Monday, June 07, 2010

Discussion on gated academic communities

Gated communities of the academic kindin Nanopolitan and by Rahul Sidharthan Universities and cities . My understanding is that original European universities were gated and that the American universities develped differently in that the role of the state was much more limited. David Larabee contends here that education in USA has increasingly become a commodity and is market driven and this has has been "highly destructive to both academic learning and social equity".
David Labaree's Understanding the Rise of American Higher Education.... is mentioned earlier . Larabee's paper also includes a discussion of William Clark's "Academic Charisma and the origins of the Research University" and the role or lack of it in the rise of American Universities. I am not sure how far the American models apply to India where the state has a large role in the education system.

P.S. Related. From a review of Dewey's Dream: Universities and Democracies in an Age of Education Reform:
"Dewey's Dream describes several other programs and projects initiated by the University of Pennsylvania in its attempt to partner students, faculty, and diverse members of the Philadelphia community together in the work of solving real world problems. For any university educator or administrator interested in facilitating collaborative community problem-solving projects, part 2 should be required reading for its presentation of concrete strategies."

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