Letters from Dr. Gose
 
1986

Dear Parent, Guardian, To Whom It May Concern,

As not only the visiting professor, but the resident professor as well, I have had occasion to step in for you from time to time this year. With fifty-four students in our house, I have sometimes felt like the statue of Liberty- proclaiming "Give me your tired, poor, huddled masses," and you did, you sent all fifty-four of them, and I stood here, just like the Statue of Liberty, but with both arms up in the air wondering why I asked for this. And so it gose (to paraphrase Vonnegut).

Well anyway, I have fifty-four good reasons to write you, but really, although I am addressing this letter to you, the parent, guardian, concerned older adult, I am really writing this letter for me, to reflect and ponder on my (our) year and my (our) spent aspirations. (After all, it's simply much too late to think about how we could have kept the student center cleaner; the dishes washed; the beds made; the noise down; and toilet paper on the toilet rolls; which is all, of course, part of it, too.).

My first reflection is that I am personally impressed with the caliber of our academic experiences. Thinking about being a part of the Year-In-Europe Program, students sometimes wonder if the European travel will dilute the quality of their academic work. I definitely have not found that to be true. Quite the opposite in fact. Perhaps because this group was chosen competitively for admission into the program, the level of academic competition here has been very intense, at first almost to a fault. (Really, I know that is difficult to believe, but it's true. There has been no curve. They have bunched toward the top). Their competition has insured the rigor and quality of their academic experience.

Second, and mostly second, I believe the supreme values of our year together lie in what Philip Jackson has called "the hidden curriculum". Intuitively we know that there is much more to our education than simply our academic lessons. We know that the climate of values we live in affects us immensely. Unfortunately we have not developed a common language (like the 3rs of reading, writing, and arithmetic) to talk about what we are "really" learning while we are studying our academic lessons. But despite the lack of a common language, it is in this area of the hidden curriculum that we have had perhaps our greatest lessons.

Alex Inkeles talks about the hidden curriculum in terms of "skills for modern living." Within his list of social skills, Inkeles argues for the importance of "skills in interpersonal relations which permit negotiation, insure protection of one's interests, and provide maintenance of stable and satisfying relations with intimates, peers, and authorities." It cannot be fairly said that we "taught" this skill. But the evidence is that, for all our students, the skill was enhanced. "Haggling" over bills, value added taxes, supplements, grades, the washer-dryer, noise, who was in the card game, which tapes to play, the choice of videos to watch, etc. provided a life time worth of opportunities, in only seven months, to negotiate and yet still, somehow, get along. I will never forget my wonderment that Dane and Zoila decided to travel together at Christmas. And yet, to everyone's surprise, they were a very successful traveling pair. But what I'll really never forget is Dane telling me afterward that he too had amazed himself. "Yeah! It was awesome. We could yell and scream at each other and still like each other." That is precisely what Inkeles understands as negotiation, insuring one's interests, but maintaining stable relationships. Our students were very successful in this critical skill.

A second skill from Inkeles' list is the development of "a cognitive style which permits thinking in concrete terms while still permitting reasonable handling of abstractions and general concepts." I can dispense quickly with this skill by simply asking you to ask your student about Basil Bernstein, Lawrence Kohlberg, B.F. Skinner, "Nate" Gage, et al, and the polyfocal conspectus, and I feel confident you will 'know' they got a good workout. A third skill, "a mind which does not insist on excessively premature closure, is tolerant of diversity, and has some components of flexibility" has been forged and tempered, if only by the German language and the European train schedules that have taken them from Oslo to Athens; Prague to Madrid; and all points in between.

Finally, Inkeles notes the importance of "a conative style which facilitates reasonably regular, steady, and persistent effort, relieved by rest and relaxation, but not requiring long periods of total withdrawal or depressive psychic slump." As our "valley" kids say, this has been tested "to the max." It has been my distinct impression that someone was always awake at Moorehaus, except perhaps, from the hour from 5 - 6 a.m. Yet they still made their classes, tests, and train schedules; carved out places for brief respites; and, despite missing you, never let up.

I should perhaps warn you (or at least remind you) that Pepperdine, and especially the Year-in-Europe Program, runs counter to some of the lessons of the "hidden curriculum" that are associated with what I (with unashamed bias) call the impersonal factory schools. Robert Dreeben has identified "norms" that he argues are ordinarily taught in school to help students prepare for the world of work. He includes the norms of "universalism" and "specificity." The essence of "universalism" is that we get used to being treated impersonally as members of categories. Some of that lesson is undoubtedly necessary. We must be in certain age groups to drive, drink, vote. We must be in a certain political party to vote in some primaries. We pay taxes on the basis of certain income brackets. It's not personal. It's just our categories. The heart of "specificity" is that we learn to accept being treated on the basis of a limited number of our personal characteristics. Most employers are, reputedly, only concerned about our productivity and whether we are on time and put in our forty hours, not what our special story might be. It's not personal. Both universalism and specificity imply that it is necessary for us to get used to being treated very impersonally. In a complex society, that is undoubtedly true to some degree. But Pepperdine's philosophy emphasizes that each student is unique, and special, and at the heart of the academic enterprise. I once attended a large, internationally famous university where at one time over 95% of the undergraduates reported that they did not know a professor well enough to ask for a personal recommendation. My brother once finished near the very top of his class at a large, internationally famous university where no professor knew him by name.

