JIM DOTI: I WANT YOUR MONEY

At the risk of sounding like Sarah Palin, let’s talk straight:  Jim Doti wants your and/or your parent’s money so he can build giant steel ball structures and $3.3 million fountains.  Chapman University, like all universities, big or small, is a business.  Chapman sells education and degrees, but it must also attract new students, as well as preserve their customer base by fostering supporting alumni and promoting its brand.  

But despite what the floating heads of William Deresiewicz, a former English professor at Yale, and Mark Edmundson, a current professor of English at University of Virginia for the past “quarter of a century,” may say about the selfish intentions of a capital oriented university, your university’s quest for moolah does not ruin your opportunity to receive a quality education.

The Administration oversees the running of the university, and it takes a lot of dough to keep an institution like Chapman running.  There’s groundskeeping, staffing, providing room and board for students, advertisement, fountains, admissions, etcetera.  The list goes on, but frankly, I’m not that interested.  The Adminstration also has a hand, to an extent, in shaping the education of the students.  They can choose majors to offer, and then classes, but for the most part, the administration has little direct contact with the students in the classroom.

William Deresiewicz and Mark Edmundson’s both agreed in their diavlog that a university, especially Ivy-Leaguers, have an interest to producing successful students, for the sole purpose of earning their donations (and their offspring) a few years down the line.  While this may be true, besides the kind of environment and attitude that the administration sets in regards to education, they don’t get to mold the students they host in this journey of two to four years (or sometimes more) of education.  That responsibility rest’s on the Professors’ shoulders.

Teachers hold the true power in the classroom.  For the sake of this paper, let’s assume that the Professors the Administration hires actually feel compelled to... well, teach; they became professors and joined a university for the sole purpose of imparting knowledge, fostering growth, and playing with students’ squishy grey mounds of nuerons.  

Being compelled Professors, they shape the minds of the youth, they create the lesson plans, they stand at the front lines, in front of the dry erase board, fighting off faulty projectors and pushing students join in on a stimulating conversation.  The Professors don’t spend all their time working on their own papers or research projects; instead they inhabit their office hours, meeting with students after class, whether its to discuss the upcoming midterm or the recent homecoming game.  

The Professors may not be liked by all, falling into the “50/30/10” student approval split, but they will teach outside of the classroom, as well as within.  To overuse a metaphor, the Professors will be the Administration’s hoses inside the classroom, and matches outside.  Inside the classroom, The Professors will will the students with what the Administration intends; students will learn what they came to the University to study: how to balance a corporate checkbook, how to calculate the thrust a rocket needs to reach orbit, or how to negotiate business transactions in German.  

Outside the classroom, however, the Professors will become matches, lighting fires in the students.  Students will come to them, where the real learning will begin and find answers to those burning questions that Jesslyn feels Chapman doesn’t provide, such as “Are you living the good life?” and other cliché, real world questions like that.

There are three major aspects to a University: the Administration, the Professors, and the Students.  Just because you and/or your parents are paying for an education from Chapman, don’t expect Chapman to fill your bucket; you have to actively pursue answers to those big questions and answer them for yourself.

Jesslyn is looking for answers to her big questions in the wrong places.  While I don’t totally agree with her that “Chapman is not exploring the good life with their students,” this is not because “all of Chapman’s classes focus towards a student’s major and not towards anything else.”  Case in point:  I’m a film major.  This is an English class.  Definitely not my field. Chapman is a liberal arts school, not a vocational school.  They have a list of general education requirements, or GE’s, that the Students have to complete in order to guarantee they have a well rounded education upon graduation.

However, this does not mean that liberal arts colleges, as opposed to vocational schools, will answer Jesslyn’s big questions.  According to Jesslyn, Chapman is “giving us the opportunity to become global citizens but not making us worthy global citizens what so ever.”  While she and I agree on this specific statement, I believe this fact supports exactly the opposite of what she intends.  Chapman’s administration can try as they might, but the best they can do is fill us like buckets.  You can’t discover the answers to those big questions or earn that “real world” preparation Jesslyn seeks in bucket form.  You can’t just walk into class and passively download it.  Jesslyn knows how to find those answers, she just may not realize it:

“Chapman does give you the opportunity to take matters into your own hands and learn on your own.  There are many activities and groups to participate in on and off campus.  Chapman has activities such as Greek life, volunteer work, athletics and much more.”

If you share a seat in Jesslyn’s boat, and feel like you Chapman has failed to provide you with those answers to life you paid for, I encourage you to go find them yourself.  That’s what college is for.  Go talk to your professors, discuss a passion, let them light your fire (academically).  Go get involved in a sport, be it varsity, club, or intramural.  Volunteer.  Get involved.  College provides you with an opportunity to dip your toes into “real life” with internships and study abroad experiences so when you do leave with a formal education that will help you succeed in the real world, you have the real world preparation to back it up.  But if you want what you seek, you have to go out and get it yourself.  Don’t expect Chapman or any other university to do it for you.  They can’t.