Thank you, Charles Blow. Here is the article, followed by my comment.
In College, Nurturing Matters – NYTimes.com.
From my years as a professor, the essence of the Gallup/Purdue study is encapsulated in this sentence:
“Feeling supported AND [my caps] having deep learning experiences means everything when it comes to
long-term outcomes for college graduates.” (page 6 of the study)
“Nurturing” is a perfect description of what a university’s role should be in “supporting” students. But it usually isn’t. Certainly, many will jump on the bandwagon and SAY they are supporting students. From my experience, most will do that in ways that are actually antithetical to “deep learning”. They will do it by, as David Riesman so aptly put it in 1980, catering to the “wants” of students, even though these wants aren’t always the same as the “needs”. “Deep learning” usually entails some stress (like that described so well here), which is not always a student “want”.
I have even seen a university boast about how it caters to student “wants”, while claiming that it is helping students. (I posted the story “Content Deflation III – Does Wash. U. Physics Prof. Adopt It With Zeal? And Does the University Boast About It? Read This” on my blog www.inside-higher-ed.com)
We can’t continue making the mistake of thinking that universities will read studies for the purpose of improving education. Far too many will read the studies so that they can hone their marketing to what they think the public thinks is the sign of a good university. Buyer beware. All of us need to beware.”
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