Michael A. Peters - Philosopher of Education

Michael A. Peters, philosopher of education, brings a critical voice to the field of educational theory. Peters, whose own training was in the analytic philosophical tradition, became disenchanted with it and took up perspectives that include continental approaches (i.e. Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, Foucault, Derrida, Heiddger) as well as a strong post-colonial awareness of indigenous rights, wisdom and voice.
Recently, Taylor & Francis Online have made five essays from the him available for free. The articles by Peters explore "aspects of Wittgenstein's thought." They can be accessed here. Anyone interested in the philosophy of education would do well to become acquainted with Peter's wide ranging works. His insights on neoliberalism are particularly salient.

Napolitano: Online Education Isn't Silver Bullett

The year is 2080. Janice Neapolitan, head of the Free University of California, speaking at the Public Politick Institute, delivered biting criticism of California Governor Brownie's claims that face-to-face instruction is the "silver bullet" for education.

Neapolitan argued that not everyone can learn with other people. Classroom situations, which require human-to-human interaction, could be places of bullying at worst and stress at best. Instructor actions, though usually not intentional, are known to show favoritism to some students and are prejudiced against others. Neapolitan mentioned heart rending cases of children who raised their hand, only to not have been called on, because the instructor preferred some other child. "Research shows that children with excessive pimples, or obese children, usually aren't selected as class presidents. With the computer, everyone can be a star!" Neapolitan spoke at length of the beauty of the computer, which has helped humanity overcome bias. Governor Brownie refused to comment. For more info on this, click here.

Liberal Arts Under Fire - University of Maine Test Case

The situation at University of Southern Maine raises a number of interesting questions: first, is there a trend in higher education to cut the liberal arts and social sciences (see: "Study finds that liberal arts are disappearing' - here)? Secondly, will the public allow departments to be axed (professors lay offs)? Will academics and students lock arms in solidarity to defend a vision of higher education that appears to be under attack? Is higher education, mimicking the corporate neoliberal paradigm / corporate-work culture in America, sacrificing the workers (teachers / staff) while top administrator pay increases (click here to view college president salaries)?  

On March 15, 2014 the Portland Press Herald reported that: "The University of Southern Maine should cut four majors and lay off as many as 50 faculty and staff to help close a $14 million budget gap in 2014-15, USM President Theodora Kalikow said Friday...On Friday, Kalikow proposed eliminating the American and New England Studies, Geosciences and Recreation and Leisure Studies majors at the Portland and Gorham campuses, and the Arts and Humanities major at the Lewiston-Auburn College, which is part of USM." here

In commenting on USM's cuts, Paul Krugman suggested that the university "seems eager to downsize liberal arts and social sciences for reasons that go beyond money." here

Bob Caswell, a university spokesman, said that while the bulk of the recent layoffs are in the liberal arts college, the administration believes arts and humanities are still at the core of any education.

"I understand where the faculty are coming from," he said, "but in terms of claims we are trying to gut the arts and humanities -- I know it feels that way -- but it just isn't the case." here

However, Susan Feiner, economics professor at USM, says that administrators' claims that they were forced to hand out mass layoffs are suspect. The University of Maine system received an AA- bond rating from Standard & Poor, which she describes as the "the fourth highest rating possible," in an article in The Portland Press Herald.  Furthermore, over the past six years, the University of Maine system has increased unrestricted net assets by $100 million, and in 2013 the total reserves of the system reached $283 million, Feiner points out." here

During the past few days "students, faculty, and staff protested by taking over part of a university building last Friday. A few days—and sit-ins and walk-outs—later, their continued mobilization against the "national corporate war on public education" appears to be resonating with students and university workers across the country...Over 100 students and faculty responded Friday by staging an occupation of the law building that houses the Provost's office—lining the hallway that faculty were forced to walk through to receive their layoff letters." here and here

"Meanwhile, faculty firings have taken place across the seven universities in the Maine system, with 520 faculty and staff positions cut since 2007 and plans to lay-off 165 faculty and staff this year, according to Inside Higher Ed."1 here

If the situation at USM isn't just an issue limited to Maine, then perhaps it's time that we had a national discussion about the purpose of higher education along with an international debate about merits/dangers of neoliberalism.

NASA funded study: Industrial Civilization Headed for Irreversible Collapse

Does anyone actually believe that we are educating today's children and young adults for the world that they will inherit?

A number of studies "have warned that the convergence of food, water and energy crises could create a 'perfect storm' within about fifteen years." here

KPMG Study: "By 2030, significant changes in global production and consumption, along with the cumulative effects of climate change, are expected to create further stress on already limited global resources. Stress on the supply of these resources directly impacts the ability of governments to deliver on their core policy pillars of economic prosperity, security, social cohesion and environmental sustainability."

The UK Government Office of Science warns that:

It is predicted that by 2030 the world will need to produce 50 per cent more food and energy, together with 30 per cent more available fresh water, whilst mitigating and adapting to climate change. This threatens to create a ‘perfect storm’ of global events.

The Guardian reports that:

"A new study sponsored by Nasa's Goddard Space Flight Center has highlighted the prospect that global industrial civilisation could collapse in coming decades due to unsustainable resource exploitation and increasingly unequal wealth distribution." 

