Introduction

Hey everyone, welcome to the schumanities blog: radical.edu.

Sometime long ago, a clever person (you know who you are…) merged my name and my academic specialty into a rather odd-looking word. I chose this URL in homage to his tasteful creativity. Thanks!

As an official title, however, "radical.edu" refers to a motivation I have long had--and I'm now finally acting on it--to speak to the world of education that has defined so much of my life and my livelihood.

In the blog posts to follow, some will no doubt be my personal musings and memories about my own experience as a student, scholar and university-level instructor. Others will comment on articles and editorials about education in the mainstream press. Still others might address issues raised in education trade journals. And if I am really good, perhaps there will even be some proper scholarship here, with footnotes and all.

For all of the above, I hope I am not just a lone voice crying out in the wilderness. As far back as the biblical book of Job and Plato's reflections on Socrates, civil and constructive intellectual dialogue has been a hallmark of sound pedagogy, serious philosophical reflection, and just plain good learning. I genuinely hope for a lot of back-and-forth, meaningful discussion on the overall subject of education. An emerging virtual community of learning connected to this blog is pretty radical in itself, and hugely important to my ambitions in radical.edu.

Thanks in advance for reading, and for your comments.