In one of my interdisciplinary classes we are in the transition between Ancient Greece and Rome. Which means we’re in the world of Alexander the Great. As I listened to my history colleague’s excellent introductory lecture to the Hellenistic world the other day, my thoughts drifted to someone else who, as Alexander was in his day, is simply the best at everything . . . His words carry weight that would break a less interesting man’s jaw Every once in... Read more
If it’s Friday, it’s time to think once again about interactions between various constituencies in academia. Today I am not thinking about faculty-administration relations. I’m wondering instead about the dynamic between professors and students. One of the challenges and joys of team teaching in an interdisciplinary program—something I have been doing for twenty years—is that you get to teach with all sorts of people. Young and not so young, introvert and extrovert, high maintenance and low maintenance, collegial and not-so-much,... Read more
A bit over a year after moving into our beautiful new humanities building, there is still a great deal of debate and disagreement for what belongs on the walls. With one notable exception. As I wrote about a year ago, there is one item so omnipresent on the walls in the new building that it is impossible to miss. Moving day on a Catholic campus is a bit different than on other campuses. The large interdisciplinary program that I direct was... Read more
I have recently been thinking a lot about faculty-administration relations, particularly about the various reasons why they might go bad. There seem to be a lot more of those reasons than there are reasons that they might work. I was reminded of when, just a year ago, a classic case of faculty/administration dysfunction erupted because of the actions of a particularly problematic committee: the LTFTU Committee. I have learned many things from my good friend Marsue, who is the rector... Read more
Every fall I get to spend several weeks with a bunch of freshmen in the wonderful world of ancient Greek literature and philosophy; two weeks ago it was Herodotus, last week Aeschylus, this week Plato. These guys make you think! Here’s what I was thinking last fall–similar thoughts this year. Jeanne got on the Amtrak early one Sunday morning not long ago, beginning two weeks of work-related travel. Bummed out, I decided to head south for church an hour and... Read more
Everyone has heard the old adage, attributed to Oscar Wilde, that “When you ASSUME, you make an ASS out of U and ME.” Although it does not lend itself to such a witty and pithy saying, there is another ASS word that gets a lot of buzz on college and university campuses: ASSessment. When the term arises in conversations of any sort, the faculty says “Look out, the administrative ASSes are coming for our academic freedom!” while the administrators say... Read more
Several years ago, as my mother-in-law was steadily descending into the hell of Alzheimer’s, an acquaintance described Jeanne’s most recent difficult interaction with her mother this way: “Rose is a spiritual being having a human experience.” This was a helpful reminder that there is more to a human being than her body, a something more that is not necessarily subject to the vicissitudes of our physical existence. Because we know our physical selves are temporary and have a very short... Read more
I have a good friend and colleague in the philosophy department whose twin daughters have just begun their senior years in high school. This means that my friend and his family spent a significant portion of the summer just completed visiting college campuses—seventeen of them, to be precise. The young ladies in question, although twins, could not be more different in appearance or personality. Daughter #1, whose interests are predominantly focused on science, favors Dartmouth College but is also very... Read more
During the first weeks of the semester I often think about my first weeks as an undergraduate–this time around, exactly forty years ago! In this post from a year ago, I identify the early stages of something that has obsessed me over those four decades–what do I do if the foundation of what I believe is wrong? Starting college at age eighteen, three thousand miles away from home, might have been daunting under other circumstances. But as I watched my... Read more
I was angry with my father for a lot of reasons over the years, some justified and some not. But I don’t recall any time when I was more pissed at him than when I heard him say on one of his cassette-taped “fireside chats” aimed at his followers and groupies that “a person’s real family is almost never his blood family.” Thanks a lot, Dad—signed, “One of your blood family.” I heard this a few short months after my... Read more
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