The shot first, I think, for those of you who aren’t interested in large chunks of text:
I took advantage of a rare moment in which the escalators were mostly clear.
Now, the very important question. This epic anti-institutional intellectual project that I’ve absconded with (by invitation, I hasten to add) – why me? Why am I so dead set on not going through the usual channels for my educational pursuits?
I tend to think this is obvious, but I live in my head all the time. So here you go – I think it’s profoundly stupid to make certain that young people, no matter how smart they are, without certain kinds of financial support, will not be allowed to pursue their intellectual pursuits. I think it’s ridiculous to expect rigid specialization and creative freedom to co-exist (ok, so mostly I don’t think the institution values creative [intellectual] freedom, which might be part of the problem). And … well, to be blunt, I want to pursue a somewhat unusual course of study and would rather not go into hideous amounts of debt to do it, particularly because it makes me less employable than I already am.
Transcendent exhaustion – I don’t think I’ve been this tired, and this engaged mentally, in months. I suspect that means tis time for me to sleep – and hope that whatever toxins are in the air I breathe all day at work don’t fry my brain before I can make this project a reality…
All right, that was a lovely break – and there was some unexpected cheesecake as an added bonus – in which I chatted, yet again, with a co-worker who is planning moving away and going to grad school. I sort of knew how completely I’d lucked out on the undergrad lottery, but … it sounds like it has gotten so much worse that thinking of a reasonable way to make this work for “undergrad” as well is absolutely vital. Without, of course, becoming a diploma mill. I think I can solve that problem – no diplomas.
Kidding aside, though, there really are three problems with grad school as it is currently institutionalized: location, fees, and people. Location is easy to deal with – by unmooring the educational experience, we remove the necessity of uprooting (which might cause a certain social problem; there is quite a bit of value in shaking oneself out of routine). Fees, we’ll get to eventually – but I think Tracy’s comment on my previous post answers quite a few of my concerns on that front. People. Right. See, this is the problem with grad school. Especially if what you want to do is some ridiculously overspecialized thing with just a few instructors – find a program with three instructors, and discover that you don’t get along with even one of them … it’s a recipe for disaster.
What was I saying? Why me? Well, see … I want to go to grad school. I’ve been saying this for three years. Except what I mean doesn’t seem to describe graduate academic experience in the institution as it stands, and besides that I have a clear idea of an absurdly multi-disciplinary path of study which, honestly, doesn’t fit into even the most eclectic brick and mortar programs I can find. Clearly the solution is to create a community/space in which I can pursue this course. Right. Because otherwise it’s figure out how to go to a halfway decent law school without taking out a hundred and twenty thousand dollars in loans, since I doubt very much that I want (or could get) a job in the kind of corporate law which might allow me to pay that one off – and then realize, three years down the line, that I still have to create a new model of university in order to achieve my goals.
So I’m pretty much exactly the target audience, here. I’m pretty sure I’m not the only person thinking like this, either.