LiberalArtsOnline Volume 5, Number 4
April 2005
Last month, our author argued that liberal arts education should promote the use of dialogue over debate and teach students how to distinguish between the two. This month, James Knauer, director of the Pennsylvania Center for Civic Life, continues to explore this theme as he discusses the importance of a specific type of dialogue for civic education and liberal learning. Democracy Lab, a program developed by the Center for Civic Life, uses deliberative dialogue to connect civic education and liberal learning in order to promote student civic engagement. As you read about this new resource, I encourage you to consider the ways deliberative dialogue can benefit liberal arts education on your campus.
--Kathleen S. Wise, Editor
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Democracy Lab: Liberal Learning for Strong Democracy
by James T Knauer
Professor of Political Science and
Director, Pennsylvania Center for Civic Life
Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania
Strong democracy, as illuminated in Benjamin Barber’s classic work of the same name, expects attentiveness, public spiritedness, and action from the general citizenry, not just from a political leadership class. Certainly one of the most fundamental and important skills of strong democracy is the capacity of citizens to talk together productively about their shared world, especially when they disagree. This capacity is no simple thing. While human beings are often assumed to be natural democrats, history amply documents our equally strong predilections for tyranny and slavery. The potential for democracy may be universal, but its realization is largely a matter of culture, which is to say, it must be learned. The capacities, habits, and dispositions of strong democratic citizens can be learned well by the many only when supported by a culture that nourishes and replenishes these characteristics from generation to generation.
The failures of American democracy are nowhere more tellingly revealed than in our public discourse, which often stymies the development of whatever natural potential for democracy we might have. Pervasive spin, outright deception, and an overall "shout radio" approach to discussion breed cynicism and apathy. Instead of strengthening citizens, our public discourse impoverishes subjects. Nothing is more important to the future of our relatively recent, historically exceptional, and fragile experiment in democracy than teaching and learning democratic ways of public talking. Schools are not powerful enough institutions to do the job alone, but democracy is unlikely to survive if they ignore this civic responsibility.
Of course, many educators, Stanley Fish most recently and famously, attack civic education for stealing time from the "proper" educational mission of the university. However, historical understandings of liberal learning have in fact always recognized its civic mission: educating the next generation of leaders. Even when civic education was only contemplated for the few, it was integral to the traditional concept of liberal learning.
Over time, ideas about liberal education have evolved from these elitist notions of the past. Today the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) advances an explicitly universal agenda for liberal learning in its report, Greater Expectations: A New Vision for Learning as a Nation Goes to College, calling for "a dramatic reorganization of undergraduate education to ensure that all college aspirants receive not just access to college, but an education of lasting value" (emphasis added). This requires helping students become "intentional learners" who are "purposeful and self-directed" and "can adapt to new environments, integrate knowledge from different sources, and continue learning throughout their lives." Intentional learners are "empowered through intellectual and practical skills, informed by knowledge and ways of knowing, [and] responsible for personal actions and civic values." AAC&U’s focus on the intentional learner in liberal education reinforces the connection between liberal learning and civic education, while expanding liberal education’s scope to include all students.
While this call for liberal learning for all students runs contrary to the traditional elitist conception of the liberal arts, the wisdom of universalizing liberal education has been supported in these pages by the research report from Wolniak, Seifert and Blaich (March 2004): "The major finding was that liberal arts experiences and a liberal arts emphasis were most important for students of color and students with below average pre-college academic ability." Far from degrading liberal arts education, as has often been claimed, the civic power of liberal learning is increased by extending its reach to all students.
The natural synergy between civic education and liberal education is further revealed in the centrality of dialogue to both. Richard Gunderman’s recent article in these pages (March 2005) makes a strong case for advancing dialogue in liberal education as an antidote to our debate culture. Drawing on the Socratic model of dialogue, he contrasts it to debate and emphasizes its connection to the spirit of inquiry that energizes liberal learning: "The parties to a dialogue aim not to defeat one another, but to enlighten one another. It is not a conflict, but a shared inquiry." But Socratic dialogue, at least as recounted and used by Plato, fits more naturally with elitist than with democratic versions of liberal education. It is a teacher’s method for leading students toward the truth, as in the case of the slave boy who is led, by skillfully posed questions, to derive "for himself" the Pythagorean Theorem—all to support Plato’s claim about prior knowledge. Socratic dialogue can be a powerful teaching method and, as Gunderman clearly envisions, it can certainly be used in ways more open-ended than leading students to known truths, but it is not an adequate model for dialogue among democratic citizens, or for achieving the objectives of liberal learning for all students.
Strong citizens and intentional learners need the developed capacity to talk among themselves, without teachers or facilitators. Within highly pluralistic national societies and an increasingly global context, they must also be able to engage diversity as opportunity rather than problem. A pedagogy of deliberative dialogue can play a key role in both civic education for strong democracy and liberal learning for all students.
Deliberative dialogue helps students gain a deeper understanding of competing perspectives on complex public issues. It is not just a matter of recognizing different views; deliberative dialogue weighs the pros and cons of various approaches to an issue, making students aware of differences in the way others see those costs and benefits. Through this process, they learn more about the issue at hand and broaden and clarify their own thinking. Thus, deliberative dialogue helps students develop an understanding of why others hold different views along empathic as well as critical dimensions.
Democracy Lab, an online learning community developed by the Pennsylvania Center for Civic Life at Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania, uses deliberative dialogue as a learning strategy that weds civic education with the intentional learner concept of liberal learning. It supports the efforts of schools, from secondary through university, to integrate civic education into both curriculum and co-curriculum. In particular, it facilitates the creation of strong campus cultures to support engagement in learning and in civic life by bringing students into constructive democratic dialogue.
