[Magdalen] US Higher Education

[Scott Knitter]

On Mon, Jan 12, 2015 at 9:03 AM, ME Michaud <michaudme at gmail.com> wrote:
> One unspoken problem in American education (IMO) is the
> lack of preparedness among the students. As an example,
> someone close to me went to a crappy university on an
> athletic scholarship. Perhaps he'd watched Animal House
> once too often. In any case, his college experience included
> lots of drinking and little study.

Indeed, our music degree program had lots of rigor, but mainly because
of the need to show up with instrument, sheet music, and pencils. The
standard milieu was full of loud music and drinking. I remember seeing
the film The Paper Chase (about life as a Harvard Law School student)
and wishing we could have that sort of intensity and drive. One has to
sort of create that for oneself or seek it out, but part of that is
finding a place to live that allows for silence, which is difficult on
a 40,000-student campus. Wish I had discovered the wonders of earplugs
and my SleepMate white noise machine long ago. :) I did find a single
(no roommates) room in an old neo-Gothic dormitory, which helped. Thin
walls, though.


-- 
Scott R. Knitter
Edgewater, Chicago, Illinois USA