(2005-08-04) Sierra College Passion New Economy

Kathy Sierra questions the value of a College Education (esp in the New Economy), and its connection to Passion. Skyler believes that life's too short to spend that many years on something you don't love. So she decided to just work for a while until she figures something out. And then a few weeks ago, she announced the discovery that Boulder is home to a world-class vegetarian cooking school that in addition to cooking classes, includes courses in professional development ranging from creating a business plan for a restaurant, to starting a personal chef business. Vegetarian cooking is her passion. She believes in it, she loves it, she takes great pleasure in it. She evangelizes it to others. What horrifies me is that even though I knew she felt this way, it never occurred to me that this was something she might consider instead of college.

With lots of comments and follow-up. Maybe there should be third-party "learning designers" (Coaching) who you pay to plan and choose the best options and put together a perfectly tailored custom program from a variety of learning vendors (instead of throwing all your learning eggs into one school basket) that still includes some general education, but in the way that makes the most sense for that particular student, and uses both online, distance, and some face-to-face learning. Includes long Roger Schank quote (from here): School isn't really about learning at all. It's about certification (Credential). College students today attend school to get a degree that they hope will get them something they want... We never ask a student if he learned a lot, we ask how well he or she did. Evaluation is based on the judgement of others when it comes to "official" learning. Students feel they did well when others say they did well. It is the rare student who says that he or she learned a great deal and thus was very happy with the educational experience."... Other department heads talked grandly about how they would broaden students worldview and create well-rounded young men and women... People tell me that philosophy or some other course taught them, "how to think." Didn't they know how to think before they took philosophy? A good deal of Cognitive Dissonance is at work here. Because people labored so diligently at school for so many years, they convince themselves that there must have been a lot of learning going on.