In this cultural moment in higher education, when everything appears to be up for grabs, perhaps it’s time to think more deeply about how grades might hamper holistic student development. Although education scholars have been sounding concerns about the value of grades for almost 100 years, I personally never gave the need for them much…

“We Can’t Go On Together with Suspicious Minds”                         --Elvis Ever since the Fall, we have experienced gender division and alienation. Whether throughout human history we have improved or are going backward in this area, depends upon what one views as the end or…

I nearly plowed down a first-year college student as I raced to a much-needed bathroom. The large cup of hotel coffee combined with a 4-hour bus ride meant that my usual concern with professionalism around students had been replaced by a nearly frantic need to reach the travel stop’s restroom. This episode during a short-term…

“Intuitions come first, strategic reasoning second.”Jonathan Haidt, The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion (New York: Vintage Books, 2012), 82 (italics in original). The present essay will not attempt to describe the circuitous path that led Haidt to this somewhat disturbing conclusion, except to say that his experiments are varied…

Stupidity is a more dangerous enemy of the good than malice. One may protest against evil; it can be exposed and if need be, prevented by use of force. Evil always carries within itself the germ of its own subversion in that it leaves behind in human beings at least a sense of unease. Against…

Redeeming Vision: A Christian Guide to Looking at and Learning from Art provides a valuable Christian framework to traditional art critical practice. Elissa Yukiko Weichbrodt combines an established framework, repeated themes, and a wide range of examples, resulting in content that is accessible to all readers, including novice art viewers. In her introduction, she proposes…

As the subtitle suggests, Shirley Mullen’s new book, Claiming the Courageous Middle, invites believers to dare “to live and work together for a more hopeful future.” This applies to all areas of life, from family to church membership, and to jobs as well, even that of professor. I don’t refer to professors as daring; I’d…

We face yet another presidential election season, and in the fall, college campuses across the country will host seminars, roundtables, and talks to help students prepare for what’s to come. One question that certainly will arise has to do with Christianity’s relationship to political power, a question that’s hard to escape when former President (and…

American confidence in the “value” of higher education is plummeting. In 2015, 57% of Americans had “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in higher education, but in 2023 that number fell to a mere 36%.Megan Brenan, “Americans’ Confidence in Higher Education Down Sharply,” Gallup. 2023 July 11, https://news.gallup.com/poll/508352/americans-confidence-higher-education-down-sharply.aspx?version=print. What role might academics…

As a member of Generation X, I have visual memories of the discrete, physical sources through which I was expected to access information as a child and young adult. There were physical books—novels, informational texts, and monographs; encyclopedias, dictionaries, and almanacs; as well as newspapers, magazines, and scholarly journals. In school I was taught how…