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http://www.edge.org/converation/howard_gardner-forming-the-mind-that-will-make-the-future
Printed On Sun Augut 14th 2016

CONVRSATION : CULTUR

Forming the Mind That Will Make the

Future
The Reality Club Conversation Continues
A RSPONS FROM Howard Gardner [3.30.16]

[ Editor's Note: On March 9, 2016, Edge published a conversation with Howard

Gardner called "Liberal Arts and Sciences in the 21st Century." The reaction from
The Reality Club was immediate, strong, and engaging, with responses from Douglas
Rushkoff, Patricia Churchland, Mark Pagel, Roger Schank, Neil Gershenfeld, Cristine
Legare, and David Myers. Now, Gardner responds. . . . ]

Just as readers of Edge base our thoughts about higher education significantly on our
own experiences, we also draw on our own more recent experiences as teachersformal
or informalas scholars, and as human beings who continue to learn, engage, enjoy, and
debate. There is no one best or one right way to engage in liberal arts learning: some
benefit more from reading and writing, some from debating, some from lectures or
Socratic seminars, some from travel and reflection, some from carrying out projects or
tackling overwhelming challenges or creating works of art. Indeed, in my ideal school
students would be exposed to several different pedagogical philosophies and practices. Not
only would they benefit from this diversity, students would also have the chance to
determine what works best for them and how they might optimally share with others what
theyve learned and what they can do.

HOWARD GARDNER is the John H. and Elisabeth A. Hobbs Professor of Cognition and
Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Gardner also directs the Good
Project. Howard Gardner's Edge Bio Page
Definitions: What are the liberal arts and sciences? Most people cannot answer that
question. Indeed, when I asked fifteen Harvard freshmen to define "liberal arts," nearly all
said the phrase meant "freedom to choose what to study." And when I countered with,
"Well, you can have an open curriculum that is not liberal arts, and a fixed curriculum
that is vintage liberal arts," they were taken aback.

While one can point to various definitions proposed over many hundreds of years, the
phrases "liberal arts" or "liberal arts and sciences" are better conveyed by examples. A
helpful example is actually provided by the econversation that took place following my
posting on Edge in early March 2016. Scholars from a number of different institutions,
disciplines, and points of view reacted to my essay and/or presented their own
perspectives on the issues discussed therein. I did not agree with everything but I
appreciated the comments, because they were stated cogently and civilly and they
stimulated some new lines of thinking. If our students could engage this kind of e
conversation (or even better, a live discussion), I would say that, wherever they went to
school, they were displaying a liberal arts perspective. And when I listen to the 2016
presidential debates and read the attendant interviews, I lament the relative dearth of
liberal arts listening, thinking, argument, perspective, and civility.

Here are my principal thoughts:

Going beyond our own experiences: Nearly all participants in Edge went to college and
most had a liberal arts educationsome at small liberal arts colleges, others at large
public or private universities. And we all had definite reactions to those educational
experiences. As an example: as a student and later a professor in Cambridge, I know
Harvard College and Harvard University very well. Its difficult for me to think about
higher education apart from my own experiencesthe positive as well as the problematic.

Its not possible to discount those personal experiences and yet we should be careful not
to universalize them. Institutions, student cohorts, eras differ, sometimes greatly we need
a pluralistic view of higher education, including education in the liberal arts and sciences.
I deliberately use the phrase "arts and sciences" because nowadays the sciences are at
least the equal of arts and humanities and the particular sciences that are foregrounded
(e.g. genetics) are quite different from those highlighted in earlier times (e.g. taxonomic
biology).

On some issues raised by the commenters, data exist. For example, at least until recently,
attendance at a small liberal arts college increased the likelihood of pursuing doctoral
studies, in the sciences as well as in the humanities. Before one concludes that nowadays
small colleges cannot prepare students for "big science," one should acknowledge that its
typically possible for advanced undergraduates to take courses at nearby research
universities.

But on other equally important issues, we lack data. For example, we know that those
who have a liberal arts education at a selective institution do very well occupationally and
financially. But we know much less about the kinds of lives they lead (in comparison to
those who lack higher education or have a strictly professional education): how liberal arts
graduates spend their time, how they raise their children, what kinds of citizens they are.
Do they listen to NPR or watch Fox News or read Politco? For that reason, a study by
LinkedIn, documenting which colleges have more graduates going into public service
proved revealing . . . and somewhat embarrassing for those institutions with very low
percentages.

Why our study? That dearth of information is the principal reason that my colleagues and
I have embarked on an ambitious study of at least ten campuses nationwidea study in
which we interview in depth eight different constituencies on a whole gamut of topics,
from curriculum and pedagogy, to opportunities and problems on campus, to issues of
citizenship, ethics, and public service.
Members of our research team are eager to learn the results of broad surveys, and to
review findings emanating from various collations of "big data" but we feel strongly that
the optimal understandings are likely to emerge ifcomplementing these quantitative
sourceswe can peer inside the heads of 2000 "players" whom we are in the process of
interviewing and infer how they are thinking about these issues.

