Student Guide Corner

As I write this entry, I am in the middle of giving my second Financial Accounting test of the semester.   The students are sweating away at this very moment.   If you would like to receive a copy of the test just to see how another teacher asks questions, drop me an email at Jhoyle@richmond.edu . ** I was asked recently to give a presentation here at the University of Richmond to explain my long-time use of the Socratic Method.   There was clearly a lot of curiosity because faculty showed up from all across campus:   biology, chemistry, computer science, English, history, law, political science, and more.   I sense that our faculty members (or maybe just faculty in general) truly want to look at alternative ways of teaching in hopes of getting away from a lecture and memorize model in order to move more toward the development of critical thinking skills by the students.  Or, maybe they all just came for the free lunch. I had a marv...

The September 16, 2015, issue of The Wall Street Journal provided a wonderful essay by Jason Stevens titled �A Professor Who Put Teaching First.�   He writes about one of his professors (Peter W. Schramm of Ashland University) who recently died.   I found almost every word to be moving.  However, here are two sentences that were really wonderful:   �His office was always full of students wanting to tear off a bit of wisdom . . .  Schramm taught his students how to think and live well, how to be prudent and judge wisely, how to seek the just and the true.�  Words like those were what made me want to become a college teacher way back when I was a young person.   For me, kings and presidents could not have a more important and interesting life than Stevens describes. Reading this essay started me thinking.   Do students today still talk about their college teachers in such glowing terms?  In some ways, the description o...