September 5, 2004
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From the back cover:
Sleeping in class. Sleeping through class. Copying homework. Cramming for tests. Dull lectures. Bitching about teachers. For just about everyone, this is how we remember school. This is certainly how I remember my college education. While many have fond memories of school because of friends they’ve met, and experiences they’ve had, this type of education – the traditional count-down-the-minutes till the end of class education – has reached a critical point for our society.
Frustrated. Depressed. Confused. Ignorant. Apathetic. Cynical. Inactive. Wasteful. For many Americans, these are the lives we live, and the people we are. We don’t love our jobs. We have little time for anything besides work. We don’t travel like we want to. We’ve traded in experiences for money and possessions. We’re unaware of the world around us. We have no hope for a better tomorrow. We don’t even begin to push the limits of who we could be. We’ve sacrificed our childhood dreams. We’ve become the people we thought we’d never become. These are the declines of our society.
In order to combat these declines, me must improve the culture of how people develop. The culture of education. Fortunately, many Americans are granted four years of college to develop before entering into their adult lives. However, these are the years that must be highlighted in order to begin curing the ills of our society. We need to re-think our culture that has made college function in a bubble, failing to prepare many graduates for the unique challenges of the real world. We need to re-think our culture that encourages parents to send their children directly into college, without receiving a break to explore the world and reflect on their lives. We need to re-think our college culture that has made the pursuit of a college education synonymous with diplomas, grades, and the status attached to a school’s name, instead of education for its own sake, coupled with out-of-class experiences to develop intelligent, thoughtful, confident, and compassionate individuals.
Fortunately, improving society won’t rest on whoever is the President of the United States of America. Fortunately, improving education won’t rely on waiting for test scores to improve, the next education policy, or the next education budget. Improving both education and society can be done by simply innovating the culture of America’s colleges and universities. After reading this book, everyone from students to college Presidents will be forced to examine the values behind higher education and personal development in America. After reading this book, we will have begun the discussion as to what actions need to take place in order to transform the words and ideas in this book, into the realities that can revoultionize higher education as we know it.
There’s actually a whole lot more to this book than I could fit on this back cover, but that’s why I wrote a book, and not just a back cover. So…grab a coffee, a beer, whatever makes you happy, and enjoy the read.
-Dan Lilienthal
Comments (5)
interesing opening thoughts, i may sit down and peruse it. i try my darndest not to fall into the traps that my education sets for me… there are so many flaws that i can see openly, so i’m interested to see what others see. still… i suppose i chose the correct path. no reasons to indicate otherwise just yet.
thanks dan hehe
way cool that you wrote a book…
and i found your site from your Outward Bound blogring, awesome idea. so, i take you’ve been on a trip before? or maybe you’re an instructor? Just curious…
-Sarah
Interesting reasoning…I just might have to read this book. You are definitely right about the need to re-examine ones goals and values when in college, because it is definitely easy to just focus on making the most money after graduation. That is exactly the problem I’m having. Good luck with the book.
Tip Number One
• Find someone with Air Miles and beg, beg, beg for a ticket.
• Find cheapest flights available, book in advance or get on the last-minute list (for us, it depended on whether or not we had planned ahead… like “do we want to go to Slovenia next week?” versus “Yeah, f-this noise, let’s just go.”)
• buying tickets online isn’t always the cheapest way to fly. Compare prices and indirect routes.
• Once you’re in a continent, never, ever, ever spend money on a taxi or city bus. Walk, walk, walk. If you’re going between areas that you can’t walk, get an economy ticket, or look for (safe) carpoolers. Better yet, find some cheapo bikes.
• Get a list of connections of people you know—relatives, ex-coworkers, friends, landlords, guys who sat next to someone you know on the bus… Call them and ask, “Hey, I was in town and so-and-so asked me to look you up for them.” Usually, that scores you a free meal and an overnight, if you’re lucky.
I made my friends do the lying… being a Canadian-born Southerner, I believe in good hospitality!
• When all else fails, get hooked up on one of those teaching-English trips… or find a friend who’s doing that. We had a friend in Japan who let us crash for a few days with her. Granted, it was the smallest little room on earth, but hey, we travelled.
• Get weekly jobs in places where they sell food. Nicholai washed dishes in some pretty dumpy places, but he brought home good eats.
• Flirt. Well, that can be dangerous… but we put Nicholai up to the game and he usually got us safe lodgings.
• Do not buy drinks in foreign pubs. Now, I’m a woman, so usually someone would (ahem) sport me a drink, but trust me, you spend a lot of money you never intended.
• Travel light on luggage and gear.
• No matter what, commit no act of theft
• Don’t be afraid to stay in one spot for longer than two or three weeks. One of our travel mates is STILL in Australia. We got tickets to fly there through a friend’s friend’s uncle who had to cancel a business trip. Turned in one first class, and spotted us for the difference on three peasant tickets.
• Too tired at present to think of many more… stay in youth hostels if you can, buy groceries rather than one meal… that kind of thing…
zzzzz… back when I can think clearly. I may send Nicholai to comment…