way of life on at my office in Tom Murray. The damp weather that cool April life support, what would we say the value of education is now. Those articles now seemed uninformed and impractical, and remorning seemed an extension of my mood. Although that day promised to be busier than most, the University grounds were de- mained uninspiring. They seemed to have missed the point completely, serted. There were no students. There were no faculty. There were especially given our current pandemic. What do we talk about now only a handful of staff present to ensure the essential operations of when an education cannot get you a job, because there are none (or the University continued. An unwelcomed visitor had made its way to fewer than before)? If written now, those articles would seem either the Hill Country, a coronavirus that seemed to have the ability to make tone deaf at best or completely out-of-touch with the human condition the earth stop spinning. The virus and COVID-19 shut down world at worst. Residential liberal arts universities, like Schreiner University, have economies and nation states; Schreiner University was no exception. As I opened the door to my office, strewn across my desk were sev- since their founding offered alternative answers to questions concerneral higher-ed trade journals with sticky notes, folded corners, and open ing the value of education, its goals, and the ultimate ends it serves. In pages, each marking a variety of articles, that before this March and addition to providing an education that prepares students for careers, April, had seemed fairly important. As a first-year provost at Schreiner small residential liberal arts campuses have as central to their core University I was trying to keep up with the conversations four-year col- mission a deeply transformative education that raises questions about the good, the beautiful, and the just. At Schreiner, we prepare leges and universities were having. I wanted to remain students “for meaningful work and a purposeful life in a current and up-to-date on the latest academic shop-talk. changing global society.” My reading schedule over the past year included headIn our current national and political environment, we no lines covering such topics as the value of a college delonger seem to know how to listen to one another, how to gree for the job market, the changing nature of work and communicate civilly, and especially how to be sympathetic careers, a liberal-arts approach to business, the workwith others who may look, act, or believe differently than we college way, popular majors for lucrative careers, acado. We seem incapable of valuing the common good any demic cost-to-value ratios, and college-rankings-based longer. What makes a society and its citizens just, good, and cost of attendance with potential salary earnings upon free, especially within the context of a global pandemic? graduation. The articles were informative and practical, Dr. Travis Frampton We need places like Schreiner now more than ever. but uninspiring. VP of Academic Affairs Occasionally being “student-centered” is understood as Still standing at the door, my attention turned to the and Provost meeting consumer demands. I often wonder, should not edshelves of books on either side of my computer. I saw the books of Neil Postman (Amusing Ourselves to Death; The End of ucation be promoted as “society-centered” or “globally-centered” or Education; Technopoly; and Building a Bridge to the 18th Century: How “problem-solving centered.” We must remind prospective students and the Past Can Improve the Future), David Brooks (The Road to Char- perhaps, more importantly, their parents that as a liberal arts university acter), Charles Dickens (Hard Times), Mark Edmunson (his trilogy, Why part of our calling is to develop students for greatness and for the good Read?; Why Write?; and Why Teach?) along with collected essays from of the communities in which they will live. We provide students necesMichel de Montaigne, Marilynne Robinson, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Gore sary opportunities for personal growth and emotional and spiritual deVidal, and James Baldwin. Yet, unlike the magazines opened up on my velopment. The most enriching and transformative growth often comes desk, these authors are closed up in my shelves, waiting their turn to through struggle, difficulty, and work. We want to prepare our students speak again. I have difficulty finding time to read those authors who not only for the careers they will have, but we also want them to learn have inspired me and have shaped my own understanding of the power to love goodness, beauty, and justice, not only for their own sake, but and value of education. What they say about the importance of edu- for the sake of others. Given the “changing global society” we all find ourselves in presently, cation and learning has little overlap with the content of our contemperhaps it is time to start pulling some old friends off the shelf, allowing porary conversations about schools and learning. As I remained at the threshold of the doorway, a revelation came to them to speak once again. Those books were relevant when they were me in the form of a question. I stared at the magazines on my desk written; their wisdom is necessary now more than ever. A first-year that argued incessantly for the economic utility of education. With the provost could well benefit from being reminded about what they have collapse of our global economies, with unprecedented loss of Ameri- to say about the meaning, purpose, and value of an education. And as I read and consider what they have to say, I may begin to nocan jobs in such a brief span of time, with the vulnerabilities of capitalism exposed in such a raw fashion with billions upon billions of tice that outside my window the fog is lifting.
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