Does the American university live up to its obligations

Duke University, in my four years here, has made leaps and bounds. It has evolved from a "hot" school, most noted for its undergraduate success story, into a research university with international notoriety. In many ways, Duke University exemplifies American higher education and its astounding success. If this nation never sells another automobile, at least we've still got the world licked in something. We can create a research university, a place where young meets old, student meets teacher, theory meets practice and research meets instruction.

Then what, in God's name, is wrong? According to our illustrious president, "The modern research university is a company of scholars engaged in discovering and sharing knowledge, with a responsibility to see that such knowledge is used to improve the human condition." Yet Nan Keohane worries enough about the "mission" (or, as she would prefer, "missions") of the American research university to publish an article entitled "The Mission of the Research University."

Keohane's piece, printed in the academic journal D_dalus, serves as a kind of intellectual call to arms for her professorial and administrative colleagues. She attempts, among other things, to reconcile the research and teaching imperatives by illuminating their interrelated natures. She says groundbreaking things like, "Undergraduate teaching can sometimes bring significant rewards" and "Educating undergraduates is part of our distinctive contribution to improving the human condition." While I would never deny the truth of these statements, I wonder if professors are so far gone that they must have these truisms constantly reiterated.

Universities stress the monetary success of their alumni and then wonder why all of their undergrads major in econ and public policy (something Keohane keenly points out). Universities perpetuate a banal, reductionist grading system and wonder why undergraduates are so grade-conscious. Universities seldom take aggressive moves to shape a dynamic campus atmosphere and wonder why undergraduates shy away from intellectual conversation.

When Keohane writes, "Undergraduates, and their parents, support our enterprise with their tuition and fees in the belief that research and graduate training redounds to the better teaching of undergraduates. By accepting the support they give to us, we enter into a bargain with those students and their families. We have an obligation to uphold our end of it." Without claiming that Keohane, Duke or the American research university phenomenon has failed, I would like to take issue with Keohane's claim.

The university, as it is invested in the same mythology and aura of the American liberal arts college, has a responsibility even greater than Keohane claims. The university must do more than "discover" and "share" knowledge. It must do more than provide undergraduates with prepared and motivated mentors. The research university must serve as an intellectual, social and cultural nurturing ground for the undergraduate. In other words, college has traditionally (and effectively) served as an American rite of passage. It is about checkbooks and laundry as much as teaching and learning.

No undergraduate matriculated at Duke thinking, "I must lower my expectations for faculty and administrator interaction because I am at a Research University, not a liberal arts college." Yet, the mythology of American college life remains intact. When a down home, red-blooded American thinks "Duke," s/he thinks college (or, at the very least, college basketball). As long as public perception of the university as an indispensable element of society depends on undergraduate enrollment, the university has obligations. Administrators are obligated to take undergraduate lives seriously-- Keohane's rash support for an all-freshman East Campus stands as an example of how to avoid doing this. Administrators are obligated to reform the tenure process (we have accepted your commitment to "discovering" knowledge; now you must accept our commitment to having that knowledge "shared"). And, perhaps most importantly, administrators are obligated to discourage a hateful, bigoted, inegalitarian campus atmosphere (Duke's continued commitment to need-blind admissions stands as a wonderful example of this imperative; Duke's obstinate refusal to re-evaluate fraternity housing status serves as an obvious counter-example).

If, upon my graduation, I were to offer one piece of advice to underclass men and women, it would be this: Don't Believe The Hype. The quasi-socialism of the American collegiate experience is a myth; in fact, your lives are dominated by exploitative, oligarchic realms of authority. Those of you who are lucky enough to spot Chronicle ads for "luncheons with administrators," go for it! Be one of the first 10 people to call in! Do not, however, assume this to be management "getting in touch with labor." In my view, any administrator who wants to maintain a first-name basis with the undergraduate student body needs to earn it.