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    The McMaster Department of Philosophy has now put together the following notice commemorating Barry: Barry Allen: A Philosophical Life Barry…

Advocating for philosophy and its public perception

Amy Ferrer

All too often, philosophy is seen by the public, the
government, and colleges and universities themselves as expendable—easy targets
for funding cuts. This belief is misguided and sets us down a troubling path.

For one thing, philosophy and the humanities give schools a
lot of bang for their buck. Most philosophy departments do not require the large
research funds and expensive equipment that other fields may need, so their
budgets can reasonably be significantly smaller than departments needing such
resources. And yet with those smaller budgets, philosophy departments make a
sizeable impact. Philosophy teaches students the hallmarks of a quality
education: critical thinking, problem solving, writing, analysis, and argument
construction, to name a few. Philosophy considers the biggest questions there
are—and what is the academy for if not for asking big questions? And philosophy
students routinely outperform students of nearly all other disciplines on standardized
tests for postgraduate education such as the GRE and LSAT. Colleges and
universities that see philosophy and the humanities as expendable are sorely
mistaken.

Unfortunately, attacks on philosophy and the humanities are
sometimes cover for attacks on tenure, when universities see it as more
expeditious to eliminate an entire department rather than go through the
required process for reducing their number of tenured professors. This too, is
dangerous, as it is certainly not expeditious to deprive students of crucial
fields of study in the name of purportedly saving a few bucks or taking
advantage of an administrative loophole. (And we’ve already discussed the
important role of tenure in supporting academic freedom and guaranteeing due
process.)

When philosophy departments are threatened, the APA
responds, as we did earlier this year when the University
of Northern Iowa threatened deep and damaging cuts. Depending on the
situation, we can offer public statements of support, connect with those at the
department in question to provide resources and assistance, and reach out to
those proposing such cuts to advocate for the continuation of these important
programs. We will do whatever we know to do to protect philosophy and the
humanities against such attacks.

And we also participate in national-level advocacy for
philosophy and the humanities. The APA is a member of the National Humanities
Alliance and each year sponsors the NHA’s Humanities Advocacy Day in March. NHA
is currently planning its advocacy for the new Congress and newly re-elected
Obama administration, and I invite you to join the APA in participating in
those efforts—you should expect to hear from me with opportunities to make your
voice heard on Capitol Hill.

But advocacy has to happen from the bottom up as well. Philosophers
must fight for philosophy at the university level, not only for program
funding but also to improve the perception of philosophy for students not
intending to be philosophy professors. We all know the immense benefits
philosophy offers its students—benefits that are applicable and advantageous no
matter what career a student pursues. These benefits are sadly lost on many
students and their parents—and, unfortunately, sometimes school
administrators—which leads to lower demand for philosophy courses. What about
public awareness campaigns to demonstrate philosophy’s value? What about
marketing philosophy courses more widely? What about educating administrators about the benefits of philosophy before programs are threatened?

What else can we—the APA and the philosophical community—do
to advocate for philosophy?

As is standard practice on this blog, signed comments only:  full name preferred, valid e-mail address required.

As this is
my final guest post, I want to take a moment to express my thanks to all those who have read my posts and shared feedback with me, both in comments and off the blog. I look
forward to continuing these discussions throughout my time with the
APA. And thanks, once again, to Brian Leiter for the opportunity to be a guest
on his blog this week.

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28 responses to “Advocating for philosophy and its public perception”

  1. M. Couch

    I think the APA could help by simply publicizing philosophy more to the broader public. A good place to start would be this video of Rachel Maddow on the value of studying philosophy. We could maybe invite her to speak at the APA or something and get the media involved.

    http://bsu.edu/web/news/maddow/education/

    Reply
  2. faculty member

    Maddow's colleague at MSNBC, Chris Hayes, was a philosophy major at Brown. Perhaps they would do a joint appearance the next time APA meets near Washington or New York. He's only 33 – perhaps the department at Brown could help get him.

    Reply
  3. Daniel Kaufman

    We had a long and pretty unpleasant discussion here about the public perception of philosophy, in connection with an article in the Chronicle. It brought some pretty ugly stuff out of people, and I'm not sure you want to start that up again, here.

