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Barbara Dellenback: From KLCC Media, this is The Oregon Grapevine. I'm Barbara Dellenback. The Oregon Grapevine highlights fresh-pressed conversations with people who are actively and passionately creating the present and future in which they wish to live. Chris Swanson is the president of Gutenberg College in Eugene. Thank you so much for coming on The Oregon Grapevine, Chris. I appreciate it.
Chris Swanson: Well, thanks for inviting me. I'm glad to be here.
Dellenback: Let's start with a brief overview of Gutenberg College. I think a lot of people don't know there's another college in Eugene. What is it, and how does it work?
Swanson: Sure. Gutenberg College is a four-year liberal arts college. You earn a Bachelor of Arts in liberal arts. We are distinctive in that our curriculum is a single curriculum. There are no other majors. All the students take the same course of study. They're with each other every day in all their classes together. If you start as a freshman, you stay with your freshman class for four years. We are also distinctive in that it is a discussion-based school. We're interested in reading books that were influential in our culture and in history, things that have set the stage for where we are in the world today. We read those books and discuss them. It is modeled after a school called St. John's College, if anybody knows what that is, which gives you a basic framework. We're also a Christian college with a very residential, familial atmosphere. It's an extremely small college. We have about 17 students in all, and we all get to know each other. We spend a lot of time together and learn each other's ins and outs. It also provides an opportunity for students to really think and interact with each other and ask the questions they want to ask.
Dellenback: I'm going to bounce around a bit, but one thing that pops into my head: I once had a conversation with a philosophy professor, and I know some parents who wonder why their child would want to be a philosophy major. So if a student says, 'Mom, I want to go to Gutenberg College,' how does that go over? What does mom say? What are you going to do with that degree? How do you convince someone, or maybe you don't need to? Why are students drawn to this very particular way of spending their college years?
Swanson: That's a great question. I like to say that everybody is a philosopher. It's just that not very many people think carefully about the philosophy they hold. The opportunity at Gutenberg College for students to actually think about what they believe and why they believe it, where those ideas come from, and whether they should ascribe to those beliefs is invaluable. We live in a world with a lot of competing beliefs, and our culture is very powerful. A lot of times we believe what the people around us believe: our culture, our subculture, our friends, our family. Gutenberg College is an opportunity for people to really think and grapple with questions like: Who am I? What am I about? Why am I supposed to do these things? That's just the tip of the iceberg. There are other reasons people come to Gutenberg as well. It's a much more personal, relational kind of institution. It is also a Christian institution, and many students are interested in pursuing questions about who they are in relation to God. We give them the freedom to pursue those questions with few boundaries, which I think is a little scary for a lot of students, parents, and honestly for us as well.
Dellenback: When you talk about biblically based teaching, there are different interpretations of what that means. So how does that work? Is the Bible one of the books you're reading, one of the founding philosophies of your approach, with a fixed meaning? How do you open the door to different ways of interpreting that document and the theology around it?
Swanson: That's a fantastic question, Barbara. We have a founding belief at Gutenberg College, something all the faculty subscribe to, and that is a philosophy of reading. It sounds like a strange place to start, but it is key. Our philosophy of reading is that we attempt to understand any book, whether it be the Bible, a literary work, or some other philosophical or historical document, from the perspective of the author. What was it that they were trying to communicate to the culture they lived in? That requires some understanding of that culture, which is why most of our classes follow a sequence that goes through history. It also requires skill in interpretation: understanding the nuance of what is being said, the context, pulling those things out. I recognize that the Bible is one of the most difficult books in the world to interpret, and we acknowledge that there are many different approaches and conclusions people draw from it. We are willing to dialog with anyone who wants to propose their own perspective and ask questions about it. Students come from many different perspectives on the Bible, and we are absolutely willing and interested in dialoging with them. We're not afraid of those perspectives. Our biggest question is: 'Tell me how you're getting that conclusion from the text we're all reading together.' We've perhaps had a little more experience than the students, but we recognize we could be making mistakes as well. We're not trying to profess a particular perspective. That's not to say we don't have one, but we try not to impose it. I think part of the reason Gutenberg's teachers are called tutors, rather than professors, is because we see ourselves as walking alongside the students, trying to figure out what the authors are saying. We really do feel that the authors of the books we're reading are the primary teachers, and we are secondary. We are there to help students uncover what they can get from the books. The Bible is obviously one of the most important books, and we read it substantially in the curriculum, but with this same approach: free inquiry, students asking their own questions, drawing their own conclusions. We're not going to force them to take our particular perspective, and many don't.
