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Campus Scenes
Who Is College Material?
Several years ago, I discovered a curious phenomenon among the diverse freshmen in the developmental English classes I teach. These are students who fail the placement exam and are forced to take a reading and writing refresher course before moving on to basic composition. In one of their grammar exercises, the name Charles Lindbergh appears. What I discovered was that roughly 90% of the developmental students didn't know who he was.
That in itself would be unremarkable. More remarkable was the fact that when I mentioned the name to my honors students, roughly 90% knew that Lindbergh was a pilot, and the majority correctly identified him as the first man to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean.
Afterwards, I joked with colleagues about scrapping our entire English placement procedure and just asking students, as they registered, to identify Charles Lindbergh. If they couldn't, they'd be placed in developmental English.
But the Lindbergh phenomenon highlights a more serious deficit. Eight decades ago, Charles Lindbergh was perhaps the most famous human being on the planet. He's part of the cultural ether. Even if there's no need to know who he was, it's virtually impossible to grow up in America and never hear his name. It's a point of reference in newspaper and magazine articles, movies and documentaries, television shows, songs, even old cartoons.
In all likelihood, therefore, the developmental students had heard the name Charles Lindbergh. It's just that 90% never cared enough to follow through. They never looked him up in a reference book or on the web. They never asked their parents or teachers. They just shrugged and went on with their lives.
After more than 25 years teaching at the City University and State University of New York, I've come to the counterintuitive conclusion that the single greatest predictor of whether a student will succeed or fail in college is not what he knows when he graduates from high school but what he wants to know when he graduates from high school. Intellectual curiosity is more determinative than high test scores or good work habits because it precedes them -- indeed, it causes them. The desire to know just for the sake of knowing, to pick up random facts and start drawing connections in your mind, is the hallmark of the lifetime learner.
Another example: With the recent resignation of Van Jones, President Obama's "Green Jobs Czar," the word "czar" has been in the news. Indeed, the President has been criticized for naming too many "czars" -- high level officials appointed, without congressional approval, to oversee different aspects of Administration policy. There's a Terrorism Czar, an Energy Czar, an Information Czar, a Drug Czar, a TARP Czar, an Economic Czar, a Stimulus Czar, a Health Czar, a Guantanamo-Closure Czar, a Mideast Policy Czar, a Mideast Peace Czar…and roughly 20 more.
In other words, you hear the word czar a lot if you pay even the slightest attention to current events.
It's an odd word. Not many English words start with a c-z. High school students should of course recognize that it's borrowed from the Russian title for emperor, also spelled "Tsar." It might also remind them of the German title, "Kaiser." The fact that the Russian and German words for emperor sound so much alike is no coincidence; both are derived from the name Julius Caesar, the Roman general and later dictator whose empire stretched from Europe to North Africa to the Middle East.
The many ways Caesar's conquests and policies influenced the history of region is not trivia; the ripple effects are still felt today. The death of Caesar is the basis for one of Shakespeare's greatest plays. Mentions of Caesar's exploits are rampant in highbrow, middlebrow, and lowbrow culture. These are references which every historically literate high school graduate should get, which any intellectually curious high school graduate would get, but which many actual high school graduates, I'm sad to report, don't get.
That lack of basic knowledge is not necessarily calamitous. Basic knowledge can be acquired, even at the college level. The more critical problem is the high percentage of high school graduates who will read about the connection between Caesar and Kaiser and Czar and think, "Who the hell cares?"
In other words, you can teach facts. You can teach skills. But you can't teach intellectual curiosity. If students haven't caught the bug after twelve years of elementary and secondary school, if they don't prize knowledge for its own sake, nothing their college professors do or say is going to remedy that lack.
The phrase "college material" has an antiquated sound. That's not such a bad thing, on the one hand, since it reeks of a time when women and ethnic minorities were kept out of elite universities by gentlemen's agreements. On the other hand, students who enter a degree-granting college with core-curriculum requirements who don't possess even a cursory measure of intellectual curiosity are, in the long run, only wasting their time.