    Reply
  4. Roger Albin

    The first 4 sentences of your second para are perhaps the strongest argument for the general public and administrators, though an important discipline like philosophy should require no defence. I'm not a philosopher but a physician-scientist at a large academic medical center. My experience is that med students with philosophy backgrounds are better prepared in terms of their ability to think critically and independently. In terms of public perception, I suspect that philosophy suffers from being classified as part of the humanities. At my large university, the Philosophy department is the site of important research work and provides excellent undergraduate education. The same is true of our History department. When most people think about the humanities, however, they usually think of English departments, where the intellectual standards are significantly lower, and this works to the disadvantage of the stronger disciplines in the humanities.

    Reply
  5. Brandon N. Towl

    I would like to echo Couch's sentiment here. It is good that the APA reacts when philosophy departments are threatened; but that should not be the only thing that the APA does. If the APA is *only* reactive, it will seem that the APA, and perhaps philosophers in general, are only interested in keeping their jobs. I believe the APA– and individual departments and philosophers– should be proactive in showing the public at large the value of philosophy. This would be something that is good for the long term state of the profession, and possibly good for the general public as well.

    Reply
  6. Jonathan Weisberg

    If we really want to be taken seriously, we need to get Stephen Colbert involved.

    Reply
  7. Wes McMichael

    Amy,

    I'm so glad to hear that the APA is advocating for philosophy in the wider public. I have two suggestions (I think both of them may have been mentioned on this blog before):

    (i) As you mention, one of the primary selling points for majoring in philosophy is LSAT scores. We constantly tout our students' ability to do exceedingly well on the exam and use this to persuade students to consider our field.

    The LSAT data indicate that our majors fall behind physics majors and are either tied with, or slightly besting, economics majors on the test. Of course, the higher up the list, the stronger our argument.

    A peculiarity of the LSAT classification, though, is that we are grouped with theology/religion majors. I worry that this grouping disadvantages us against physics/math and economics majors (our two closest rivals).

    The GRE lists scores by intended majors and separates philosophy from religion. I'm assuming that the majority of students pursuing graduate studies in philosophy were philosophy majors and the majority pursuing religion were religion majors (though, the latter could very well be mistaken and still not affect my point). According to the latest data (http://webb.nmu.edu/Departments/Philosophy/SiteSections/Resources/GRE_Scores_by_Intended_Major.pdf), students intending to study philosophy (who are presumably philosophy undergraduates) score 1st in verbal reasoning and analytic writing and 14th in quantitative reasoning. Those intending to study religion (and, presumably, religion undergraduates) score 3rd in verbal reasoning and analytic writing and 20th in quantitative reasoning.

    The tests are, obviously, very different, but I can't help but think the differences in GRE scores would predict differences in LSAT scores, especially in terms of the six point difference in the quantitative reasoning section. That section more closely parallels the LSAT rankings (physics/math majors lead the way, with economics and engineering close behind in the GRE, and these are part of the top five in the LSAT scores). I think there is a case to be made that, by separating the philosophy/theology group, philosophy could break the tie with economics and close the gap with physics/math majors.

    Since we are using these scores as a selling point for our field, might this warrant an official request from the APA asking the LSAT administrators to break these groups apart? If we are using LSAT scores as a major selling point, don't we want our scores to accurately reflect our students' accomplished without being dragged down by students from another major?

    (ii)I've noticed a trend in commencement speeches of late: mocking philosophy majors. The first was a fictional speech, given in the second Twilight movie (

     The speaker encourages the graduates to "make mistakes," one of them being to "major in philosophy because there's no way to make a career out of that" (49 seconds into the video). The second is the highly circulated Dartmouth speech Conan O'Brien recently delivered (

     He says, "If your child majored in Fine Arts or Philosophy, you have good reason to be worried. The only place where they are really now qualified to get a job is ancient Greece." The third is a commencement speech at Northwestern given by Stephen Colbert (

     There, he explains that he began at an all-male college in Virginia as a philosophy major, but "decided to switch to something with stronger job prospects: theater major."

    Maybe any press is good press, but it's a bummer that we're being connected with a dead end major. Could the APA possibly respond to things like this as they arise? I'm thinking a response that doesn't take ourselves too seriously. A funny press release that condemns a comedian's statement, or maybe a YouTube video along the line of Monty Python's bit in the Life of Brian, "What did the Romans ever do for us?" (

     I think a "What did philosophers ever do for us?" skit would be rich with examples and very effective.

    Whatever the particular response, I can't help but feel we need a good public image boost. I don't want the public perception of our field to be one of a wasted life.

    Thanks for all of your posts, Amy; I've really enjoyed reading them, and I'm so glad to see that the APA is responsive to its members needs (I've let my membership expire, but need to reestablish a connection). When you finish guest blogging here, it'd be wonderful if you, or someone else from the APA, would continue something like this so that we can hear what all of you are doing and so we can give feedback. Thank you for your important work!

