1. Learning for Democracy: John Dewey Redux, a Conversation
Xenia Coulter (International Programs) and Alan Mandell (College Professor of Adult
Learning and Mentoring/Metropolitan Center)
Recent critics of higher education argue against its emphasis upon the disciplines (e.g., Roos-
Eefstin, 2008); instead, they suggest, preparation for engaged citizenship ought to be its primary
focus (e.g., Muscatine, 2009). About a hundred years ago, John Dewey (1916) made a similar plea.
If we took seriously these suggestions to re-conceptualize the purposes of higher education, how
could we, in our distance courses, in our individualized studies, in our interactions with our
students, promote this goal? How exactly might our practices be changed? Should the fact that our
students are primarily adults – already fully engaged in their communities – give us pause? These
questions represent some of what we hope to consider in our workshop.
At our workshop, rather than considering why disciplinary study is insufficient and even, perhaps,
inappropriate, particularly in preparing students for democratic citizenship, we focused our attention
on the viability of alternative approaches. John Dewey (1916), whose work we discussed last year,
envisioned the “classroom” as a mini-society where students are given the opportunity to practice,
on a daily basis, the skills of democracy. Course content, in this setting, is introduced in the service
of this “society” and sought out as the result of a careful interrogation of student experiences and an
open-minded (“scientific”) form of reasoning.
Most traditional college teachers today hold a somewhat contrary belief – that democratic thinking
will automatically result from a primary focus upon relevant course content supported by carefully
regulated class discussions (e.g., Brookfield & Preskill, 1999). The mentoring model, so central to
the core values of Empire State College with its focus upon student empowerment (see also Shor,
1996) and student/faculty collaboration (e.g., Herman & Mandell, 2004), may represent a somewhat
different, and perhaps more relevant, approach. But in both cases, it is fair to say that an engaged
citizenry is seen by most us to be a byproduct rather than an explicit goal.
In this workshop, we asked what might happen if we reframed our focus and re-assessed our
practices so our graduates might be, first of all, prepared to be fully informed, engaged, and
committed citizens in our complex society. Simple as this educational ideal might first appear, it
seemed to all of us that it opens up a variety of other questions that need to be addressed. For
example: What indeed would an engaged and informed citizen need to know? What kinds of skills
would she need to have? Does this kind of knowledge, these kinds of skills, require a college
education? Is this kind of education desirable, or even possible, for adults already fully engaged in
our society? Are we, with our PhDs in particular subject areas, actually prepared to do the kind of
teaching and mentoring that this goal calls for? If, not, how could we gain experience, how could
we better learn, to do this kind of teaching/mentoring? And, finally, are there innovations in
technology or pedagogy needed to make this happen?

2. To make our conversation even more concrete, each member of the group focused on a specific
course/study he/she has taught or developed and attempted to answer the following questions:
• In what way might this course be important for someone you would consider an engaged
citizen in the U.S. or elsewhere?
• How might this course be made more relevant to that goal? (What would you change? What
would you add?)
• Does the pedagogy of this course (explicit or implicit) promote independence of thought, an
open-minded spirit of inquiry, problem-solving skills, and relevant critical perspectives that
are directly applicable to complex problems and that might lead to multiple and conflicting
answers?
• Are there ways the methods of teaching, the pedagogy, associated with this course could be
changed so as to more effectively develop these kinds of skills?
• How might the disciplinary imperatives that inform this course be transcended so the
practical objectives related to citizenship are not lost or trivialized?
The participants were unusually sophisticated in issues related to the politics of education—to the
ways in which teaching styles, reading lists, and pre-determined conversation topics affect student
learning. We particularly focused upon the difficulties of relinquishing control and thus upon the
question of authority. As a result, we acknowledged and discussed in detail how we as faculty may
purport to a democratic outcome but contradict that goal by our quite undemocratic actions,
however subtle they might be.
Brookfield, S., & Preskill, S (1998). Discussion as a Way of Teaching. San Francisco:
Jossey Bass
Dewey, J. (1916). Democracy & Education. NY: Macmillan Company
Herman, L., & Mandell, A. (2004). From Teaching to Mentoring. NY: RoutledgeFalmer.
Muscatine, C. (2009). Fixing College Education. http://www.upress.virginia.edu
Roos-Eefsting (2007). The Conversation Continues: Liberal & Professional Education
(DVD). http://faculty.gvsu.edu/roosb
Shor, I. (1996). When Students Have Power. University of Chicago Press.