Agent of Democracy - Society for College and University Planning

Agent of Democracy
• the direct links among professional school education, global
citizenship, and field practice beyond the campus
• the explication of public scholarship constructs and objectives
• the epistemological limitations of traditional university practices
and the potential inherent in the public scholarship
practices some have adopted to replace them
• the developmental and educational links between public
scholarship and the public decision making required by
democracy
Each approach represents the fundamental work of scholarship.
Each has been conducted, not as a good service add-on, but as a
component of our work as professional scholars in a democracy.
We are trying at Penn State to distinguish between the complexity
of teaching and learning democracy and the simple and ethical
decision to volunteer in a community. We’ve learned that the obligations
the Constitution holds for professional educators are not
passive. The idea of public scholarship has provided an instrument
through which we have been able to begin to make the argument
that teaching and learning democracy are obligations of membership
in a democratic community and are at the heart of the civil
fidelity entrusted to our schools and that the public diffusion of
the discoveries and applications of our work as scholars, artists,
and artisans is a foundation of politically responsible curriculum
and pedagogy.
Confronted by the demands of his own conscience as well as
the claims of others, Joyce’s young artist came to understand his
obligations as an artist. Public scholarship, we believe, is about
nothing less than the obligations of educators and educational
institutions to the duties of democratic sovereignty. In the face of
research university practices that include economic pragmatism,
a premium on personal advancement, and purposeful avoidance
of political engagement, our democratic obligations are too often
unmet. In a time of violent warfare in the name of democracy that
has extended for a period longer now than the violence of World
War II and that has usurped U.S. constitutional rights long held
168