They're not college material.
Comments
Leave a Comment
Josh Price| 9.28.09 @ 9:41AM
Finally someone makes this point.
I've never been a proponent of using test scores as the chief predictor of academic success at the collegiate level. Intellectual curiosity is most definitely a better predictor.
Knowledge cannot be created without the desire to learn. If you hear or read something you don't understand, look it up. To this day if I don't know the meaning of a word or a colloquialism, or whatever, I'll either look it up immediately or make a note to do so later.
You're right, Professor Goldblatt, if people only had the desire to learn the origins and meaning of "czar" there would likely be much more outrage. People just have no desire to learn about history. It's sad, but true.
Josh Price
theconservativebeacon.net
jerryofva| 9.28.09 @ 9:58AM
The SAT is a poor indicator of actual knowledge. The ACT is a much better test. It measures what the student actually knows in four key areas. This correlates well with intelectual curiosity. I bet that if the Ivy's used the ACT instead of the SAT then the composition of their student body would undergo significant change.
Jerry S| 9.28.09 @ 11:23AM
Jerryofva,
Actually there would be little difference if colleges switched to the ACT. SAT and ACT scores correlate very closely.
http://professionals.collegebo.....1_3913.pdf
One also has to ask whether intellectual curiosity is truly an independent variable ... or largely a marker for something else. It is possible that this characteristic likewise correlates with academic ability. (IMO it is quite likely).
jerryofva| 9.28.09 @ 1:03PM
Having read the article I may have been generalizing my and few friends experience from 40+ years ago where I scored a little over 1200 on the SAT and did not miss a question on 3 of 4 ACT parts. I had many classmates who outperformed there SAT scores on the ACT.
One can argue that most students took the SAT only once back then because they were bound for Midwestern, usually Big Ten schools, and really didn't care about the SAT since at the time these schools did not accept the SAT for admissions. Perhaps we all would have done better if we had taken it three or four times the way students do now. Of course both test were much harder back then.
jerryofva| 9.28.09 @ 1:05PM
I know the difference between their and there and I didn't proof read. I will admit that the test that I didn't get a perfect score in was English
Lullaby's, Legends and Lies| 9.28.09 @ 9:56AM
The old Jay Leno's bit on the Tonight Show (Jaywalking), is a perfect example of what you're talking about here. Sometimes Jay goes on campus, to interview college students for this gig And some of their answers to his most trivial American History questions are, hilarious at best, and yet completely shocking at the same time, when you think about the fact, that these students will one day be America's future leaders . It's really sad to think, that they are really that dumb, but it might just be true.
And the, “Who the hell cares about Julius Caesar” syndrome, that is so ramped today? Well it just seems like nobody has the time anymore for anything other than TV and video games. Read a book you say? Are you kidding me? No way!! It's too old fashioned, and boring, and I might learn something by mistake if I did. So if you want them to learn about Julius Caesar today? Well turn Caesar into a video game, and the kids today will take over Gaul in less than an hour. Unfortunately for them, they still won't learn anything about history in the end, but they will have killed a few hours in the end.
Zach| 9.28.09 @ 2:24PM
Now, let's not be too hard on video games. It was Rome: Total War that launched me into a real interest of Roman history. While not completely accurate, the depictions of the factions and strategies were very good and engrossing. Not every game is going to do that, but for me, I needed Rome: Total War to point me toward Suetonius.
Zach| 9.28.09 @ 2:25PM
And actually, I learned about Charles Lindbergh by watching Jimmy Stewart in "The Spirit of St. Louis", so there's a point for TV, too. Of course, my curiosity led me to follow through and learn much more about Lindbergh and early aviation pioneers, but for a curious child, TV or video games can provide the spark.
Caped Crusader| 9.28.09 @ 10:27AM
AMEN, AMEN AND AMEN. I am 75 and never intend to stop learning, I am dumbfounded at how few care about ANY learning after receivng an "EDUCATION". I have 3 advanced degrees but some of my best friends and those who know the most are high school grads who never stopped learning on their own.
