MILAN, Italy – This one goes out to all the recent grads and to anybody who has ever had to take a class they didn’t want to take (which is probably everybody.)
Full disclosure, I’m actually writing this column from Milan, Italy. I mention this not to inspire jealousy in the poor souls reading their summer paper in one of Harrelson’s windowless classrooms of despair, but to kick off my discussion of the value of an American education.
To those trapped in summer school: don’t be too jealous; it’s not like I’m on a Mediterranean beach double fisting tropical margaritas. I’m living in a crowded apartment in a crowded city, and the weather here is not all that superb. It’s a lot like I imagine the weather in Boone to be like in the summer: humid, but not as hot as the piedmont. OK, I shouldn’t complain; the fresh mozzarella cheese makes up for everything.
At least I’m not actually studying here. After all, who really needs credit? I am, however, living with about seven other guys that are students at Milan Polytechnic. From what they’ve told me, I think I’ve started to get a pretty good idea of the higher education experience in Italy, and I think I can make some interesting comparisons to the standard university education in America.
For starters, the individual academic departments at universities overseas seem very isolated. Take for instance, the fact that most of my roommates are physics majors! No offense to the fine people in the physics department at State (heck, I’m one of them), but I just don’t think I’d really want all of my roommates to be physicists. I already spend so much time doing homework and going to class that I’d rather not have the subject of most of my socialization be the same stuff that I slept through the day before last.
The guys I’m living with are very good friends, and while this is certainly an admirable situation, it still begs the question: how did they become such good friends? I don’t really know, but I speculate it is because they have been in college for some time now, and all of their classes have been in one single department: physics. Academically, there seems to be very little cross-discipline opportunities for undergraduate and graduate students alike, and I’ve learned that this trend seems to extend across Europe.
Nobody that I’ve talked to has ever taken a class outside of their field of study. Seriously, no literature for a math major, no geology for a history major and absolutely no chemistry or botany for a communication student (a rule we should implement on our side of the pond: com students need to be kept away from chemicals and plants.)
Yeah, yeah, I know you’re thinking, “Ball, that sounds awesome. I’m a nerdy engineer, and I hate taking B.S. humanities to fulfill my graduation requirements.” Or, maybe your thoughts are more along the lines of, “I don’t understand math because I am a business major. Salesmen, middle managers and demon-spawn don’t need math because we have enslaved calculators and accounting departments to think for us. I should move to Europe.”
Well, that sort of thinking is right out. Yeah sure, we all love to complain about the random art history class that is only getting in the way of our real homework, but honestly, do you really like doing any of your homework? If nothing else, I think that the opportunity to take a bunch of different crap and still end up with a degree in something you know nothing about is kind of cool. You can’t entirely just build your own degree, per se, but there are still lots of options for most students. It’s like a good Chinese buffet: a good bit of the food you eat isn’t Chinese, but when you leave you’re still stuffed. Ah, the American mentality.
Many people really think that an American university education can’t compete with an education garnered in another country. In certain contexts, they’re right. In terms of actually knowing stuff, I think we probably kind of suck. I bet there are plenty of graduates in Europe or Asia that could kick our butts at reciting memorized formulas.
Fortunately for us slackers over here in the states, the world isn’t about knowing everything. I think that an American university education isn’t about actually being able to cite the works of Lord Byron in detail. I don’t know a whole lot about British poetry, but I think if I ever needed to be knowledgeable in the subject, I could look it up and understand the material.
That’s the boon of a diverse education: the confidence to say, “I don’t know, but give me some time and I’ll figure it out.” Sure, you don’t remember what Plato said about forms or what your math professor said about indefinite integrals. If you weren’t majoring in philosophy or math, the value of these classes wasn’t in the lectures you slept through or in the notes that you’ve lost. The value is in the garnered skill of learning: the confidence and ability to understand something that is vexing and perhaps even unpleasant.
I’m not trying to say that universities outside the states aren’t providing their students with good educations. I’m just pointing out that American students often take for granted the flexibility and the diversity of their curricula.
To all you recent grads, keep on fighting the good fight. Take heart: at least you didn’t graduate from Carolina.
Tell Ken to take a break from the wine and fresh mozz and actually write a decent column at [email protected].