Robert P. Doede wants his students to get off Facebook and to skip the latest Harry Potter movie.
Mr. Doede, a philosophy professor at Trinity Western University in British Columbia, offers students extra credit if they don’t use social and traditional media while taking his course. That includes social-networking sites, television, movies, and video games, which they give up in exchange for an extra five percent on their overall grade.
What he found did not surprise him. In their diaries, which the students are required to keep in order to receive the credit, some who took his dare reported that their GPA’s had risen, and others said they had lost weight – probably because of “getting out for face-to-face socializing, and not mindless munching while transfixed the screen,” says Mr. Doede. The students’ overall anxiety levels diminished.
In recent years, he says, he had noticed students’ anxiety levels rising towards the end of class periods. “And one day it dawned on me that this swelling of anxiety might be attributed to the fact that their social lives were still online, owing to social-networking sites, even when they were offline in my class.”
Mr. Doede’s experiment in his course “Issues and Ethics” began two years ago, and he has repeated it with 10 classes of approximately 35 students each. About a quarter of the students attempt the challenge each semester, but only a handful make it to the end of the three-month course.
He says students who decline his offer say the thought of giving up the likes of Twitter and television “arouses panic in them.”
“Most who do take on the fast begin their journals confessing that, though they have invested more time in these technologies than they feel good about, they doubt that they will find it all that difficult to complete the fast,” he says. And nearly all the students who keep up the fast until the course ends conclude that they used to be addicted. “It’s interesting to identify in their journals some of the tell-tale symptoms of addiction withdrawal,” he says.
7 Responses to Professor Challenges Students to Turn Off, Tune Out, Drop In
carmean - July 24, 2009 at 5:26 pm
Keep your extra credit. Keep your bribes, misuse of authority and philosophical rejection of connection, community, shared knowledge and participation in the world. Don’t need your 5%.
sequoiacohe - July 25, 2009 at 1:41 am
To Carmean, commenting on July 24: So who exactly is the real manipulator and the one manipulated? Tremendous amounts of money are being spent to manipulate your spending without any regard for your well-being. My observation is that there is a steady decline of capacity for subtle, sophisticated and adequately informed political thought. I have not owned a television–ever. I am now 52 and left my parent’s home and their television 34 years ago. My achievements in the scientific and political realm are beyond what most could dream of approaching. More than that, my rewards for mentoring young professionals could be traded for nothing. I attribute my success to the time made available for reading and serious thought as well as the freedom from the detrimental cognitive junk food that commercialized electronic entertainment offers. I interact with people deeply and personally. Carmean, you mention “community.” Try a community of real people sitting around a real table discussing, or try a real community doing real physical work in the act of deliberate production! Then you might understand freedom, thought, courage and the thrill of well-founded resistance. Personal electronic devices have made it possible for humans to unite their minds in a vast and impressive syncytium–if you will-of common brain matter. Unfortunately, so much time is spent on feeding the cravings produced by dysfunctional families and society that the exchange of things of true creative or substantive value is far from its potential. Make a difference Carmean, for yourself and for our future, but please do not sound like a whiney, silly adolescent. I am sure it is not becoming your true potential. Maybe you should take that professor’s advice, plus, guess what–you get a 5% bonus for your courage and hopefully the immeasureable payoff in a future life well-lived.
cheard - July 25, 2009 at 11:47 pm
I’m glad that Professor Doede doesn’t teach on my campus, since that would put students in a real bind when he’s bribing them with extra credit not to use Twitter and I’m inviting them to do so every time they come to class. Awkward.
rubaiyat - July 26, 2009 at 4:13 am
It is quite a challenge and the perspective is good. Bravo for thinking outside the box and challenging students.
flyer - July 26, 2009 at 10:51 am
Sequoiacohe, your comment makes me nauseous. While you drip condescension and congratulate yourself on your scientific and political achievements and your deep thinking friends, you might want to take a moment to consider whether you are repelling people with your snotty attitude. Many of us find great purpose, meaning and joy in connecting with the world beyond our exclusive circle, and seeing the live images broadcast across the world through infinite user-generated channels. And many academics and others manage to engage in social media enthusiastically AND to turn it off sometimes. Most people find a balance, and integrate social media into healthy lives that are expanded by the Internet connection with loved ones far and near. You are the one who seems whiny and pathetic.
emmadw - July 27, 2009 at 5:00 am
CAll me dim … but how does he *know* what they’re (not) doing in their personal time?
fcappado - July 27, 2009 at 2:32 pm
It’s important to remember that professor Doede is offering a choice to be or not to be… on Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, etc, etc.
Ultimately, a student will decide whether the 5% is worth it for them. I suspect that those who agree to undertake this venture do so more for the challenge of it than for the 5% they’ll receive.