Ray| 9.28.09 @ 11:04AM
Who is Charles Lindbergh?
Growing up in Minnesota, I learned about Charles Lindbergh at an early age. Well, to be honest, I learned only a few things about Charles Lindbergh at an early age, all positive things. I was never taught about the negative things Charles Lindbergh did, like how he was a Nazi supporter and a fervent anti-war activist prior to the US entry into WWII.
I didn't learn of those things from any actual research, even though I did research and report on Charles Lindbergh for part of a class project, I learned of them through second-hand sources and casual conversations later in life. This is because the things I learned from casual conversation and non-traditional sources were not available in traditional sources, like school supplied books and museum lectures.
All of this brings me up to one point, and that point is: Traditional education is fine if you don't mind a limited knowledge of past events and historical figures, but we need our students to have, and use, ability to gather information that is outside the boundaries of "traditional' education, especially when "traditional" education involves the use of "educational" materials, school supplied and suggested materials, as a source, like college students are expected to use. So, are relying uopn "college material" people, people taught to use "educational" sources as a basis of understanding, really that desirable when selecting college students? Or is it better to admit people who haven't been taught, and are less like to rely upon, "educational" material when understanding history?
Personally, i thing it's better to educate people who don't have a prior "understanding" of things like History so they won't simply rely upon materials selected by an educational institution as a source of research. I'd rather have people who will find their own sources and make their own determinations. If this means that we admit people who don't know, prior to college, who Charles Lindbergh was, so be it. It's far better to be ignorant of certain subjects than to be educated poorly on those subjects. An ignorant man can always learn things anew, but it is VERY difficult to "unlearn" a poorly educated "intelligent" man.
badcrow| 9.28.09 @ 11:25AM
I come from a family of teachers, and I'm continually astonished at what passes for education now in this country. They teach "history" of no importance (the "bottom-up" viewpoint, that de-emphasizes the actions of prominent people and emphasizes the actions of insignificant players.) They no longer teach "longhand" mathematics--only calculator technique. Classic literature is roundly ignored in favor of leftist dogma like, "The Motorcycle Diaries." And some elementary education programs are preparing to eliminate cursive writing entirely! Now if you take all of these things into account, on a timeline that begins with the Federal Government taking over education, it would seem like a plan is afoot to DE-EDUCATE the population, and turn it away from the classic bricollage of Western knowledge that was the well established reference point for functioning in our culture. A society without a common culture will be naturally fractured, and a fractured culture, miseducated to react against strong, critical thinking skills, will be easy pickings for totalitarian control. I don't believe this is coincidental, the "Bill Ayres'" of the world couldn't win the hearts and minds of a correctly educated people, so they infiltrated education itself--to change the collective culture of those they hope to rule. We are now seeing the fruits of this decades long effort.
jerryofva| 9.28.09 @ 1:14PM
As a conservative opponent of our Juan Peron in the making I would like to believe your de-education argument but it is not really supported by historical evidence.
Germany had the most literate and best educated population in Europe and they still went for with the Nazis. I wager that if you compared the educational level and achievement of the Nazi movement to the rest of the German population you will find that they are from the top rank.
In Italy, the Fascist Party was a movement centered in the Italian north which contained the better educated more affluent population of the country.
Totalitarianism is more attractive to the elites then it is to the common man. Fascist "isms" appeal to those who have an innate sense of superiority. That is generally a trait of either sociopaths or the highly educated.
crookedwren| 9.28.09 @ 2:22PM
I agree.
How many times did I hear from otherwise lovely, talented young teachers that George W. Bush was the equivalent of Hitler??? Oh?
If you want to create a ruling elite, you limit the education of the proletariat.
I remember reading in a textbook designed specifically for graduate students in education that a teacher's primary responsibility in the classroom was "social engineering." I'm not kidding. I was horrified. Actually, I tossed the book across the room, crying out, "Who elected me?" (I was forced to take the class -- which I audited.)
