A College for reading?

My dad saved an article of a news paper for me, I thought I would share it here. A college for Reading?

October 9, 2006
BY JIM RITTER Staff Reporter
An unusual little college has just moved to the South Side of Chicago.

It's called Shimer College, and it's the only college in the Midwest where every student must take a daunting Great Books curriculum.

For four years, students immerse themselves in the often-challenging writers who have shaped Western culture, from Aristotle and Sophocles to William Faulkner and Toni Morrison.

Students call their professors by their first names. Professors call themselves "facilitators." There are no lectures. Classes, typically with just 12 students, are run like Socratic dialogues. ...

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What do you think of that? I wish I could go there...They're reading Dostoevsky! I'm reading his crime and punishment now, and I want to read the one there reading. Does that make me smart or what, hm? hee hee.

I have a collection of all the great books that have influenced western culture, oddly enough. They're old, and probably not worth much now, but there's volumes and volumes of them.

This is a cool idea, I hope it works. I never want to go there, but its still a cool idea.

Sounds fun to me.

It's an excellent idea.

sounds like agreat idea.

I wish I could go there, it sounds great.

There are actually a lot of schools that have "great books" classes.

I just googled "Great book classes in *enter state abbreviation here*" and found a list of them, but I'm sure there is a better list out there.

There's another school like that near me called Saint Johns over in Annapolis, MD. I didn't know about it until I was already in college, otherwise I at least would've applied. It's a really nice campus, and the Great Books curriculum sounds cool. Plus, I kind of think that's the way college should be done.

I just like the idea of having a univeristy run the way an institution of higher learning should: through socrating method, instituting actual LEARNING not rote memorization for tests.

I'm such a book nut case, and all I will read are old classics, not much else unless its something for shear entertainment so I really liked this idea...

There aren't many (I think...2?) in my area though.

Saint Mary's College in Orinda has a program like that.

St Mary's college in Omaha begged me to go there, offered me scholarships and the like. They're an all girls school, figure that one out.

That sounds awesome! Do you not have to take the general ed classes and what not as well?

The General ones? I'm not sure. I think like any college you could go just for that one class, perhaps....If you were just going to learn, and not to graduate. Or something.

But, I have no idea. I don't know anything about college.

Yea, I know that much. I was just wondering because it kind of sounds like all you do is read...no science, math, etc. involved. I was just kind of curious to know how a degree there would be nationally recognized if the gen. ed. classes weren't taken?