Dellenback: I know there's a term called 'great books.' It sounds finite to me. My impression is that there are certain books included, but they end at a certain point. Is there a historical cutoff date? Are you reading only books up to 1950, or 1820, or some other year? How do you decide? Are there contemporary books in the curriculum?
Swanson: It's very difficult. The term 'great books,' and I may be mistaken, I think comes from a series published in the 1940s by Mortimer Adler and Robert Hutchins called 'The Great Books of the Western World.' Those were sold widely throughout the United States. Their goal, and ours to some extent, was to identify works that have been most influential in the history of ideas. Choosing which books are the most influential is a tricky chore. Generally, people look at how widely they were read, how much they impacted future thinkers, and how much they have shaped the culture we live in today. Obviously, someone like Aristotle was hugely influential through the Medieval and Renaissance periods, and even today, so we're going to read him. There will always be differences of opinion, and we spend time as a faculty looking at our particular selection of books and asking: Should we keep that one or drop it? How did the discussion go? Is it really significant? Are we missing something? We may or may not make the right decisions, but they're the decisions we're making. When it comes to the more modern period, it's much harder, because one thing you can assess with ancient books is how they've stood the test of time. After about 1950 or 1980, that's a harder question to answer, because a book may be popular for a period and then go out of fashion. So we have to be more careful. We don't tend to read many books from after the 1960s or '70s. We did introduce one course more recently that gives students an opportunity to take on what we call a contemporary issue. We gave the students the option to say what contemporary issue they'd like to pursue, and then we pick that topic, look at it historically, trace the developing ideas around it, and read current works. The last topic the students chose was the nature of gender and sexuality. We spent a whole quarter reading some of the seminal works in that area.
Dellenback: You mentioned that students enter with a class and stay together. For that contemporary issues class, did the seniors take it, or did everyone take it? And if seniors took it but freshmen also wanted to, how do you make that determination? Is there cross-pollination?
Swanson: Sure. Because we're a small college, we have to make some choices in terms of staffing. It turns out that juniors and seniors take a course together called Great Conversation in their last two years, and they are always together. It covers a two-year course of study. So juniors and seniors are together in one year, and the next year the juniors become seniors and are joined by the previous class, and so on. It swaps back and forth. That contemporary issues class is something both juniors and seniors take together, and it's offered every other year so that everyone has a chance to take it. We may change the topic as time goes on, if students are interested in something else.
Dellenback: I know that students don't just sit and read, although reading and discussion are clearly central. There's also a community involvement component to the curriculum. And certainly, for people of faith, many believe it's not just an intellectual exercise but a life calling. How do you incorporate that into what you're teaching and modeling for your students, and for your faculty as well?
Swanson: Sure. Gutenberg is a close-knit community, partly because of its size. It is housed in a building on the corner of 19th and University Street, an old fraternity building. We are fortunate to have it. On the second floor, there are a number of residential rooms. We can house up to 20 students at a time in the building, and many of our students live there. They're not required to, and they're free to find other housing if they want. We're not big on coercing people to do anything. But many students do live in that community. They get five dinners a week cooked for them and are responsible for their other meals. That creates a kind of communal life. The faculty are around a lot, and we participate. We come for dinners, we hold events where students and faculty get together. We have Friday tea every week after our last class. We all get together, someone brings a treat to share, we drink tea and hang out. I have students over to my house for dessert and a movie once a quarter or so. So there are definitely ongoing opportunities to interact with students: coffee one-on-one, communal meals, events. That communal aspect has been really important for the development of the college. We've found that the things students are learning in class, which can be academic and abstract, do sometimes spill out into everyday life. They're talking about something in class and then continue that conversation afterward. Or they start thinking about how they're behaving toward each other, rethinking who they are and how they're supposed to interact with, say, someone who's really getting on their nerves.
Dellenback: What about comparative religions? Do you bring in other conversations? I mean, the people there are probably mostly Christians, and that's what they're learning and studying, but do you also bring in guest speakers, other books, or other conversations about other options for spirituality?
Swanson: The primary focus at Gutenberg College is on the Western intellectual tradition, because we live in the West and our intellectual world has been framed by that tradition. Now, within the Western intellectual tradition, there is a wide variety of religious perspectives and ideas. We start early. We encounter the polytheism of the ancient world, a variety of other religious expressions in Rome, Stoicism, and various philosophies that are essentially religious. There are a number of very different ideas within Christianity that go in all kinds of directions. There are also thinkers dealing with religion in what you might call the post-Christian world: criticizing Christianity, questioning whether it's true. We read Darwin, we read Nietzsche, we read the people who have critiqued Christianity as well. We look at historical events, and the importance of the Muslim community in the history of the West was also significant, so we touch on that. We don't spend much time on the Eastern intellectual tradition, which includes Buddhism, Confucianism, Indian religion, and related areas. We focus on the West, but there's a pretty broad range of ideas within that tradition, covering the whole gamut.
