To Stop Summer Melt, Whitworth U. Sends Its Mascot on a Quest

In many ways yes. From experience, there are annoyances that contingent faculty have other than lack of pay/benefits and some of those can be resolved in a similar fashion. For example, I knew a lady who was content until someone in the registrar’s office enrolled a student in an overcapacity room against the teacher’s expressed wishes. I gather it was the only time people on campus had seen this person lose their temper, but the overall incident didn’t have to occur.

Good point. The Bible says what we do to the least among us is done unto Jesus (even if you aren’t religious, the basic idea of judging the conduct of others based on how we treat the weak is a good ethical concept). Finding out how the people at the bottom are treated at your institution is the best way to find how your place actually works. Plus, many places have most of the teaching done by adjuncts, so only interviewing FT people would cut out a majority of the teachers.

Well, it certainly looks like every single panel and participant shares a dogmatic commitment to liberal theology in these matters. Would it have killed them to invite a single conservative dissenter?

I guess academics working on highly charged topics of race-class-gender feel a special need to insulate themselves at all times in a bubble of the like-minded, and pretend that it’s disinterested scientific research.

Help me understand, using a disabled (visually impaired) criminal on a skateboard will encourage me (as a parent) to spend $128K on a Whitworth degree?  Not worth a whit!

Give em a break. Obviously they are trying to connect with
their demographic. The complaining here smacks of jealousy.

Looking at their other YouTube videos – they DO produce some quality content, like this: http://youtu.be/4mD1jImrriU

If students like the “silly” video, it didn’t consume extensive resources to produce, and the students choose to follow along on Facebook it has value and can be the first step for more serious engagement. Is it wrong to have any fun in your marketing?

Well said! 

The thing I wonder most about is not the silliness of the video or the idea, or what some people think it might say about the institution. 

As someone who’s been in admissions and enrollment for almost 30 years, I wonder what it says about how people view and understand student choice and affiliation.  To suggest that something like this either solidifies the former or encourages the latter sort of baffles me.

I tried to watch the video–really, I did.  I just couldn’t stay with it, it’s so silly and childish.

Wow — I can’t believe the nastiness of the comments below. I work at Whitworth (not in admissions), and  I just want to say that we do all of the things mentioned below in addition to making inventive videos that get kids involved in their class and their university even before they set foot on campus.  If we were relying on videos like this as our only recruiting tools, we’d certainly have missed the mark. But the videos are fun, effective (check the information on response), and silly enough to please anyone with a sense of humor.  We must be doing something right, since our freshman-to-sophomore retention rate is among the highest in the country and our alums rate us very highly in all of the areas you mention below. Finally, why such disdain? I’m inclined to agree with the person who mentioned jealousy as the motivation for the sheer vindictiveness of some of the responses below. Haters, I’m sure you’ll do something someday that the Chronicle will find interesting. Just keep plugging away!

Teemitch,

I’m with Mallory, I think you’re doing a great job. We just wish more would have been mentioned about the other things you do that made this video a success. 

On the other hand, I am_so_ glad I went to Whitworth.  I was just thinking today that I wish my undergraduate students could be trusted to do the reading and participate in class like my classmates at Whitworth did.  Is this campaign a bit silly?  Sure.  Whitworth can be a silly place, but that’s not a bad thing if you ask me.  It balances out the deep earnestness at the core of the institution and most of its students.  Being able to not take itself seriously all the time is part of what builds the student loyalty that makes Whitworth a great place to grow.  Schools like this aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, but that’s no reason to dismiss them out of hand. 

Before I visited, Whitworth had been an unappealing backup to several other schools.  All those schools admitted me, but a few months later I checked into my dorm room at Whitworth.  I’d say the admissions office must have something going for it to manage a complete change of heart like that.

Western tradition has become ubiquitous because of a general consistency. This consistency allows people to move from country-to-country or institution-to-institution with relative ease. This is one hallmark of globalization.

Within “Western” education there are differences. A review of schools in EUR, AUS, NZ, and the US shows differences in curriculum, expectations, time-to-complete, and even the meaning of PhD. But if I say I have a Bachelors degree everyone in a Western school understands that educational level.
I had a colleague who purported to publish important work with a co-author in Ukrainian journals written in non-English. Fortunately, he was tenured, but it was hard to discern the legitimacy of these efforts. I would never want to decide a hire or tenure based on a model that is non-Western, unless I could get a lot of background information. I feel this is pragmatic and fair for everyone, not xenophobic.

My point is that problems arise at the boundaries of different cultures. It would be an injustice for Western schools to act like we accept a wide range of educational backgrounds but turn down people from these non-Western schools for hiring and graduate schools. Much like currency, there needs to be equivalencies for higher education in order to accommodate globalization.

Colonization is a bit strong. Growth due to standardization is more accurate. Unfortunately, indigenous education seems to be paying the price for this standardization effort.

