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08 Jul 08

The American Scholar - The Disadvantages of an Elite Education - By William Deresiewicz

  • They’ve been driven their whole lives by a fear of failure—often, in the first instance, by their parents’ fear of failure.
  • Being an intellectual means, first of all, being passionate about ideas—and not just for the duration of a semester, for the sake of pleasing the teacher, or for getting a good grade. A friend who teaches at the University of Connecticut once complained to me that his students don’t think for themselves. Well, I said, Yale students think for themselves, but only because they know we want them to. I’ve had many wonderful students at Yale and Columbia, bright, thoughtful, creative kids whom it’s been a pleasure to talk with and learn from. But most of them have seemed content to color within the lines that their education had marked out for them. Only a small minority have seen their education as part of a larger intellectual journey, have approached the work of the mind with a pilgrim soul. These few have tended to feel like freaks, not least because they get so little support from the university itself. Places like Yale, as one of them put it to me, are not conducive to searchers.

The miseducation of American elites - Crunchy Con

  • My education taught me to believe that people who didn't go to an Ivy League or equivalent school weren't worth talking to, regardless of their class. I was given the unmistakable message that such people were beneath me. We were "the best and the brightest," as these places love to say, and everyone else was, well, something else: less good, less bright. I learned to give that little nod of understanding, that slightly sympathetic "Oh," when people told me they went to a less prestigious college. (If I'd gone to Harvard, I would have learned to say "in Boston" when I was asked where I went to school--the Cambridge version of noblesse oblige.) I never learned that there are smart people who don't go to elite colleges, often precisely for reasons of class. I never learned that there are smart people who don't go to college at all.
13 Dec 07

Open Yale Courses

  • Open Yale Courses provides free and open access to seven
    introductory courses taught by distinguished teachers and scholars at
    Yale University. The aim of the project is to expand access to
    educational materials for all who wish to learn.
01 Dec 07

02138 § Harder Than Harvard

  • Despite the fact that its founder, Cecil Rhodes, was a racist businessman who made his fortune mining bling, the
    Rhodes Scholarship requires applicants to have a combination of "high academic achievement, integrity of character, a spirit of unselfishness, respect for others, potential for leadership, and physical vigor." Every year about 1,500 American students think they fit the bill; of the 896 who garnered their university’s endorsement last year, Oxford rejected 864.
22 Mar 07

Association of Indian Students at Linkoping | Minds of Integrity

  • The AISL is formed to organize ourselves better and of course to help new students gain some insight into Sweden and Swedish education system. We provide information to prospective students and Freshers about various aspects of life in Linköping, Sweden.
11 Mar 07

12 Byzantine Rulers: The History of The Byzantine Empire - Anders.com

  • This history lecture podcast covers the little known Byzantine Empire through the study
    of twelve of its greatest rulers. Mr. Lars Brownworth presents this series for free
    through this website and the podcast section of the iTunes store.
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