stray thoughts on Russian and education

[Paul A. Klanderud]

Fellow SEELANGers:

I was just looking through my e-mail after a rather uneventful day of
maintaining COBOL code in my new and unexpected (and hopefully temporary)
profession as a programmer, and came across another letter hoping to get
some data on ways in which students have put their knowledge of Russian
(I'll lump lang, lit, and culture together) to some fiscally responsible
use. Seems like we're thinking a lot these days of education in terms of
cost-benefit analysis, no doubt partially owing to the way education as a
whole currently is being run.

I've got nothing against making money (preferably in sizable quantities),
nor against putting one's knowledge of Russian to use in the "real world."
And it's probably business considerations that will -- someday -- give
Russian studies the shot in the arm it needs.

But...have students changed that much? I don't mean from the fifties and
sixties, but from, say, the seventies and eighties? How many of us, as
undergrads, were thinking in terms of gainful employment when we signed up
for fourth year Russian, for a Dostoevsky course that we didn't even need,
or for any other lit or culture course? Naturally, there were some classes
some of us (present company excluded) might conceivably have taken because
they were known as easy A's, but for the most part, I'd guess we took all
these fiscally useless courses because they sounded *interesting*.

As a rather broad aside, how many students these days truly relish their
years as just plain students, no matter the subject matter (but I have the
"liberal arts" in mind)? Most of us who have made it or are making our way
through grad school, and those who are now teachers in the profession,
probably would have been pretty darn content to remain students all our
lives -- that's one of the big draws of academia, and one I sorely miss,
adrift as I am in the "real world" of insurance and computers.

The point of my admittedly rather aimless missive? Maybe it's time that we
reconsidered and defended the value of education, learning, and the sharing
of ideas that have no quantifiable "real-world" value. At the risk of
sounding far too new-age (or anachronistically old-timey and Mr. Chippy),
maybe it's time that we reminded our students that they are going through a
once-in-a-lifetime experience, a period when they can get away with thinking
both lofty and irrelevant thoughts, taking them as far as they go, writing
them down for no one but themeselves and their instructors, and drawing from
that experience the memories that will carry them through far too many days
of fiscally responsible drudgery once they become card-carrying citizens.
The value of student years spend in this manner is immeasurable; the rewards
for the rare teacher who can inspire such an attitude, irreplaceable.

Remaining a humble servant,
Paul Klanderud





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Paul A. Klanderud                   N8106 1130th Street
tel: (715) 425-9507                 River Falls, Wisconsin 54022
e-mail: paulkla at mail.pressenter.com