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Headline: Deep thinkers missing in action
Byline: Mark Clayton Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
Date: 01/21/2003
Cheerleaders for a collegiate chess team? It may sound odd, but the
president of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, doesn't mind
going to such lengths to celebrate smarts.
In an effort to draw more academically talented students, this mid-size
research institution offers scholarships to top chess players. It
recently won the American Intercollegiate Chess Championship for the
sixth time, handily surmounting intellectual bastions such as Harvard,
Stanford, and Yale.
This strategy has not won the school millions in advertising revenue.
Nor has it magically vaulted it into the Ivy League. But President
Freeman Hrabowski says it sends a signal to prospective students that
if they cherish the life of the mind, they will feel at home at UMBC.
"We want to counter the anti-intellectual thread that runs across
higher education, even [at] the best schools," Dr. Hrabowski says.
"People often know about an institution because of a winning football
team. How often do you hear about a university known for sending large
numbers of students on to graduate programs, professional schools, or
community service? We're talking about a need for balance."
Critical thinking, self-examination, and the questioning of assumptions
are all widely genuflected to as part of any good college education.
But that's not what's happening on many college campuses, he and others
argue.
American higher education has long had a dynamic tension between
intellectualism - represented by the humanities and elite colleges -
and more "practical" education offered up by land-grant universities,
observers say.
But while the US university system is widely hailed for its quality,
some fear the pendulum may be swinging toward an overall anti-
intellectual approach.
"You can party a lot, ski a lot, and still do well and not be that
intellectual," says Michael Newton, a junior majoring in government at
Dartmouth College. "At Dartmouth, it's not that cool to be
intellectual. It's much cooler to be outdoorsy. At Yale, my friends say
it's cooler to be urban trendy."
Sports aren't the only culprit
At public universities, much of the blame for anti- intellectualism
tends to be laid on big-money sports programs.
Murray Sperber, a professor at Indiana University, says a
"beer-and-circus culture" has permeated much of public higher
education, often substituting for solid intellectual growth among
undergraduates. He traces this phenomenon, in part, to an attitude
prevalent in society that college is merely a means to a well-paid job.
"It's always anti-intellectual when the most important thing in life is
making money," Dr. Sperber says.
And it's not just an issue at big-time sports schools. Some may be
surprised to realize that anti-intellectualism is also rearing its head
in the Ivy League.
Take the "nerd" label. In a column in the Daily Princetonian, Prof.
John Fleming recently opined that "even at Princeton, one will
frequently hear echoes of a national culture that rewards people with
an undisguised passion for knowledge and exact intellectual application
with such appellations as nerd, geek and wonk."
Princeton students' open letter
Some students and faculty recently raised concerns about what they see
as a paucity of intellectual ferment at the Princeton, N.J., campus.
"There seems to be a widespread belief that intellectual life in the
classroom and in the dorms, colleges, and clubs is not what it should
be," wrote the Undergraduate University Council in an open letter to
the president Sept. 30.
"This problem of a lackluster intellectual culture manifests itself in
various ways and in all aspects of undergraduate life."
Signed by 11 student leaders, the letter calls for an investigation
into what has weakened intellectualism on campus. One suspect, the
letter says, is a prevalent "work hard, play hard" mentality that leads
to "a strict dichotomy between structured, resume-building
extracurricular activities and activities that provide a mindless
release."
One Princeton professor, quoted in the open letter, jokes that faculty
office hours are so underutilized they provide "the best time for
solitary meditation."
In the face of such criticism, some observers caution that it would be
a mistake to believe there was ever a "golden age" of intellectualism
on campus.
The "gentleman's C," for instance, was acceptable at elite universities
in decades past. When Woodrow Wilson was president of Princeton
(1902-1910), he introduced "precepts" - small discussion groups that
are still part of the structure today - designed to improve the level
of intellectual discourse.
But even these discussions now sometimes end up being "uninspiring" and
"underwhelming," the letter says.
If students see their degrees as just credentials for jobs, they
decide, "Hey, if it's not going to be graded, why study for it?" says
Jason Navarino, a junior at Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public
and International Affairs.
In one of his precepts, the moderator would check a student's name off
once he or she had participated in the discussion. "You had to speak at
least once.... After they said something intelligent, everyone just sat
back," Mr. Navarino says.
Objections to the anti-intellectual label
Already the letter may have accomplished what it intended. A faculty
committee is examining the problem. And a hot campus debate has ensued,
with many complaining the letter unfairly tars Princeton students as
"anti-intellectual." It's something Joshua Anderson, one of the
signers, is quick to deny.
"There's nothing bordering on an anti-intellectual culture at
Princeton, and nobody frowns on intellectual pursuits," he says. "But
there is an intense concern over what we'll be doing after graduation.
Will you be making a lot of money or changing the world? ... Sometimes
general intellectual pursuits fall by the wayside."
Some at Princeton aren't so quick to dismiss the idea that there may be
a problem of anti-intellectualism by omission.