Dellenback: How did you come to Gutenberg?
Swanson: Wow. I graduated from a Christian liberal arts college in California and came to the University of Oregon to pursue Ph.D. studies in physics. While I was here, I ran across an organization, sort of the forerunner of Gutenberg College, called the McKenzie Study Center. It existed to provide a foundation for people interested in thinking about Christianity in the context of either their university studies or their lives as community members. I became interested in what they were talking about. It was very encouraging to me, and I became a participant in that community. It was from that community that Gutenberg College was founded. The former president of Gutenberg College was David Crabtree, who became interested in education and in finding a way to help people become better readers. He wanted them to be better readers of the Bible ultimately, but he was thinking more broadly about the kind of education that would be very helpful for students. He started thinking about the great books model he saw at St. John's College. He started a small reading group that lasted about three years. It was an evening class that met once a month, and he titled it Ignoramuses Anonymous. I knew I had to be in that class because I was a physicist and I was definitely an ignoramus who wanted to learn. I was there at the beginning, teaching classes when the college started up. That's how I got involved.
Dellenback: This is backtracking a little, but this is a very arcane and specialized school, and we hear a lot about the trauma and turmoil of higher education: why does it matter, does it matter, and so on. Is this model thriving? Not just Gutenberg, but I'm assuming you have conversations with other smaller, more specialized schools, whether they're specifically faith-based or not. How do those conversations go in terms of whether this feels like something that's thriving and has a future?
Swanson: Yeah. I would say there has been an upsurge of interest in what I would call classical K-12 education, and that is definitely thriving. A number of classical schools are opening up all over the country. Depending on the rules in each state, there are a lot of charter schools growing that are also classical in nature, and a lot of classical homeschooling. There are organizations helping these schools: the Society for Classical Learning, the Association for Christian Classical Schools, and others. So there's a big movement in K-12. I would say the movement in higher education has not really caught up. There are a few small schools around the country interested in the same model of education that we pursue, but it is not as much in demand as in K-12. Our hope is that eventually the K-12 upsurge of interest will carry over into higher education. But society tends to think about higher education differently: most people, or at least a lot of people, are looking for a school with a reputation and a major that will give them their first step in their economic life. When they look at Gutenberg College, they see the size of the school and the unusual nature of the curriculum, and it's not a slam dunk for a lot of students. So it is a challenge for Gutenberg to continue to strive and thrive in the educational environment we're in right now. But we're committed to it. We feel that what we have to offer is so valuable to students. It is something that is going to impact their lives, not just their careers, for the rest of their lives. We know that our alumni are very appreciative of what they've had, and that most parents are really appreciative of what their students got. There's something very vibrant, life-giving, and valuable about coming together to think about what's important, so we're committed to it, and we're going to see it through.
Dellenback: Is there anything we haven't touched on that you want to make sure we cover about Gutenberg before we say goodbye?
Swanson: I would mention one or two other things. One is the financial side. Gutenberg College doesn't charge a lot of tuition, partly because we're small, but it also goes back to that relational aspect we have with our students. When you get to know a student and you're sitting around eating lunch with them a couple of times a week, they're a person, and our financial dealings with them are going to reflect that personal relationship. We strive to find a way to partner with them. We communicate with students and their parents to figure out what they are capable of paying, and we try to fill the gap as much as possible. We don't accept federal funding, so students can't get federal loans, but we do offer our own financial aid and scholarships to make it possible for students to come. I think students appreciate the fact that it's not a transaction but a partnership. That spirit also carries over when they graduate and are looking for careers. We do provide some services and ideas to help them think about what they want to do with their lives. And it's worth saying: while the curriculum may seem esoteric, the skills students develop in listening, reading, communicating, interacting, and writing are very valuable across all kinds of jobs and areas of life. Employers who see someone who is genuinely willing to listen, think carefully about what's been said, and respond creatively tend to appreciate that. So those were the two pieces.
Dellenback: I really appreciate that insight. Thank you, Chris Swanson, for coming in and talking about Gutenberg. I'm happy to learn more, and I appreciate the work you're doing.
Swanson: I'm just excited to tell other people, so thank you.
Dellenback: You've been listening to KLCC Media's The Oregon Grapevine: fresh-pressed conversations with people who are actively and passionately creating the present and future in which they wish to live.