The writer protests too much. He criticizes without taking the time to understand why other academics would put together such a conference.  It reminds me how some (willfully?) misunderstand Said.  Were the conference participants saying that there was nothing redeeming in western universities?  Probably not.  Give me a break.  The writer trivialized their concerns & goals, making them into a strawman that could be easily sliced down.

The current hobby wars the US is waging in Islamic nations–justified by falsified or hugely mistaken sloppy work—supports the anti-West stuff of this conference.   The people killed by US hobby wars strongly proclaim that colonial interference is alive and well while they themselves are no longer alive (to put it effectively oddly).   That is one pole.

Another pole is the erosion of investigation, methods, publishings, and results wherever people are not forced into them—these complaining nations and academias are rife, immensely rife, with falsified research, publishings, promotions, and the like.  A huge industry throughout East and South Asia of phony conferences, in one nation but all the participants from ONE other nations, created solely to up conference presentation numbers for promotions and to raise international rankings of particular deans, presidents, and schools.   There must be dozens of such phony conferences in Japan alone every year, with no Japanese participation but done by particular non-Japan nations in Asia to up numbers.   The quality of presentations there are absolutely beyond belief.   Most of us would not accept such work from our kids in middle school.   

So we have truth split onto two opposing poles—the conference people are right, Western nations continue to traipse around the world choosing its weakest poorest nations and sending armies in to kill people.   Not very nice.   And the non-conference people are right—the complaining nations of that conference have yet to show a will and capability to meet Western standards of investigation, methods, publishing, and results.   

IF IF IF they had AN OTHER SYSTEM, a different form of higher education that matched or out-performed Western universities, then some real discussing could go on on this matter. BUT they lack an alternative with anything like the same amount of results (half of all children on earth NOT dying before the age of 10 due to vaccines against dozens of diseases for the simplest example).   They lack an alternative with anything like the replicated in all cultures and places and times results of published Western research (to be sure only a fraction of Western research reaches this standard).  They lack an alternative LOYALTY TO TRUTH, beyond family, era, culture, religion, profit—that dream of the 1606 Societe Philosophe in Paris, that ” I am more a citizen of truth than of France”.    They entirely lack that aim, ambitions, and most in fact outlaw that attitude and approach.   

Both poles are right and therefore, the West has a lot to learn and the East has a lot to learn and only he who does not have a glass house in this matter should safely throw stones.   The conference threw stones without taking responsibility for an alternative or improvement in what it denigrated.   Hating the world is easy; improving it is a pain!!!! for us all.  

The conference rather than throwing stones one-sidedly could have made progress by a balanced critique:
1) US phony research, the vast majority of it unread because unreadibly trivial and invalid (correlations are not causation, effects without magnitudes are usually worthless for practice)
2) East Asian research, data chosen and analyzed without literature review or contribution to a dialog among global scholars/publications—data analysis because data is easy and analysis is easy (Kennedy school type stuff)
3) European Giant Overweening Masters—who publish thousands of pages of unsubstantiated opinions STILL–legends in their own minds.
EVERYONE has their own preferred forms of slop, junk, waste, and evil. SO, such a conference COULD have addressed—-
10) WHAT NEW FORM OF RESEARCH gets beyond US phony papers of topics tiny enough to make their pitiful maths work, gets beyond East Asian reasonless data choice and analysis, and gets beyond cosmic scale dumps of European lordly personal opinions?
OKAY what does that job? I want to know. I have failed to solve this myself thus far. A conference on this just might come up with a form of research and international supports for it that overcome Western research phoninesses, East Asia research phoninesses, and European research phoninesses.

Take Chinese medicine in the USA now as a case showing how HARD addressing this question 10 above would be:
The Chinese medicine approach (vastly simplified) is simple–10,000 bee stings not one tipping point (the Western medicine approach is find that one tipping point where slight inputs change whole systems). So you are a small in stature woman with rheumatoid arthritis–the Western approach is extremely purified chemicals that shut down powerful parts of the immune system, saving joints and increasing cancer risk 10 to 40 times above normal (the women die in some other physician’s department so rheumatology appear non-deadly). The chinese case is showing up in 2010 and 2011 much more powerful—women of short stature (or of any of 22 other traits that tilt for this illness) need clean synovial fluid, which requires good blood clearing, which require good functioning livers, which requires great bile flows (the smallness of diameter of that tube in short women causes many to suffer dirty blood etc.). So Western medicine give ONE highly pure chemical to increase bile flow (say by lowering viscosity of the bile)—BUT that purification makes a side-effect magnified, that kills the women (eventually). The Chinese approach is five different medicines each of which increases bile flow by slightly different mechanisms, and each is given in herbal form, not highly purified, so side-effects are slight AND since each of the 5 has different side-effects, NO final harm is done by the treatment. The NIH has sat on this data for over 8 years while British and Canadian practitioners and scholars get deeply excited about and pay for testing of it on patient populations. Those interested can write me for the leading NIH publication practitioner of the Chinese approach—he has 18,000 patients in East Asia and is 80 years old but still publishes in NIH journals twice or so a year—amazing person.