"It's possible to have kids who are very bright, capable, and
hardworking, who are not necessarily intellectual in terms of being
inquisitive, part of the life of the mind, in pursuit of knowledge for
its own sake," says Aaron Friedberg, a professor at the Woodrow Wilson
School.
"It's true that there is less of that kind of interest than you might
hope for and want to see at a place like Princeton."
Deference to authority was another concern mentioned in the open
letter. Princeton professors were quoted as saying that students were
"disconcertingly comfortable with authority" or rarely challenged what
a professor said.
"America is not a deeply intellectual culture," says Anthony Grafton, a
history professor at Princeton. "[Intellectualism] is a countercultural
value, not one that most people embrace. It's not what life in the
suburbs is about, and most of our wonderfully bright students come from
a well-off suburb."
'No reflection time' at Harvard
The challenge to reexamine intellectual culture spans far beyond
Princeton.
For students with packed schedules on many elite campuses, dinnertime
and weekends are more for blowing off steam than for discussing Ovid's
"Metamorphoses" or lessons that the Yuan Dynasty might hold for modern
globalization.
The Chronicle of Higher Education hosted a vigorous online debate in
2001 about whether most colleges were overlooking the way students
ignore campus intellectual life.
At the center of the discussion was an article by Duke University's
Prof. Stuart Rojstaczer entitled, "When Intellectual Life is Optional
for Students."
"The hardest thing for students at Duke - and at most elite
institutions - is getting in," he wrote. "Once admitted, a smart
student can coast, drink far too much beer, and still maintain a B+
average."
At Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass., the undergraduate curriculum
is undergoing a top-to-bottom review.
The rich mix of lectures outside of class do seem well attended, but
the hectic pace can sometimes work against deeper learning, says Sujean
Lee, president of Harvard's undergraduate council.
"There is no reflection time whatsoever," says the senior biology
major. "I don't even account for reflection in my schedule. The fact
that I don't even think there needs to be reflection time is telling
what values are at Harvard. I have a journal I rarely write in."
Many students seem to think they gain more from their extracurricular
activities than from their classes, she adds.
For Hrabowski at UMBC, anti-intellectualism in higher education was
summed up perfectly in the response to a recent speech he gave to a
group of academics.
"I was making the case that universities should be celebrating the
student who is accomplishing a lot in English literature as much, or
more, than the student who's a great basketball player," he says.
"Well, when I said that, they just laughed. They laughed! That's the
problem we face."
* E-mail claytonm@csmonitor.com
The interplay of sports and smarts
Intercollegiate sports can have a corrosive effect on educational
values, even on elite campuses. That's the thesis of "The Game of
Life," a seminal book coauthored in 2001 by William Bowen, a former
president of Princeton University.
But there's an active debate about how responsible sports are for what
some see as an intellectual culture that's not living up to its
potential at Princeton.
"Princeton does have a big-time sports culture," says history professor
Anthony Grafton. "We actually have a much bigger proportion of
recruited athletes than many people think. Athletics pose a
challenge.... They do pull a lot of the energy away from students and
what they may be doing in class."
English professor John Fleming has been writing a regular column for
Princeton's student newspaper about the intellectual climate on campus.
A former athlete, he enjoys campus sports, but notes misplaced
priorities among some athletes on campus.
"When I meet someone at Princeton who says, 'I'm here to row,' I just
figure, well, nobody should be here who isn't here to get a great
education first and foremost," Dr. Fleming says.
Some students, however, are circumspect about the issue.
"I don't know whether athletics is a problem or not," says Jason
Navarino, who is majoring in political science. "But there always seems
to be the right number of running backs on the football team."
Dane Claussen, a professor at Point Park College in Pittsburgh, Pa.,
points to the NCAA's recent push for reform, which began in the early
1990s, as recognition of the problem of anti-intellectualism.
"It's kind of funny that athletics got a free ride on campus - so
little scrutiny, for so long," he says. "I think, though, that with all
the sports scandals on campus in the last few years, people are
beginning to get a better picture of how the tail is wagging the dog."
In at least one place, though, the "big man on campus" is more likely
to be a bespectacled chess player than a burly football player.
The chess team at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, has
cheerleaders, pep rallies, and road trips. It's a winning team of
intellectual athletes - complete with nicknames like the "Hammer From
Alabama."
The team's star is Alex "the Invincible" Onischuk, a hero to the
nose-in-the-books set on campus. A 26-year-old Russian grand master,
Mr. Onischuk once played Gary Kasparov, the world's top player, to a
draw.
The school has sports teams, but it's the chess team that gets the most
attention, just the way President Freeman Hrabowski likes it.
"In my mind, we spend much too much time overemphasizing athletics and
underemphasizing intellectual activity," he says. "We wanted to focus
on the life of the mind in a proactive way."
(c) Copyright 2003 The Christian Science Monitor. All rights reserved.
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