[Continued]
You Made Me Grow…
Ironically, in the end this student seems to
have gotten what s/he sought after all. To wit:
…you pushed me more then many
teachers... not in the way you wanted me to see how you thought you were right
and i was wrong--but to investigate my truth and challenge what you proposed to
be different. You made me grow significantly closer to God and in my faith….
Of course this is hardly the first time I’ve been told
that I’ve pushed a student harder than other instructors. While I don’t take
any particular pride in such statements, it does suggest to me that I am doing
my job properly. Indeed, comments like these also make me wonder what might be
happening in other classes and why. While the consumerist values of comfort and
convenience largely form the attraction to online classes, from a pedagogical
standpoint good teachers should always push students outside of their comfort
zones. The discomfort of cognitive dissonance is often the teachable moment.
I also take no small amount
of comfort in knowing that the student grew significantly. That is, after all,
the mark of a true educational experience as opposed to merely memorizing stuff
and demonstrating a bottom line competency on a test. If one comes out of a
class with exactly the same understandings of the world with which they
entered, they’ve largely wasted everyone’s time and money.
One of the expectable
results from critical reflection on one’s belief systems is the possibility
that one will come to better understand what s/he believes with all of its
strengths and weaknesses. As a result they will then have a much better idea of
why they continue to believe those things and the conditions under which such
beliefs are themselves credible to anyone outside the circled wagons of the
like-minded.
This is particularly true of
religious understandings. Most of us
inherit our religions from parents or other authority figures with little
critical consideration. Thus, when challenged, we often have no response to
offer regarding the credibility of our beliefs. The usual response to
challenges in such cases is to anathematize the challenger. It’s not surprising
that historical constructions of the Satan, the tempter, tester and trier and Lucifer,
the angel who shines light on the darkness of one’s belief systems, are often
the anathemas of choice for those who push us to reflect.
While growing closer to any
given construction of G-d or belief system was not the goal of this course, at
some level it would seem that the instructor whose teaching had prompted
critical reflection which led to this result would be seen as having done the
student a major favor. Of course, in all fairness, it could also have led to a
morally indignant retreat back into
Plato’s Cave, fingers in ears singing “La la la, I can’t hear you…”
Be Open to All
The student’s response ended
with the following:
I think that you should teach but
everyone needs to evaluate how they are doing every now and then and see how to
better themselves. you pride yourself on your familys teaching background and
your history with it--you were designed to be a teacher but like this young man
you wrote about... be an open mentor and influencer to ALL students not just
the ones whose specific beliefs align with yours.
I always find the
presumption that educators somehow are unwilling to evaluate their own
performance unless somehow forced to do so rather remarkable. Why would that be
so? I realize that my own experience is not necessarily normative for anyone
other than myself. But there has never been a term that I have not sought to
learn from my experience and modify my pedagogy and content in response. I have
never needed anyone to bludgeon me into improving my classes. Indeed, I cannot
imagine why a teacher would not want
to do so.
That’s precisely why the
carrot and stick approach of student ratings used by this and most universities
is profoundly misguided. Moral reasoning that compels behaviors by threats of reward
and punishment is the mark of children, Kohlberg’s pre-conventional level. While
such conditional reasoning is inevitably the mark of consumerism (What’s in it
for me?) it is unworthy of such an important enterprise as higher education.
Moreover, I readily agree
that a good teacher needs ongoing feedback on their work. I’ve had my courses
observed many times over the years by colleagues and superiors and I have
always taken their feedback seriously even when I have challenged their
observations. There is a world of difference between dismissing feedback out of
hand and wrestling with it for days in forming a critically reflective response.
Finally, the fact that I
have devoted several days to reflecting upon and responding to this student’s
comments ought to suggest how seriously I take student feedback as well. While
I don’t think faculty can be mentors to every student who comes along if for no
other reason than the fact that mentors offer very personal skills and insights
to those seeking the same, I do seek to reach every student who comes into my
classes even as I know that is unlikely to occur. That includes those who
arrive largely disinclined to seriously consider what my classes may offer
them.
Of course, turnabout is
always fair play when making critiques like this student offers. Might it not be
fair to respond to this student that s/he should be open to all teachers, “not
just the ones whose specific beliefs align with yours?” Doesn’t everyone
need “to evaluate how they are doing every now and then and see how to
better themselves?”
Use it Well
You are talented so use it well!
Again, I appreciate the
student’s couching his/her comments in the language of compliment if not
flattery. But I think this point is also a good example of the maxim that what
is good for the goose is good for the gander.
The reality is that a
student capable of coming to a university and succeeding in a class like
Christianity is also talented. While the workload of this class was not
particularly burdensome, the level of cognitive consideration and existential wrestling
this material demanded was considerable. A student who successfully undertook
such a challenge evidences no small amount of talent him/herself.
Moreover, as the student
says, such talent must be used well. The Christian scriptures reflect the
belief that to hide one’s light under a bushel basket is ultimately a moral
failing. That requires both the courage to confront one’s own limitations of
thought as well as the willingness to continue engaging a process that may well
prove painful in its cognitive dissonance.
I believe it is the vocation
of a good teacher to call students to engage this kind of Hero’s Journey.
Indeed, I believe the failure to do that is a waste of the teacher’s talent as
well as that of the student. When the ability to live into that vocation
becomes impossible in a system that no longer values heroes and heroines there
will no longer be a place for good teachers or students in that system. Sadly, in
a day of consumerist driven pedagogy, I believe that time is drawing closer and
closer for this teacher.
Thank you for your response
to my blog entry and for providing this opportunity to respond. You will find
your comments posted at my blog site today. I do not labor under the
misapprehension that my words here will have convinced you nor was it
necessarily my goal to do that here, but I am grateful for the chance to actually
say them for a change.
As I say to all of my students in parting, “I wish you
well.”
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., M.Div. Ph.D.
Member,
Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest,
Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Asst.
Lecturer: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
Osceola
Campus, University of Central Florida, Kissimmee
If the unexamined life is not worth living,
surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth
holding.
Most things of value do not lend
themselves to production in sound bytes.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
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