The Chronicle of Higher Education's Career
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Wednesday, September 8, 2004
Teaching the 101
By DAVID D. PERLMUTTER <mailto:firstperson@chronicle.com>
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Call it the uncodified status hierarchy of the academy: The less
interaction you have with undergraduates, the higher your prestige as a
professor.
That attitude is common at research universities that describe
themselves as "elite" or "flagship." A colleague at an Ivy League
university told me that the year before his retirement the undergraduate
classes voted him "teacher of the year." His comment: "Lucky for me, I
was on my way out: It would have hurt my career if I won that kind of
award as an assistant professor."
Another senior professor at a top research university put it more
bluntly to me: "I do anything to avoid sophomores: Real professors don't
teach undergraduates."
Of course, nobody can come right out and say that publicly. All
universities need to assure parents, alumni, and legislators that
"teaching is our highest priority," even when, structurally, teaching
undergraduates is little regarded and undervalued.
Unfortunately junior professors are quickly caught up in this culture of
avoidance. Many assume that their career arc is to teach more and more
graduate seminars and eventually to never meet an undergraduate save the
ones that serve lunch at the Faculty Club.
I disagree, and luckily, I teach at a university that still believes
undergraduate teaching is essential -- and not a sideshow -- to the
mission of higher education.
The central symbol of this controversy for me is "101." When I tell
research-oriented colleagues on other campuses that I enjoy teaching the
"intro" survey course, I get one of two reactions -- and I'm not sure
which is more disapproving.
On the one hand, some fellow teachers shoot me a sly wink and say
something like, "Oh, yes, that's the fun course." The not so subtle
imputation: You teach it because it's easy and nontaxing.
The other response I get is a raised eyebrow and a chortle accompanied
by a line like, "Really? Are you still doing that?" Implication: Intro
classes are for adjuncts and teaching assistants; when you get tenure,
when you become a "real" scholar, you put away childish curricula.
Why is an introductory course beneath the dignity of the tenured set? Is
there something wrong with me for wanting to teach it? What defense can
I offer besides personal whimsy?
After talking with colleagues, administrators, and students, I've come
to the conclusion that the intro course is held in low regard and that
teaching one is judged as low prestige for several structural and
psychological reasons -- all of which make sense for the individual
professor sniffing up his nose at the task of teaching a 101 course.
But at the same time, education needs us on the front lines of
undergraduate teaching, not just in the grottoes of high-level seminars
and colloquia. Having tenured, research-oriented professors teach
introductory courses is good for the students, good for our
institutions, good for education in general, and also, I think, good for
us. Let me make the case.
The administrative argument for why tenured professors at research
universities should teach the intro course is unambiguous: Young minds
should be ushered through the basic concepts, terms, boundaries,
debates, and history of a field by qualified experts.
While it is absolutely true that doctoral students may know those
subjects, they do not have the depth of experience and authority that
comes with years of long interaction with the topics. An analogy here
may help: If your children were visiting a foreign country, whom would
you rather have as their tour guide: a newcomer or a long-time native?
Administrators also offer an important public-relations argument for our
teaching the introductory course. Going back as far as Socrates' time,
scholars have never felt fully appreciated by the society in which they
live.
Perhaps there was no golden age, for even in the 1950s when Paul F.
Lazarsfeld, Wagner Thielens, Jr., and David Riesman constructed a
profile of "the academic mind" (based on 2,400 interviews on 165 college
campuses), they found that "the academic men and women covered by our
study felt that they were not especially appreciated by the outside
world."
Being unesteemed may have something to do with self-imposed isolation
from the taxpayers and legislators and businesspeople who pay most of
our salaries. Yes, society should support a life of the mind, but unless
we are willing to spend at least part of our time engaging the youngest
sons and daughters of the republic, then we will never completely have
their confidence that we're not just having a solipsistic good time at
their expense.
It's simply a smart move for the future of the business to publicize our
relevance.
But if we make only an administrative case here, then obviously most of
us will consider the teaching of 101 courses to be little more than a
grudging good-citizenship duty, and will continue our uncamouflaged
avoidance strategies. So it's worth arguing that this is good for us as
scholars, too.
Preparing to teach an entry-level course can help us clarify our
thoughts about our field. We encounter new audiences who have little
inkling, and may even harbor misconceptions, about topics to which we
have devoted our lives. It's quite easy for research specialists to
become hypnotized by our own agendas, and to find our prejudices and
prescriptions reified and fetishized by a narrow cohort of fellow
specialists.
Perhaps it's beneficial to encounter young people who, as in the story
of the emperor's new clothes, may ask us questions -- in class or during
office hours -- that set us to thinking about our basic assumptions.
What does it mean, for example, when my students reach conclusions
completely different from mine about a text, and miss the ones that I
see as self-evident? Don't we all need to have a young, bright mind say
"I don't get it" to our faces regularly?
Also, rather than an exercise in dumbing down or oversimplifying,
teaching the intro class forces me to explain and justify what I do more
clearly. I have often wondered, sitting in academic conference sessions,
whether our jargon helps us to understand one another, or instead limits
us to safe conceptual categories.
A colleague admitted to me that once, while he was teaching an
entry-level class, he was trying to explain a complicated concept and
could see from the glazed expressions of the freshmen and sophomores
that, for all intents and purposes, he might have been speaking Hittite.
"My inclination was to blame them for not understanding me, but the more
I thought about it, I didn't understand me," he confessed.
Teaching an intro course also allows us to step back and get a
forest-eye view of our field's past, present, and future, however
specialized. Every time I teach an entry-level course, I have to renew
my acquaintance with certain areas of the discipline in which I
officially have a doctorate. Then I have to put all of that knowledge in
some sort of order, into digestible categories, and map out the
evolutions, revolutions, major players, controversies, and patterns of
research and theory.
Another colleague argues that "teaching the basic course is harder for
me than teaching a seminar in my own area -- there's more to learn and
relearn. It's not a no-brainer by any means."
For me, introducing others to my field reintroduces me to myself and
what affects my own studies.
Finally, teaching the young rejuvenates us. I know very well -- because
I sat in their classes when I was an undergraduate -- that there are
stale old folks out there who have become bored with their 101 material,
haven't updated their transparencies since the Nixon administration, and
are obviously simply whittling the hours until emeritus.
But for many others in the middle and the twilight of our careers,
having to challenge young minds should and can be an exciting journey.
Spending a semester with 200 18-year-olds can operate as an anti-aging
tonic.
I'd be misrepresenting the enterprise if I didn't note that in one sense
the naysayers are right: For me teaching 101 is fun. I enjoy having to
figure out how to captivate (or at least keep awake) the overstimulated
and distracted modern student. I want very much to "sell" the
fascinations and joys of my field to them. That's the real thing; that's
what real professors should do.
David D. Perlmutter is an associate professor of mass communication at
Louisiana State University and a senior fellow at the Reilly Center for
Media & Public Affairs
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Received on Wed Sep 8 10:20:37 2004
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