Issue 8, Fall 1994

William A. McEachern, Editor

Odds and Ends

• To be good at teaching, we must be good listeners. It's obvious when we are not: we look around, wear a dazed expression, glance at the clock. We shouldn't try to fake attention. Nor should we focus on what we will say when the speaker takes a breath. Avoid prejudging the speaker. Don't rule out any topic as completely uninteresting. Keep your mind open. Creative people are always on the lookout for good ideas.

• The American Association of University Professors recently published The Work of Faculty: Expectations, Priorities, and Rewards, which relies on 1988 data. It concludes that faculty members worked that year, on average, about 54 hours per week, up from about 43 hours per week reported in 1977. The work week differed by type of institution. Those at doctoral institutions worked an average of 54 hours per week; those at comprehensive and liberal arts colleges, 52 hours; and those at two-year institutions, 47 hours.

• Sedona, Arizona, is on the cutting edge of the New Age.
  From the "there-is-no-disputing-taste" department, consider the following ad, which appeared in a Sedona advertising circular: "'X-Static Sound Tune-Up,' Tibetan bowls played on your body, 45 minutes, $25."

• "Most academic subjects have fallen victim to the Sirens of the ivory tower: sacrificing utility in favor of elegant abstraction, to various degrees at various times in their history. Perhaps economics and philosophy have the worst record of all, a short head in front of psychology."
  - Michael Scriven, in the Forward to McPeck (1990).

• "The tendency to avoid challenge is so omnipresent in human beings that it can properly be considered a characteristic of human nature. But calling it natural does not mean that it is beneficial or unchangeable. Indeed, all self-discipline might be defined as teaching ourselves to do the unnatural. The characteristic of human nature that makes us most human is our capacity to do the unnatural -- to transcend and transform our own nature."
  - M. Scott Peck

• "A generous and elevated mind is distinguished by nothing more than an eminent degree of curiosity."
  - Samuel Johnson

• "Judge a man by his questions rather than his answers."
  - Voltaire

• "Creditors have better memories than debtors."
  - Ben Franklin

• "Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes."
  - Oscar Wilde

• "When the student is ready, the teacher appears."
  - Chinese proverb

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