Best Kind of College

Susan McWilliams is Associate Professor of Politics at Pomona College and the author of Traveling Back: Toward a Global Political Theory. John E. Seery is George Irving Thompson Memorial Professor of Government and Professor of Politics at Pomona College and the author of America Goes to College: Political Theory for the Liberal Arts.

• AcknowledgmentsIntroductionSusan McWilliams and John E. Seery, Pomona CollegePart One: The Classroom What’s Love Got to Do with It? Shakespeare: A Liberal ArtMartha Andresen, Pomona CollegeIn Defense of Small: Some Personal Reflections on Teaching Chemistry at a Primarily Undergraduate InstitutionDasan M. Thamattoor, Colby CollegeAn Invitation to Get Lost: The Right Kind of Place for Liberal LearningNicholas Buccola, Linfield CollegeFrom Observation to Engagement to Collaboration: The Liberal Arts JourneyJerusha B. Detweiler-Bedell, Lewis & Clark CollegeMagic in the ClassroomArthur T. Benjamin, Harvey Mudd CollegePart Two: The Career Learning to Live a Life of Learnable MomentsJustin Crowe, Williams College(What Is Meant to Be) Straight Talk on Intellectual, Cultural, and Moral FormationJason Peters, Augustana CollegeRobert Frost, Symbolical TeacherRobert H. Bell, Williams CollegeThe "Job Definition" of a Faculty Member at a Liberal Arts InstitutionElizabeth J. Jensen, Hamilton College How Liberal Arts Colleges Have Shaped My LifeAkila Weerapana, Wellesley CollegePart Three: The Curriculum Liberal Education as Respecting Who We ArePeter Augustine Lawler, Berry CollegeHumanizing the Subject: Toward a Curriculum for Liberal Education in the Twenty-First CenturyJeffrey Freyman, Transylvania UniversitySinging a New History: Pathways to Learning in a Liberal Arts SettingSteven S. Volk, Oberlin CollegeLiving ArtRuthann Godollei, Macalester CollegeSocial Entrepreneurship and the Liberal ArtsJonathan Isham, Middlebury CollegeBeyond Cs Getting Degrees: Teaching the Liberal Arts and Sciences at a Comprehensive UniversityJeffrey A. Becker, University of the PacificPart Four: The Community Unlearning Helplessness: The Liberal Arts and the Future of EducationAdam Kotskom, Shimer CollegeLiberal Arts Colleges: The Mother of (Re)InventionJay Barth, Hendrix CollegeThe Best Kind of College: Spelman CollegeDonna Akiba Sullivan Harper, Spelman CollegeAthletics in the Liberal ArtsJennifer Shea Lane, Wesleyan UniversityGoing Elsewhere, Coming HomeYolanda P. Cruz, Oberlin CollegeOn Not Lamenting Our VirginityJane F. Crosthwaite, Mount Holyoke CollegePart Five: The College DeparturesK. E. Brashier, Reed CollegeWhat Matters Most? Liberal Arts Colleges in Perilous TimesJohn K. Roth, Claremont McKenna CollegeImporting the American Liberal Arts College?Kristine Mitchell and Cotten Seiler, Dickinson CollegeNationalism and the Liberal ArtsWill Barndt, Pitzer CollegeThe Liberal Arts and the Pursuit of WisdomTimothy Baker Shutt, Kenyon CollegeAbout the EditorsIndex

"At last, some good news about education! This collection brings together essays by professors at small liberal arts colleges, voices largely unheard in the debates raging about higher education. It ranges widely through disciplines and across colleges, taking us into classrooms where we see the creative, inventive kinds of teaching that go on when classes are kept small and professors can interact with students. This book is a welcome corrective to claims that higher education is 'broken' and in need of a high-tech fix, a quiet reminder that 'innovation' goes on as a matter of course at colleges where teaching is top priority and is kept to human scale." — Gayle Greene, Scripps College"McWilliams and Seery have achieved something remarkable: they have found a new and interesting way to present the case for the liberal arts model in American education. More than that, they have managed to show the value of, as well as present the argument for, the model. At its best, the book recreates something of the experience of a liberal arts education in microcosm. This is a wonderful, provocative, engaging, and moving book. It is unlikely to be surpassed." — Simon Stow, author of Republic of Readers? The Literary Turn in Political Thought and Analysis