School of Athens, by Raphael, 1505, Apostolic Palace, Vatican City.

School of Athens, by Raphael, 1505. Apostolic Palace, Vatican City.

Ways of Learning

Volume 1, Number 4 | fall 2008

A Young Man Being Introduced to the Seven Liberal Arts, by Sandro Botticelli, c. 1484. Louvre Museum, Paris, France.

Preamble

Playing with Fire

By Lewis H. Lapham

The framework of American education holds fast to the ardent but mistaken belief that education is a commodity, the stuff that one pours into empty vessels.

More

A school without grades must have been concocted by someone who was drunk on nonalcoholic wine.

—Karl Kraus, 1909