When I consider the students who are lionizing the likes of Bill Ayres, I shudder. Students do lionize professors. Think of when the "favorites" get together with Professor Ayres and HIS WIFE at the local hangout. Just imagine how Ayres recounts his early days as a "scholar."
Shudder.
Hank Archer| 9.28.09 @ 11:52AM
How does one measure intellectual curiosity? To me, it's one of those "I know it when I see it" sort of things.
Kevin Killion| 9.28.09 @ 11:52AM
The author gets one major point dead wrong, and another precisely correct.
First, the author assumes that knowledge is actually desired by our nation's schools, saying, "In all likelihood, therefore, the developmental students had heard the name Charles Lindbergh." This makes one wonder if he has actually examined grade school and high school textbooks under the modern rubric of "social studies". It takes only a brief perusal of these glitzy, MTV-like paperweights of politically correct diatribes and America-is-the-root-of-all-evil spin to conclude that teaching of facts is completed out of style today. When a majority of students (in one recent article) couldn't identify who was the first president, then it would be a miracle if they were ever exposed to Charles Lindbergh.
But the author's second point is exactly correct. Take a look at a stack of "education" textbooks, and look in the index for "curiosity". It is mind-bogglingly astonishing how little curiosity is mentioned! Ed school students are given mountains of drivel about all kinds of wacky New-Agey theories, but understanding the role that curiosity plays in learning is all but absent.
The problem is NOT that school teach facts without encouraging curiosity. Rather, the endemic problem is that schools encourage making up opinions out of nothing, without providing a factual basis on which to develop opinions.
Cuffs| 9.28.09 @ 12:53PM
I have always told my daughters:
The more you learn, the more you realize
how much more there is to learn.
One is a veterinary doctor, the
other a website architect.
David Govett| 9.28.09 @ 1:13PM
Judging from my acquaintances over the decades, the single greatest predictor of success is luck: right place, right time.
crookedwren| 9.28.09 @ 2:14PM
I wonder if Lindbergh would have greater recognition amongst college "freshpersons" if he had been something other than a white male American.
In the college classroom, I'm shocked -- for the most part -- by one thing: what high school graduates/incoming college students DON'T EVEN RECOGNIZE.
Each semester the problem seems more difficult to overcome.
Ever read Oedipus Rex? No.
Ever HEARD of it? No.
In what century did the Salem witch trials take place? Not the first clue.
In what century did the Pilgrims land? Where did they land? Double-whammy on that little question. THEY DON'T KNOW.
Then there's the vocabulary. Each semester I am shocked by the words that are nearly lost. This semester the first shocker was the word "efficient." (One student in a class of twenty sort of knew what that one meant.)
True, I am only a lowly adjunct at two small, private colleges. Still, though, these questions don't seem to me to be based on advanced material.
Of course, what is worse than not knowing is that lack of intellectual curiosity. The "so what?" factor -- exhibited by the rolling eyes, the shrug, the intent concentration on the "hidden" blackberry in the lap with the next text coming in -- is tough to take.
These young people face not just local competition for work. They will be competing with workers from around the world.
And we have educational bureaucracies intent on "social engineering" (direct quote from a text designed for those seeking a Masters in Education) and "political correctness" (not to mention "diversity"). Forget that much of advanced education builds upon a cultural construct that demands a reasonably thorough understanding of literature (especially Shakespearean and Biblical references), historical concepts, etc. If students can't read the words, can't decipher the connotation of words, or maneuver through an imbedded metaphor or analogy, how can they stay the course all the way to graduation?
During my years teaching at a small, Appalachian high school, we had an exchange student from Germany who knew more about U.S. history than our own students. She also recognized more subtleties in the language. Allusions were not utterly lost on her.
Please, someone, tell me that my experience is not the common one.
Kevin Killion| 9.28.09 @ 5:02PM
Dear crookedwren,
Sorry to tell you, but yes, your experience IS the common one.
KRB| 9.29.09 @ 2:46PM
I am sorry to say that experience is common. You are also correct in placing the blame on transformation of classrooms into environments of social engineering. Exposing children to the references they will need to decipher advanced literature and concepts has disappeared from education.