    Reply
  8. Shane J. Ralston

    For those of you not aware of it, the APA also has a Committee on Public Philosophy, made up of ten members (of which I am one). The Committee's mission is "to find and create opportunities to demonstrate the personal value and social usefulness of philosophy." Some of our past and present activities include (i) organizing a public philosophy Op-Ed contest, (ii) sponsoring grad students to attend the Public Philosophy Network conference, (iii) organizing panels on public philosophy at the three division meetings, and (iv) our most recent event, a book signing at the upcoming Eastern APA meeting, which will feature authors whose books address ideas that the public might find relevant and useful. Through a press release, members of the public will be invited to participate. To find out more about the APA Committee on Public Philosophy, visit the website: http://www.publicphilosophy.org/index.html

    Reply
  9. Timmy

    This is a bureaucratic interpretation — In my take the major problem unique to philosophy as a discipline is the way that its practitioners constantly attempt to discredit their own profession by declaring their colleagues to be either incoherent, outdated, or irrelevant. Most other fields accept that there are divisions and subdivisions to their practice and keep their disagreements intramural. Philosophy often quite conspicuously makes it clear that they not only don't want anything to do with other fields, but that they consider a large majority of their own colleagues to have failed dramatically at their work. The passion for clarity and the extremely high standards of the field is part of what I love about philosophy, but during a time of neoliberal administrative program-cutting this kind of rhetoric makes philosophers vulnerable to the whimsy of whatever former businessman a university has appointed to chop heads and programs. What better target can there be than a program suffering from hyper-myopia with few majors?

    Reply
  10. Jarrod Rutledge

    It would be nice to know why Dr Albin thinks that intellectual standards of English departments are so low, or, more importantly, why he thinks that philosophy suffers from being labelled as a part of the humanities (aside from his suspicions, of course). In my experience, those people who denigrate the humanities are actually most familiar with some philosophy (eg Crito) and so those bits of philosophy become the focus of their attack on the entirety of the humanities. Likewise, scientific minded people tend to have some vague understanding of Kuhn (and soon, I imagine, Thomas Nagel), and again philosophy becomes the target. Whatever the relationship between literature and philosophy is/should be, I doubt very much that English departments are the reason why philosophy is suffering. Surely we can cast a more critical eye than that?

    Reply
  11. Jason Streitfeld

    I think philosophy departments are important and valuable, but I think we should be more careful with what arguments we use to forward thta position.

    Using LSAT or GRE scores to sell philosophy as a major seems problematic. First, the fact that philosophy majors do well on certain standardized tests only means that people who pursue philosophy tend to do well on those tests. It doesn't mean that studying philosophy will strongly improve your scores, even though it might in fact do so.

    Second, by using test scores to sell philosophy as a major, you are implicitly claiming that a philosophy major is only good if you want to go on to earn a degree in something else–that is, something other than philosophy. And if that is your claim, then why do universities need separate philosophy departments? Why not just let those "something else" departments hire philosophers to help their students boost their test scores?

    The point, then, is to heed the distinction between philosophy classes and philosophy majors. The former are widely considered to be much more valuable than the latter.

    Reply
  12. Jason Streitfeld

    To add to my previous comment: One could rightly note that, if you want to hire philosophers to boost your students' test scores, then you need people with qualifications in philosophy, and that plausibly means people with philosophy degrees. But if philosophy degrees are only valued for their ability to help people with other interests improve their test scores, then philosophy degrees should be more tailored for that function. Kant studies, for example, would seem a bit of a distraction and waste of resources. Schools would reasonably prefer a different sort of degree altogether: an LSAT Prep degree, perhaps.