We expect to be surprised. For example, one might hypothesize that students from highly
educated families who attend selective schools are more likely to take advantage of the
many curricular choices available on their campuses. But we may in fact find that it is
"first gen" students at less selective schools who are more likely to be open to a major
transformation in how they think or what they think about. Or one might hypothesize that
individuals in possession of "plenty of cultural capital" would be more likely to take
advantage of the cultural institutions on or near campus but perhaps these opportunities
would be much more valued by those who have never been to Paris or Tuscany, the
Metropolitan Opera or the Metropolitan Museum. Or one might hypothesize that seniors
are more likely to think that the purpose of college is to get a job but perhaps well find
that freshmen are more likely to think in terms of jobsor that freshmen at certain
schools or from certain demographics are more prone to be "hypervocational," while other
agemates valorize deep content knowledge, or diverse experiences, or having the chance
to be independent. We just dont know.

And what will we do with what we find? Of course, we will begin by analyzing our
data carefully and describing them accurately. But the purpose of our study is not simply
to report: its to highlight specimen programs that bring the different constituencies into
better alignment with one another and to offer recommendations about the optimal ways
in which to preserve and strengthen a form of education which, we believe, has served
society welland whose dilution or disappearance would be catastrophic. And if you say,
"I am eager for the results and the recommendations," I smile and respond "Not as eager
as I am."

Other perspectives: Responders raised a number of vexing issues:

Return on investment: Perhaps eighteen year olds would be better served if they
were given the cost of a college education and allowed to invest it. Two problems:
l) For every Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates, there will be scoresand perhaps
thousandswho are unable to use the money wisely 2) Even those who manage to
get a reasonable return on their cash gift will be deprived of the opportunity to cast
their minds broadly at a time when their minds are exquisitely open and when they
are not preoccupied with the concerns of creeping middle age: raising a family,
dealing with ailing parents, keeping up on the payments.

Cost of college: Without question, the costs of most institutions, even public ones,
are accelerating at a rate that will make them beyond the reach of many if not most
families. For that reason, we need not only find ways to cut costs (e.g. streamline
administration, share faculty with nearby institutions, eliminate big time athletics,
which lose money on all but a handful of campuses) but also to consider alternative
models (e.g. a greater reliance on MOOCS combining study with employment or
monitoring experiments like Minerva, where students receive an education in the
liberal arts with scant campus life or personal interactions with professors).

Dating back to 1947 and the Truman Report on "Higher Education for American
Democracy," policymakers have proposed that American higher education should be free.
Despite current campaign rhetoric, I dont think this is feasible. But it would certainly be
possible to loan students money for tuition, with the proviso that if they do well
financially, they will pay back a certain percentage of their income alternatively, if they
go into public service, their debt will be reduced or eliminated. I wish we were as
imaginative about financing higher education as we are about creating and tolerating
financial instruments, which almost no one completely understands.
Back to the liberal arts and sciences. Just as readers of Edge base our thoughts about
higher education significantly on our own experiences, we also draw on our own more
recent experiences as teachersformal or informalas scholars, and as human beings who
continue to learn, engage, enjoy, and debate. There is no one best or one right way to
engage in liberal arts learning: some benefit more from reading and writing, some from
debating, some from lectures or Socratic seminars, some from travel and reflection, some
from carrying out projects or tackling overwhelming challenges or creating works of art.
Indeed, in my ideal school students would be exposed to several different pedagogical
philosophies and practices. Not only would they benefit from this diversity, students would
also have the chance to determine what works best for them and how they might
optimally share with others what theyve learned and what they can do.

Still central is the substance of the education. And here I resonate especially with those
who want to engage the issues of what it means for something to be true (or false or
indeterminate) and how we are best able to make a determination whether beauty is a
viable concept and, if so, how to think about it, when and where to experience it, and if
possible, to add to the beauty of the world and, most important, how we think about what
is a good life, and how best to help ourselves and others to become good persons, good
workers, and good citizens, and then to help to nurture these "goods" in succeeding
generations.

While these questions cut across the disciplinary terrain, they are most properly thought of
as philosophical questions, literally Socratic questions. Venturing out on an
epistemological limb, Ill posit that philosophy has been and should remain the central
discipline of an education in the liberal arts and sciences.

By coincidence I had these thoughts on the same day that I read about the death of Hilary
Putnam one of the major American philosophers of our time, and also read philosopher
novelist Rebecca Goldsteins Edge essay on "The Mattering Instinct." Very different
individuals, very different approaches, but both helping us to think about the issues that
"matter" most. One need not have a liberal arts education to engage such issues and
ultimately one should draw ones own conclusions rather than simply parroting what
others have maintained but how much better it is to be able to build upon the wise minds
that have gone before, to engage with the reflective minds of today, and to help form the
minds of those who will make the future.

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Topic
CULTUR

John rockman, ditor and Puliher

Ruell Weinerger, Aociate Puliher
Nina Stegeman, Aociate ditor

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