All I am saying is:
in a matter of life and death
for tens of millions of women in the Western world
the West holds onto its preferred form of solution, while it manifestly does harm and cures not
the West finds continual excuses and delays for the Eastern 10,000 bee stings approach.

So East and West may both be right and both be wrong, but they have NOT show a lot of ability or will to learn from each other.

Well thank goodness for people like Ben Wildavsky who knows better than those silly-speaking people who don’t know what’s truly good for themselves. 

Mr. Wildavsky is correct to point out that the Western model of education should not be considered as “colonial academic oppression” – such a theme is absurd. Yet, as with all things, we should also not become narcissistic about our own systems. Perhaps there are some elements elsewhere that would lend themselves to some kind of “fusion academics”. We have to be careful that we don’t start saying “you’re either with us or against us” and that goes for all: North,South,West，East. A lot also depends on context and what is taught.

I have to say I enjoyed the smugness of the author’s assertion about the obvious preeminence of the Western University over other possible educational model.

It reminds me of the way the West approaches (and as always) approached other cultures in general. We define the playing field, set up the rules of engagement, bemoan the fact that the rest of the world doesn’t understand what’s good for them, celebrate the few who have adopted a “if you can’t win, join them” attitude as progressive beacons of enlightened understanding, castigate those who resist as backwards-looking reactionaries, and go home pleased with ourselves with yet another display of our innate superiority.

Nothing new under the sun. If Barthes were alive today, he would have a field day.

Actually, the exact opposite policy would have a far more beneficial effect on our society. Let parents allow their children to drop out at whatever age they choose. Of course, that would require
parental responsibility, which is in short supply in the U.S.!

I beg your pardon.  Keep kids in school to provide jobs for teachers?  Like we keep more people in jail to provide jobs for prison guards?  Sorry, but your last sentence made your whole proposal sound callous.
 
Our students are not mice to be experimented upon, nor “precious resources” to be refined for the good of society.  Nor are they “our future.”  They are human beings who, after a dozen or so years of being told what to do, generally want to start making some decisions for themselves.  (Especially if what the adults have decided up to that point hasn’t worked out so well for them.)

Alternative high school options that combine traditional high school classes while creating
career centers that train students for specific jobs is the real answer.  If such programs were
well co-ordinated so that the practical training of the career centers, applied the math and made use
of the writing and comprehension skills from the traditional high school classes, students would
see the relevance and be more inclined to stay in school and graduate.
Of course this would take funding, newer facilities that match today’s needs and outstanding
teachers and curriculum development.  Someone must have a vision for the future. 
What a thought!  Someone has to care.

Maybe we can turn all those drop outs into Soylent Green.

Part of our problem – collectively – is that we accept that meaningless, painful, and demeaning experiences comprise our legitimate expections for life and work. Thus, high school, which too many students experience as I described, must be endured as the appropriate preparation for success (read survival) in the workplace.

I, fortunately, had many positive experiences in high school; these outweighted the negative ones. However, many students find nothing to compensate for the prison-like environment of many high schools. High school students are children in the process of becoming adults. Until we respond to this reality (and the horrid family and social environments that surround many of them) we can expect many of these children to escape into the wasteland that they consider superior to their shool environments.

I agree, students should graduate; however, you can lead the horse to the water, but you can not make him drink.  In Kentucky, they will “Pull” the driver license of any student under 18 that is failing too many classes.  That can cause a problem when a 17 year old student, in the seventh grade, is allowed to play middle-school football (barely enough passing grades) and drive to the games.  Yes, he did drop out when he turned 18.  He was a bully in school and he gave the teachers hell for 2 years.  He should have been allowed to quit at 16.  I am sure that there are others like him in the country.

Isn’t eduaction a strong weapon for holding some people down while lifting others in any civilized society? What happens if the masses are uneducated and can’t find a job? Will the rich and so-called “middle-class” feel secured? Doesn’t the impact of keeping people at schools outweigh the option to drop out?

This is a very good idea, good program.  Unfortunately, ALL that is the President’s idea is to raise the age to 18 PERIOD  Too many schools, especially in urban area have little or no money for extra programs.  If the President alloted funding for such programs whereever they are needed, then maybe.

Funny the way you express it: that education is “a strong weapon FOR holding some people down while lifting others.”  Indeed, it can work out that way.  In this compulsory 12-year competition in which all children are entered, all these very different individuals are expected to learn the same things at the same ages to the same degree of mastery.  Students who bloom late (or early), or think differently, or whose particular talents are not on the curriculum that year, will be penalized for their inability to fit the school’s demands.

Children quickly discover in school which students are smart and which ones are stupid, which ones are popular and which are outcasts, which ones are winners and which are losers. From my observation, kids usually accept those labels, positive or negative, and live with them for their remaining years in school.

We’ve had compulsory education in the U.S. for over a century, and we still have uneducated masses unable to find jobs.  I don’t think two more years of torture for those masses will help.