    Reply
  13. Richard Marshall

    This might seem a little trite but perhaps it's a branding issue. Physicists learned about branding some years ago and have ensured that their brand of genius geek knower of fundamental stuff, which ordinary folk can't possibly really understand but nevertheless think is essential and clever and makes things happen, thrives. They have icons (Einstein, Hawking etc) and a whole set of cult strange attractor personalities with an esoteric maths language and then lots of flag waving and 'made-easy' books and programmes , including attractive practitioners able to do tv like Bian Cox who is always energising interest and ensuring there's a media presence. The comedy show Big Bang Theory endorses all this and places the brand in popular culture to a massive audience where the stereotypes are fully mapped out to brilliant effect. A real live physicist helps write the show! Physics didn't run away from their inner geek but moulded it through great PR. Of course, being part of the military industrial complex did them no harm. But Philosophy should learn from this – after all, you guys go even deeper than Physics, are equal in geekdom and pugnacity, have your beauties, your controversies, icons and esotericism. The Continentals, understood as a branding device, is wildly succesful – Zizek and a few others can draw huge crowds and get the press – and commands far more cultural capital than their philosophical achievements merit. They brand themselves as jazz cool intellectuals. Who isn't going to be drawn to that? And given the specialities within philosophy there's likely to be more than one brand we can mobilise- think of the way music markets itself. I'd say that there's a very bright scene in all the different strands of current contemporary philosphy, – but we need to find ways of marketing them better. And perhaps that starts with sounding more self confident and less embattled – make it more about the intrinsic briliance of philosophy itself rather than about university. And get more women in the Academy. And more non-whites too. So perhaps the APA should get some marketing people in….

    Reply
  14. Ethan Brown

    …Honestly, academic philosophy in the US looks, demographically, like a slightly younger version of the republican party. Perhaps some degree of public perception will change when the demographics change.

    Reply
  15. Daniel Groll

    Following up on Wes' second point here. My wife is a nurse and follows this site: http://www.truthaboutnursing.org/. Of course, philosophers aren't represented in popular culture as much, or in the same negative light, as nurses, so we probably don't need anything quite like the site above. Even so, perhaps the APA could have a page that is geared toward the public to explain what we do, to keep track of threats to the profession (and the humanities at large), and to respond to misrepresentations. I realize it can seem a little heavy handed and humorless to respond to the kinds of things that Wes mentions, but I do think some kind of response can only help (well, assuming it's reasonably well done).

    Reply
  16. Roger Albin

    Jarrod – try a thought experiment. Suppose philosophy was classified as part of the sciences. This is hardly ridiculous. Basic mathematics is classified this way. Now, who has more money for research support – NSF or NEH? Who do you think has more lobbying power in Washington – a variety of scientific organizations or the National Humanities Alliance? I'll bet my small professional organization, the American Academy of Neurology (AAN), has more clout in Washington than the National Humanities Alliance. The AAN was able to lobby Sen Klobuchar (D; Minnesota) to sponsor attempted legislation on Medicare payment reform that would have helped neurologists. AAAS does have a section on History and Philosophy of Science and also one on Education. AAAS is an organization with a real presence and voice in Washington. If philosophers wanted to get themselves heard in DC, a concerted effort to work through the AAAS is a plausible avenue.

    As for my "suspicions" about how people in general regard the humanities, they are based on a large number of conversations with patients over the course of many years. I see a lot of patients and many of them are not shy about voicing opinions about education. By the way, the philospher that "scientific minded people tend to have some vague understanging" of is not Kuhn but Popper.

    Reply
  17. Joshua Mozersky

    I think that Richard Marshall makes two excellent points.

    First, it is not trite that when dealing with issues of public perception "branding" matters (maybe this is somewhat dispiriting, but that doesn't mean it's false). Look at all the exceptional public explainers of science that there are/have been: Bronowski, Sagan, Dawkins, Hawking, Gould, Cox, Greene, Tyson, and so on. Their public appearances have surely gone a long way toward ensuring that science retains its standing in the public eye despite the relatively small numbers of people who actually understand the research behind the public broadcasts. Finding a way to get the great explainers of philosophy (Dennett, Searle, and so on) to get their explanations into the mainstream would be valuable.

    Secondly, the key is to focus on the inherent interest and value of the sort of understanding that philosophy seeks and provides. While physicists, for example, often mention the various successful predictions and pieces of technology that physical theories have produced, the underlying message one gets in watching, say, a NOVA episode is how deeply the relevant theory advances our understanding of ourselves and the universe we inhabit. Philosophers are in the same kind of business, so we ought to be able to successfully present the same kind of message.

    Scientists rarely present the value of their fields as residing in their ability to help one in getting into law school or getting a job in business and I don't think similar presentations should be at the heart of Philosophy's message to the public. After all, there may be good ways to generate excellent LSAT scores without hiring a whole department of philosophers, and if our message is "we improve LSAT scores", then what would our recourse be should such alternate ways be discovered? The value of the understanding that philosophy produces will be harder to replace by online courses and special "improve your LSAT score" courses, so promoting the former seems the right course. Moreover, that is really what makes philosophy worthwhile, isn't it?

    Reply
  18. S Reeves

    You have identified the problem but you are not being explicit about the solution.