Bram| 9.28.09 @ 2:22PM
Many of top students I knew in college were the dullest most incurious people I've ever met. They did well because they never got sidetracked - they simply listened to the professor, read the textbook and regurgitated the information back in papers and tests.
Me – I couldn’t read about Greek history, astronomy, medieval philosophy, or Theravada Buddhism with going off on tangents and doing research unrelated to the class work.
In today’s politically correct atmosphere, too much curiosity and thought is now actively discouraged. Just take your Ritalin and believe us.
Anthony| 9.28.09 @ 3:18PM
With all due respect, I firmly believe you can teach intellectual curiosity and that college is the ideal place for such learning to take place. I was always encouraged in college to read additional source material.The fact that this has sadly been the exception rather than the rule, does not mean it can't be the rule once again. All good teachers inspire the thirst for knowledge, the problem is the good teachers have been replaced by the ideologues.
PersonFromPorlock| 9.28.09 @ 3:25PM
But if intellectually incurious illiterates aren't college material, how will future journalists get their degrees?
Ed| 9.28.09 @ 3:30PM
I teach Anatomy and Physiology courses to pre-nursing and pre-allied health students. What we ultimately try to do is to get the students to "think like a clinician". That is the ability to solve clinical problems that are not "in the book". Some can do it, many cannot. Trust me on this: you want nurses who are able to do this taking care of you and your family members.
My biggest concern about the commercial colleges like U of Phoenix and Kaplan U are their rates for flunking out and dropping out. If the part-time teachers at these institutions are pressured to pass their students (and they are all part-time instructors), watch out for their graduates.
Michael L. Hauschild| 9.28.09 @ 3:48PM
Intellectual curiosity is a behavior, it cannot be “taught.” It can, however, be encouraged by rewarding the individual that exhibits it. The “compliment” is the absolute pinnacle of instruction, recognition is the currency of acquired knowledge.
Sheila| 9.28.09 @ 5:52PM
Sorry, Crookedwren, but the level of aggressive ignorance is appalling out there. My teenage son loathed high school because his classmates were so witless - lots of those A+++ Asian students who regurgitated facts but had zero intellectual curiosity or imagination.
Although I despise what my alma mater has become, I still harbor fond memories of hours spent following winding paths from the card catalogue through the stacks in the library. As for today's students, Alexander Pope still applies: "Drink deep" or go work as government bureaucrat.
Chana Siegel| 9.28.09 @ 11:59PM
As a child, and even as an adolescent, my parents seemed the most witty and broadly informed people I knew. excelled only by a few of their friends. I read widely and kept my antennae up because I wanted to get the jokes and maybe score a few points myself. Most of my peers in high school found this odd, but they, they'd have been miserable failures at our dinner conversations.
HSCC| 9.29.09 @ 10:05AM
I think the following quote is extreamly accurate, not only for collegiate success, but also throughout life.
"...the single greatest predictor of whether a student will succeed or fail in college is not what he knows when he graduates from high school but what he wants to know when he graduates from high school. Intellectual curiosity is more determinative than high test scores or good work habits because it precedes them -- indeed, it causes them. The desire to know just for the sake of knowing, to pick up random facts and start drawing connections in your mind, is the hallmark of the lifetime learner. "
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Watashi| 9.29.09 @ 3:26PM
I once read the difference between intelligent people and the space takers is curiosity. When the intelligent see or hear something they don't know about they google it. It is said all children are curious up to a certain age like 6 or so but the intelligent ones never stop being curious about the world they live in.
Handy| 9.29.09 @ 4:23PM
Dear Mr. Goldblatt.
I would like to point out the obverse. What colleges are "student-ready?"
Seems to me that a lot of institutions aren't teaching facts anymore. They are merely brain-washing.
Linda F| 9.29.09 @ 5:00PM
I teach science in a high school. The curious student is a rarity - most of the "better" students are mind-numbingly dedicated to getting the grades, never mind that they retain little. I find the intellectually curious are just as often poor students.
But, they think - deeply, widely, for fun.
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