So . . . today I'm continuing with my annual Thornton Melon memorial "Back to School" blog week. By the way, I'm pretty sure that this is the only movie ever to have all of the following people appear: Adrienne Barbeau, Robert Downey Jr., Danny Elfman, Kevin's older brother Wayne from the Wonder Years, Sam Kinison, the bad guy from Karate Kid, and Kurt Vonnegut(!). Anyway, back to what I was discussing: the start of the new school year. Yesterday I asked the question "why are we here" with the "we" being students. I'm going to address the same question today but with a different emphasis; instead of "why are we here," I'm asking "why are we here." Besides, apparently, to split hairs.
I once attended a case-teaching workshop (interestingly, they did not use cases to teach how to teach cases) and the instructor made a very good point. With advances in online learning, greater informational resources available to all and an increasing focus on career-oriented university education, it becomes harder and harder to maintain the standard university system. Should students have to rise early and attend classes to listen to a prof read a lecture that they could otherwise read on their own? Should they even have to move out of their parents' houses when they can get a degree online (though both student and parent are probably happy to have some space)? Should you be taking Latin 101 when it is highly, highly unlikely that you will ever need it other than to show you know a language that no one uses? My one-year-old daughter speaks a language no one else uses. She does not get paid for it.
The answer, the instructor claimed, was that more people should use cases (no, that was really the answer - self-serving much?). The reasoning is at least more sound than the bare claim. You need to create a system where it is necessary to prepare and attend, and where the learning is relevant and useful. Cases are, in fact, one way of doing this. To discuss a case you need to be present with other people; better interaction in online courses aside, there is no substitute for face-to-face discussion. You need to know the case to be able to discuss it. Cases are real-world examples (whether they are business, law, medical or other cases) and therefore provide a real context for discussion and learning.
But most importantly, cases are not about teaching facts and figures, dates and data. They are about developing a process for dealing with all of those, and above all for decision-making. It is an antiquated notion that people need to have a treasure trove of knowledge in their head to succeed. Instead, they need to know how to get the information and then use it. This is even true of professions that resist this idea, such as medicine; diagnoses by computer tend to be more accurate than by doctor, no matter how much knowledge and experience the doctor has. What a computer cannot do (yet) is use that diagnosis to decide on and implement a course of action. That requires a doctor.
(You know what else a computer can't do? Explain to me how the hell Warner Brothers has hired Mel Gibson to make a film about Jewish legend and Hanukah-story-protagonist Judah Maccabee. This actually has nothing to do with today's post, but I just heard about it here and it's really sticking in my craw.)
Cases and reality-based discussion provide that reason for students and professor to get together a couple of times a week. I think I have previously mentioned my distaste as a student and a professor for classes that I didn't need to attend. If I can read it on my own time, I will. The class experience (via the prof) needs to add value beyond the text or article. Learning to make and defend decisions and to apply tools to problems is where the real value gets added. This doesn't only have to be in an career-focused field like business, either. I had a lit class in undergrad that consisted of sitting around while the prof read the material (i.e. the classic literary work). That does not add value, but a discussion of the work and its relevance, or the larger message, or its context might.
You know why university class attendance rates are so low? Because students don't have to show up to do well. That isn't a problem with the students, it's a problem with the classes. There are few things in life that you can excel at without showing up, so we're not really training our students as well as we can.
So whether you're a student or a prof (or neither), think about why you're there and why your compatriots and counterparts are there, too. And if you don't have a good reason for being there/can't give a good reason for them to be there, question your existence.
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