    We, as a community, and for lack of a better term, an industry, have a marketing problem.

    To affirm this all you need to know is that in an age where access to the internet is an assumed requirement for a standard of living in the US is that philosophy.com is a commerce site for cosmetics.

    You rightly acknowledge all of the benefits of studying philosophy. But you are speaking to those that know rather than not those that do not. This is a pattern every philosopher is familiar with– advocacy of a thought or program that runs counter to the intuitions and long held beliefs of the untutored masses.

    While our overall budgets are smaller then say, the average biology department, they are still a cost. Until we can speak to the ability of a philosophy department to be a revenue generator in the university system we will continue to earn the ire of policy makers when austerity is the order of the day.

    Generating a profit is not the goal of a philosophy department at a university. However, we should be held accountable to speaking to return on investment of university resources. This should certainly be the case at public institutions that are funded largely by a states’ tax revenues.

    In my view, our survival in the academy depends on our ability to become the glue, if you will, that holds together interdisciplinary study. We need to make the case for Introduction to Moral Theory as a required, not elective, course for all humanities undergraduates. Applied Ethics courses should be required, not recommended, for students in pre-professional tracks of study. If a student is graduating a university with a bachelor’s of science (or comparable BA), a philosophy of science course must be part of their course of study. It puts bodies in chairs and fresh minds examining classical issues that otherwise would not.

    Failing to successfully sell what we are capable of adding to the preparation of a student to the professional world and having this conversation only with ourselves and not key decision makers and potential “customers” (read, students) will hasten the shuttering of additional departments.

    Reply
  19. Becko Copenhaver

    The success of Philosophy Talk shows that the public really is interested in what we do – and that we can engage the public well when we reach out with actual philosophical content. So, talk less about "what we do" and "why we're valuable" and simply just do more philosophy with the public! When I first went to my SLAC about hosting Philosophy Talk, the PR department said, "well, there just is no broad interest in this stuff." They tried to book Philosophy Talk into a 30 person classroom! When 500 people showed up (I did get the venue changed), the lightbulb clicked: there is broad interest in this stuff!

    Reply
  20. M Swanson

    I don't think more publicity about what professional philosophers do is the answer. Nor is more "philosopher appreciation." Philosophy as a spectator sport is boring. You have to involve the public.

    Reply
  21. Gordon Hull

    S Reeve at #18 is I believe mis-informed when he / she writes "While our overall budgets are smaller then say, the average biology department, they are still a cost. Until we can speak to the ability of a philosophy department to be a revenue generator in the university system we will continue to earn the ire of policy makers when austerity is the order of the day."

    A number of analyses have shown that the humanities are actually "profit centers" for universities compared to sponsored research units; that is, we generate much more in tuition dollars per credit hour than we cost, and are actually subsidizing sponsored research units through "cross-subsidies."

    Chris Newfield, whose blog "Remaking the University" (http://utotherescue.blogspot.com/) is a must-read, is an excellent source on this topic. This piece is representative; the bit on the humanities is on page 8: http://www.academicfreedomjournal.org/Previous/VolumeTwo/Newfield.pdf

    Reply
  22. grad student

    Making philosophy relevant to the public is important for the profession in more ways than is readily apparent. Maybe I'm wrong, but I feel like most of us begin graduate school in philosophy because we enjoy the intellectual pursuit. But after we're in it for a bit, it can be overwhelming to learn that so much of what philosophers do has so little influence on public life. Many, I believe, then force themselves to believe (rightly or wrongly) that philosophy is an end in itself and that this is good enough to keep going. This has the further affect of making us believe that we don't have anything relevant to say to the non-philosophy public, and so we end up just writing for and talking to each other. And on it goes. (We hear, for instance, absurd suggestions for writing "influential" dissertations: "Give the best defense of a position you know is false.")

    Reply
  23. Eddy Nahmias

    I love Wes' idea of a Monty Python skit "What has philosophy ever done for you?" and it may not be impossible. Notice that John Cleese has already helped the APA with these (too hard to find!) clips on the value of philosophy: http://puffin.creighton.edu/phil/John_Cleese_on_philosophy.htm

    I also agree that the key is just to help people see that they already think philosophical questions are interesting and that they already have philosophical views. Philosophy Talk is a model for this.

