“Daniel Shore, the chair of Georgetown’s English department, told me that his students have trouble staying focused on even a sonnet”: from an Atlantic article by Rose Horowitch, “The Elite College Students Who Can’t Read Books.”
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Friday, October 4, 2024
Fourteen lines? tl;dr
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comments: 2
I don't have a clue about this horrendous situation. Not a clue. That said, if marines can learn to be marines then maybe scholars can learn to like, you know, read? Speaking of proud marines, maybe the undergrads don't see themselves as students, hence are not motivated.
I do know that, according to documents, experts in the field of drama are convinced that concentration can be improved. This fits what I know of other fields.
Call me harsh, but I think grade inflation should have been deflated after the end of the Vietnam draft. (conscription) My department head confided that the faculty head had (secretly?) ordered her to give an average grade of C+
It was in the 1980's that Rita Mae Brown (born 1944) pointed out that boomers had been conditioned by television to expect a break in their concentration every X minutes. She wrote that certain themes required time to sneak up on, and that if you couldn't read at length then those themes must go unaddressed.
The point you make about students v. military personnel makes sense: motivation is necessary. As are high expectations. I hate to see faculty lowering their expectations — someone was quoted in the Chronicle podcast saying that if she goes any lower, she’ll be an activities director on a cruise.
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