Fighting a losing battle.

Abu Kamara 

It is no secret that effective instructors, among the many things that make them great and effective, share a deep awareness of the importance of creating learning environments that have as their ends a fundamental preoccupation with empowerment and autonomy.  This awareness is illuminated by the simple understanding that in order for learning and teaching to be possible a precondition of respect is first necessary. In other words, both teachers and students must recognize one another's humanity. In Freirian terms, the teaching methodology cannot be one that is steeped in the ideology of a banking concept type education; it cannot be an atmosphere with a power dynamic that suppresses the recognition of students and instructors.  Above all else, it must be a liberating form of education that in addition to recognizing students and instructors as historical agents allows them to work together with the indispensable concepts of respect and collaboration as guides and life-long learning as a goal.

 Everyday, driven by the singular goal of educating their students, brave instructors spend countless hours outside the classroom researching, shaping and reshaping lesson plans. Even more impressive is the Herculean effort invested into the process of transforming complicated topics into accessible ideas. Given all the wonderful things instructors do to prepare students for their varied post high school and college roles, why the claim—they are fighting a losing battle.

With few exceptions, the sad truth is that currently the education system in North America does a very poor job of empowering students to become self-directed learners. Instead, students today depend on their instructors for everything. Of course, some dependency is inevitable but the type of dependency meant here is the one that makes students incapable of independently solving their own problems. It is not surprising then, given how accustomed students have become to extrinsic help, that there are widespread problems with critical thinking skills.  The biggest concern however is that with such a dependency students may find themselves lost in a market place that demands self-directed learning. Sadder still is the fact that there does not appear to be an end in sight, especially with the rapid growth of the knowledge economy continually yielding complicated problems that require fully developed life-long learning skills.  So, although enrollment continues to climb and the steady stream of graduating students continue to pour uninhabited out of the halls of higher ed, sings to some that may signify a robust and healthy higher education, the contention here is that students’ dependency on faculty members may have teachers fighting a losing battle when it comes to empowering students to become self-directed learners.