We live in interesting times in higher education. Fascinating to see the split between techno-optimists and techno-pessimists in academia. Similarly fascinating: some see the current moment as an opportunity for disruption and renewal, while others are doubling down on old systems. I just spent several hours wading through syllabus checklists for a weeklong course abroad that we have taught for almost 40 years. For 21 of those years I have taught it. Most of the course is spent touring sites around Greece. I take the students to museums, to farms, to ancient ruins, to monasteries old and new, to wineries and vineyards, to modern cooking and dance lessons. I have no idea how to capture all the “learning outcomes” in the appropriate verbs. I don’t care whether students use AI on that course (or on my backcountry Alaska course). I don’t feel the need to list my office hours, or the location of the campus writing center, or a number of other things the syllabus checklist requires. The grading feels rather unimportant, provided the students show up and give their attention to the place and to its people.

I do very much care about the students, their growth, and their presence. And I care about Greece, its people, its history and languages, its culture and agriculture, its islands and ocean and fish, its flowers and its churches, the immigrants who arrive, the people who trace their family roots to this land for millennia.

The university provides me a foundation from which to teach these things. I teach not by proferring data but by bringing students along as I continue to learn.

Teaching should not be merely about what tools the students use, nor about what metrics we can contrive to justify our teaching. The proof of the education should be in the students themselves. And the teaching should come not from the techniques and devices of the teacher (very few of us learn how to teach, and fewer still can honestly say they know how to teach others how to teach) but from the teacher’s character. We should show up as the best students in the class. We should exemplify wonder and curiosity. We should ask good questions so that our students can ask even better ones. We should bring students along as we continue to learn, not studying for the exam, but delighting in this world that is our to explore.