2050 WORLD FOOD INSECURITY

"The world’s population is expected to hit 9 billion people by 2050, which, coupled with the higher caloric intake of increasingly wealthy people, is likely to drastically increase food demand over the coming decades."  UN Warns World Must Produce 60% More Food by 2050 to Avoid Mass Unrest

See UN Report here

2050 Framework is dedicated to re-conceptualizing education based on the realities that youth will face by mid-century.

The Future of Adjunct Teaching

Lawrence S. Wittner, in his article "Inequality on Campus," informs us that:

Some of the nation’s poorest people work at higher educational institutions, and many of them are members of the faculty...These underpaid educators are adjunct faculty, who now comprise an estimated 74 percent of America’s college teachers. Despite advanced degrees, scholarly research experience, and teaching credentials, they are employed at an average of $2,700 per course. Even when they manage to cobble together enough courses to constitute a full-time teaching load, that usually adds up to roughly $20,000 per year -- an income that leaves many of them and their families officially classified as living in poverty. Some apply for and receive food stamps. 

The problem with working as an adjunct is not only the low remuneration.  Adjunct instructors are usually dehumanized (e.g. photos not included on departmental websites), disrespected by full-time faculty (e.g. given a syllabus and textbooks to use, or invited to workshops where "adjuncts can be good teachers too" themes abound), and subjected to a campus culture where they have absolutely no voice and are often seen as a cost saving embarrassment.

What can be done? First, it's imperative that full-time faculty recognize adjunct instructors as stakeholders and include them in departmental decisions concerning course offerings. Secondly, campuses should recognize excellent instruction among adjuncts in the same way that excellence is recognized among full-time faculty. Third, perhaps it's time that universities pry open the coffers and ensure that adjunct instructors do not end up living a life of poverty. How can this be done, other than paying a higher per class fee?

Adjunct instructors could be encouraged to apply for program coordinator and director positions, running programs that link students to internship opportunities, etc. They could work closely with the grants office to pursue and manage foundation, State and Federal grant funded programs. They could lead the institution's efforts to broaden its outreach beyond its immediate campus borders (e.g. organizing and taking students into impoverished inner city school to provide remedial tutoring, big brother/big sister activities, SAT test prep, etc.).

It should be remembered that not all adjuncts are lifers who were passed by and unable to secure full-time positions, as the prejudice often goes. Many young faculty on the to "promising" careers start out as adjuncts; and many individuals work as professionals in other fields, bringing real-world knowledge,  skills and connections that full-time faculty simply don't have. But even those who are full-time adjuncts, working at several institutions at a time, could serve an interesting purpose. As they come to know the inner workings of different institutions and departments, they could serve the purpose of "cross-pollinators," carrying knowledge of best practices from one institution to another, if only they were valued.

Finally, with MOOCs set to put adjuncts out of business, it's time that the academy rethink its use of individuals who have gone through the pipeline from Freshman to terminal degree, lest that pipeline itself become imperiled.

   

William James, Herbert Spencer and the Dilemma of Peeing Dogs

Brussels, Belgium

Newport Beach, California

William James once wrote, regarding Herbert Spencer's theory that the human brain is like clay, and that it is impressed and absorbs the influences around it, that: 

"a race of dogs bred for generations, say in the Vatican, would have characters of visual shape, sculptured in marble, presented to their eyes, in every variety of form and combination," and the result of generations of dogs bred and raised in an environment rich in art, would make them "dissociate and discriminate before long the finest shades of these particular characters. In a word, they would infallibly become, if time were given, accomplished connoisseurs of sculpture."

But James argues, based on his own observations of his dog, that this probably won't happen. Instead, our Vatican bred dogs would remain interested - connoisseurs - of who peed on which statue.

Perhaps as educators we can sympathize with those, hypothetical trainers in the Vatican who have spent their lives hoping their dogs would come to appreciate the fine art around them, only to watch them raise their legs or run exuberantly to the next statue to check out who among them had left their mark. This is not to say that we all haven't observed several students have an "ah ha!" moment. And most educators will tell you that that moment is what they wait for as teachers.

But let's take up the problem and turn it towards pedagogy. If Spencer is right, then simply dropping students in an environment rich in culture, art, history, etc. should form the mind. But James tells us that there is fundamentally something more that is going on here. For James it is an underlying "interest" of the mind towards its object, not the object, that fosters the connoisseur. So, how do we inspire that "interest" in our students? And what stands behind the interest? Where does the interest come from? For James "mind" involves the relation of the "inner" to the "outer. Mind "contains all sort of laws - those of infancy, of wit, of taste, decorum, beauty, morals and so forth, as well as perception of fact."

I think we need to move away from a simple behaviorist model that we can change "mind" by rigging the learning environment in a certain fashion. Instead, a holistic education, that incorporates aesthetic judgments, and asks students to grapple with moral issues (historical as well as contemporary), and to contemplate metaphysics (the meaning of life and our place in the universe), and an education system that extends outwards into the community and incorporates parents, neighborhoods, etc. is the only chance we have to foster an "ah ha" moment for our students and help some to "lower the leg."