Well, after a year together, we certainly know your student's name, and well enough to recommend and remember each one. Indeed, it would be impossible to confuse them or forget them. Ah, the memories, back in Malibu, at the first dinner for students going to Heidelberg, Mark stood up and announced he was a freshman major. At the summer gathering at our home on campus, Cindy announced, on the video tape I made, that Debbie Thomas would be our biggest problem. At the getaway dinner, I remember eating at the table with Janille and her parents and wondering what our adventure would be like and how could I already be old enough to actually be everyone's parent? By the time I got to Heidelberg, I already knew that Cindy idolized Michael Brizzy Koff, or something like that, and Kristy idolized Sting. By the time I got to Zurich, even I had liberated a Sting poster for Kristy. By Halloween and the first talent show, I already knew Paige played the piano beautifully; Kim Cabe sang beautifully; and that Carolyn was a Talking Fish Head. Also that David needed Christina (a.k.a. Bride of Frankenstein) to feed him breakfast and that Dane had a perverse affection for the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Janet shattered her reserved image with her outrageous impersonation of Jeff Gillet, who was busy with his own shabby impression of yours truly. Jan Strand was Helen Keller; Tim Maz wore diapers. Somewhere along the line, Jeff Scrivner and Jon Block showed up with earings (you mean they hadn't told you yet?). Connie started her career as a charity worker by knitting a sweater for a hunchback. Midori took note of Connie's limited success knitting sweaters, and Shannon's and Jeff's scarves and bought a truck full of already knit sweaters from Florence. Students made my classes adventures. I had to live with students upstaging me, for example, Brad "on trial" for having murdered his orally fixated roommate; Becky as Laverne on Phil Donahue; Danielle giving one of my tests; Patrick asking where the wind goes; Russ and Shayne in mortal courtroom conflict; John singing of Tevye's moral dilemma; Tanja's getting unprecedented perfect scores; Julie's climbing all the way up Philosopher's Way on bad wheels, then climbing to the top of the Ampitheatre as well. Having to laugh and tell Erin, just like my own kid- "do as I say, not as I do." Dena, Todd, and Paige having the good sense to miss taking any of my classes; Kim Cabe, Kim Sauer, Stephanie, Russ, Shayne, and Dane taking me for all four. Each different (as I write this, I actually overhear Jeff Gillett saying "different, not deficit"); Brett in a Crickett jacket; Kevin in preppy red; Todd in his derby; Diana in her vogue knit outfit that she had made herself; Zoila with her sense of style; Don dressing as Dr. Luft; Brian (a.k.a. "Sweetness") in his trucker's cap speaking respectfully of McAhDeez; Cara and Shannon in my missing pajamas. Everyone adopted my seven year old, Creedance: Monica tutored her in German; Patrick helped her search for the magical Panda Bear; Jennifer had her own seven year old sister write her; Stephanie (among others) talked and played cards with her on the field trips; Kim Sauer did lichubby" with her at the Talent Show. All of this life together consistently punctuated by the distinctive laughter of Michaelann, Carrie and Shannon. Quiet times for Caroline and Tim, among others, to become "couples". Time for me to talk with Kowanda about God and Kathy about the 60's; to wonder about Eric's story of his encounter with a stowaway; Caroline's experience of a bank hold-up; Russ and Shayne's story of extortion and kidnap. Field trips: losing the student body race to the bus' W.C. in Prague to Debbie; watching Steve's reaction to the Iron Curtain Black Market; seeing Kim Austin make rainy days happy; skirting every snowball except the five Paul threw. Asking Sara why she was last in the cafeteria line, was it to be nice? "No, I had to go to the bathroom." Our fifty-four individuals. O.K., sometimes we called Connie, Tanja and Tanja, Connie, but it was because they became such inseparable friends, not because we could not tell them apart. We had fifty-four who all stood out and were appreciated for their own special ways. We think our future leaders will be those who have had the best of such opportunities to value and be valued in such personal ways. This personalness was at the heart of our year together.

Besides social skills and norms, values are another area of special concern to our implicit curriculum. Unlike many universities, which pursue knowledge with great vigor, but tend to abandon value education, we are "dedicated to the integration of a person, mind, body, and spirit- believing that it is whole people, with a sense of history and culture and humanity and spirituality, who will indeed preserve our civilization from decay." Pepperdine's 1985 Annual Report quotes our President, Dr. David Davenport, responding to the question of whether in the not-too-distant future Pepperdine would take its place on the list of the nation's most prestigious academic institutions. He answered, "I certainly hope not. Rather, it is my hope, and it is my vision today, that in the next century, when educators speak of Pepperdine University, they do not include it as number 20 or 10 or even number 5 on the list that begins with Stanford, Harvard, and the rest. Instead, we hope they will say that Pepperdine is at the head of a new list, as a school where the glowing light of reflection and the light of discovery are in a very real way combined with the guiding light of values." Research indicates that such values as aesthetic values, personal identity, friendship, altruism, religious faith, among many other values, are positively affected by church related schools such as Pepperdine. We believe such values have been encouraged here.

I have stressed our aspirations for the explicit and implicit curriculum and hope that in some meaningful way they have had value for your student. But I'd like to close with a quotation from James Herndon that is perhaps more reflective of the actual day to day realities of our life here together. Herndon, my favorite American educator and author, sent me his new book which, happily, arrived during this year in Europe. It so happens that Jim's first teaching job was here in Heidelberg. His books share memories much in the way all of us will recollect the countless memories we all take home from Heidelberg of our happy times together when "we would all recognize for an instant the foolishness and absurdity of our ways through the world and feel the impact of the great occasional and accidental joy which (was) our reward along those paths."

Janice, Creedance, and I will miss everyone very much.

Yours truly,

Michael D. Gose