What are we doing here?

Good question.  Timely question.  

With each generation educators must look at their mission with an eye on what our graduates should look like.  Gone are the days that colleges were for clergy, doctors and teachers.  Gone are the days when college was for young gentleman to kill (waste, idle by) four years.  Gone is the MRS degree.  Gone is dodging the draft.  Gone is the Cold War and the race for space. 

So, what do we do now?  Just why are kids in college? Information literacy. 

Information is at our fingertips.  The Good information, The Bad information and The Ugly.  The Internet does not supply answers, only information.  There is a huge disconnect on how this factors into our students’ future careers and life ways.

Technology has advanced world cultures in many ways.  However it is not the answer.  Look at Iraq.

 Technology was to make wars different: fast, efficient, easy wins.  We would be the victors in two weeks.  We were not.  Want to know if space aliens built large primitive structures like Stonehenge?  Lots of Internet sources can not only tell you "Yepper", but show pictures of space people busily building them.  Is the world warming?  The Internet shows you “Nope, it is not” and, with another click, shows you “Yah, it sure is”.  Who is right?

Memorizing the planets in order is information.  Figuring out logically, with facts, why space aliens did not, could not, build Stonehenge requires one to identify valid resources and logic it out.  What would the life sustaining requirements be for a space alien to travel to earth, for them to breath our air, find nourishing food to eat, poop and get rid of it, and power the 'dozers they brought?  What is the probability of Earth meeting their life sustaining resources?  The nearest planet we might live on is generations away.  How did they get here?

We are here to make them think.  Not memorize.  Not recite.  Not  passport their way through college.

Their diploma gets their resume on the career application pile.  Their skills win the job and retain them in their career: creativity, critical thinking, communication and collaboration.

Let's see they get these!