Typically, students first encounter Democracy Lab when they take a class that uses one of our online forums. These forums are adopted by instructors as a course requirement. Students purchase access for $25, just as they might purchase a supplemental book. (In some cases, schools cover the cost of student participation.) Dialogue, guided by announcements and instructional modules, occurs on asynchronous bulletin boards available 24/7. Students participate in a dialogue group with other students from around the country for 10 weeks. Separate forums are conducted for high school and college students.
Using a non-partisan issue framework, students work through a deliberative agenda that takes them from dialogue to inquiry to action. Each framework presents an introduction to the issue, along with three or four different action approaches. Students deliberate the pros and cons of each approach, identify questions for further inquiry, share and discuss research results, reflect on their learning processes, and commit to action.
Forums are available on a variety of issues, including Americans’ Role in the World, Racial and Ethnic Tensions, and News Media and Society. These forums use professionally prepared materials from the Kettering Foundation and National Issues Forum Institute. Democracy Lab student leaders have contributed to the development of other issues, including Youth Civic Disengagement and What Kind of General Education Should All College Students Have?
As current concerns about political polarization recognize, deliberative dialogue is significantly counter-cultural, but many students find it a much more interesting and productive way of discussing political issues than the "shout radio" approach. Forums are not merely exercises in social science argumentation; they encourage students to share experiences, underlying concerns, and ultimate values, stimulating exactly the kind of conversation and reflection Jeffrey Nesteruk called for in these pages (November 2004).
Beyond their first experience, Democracy Lab offers increasing levels of responsibility to students. Those who move up the Democracy Lab leadership ladder continue to participate in forums, but in developmentally sequenced roles: first as participant observers on student civic leadership teams (also engaged in meta-dialogue about the deliberative learning process), then in online internships as research assistants monitoring and facilitating dialogue, and finally as researchers (perhaps for a senior thesis). Thanks to three-year funding from the U.S. Department of Education Fund for the Improvement of Post-Secondary Education (FIPSE), partner institutions receive small grants to implement the Democracy Lab leadership ladder. Democracy Lab also brings students into the learning project as co-directors, who participate in implementation, evaluation, and ongoing enhancement.
Dialogue groups are largely self-moderated (with no direct participation by faculty), giving students responsibility for the process, and teaching them the art of deliberative dialogue—the conversational skills of strong citizenship and the inquiry skills of intentional learning. All groups are monitored by trained student staff who have moved up the leadership ladder. Occasionally these monitors post moderating messages to help groups interact as productively as possible without relieving participants of responsibility for their success.
The rich educational impact of Democracy Lab forums comes from the opportunities for student-to-student teaching and learning. Dialogue groups bring together a more diverse student population than is present in most classrooms, beginning but not ending with demographic diversity. Opportunities for student-to-student teaching and learning increase when some students are in an economics class and others in sociology, when some are seniors and others freshmen, when some are studying the issue in a public policy class and others are studying the process of deliberative dialogue in a communications class. This learning across disciplines fosters "the maturation of responsible citizens endowed with a shared vocabulary, common sense, and well-developed moral character" that Jennifer Laskowski identified as a public concern in these pages (October 2004).
Although instructors have no direct involvement in the online dialogue, our experience has taught us the critical importance of instructor involvement through their courses. Deliberative dialogue achieves its potential when students bring material from their participating courses into the online discussion. Given the disciplinary and grade-level mix of dialogue groups, when students do this they are inevitably asked for further explanation. It is no surprise, then, that the most successful dialogue groups are enriched indirectly by instructors who prepare their students to apply and explain course material online.
Our four semesters of experience have clearly supported the idea that strong citizens must be intentional learners and that liberal learning for all students is critical to strong democracy. Democracy Lab forums and leadership mentoring are being integrated into a variety of programs, including service learning, honors, civic leadership, faculty professional development, performing arts, public and environmental affairs, teacher education, and high school partnerships. We look forward to realizing further synergies between liberal learning and education for strong democracy and invite you and your students to take part in this process.
Democracy Lab is currently accepting instructor reservations for our fall 2005 online forums. Please submit your reservation by May 1 to help ensure the availability of your preferred issue. Faculty reserving by May 1 will be invited to participate in our online workshop, Course Design for Democracy Lab, from May 23–27. Visit our website for detailed information about Democracy Lab, including a reservation form for fall 2005 forums and our current partnership RFP.
Direct personal responses and inquiries about Democracy Lab to jknauer@lhup.edu.
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The comments published in LiberalArtsOnline reflect the opinions of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the Center of Inquiry or Wabash College. Comments may be quoted or republished in full, with attribution to the author(s), LiberalArtsOnline, and the Center of Inquiry in the Liberal Arts at Wabash College.
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Application Deadline Approaches for
National Study of Liberal Arts Education
The Center of Inquiry in the Liberal Arts will begin selecting participants for the National Study of Liberal Arts Education on May 1, 2005. We encourage research universities, regional universities, liberal arts colleges, community colleges, and other institutions of higher education to apply now to participate in this groundbreaking study. Application forms and participation information are available on the Center of Inquiry website.
The National Study of Liberal Arts Education is a multi-institution, longitudinal study of the effects of American higher education on liberal arts outcomes. We will explore not only whether and how much students develop because of their collegiate experiences, but also why and how this development takes place. Our research will help colleges and universities improve student learning and enhance the educational impact of their programs.
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