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A
Collegiate Christmas By John J.
Pitney Jr., professor of government at Claremont McKenna College
& author of The
Art of Political Warfare. |
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 s
I wave goodbye to students leaving on winter vacation, I sometimes
think about the gifts that would do them the most good. Here are a
few of the things that I hope they find under the tree.
Clothing. For most men, a necktie is a default gift, suggesting that the giver couldn't think of anything else. (Rush Limbaugh's line of neckwear was a glorious exception, turning gaudiness into a statement of conservative defiance. Alas, production stopped in 1998.) For a male college student, however, a tie can be a valuable reminder of impending adulthood. It has been decades since American institutions of higher education have asked young men to wear ties to class. Unless he went to Catholic school, the typical student has gone through life with a naked throat. A necktie tells him: "Up to now, you've wanted to base your life on beer commercials. Soon, you will switch to bank commercials." When you wrap the tie, by the way, include instructions on how to make a proper knot. They don't teach such things at orientation. As for women, consider giving dresses or skirts that reach the vicinity of the knee. Even as Ally McBeal's Nielsen numbers plunge toward oblivion, that wretched program continues to have baneful effects on fashion. Some elementary and secondary schools have clamped down on high hemlines, but colleges can't do that. So here's a voluntary solution that can simultaneously restore decency to the classroom and help the economy of Afghanistan: Let's buy up all those used burqas. Each one has enough material for six full-length skirts and a nice scarf. Books. Thanks to the teacher unions, many students reach college with little knowledge of grammar and diction. Speak of "dangling participles" or "split infinitives," and they will giggle, thinking that you have uttered something naughty. Therefore, every student should have a copy of Strunk and White's Elements of Style, the best brief guide to writing the English language. Although the current edition is a little too permissive for my taste, this little book remains indispensable. When I grade papers, I circle each stylistic mistake and give a page reference that deals with the problem. (Page 58, for instance, explains the difference between affect and effect.) Since their teachers have marinated many of them in moral relativism, students also need a hand with the idea of good and evil. Here's a true story. Before a group of prospective students a few years ago, I asked for examples of things that were absolutely wrong. Silence. I then suggested cases of deeper and deeper gravity, ending with the Holocaust. One young man answered, "Well, the Holocaust was probably wrong." This fellow didn't come to our school, so I don't know what he thought of September 11. C.S. Lewis's The Abolition of Man is one remedy for moral illiteracy. To those who say we should "see through" the notion of absolute right and wrong, he answers: "It is no use trying to `see through' first principles. If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To `see through' all things is the same as not to see." Summer Work. Picture a student opening a gift envelope. Instead of cash or a gift certificate, it contains a letter promising help in finding a blue-collar job the following summer. That student will regard it as the equivalent of a lump of coal. In recent years, college students have increasingly disdained positions on paint crews and lifeguard teams in favor of internships that involve more cerebral demands. I'm all for internships, and work closely with students to line them up. But too many middle-class students now pass from kindergarten to professional school without ever working with people who sweat for a living. They're missing an important life experience. In blue-collar jobs they'd meet the men and women who elected Reagan, listen to Rush, and are repairing the Pentagon. My most important education came not in a classroom, but in my father's milk truck. By helping him with his delivery route during the summer, I learned about hard work and gained more appreciation for the sacrifices that he and my mother were making for my sisters and me. Every Christmas, I think of his example, which is the best gift I ever got. |
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