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This is the space where members of Common Core’s board and guest contributors will comment on happenings in the world–big and small–of interest to those of us who are concerned about the status of liberal education in America. We hope readers will add to the observations posted here. We invite comments of all kinds.
Common Core’s able research assistant, Lauren Prehoda, came across a new series of online commercials for MSN that strikes a chord. The series is titled “No One Wants to Look Dumb” and stars twentysomethings in situations they find intimidating due to their lack of knowledge. A young professional named Kathy is thirsty but she’s afraid to visit her office watercooler because it is surrounded by colleagues she considers “mental sharks.” Rather than risk being asked a question she cannot answer Kathy cowers in a nearby supply closet stalling until they scatter. Another commercial features Billy Beckett, a young man who is picking up his date. As he knocks on her door he’s seized with worry that she might ask about something—subprime interest rates or the Kyoto treaty—that he knows nothing about.
These spots are trying to sell MSN news services so some of the knowledge they highlight is ephemeral—basketball scores, current weather, celebrity gossip, etc. But of course not knowing tomorrow’s forecast wouldn’t embarrass anyone. What makes these commercials ring true is that they depict a generation of young Americans who live daily with the insecurity that accompanies a severe lack of knowledge. These commercials are funny for the same reason many jokes are—because there’s a kernel of truth in them. As Common Core’s “Still At Risk” report demonstrates many young Americans are indeed graduating school and entering the workforce with almost no real base of knowledge.
I suppose we can at least find solace in the fact that the ads depict “looking dumb”—their word choice–as an uncomfortable, unpleasant state. Ignorance is not yet bliss, thank goodness. If you have a second, watch a couple of these ads at
http://msn.imeem.com/video/N6m7Onjx/msn_supply_closet_commercials_video/ and tell us what you think.
Lynne Munson
Tags: Uncategorized
I ran across a news story about Common Core, searched you out, and am impressed by what I see. After graduating from a Liberal Arts college, I worked for 37 years in higher ed administration at a research university and have long felt the need for what you seem to espouse.
I wish you the best. In order to succeed you will have to swim upstream against the currents of political correctness in a host of ways. But perhaps the time has come when society is beginning to reap the harvest it has sown and is finding it wanting. Certainly this is what ‘The Fourth Turning’ has predicted.
I will be in your corner cheering you on.
Tom Lindholtz
Sacramento, CA
I rarely watch TV, but I could swear that I remember similar TV commercials back in the mid-nineties or early two-thousands, I think for an internet site. Anyone remember?
“What makes these commercials ring true is that they depict a generation of young Americans who live daily with the insecurity that accompanies a severe lack of knowledge.” Insecurity, but hidden under bravado–that was a major feeling among the students I taught and observed in high school. Far too many students would not take a risk, even a small one; even the most competent would do only the minimum necessary to get an A. But then, of course, I thought I was supposed to be teaching a subject, content. And so I also met resentment I believed came from placing expectations and thinking that my students were responsible for their action and their results.
I also found it impossible to challenge my students; they simply refused to take up a challenge. Without testing of their potential, without the push to go beyond what was already accomplished (already a minimum), children cannot discover what they may be capable of doing. The overarching optimism in our attitudes about the wonders of childhood–I have seen this called the child-centered disease–does not prepare the change from childhood to adulthood. It seems to me that we betray our children when we do not teach them how to face difficulty in life.
The reality that a number of young people escape such dangers and learn how to accept and meet challenge is reassuring, but does not justify neglect of all the others.
I find it very striking that there is virtually no mention of science in anything done by Common Core. Basic science knowledge is as fundamental to a functioning citizen as is knowledge of historical or literary facts. I would further argue that science — if properly taught as a method of inquiry rather than a mere accretion of vocabulary — enriches the learner with habits of orderly thinking, general skepticism and a requirement for evidence rather than authority. As much as the ‘liberal arts’ may be valuable to us as humans, they have historically done little to help young people understand the distinction between fact and opinion, or the difference between what we know and what we don’t know.
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