It’s week four of the strike here in Windsor, and just making it to the weekend without a network glitch or IT problem had us tempted to leave this week’s Friday celebration at this.
But before you send that angry email voicing your outrage over the amount of popular television references made on this, a scholarly blog, let’s not forget how many of our educational heroes built great careers as television personalities. Yes, this week we celebrate Friday by celebrating television educators.
First and foremost, who among us didn’t learn a thing or seven about science from watching Bill Nye the Science Guy? His unique blend of hard scientific knowledge with theatricality and multi-media made him far more memorable than any text book our teachers had to offer. It would be wrong, however, to assume that Nye’s work was only about entertainment value: the science guy also happens to be an outspoken critic of teaching creationism in American public schools.
Similarly, most of us who grew up watching him on PBS would have a hard time imagining Mr. Rogers as anything other than a friendly neighbour, but did you know he was also an important defender of public access television? Like Bill Nye, Rogers is often remembered more for his theatricality than anything else, but that’s exactly why he showed up to the American Senate in 1969 completely in persona to argue for increased funding for PBS.
And speaking of personas, there are few people more committed to staying in character than Stephen Colbert, but it’s often to bring attention to real issues. For instance, did you hear about the time he showed up to a Senate Subcommittee hearing in persona to speak about the exploitation of migrant workers?
So on the first Friday of October, when the weather doesn’t make sense, the sports seasons get hectic, and the exam season threatens to pop-out from behind every corner, let’s celebrate television for being mostly mindless but now and then offering valuable commentary on the intellectual arena. After all, wasn’t it t.v.’s first family, the Simpsons, who described the life of a developing academic best?
Don’t you hate when you get the urge to have a scholarly debate but your friends just want to talk about the series finale of Breaking Bad – again? We know we’re not the only ones. That’s why we’re always looking for new ways to connect to the scholarly community. Some of these you’ll find as links in our BlogRoll, such as ProfHacker and InsiderHigherEd. Others we’ve introduced in weekly posts.
With that in mind, we now introduce UDaimonia Online. A website for students by students, UDaimonia provides a venue for students of all levels and disciplines to share their thoughts on the state of higher education. In the words of the editorial team:
UDaimonia Online provides readers with a Canadian student perspective on major debates and discussions in higher education. We believe that students play a key role in the rapid evolution of Canadian higher education, and we hope that this serves as a platform for sharing valuable perspectives from across the country. We want you to emerge from your UDaimonia Online experience with new ideas that leave you thinking as you crawl into bed and drift off to sleep.
So why does it appeal to us? For starters, it’s nice to see a student-run initiative that acknowledges students as scholars capable of offering important insight on the current state of the education system. You’ll notice, also, that the editors have maintained an open call for submissions encouraging readers to contribute (for those of you who read our post last week on thinking about publishing your work).
Moreover, it’s nice to see a scholarly website that brands itself as the Canadian student perspective, and for the most part the shoe fits. We’re all for international discourse, and not every article on UDaimonia is overtly Canadian, but anything that attempts to bring focus to the Canadian student experience is okay in our books.
By the way, did you hear about the Canadian version of Breaking Bad?
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