    I think the Ask Philosophers website does it well and should be promoted more (disclosure: I contribute to it): http://www.askphilosophers.org/
    It sometimes has philosophers offering advice for more practical, messy, real-world problems, but it seems to me that philosophical thinking is well-suited to do that. (Someday I hope to create an intro to philosophy class that focuses on questions the students confront and should be thinking about a lot more, such as Should I have children? What should I do with my disposable income? Is it OK for me to spend (so much) time playing MMO games? etc.)

    And we need some stars who can go on Colbert and be funny.

    And this sort of stuff can't hurt either: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/10/nyregion/jamming-about-the-mind-at-qualia-fest.html

    Reply
  24. Michael Cholbi

    I'd like to suggest an avenue by which the discipline could relatively easily improve its public perception. We already have a large and somewhat captive "public": our students. I would guess that to the extent that non-philosophers have any experience with philosophy at all, that experience overwhelmingly takes the form of introductory or general education courses at colleges and universities. The best way to improve our public perception is take these students and these courses seriously: not as burdensome distractions from more intellectually simulating activities such as our research and upper division (or graduate) teaching, but as the setting in which we help to secure our place in the larger culture by demonstrating philosophy's relevance and seriousness to the public that ultimately controls the purse strings.

    There will always be those antagonistic to literate culture, and it's no use trying to advocate for philosophy to them. But we would do ourselves a great favor by striving to teach our undergraduate students better — with greater energy and engagement, and by keeping in mind that every act of pedagogy is also an act of public relations.

    Reply
  25. Nick Z

    My comment is in keeping with earlier remarks on prominent figures (Colbert, Maddow, and Hayes) who could speak to the value of philosophical study. In a radio interview this week, the defense journalist Thomas Ricks mentioned the unique case of Lieutenant General (Ret.) James Dubik. Rather than making the commonplace (and often lucrative-but-odious) career-shift from prominent position in the U.S. Armed Forces to lobbyist for the defense industry, Dubik decided to resume his graduate studies in the Department of Philosophy at The Johns Hopkins University, where he's been ABD since 1981. 37+ years is the longest case of ABD-itis I've ever heard of, but Dubik could be an important advocate for increasing the public profile of philosophy.

    Reply
  26. Dan Dennis

    It would really help if the APA could work to increase the number of High School pupils who encounter philosophy. Provided these encounters are done well, they would then be more likely to study Philosophy at University, more likely to retain a hobbyist’s interest in philosophy and more likely to view Philosophy as interesting and valuable.

    How best to promote philosophy in High Schools? Well here are five suggestions – doubtless readers can think of more.
    1) Propagate to school teachers the view that in addition to being intrinsically interesting and important, philosophy teaches thinking skills which are useful for all other subjects.
    2) Propagate the view that teaching Ethics is an important function of schools, and highly beneficial to society generally. Perhaps develop syllabi, materials, etc which provide guidance regarding what should be taught and how to teach it. Perhaps look into playing a role in teacher training… Lobby for including ethics in what is taught in school. Many who doubt the value of other areas within philosophy still see that Ethics is important.
    3) Encourage the development of, and offering of, school level qualifications in philosophy (in the UK this means GCSE exams at 16 and A-Levels at 18; though it would also be possible to independently develop an exam and certificate which could be added to the pupil's CV). Pupils are more likely to choose to spend a lot of time studying something if there is something to show for it at the end.
    4) Encourage partnerships between universities and schools, where university professors spend time in schools.
    5) Start a charity whose aim is to raise funds to spend on promoting philosophy in High Schools. Consider emulating the Royal Institute of Philosophy’s 'Philosophy in Schools' scheme: http://www.royalinstitutephilosophy.org/page/43

    Reply
  27. Christopher Pynes

    This was the post I was waiting for. How to demonstrate the importance of philosophy to a wider audience. One thing we have to do is to combat stories (really advertisements) like this:

    http://education.yahoo.net/articles/degrees_to_avoid2.htm?kid=1NQM0

    Yahoo runs these stories all the time about what one should major in and what majors one should avoid. Every one of these stories is "produced" by Vantage Media, LLC. They are essentially advertisements for other things (online degrees usually) and not news stories. And they almost always rip on philosophy.

    The story lists the #2 major to avoid as "philosophy and religious studies" and the articles quotes someone named Lynn: "In my opinion, these degrees are not at all marketable," says Lynn. "I don't even know what people do with these degrees to be honest. Unless they're willing to go all the way to a PhD in philosophy, for instance, their career paths are zero."

    So there are lots of things to worry about. (i) Better perception of philosophy. (ii) To aid in (i) we need to make sure it is separated out from religious studies when analysis on majors is done. (iii) We need to promote philosophy teaches skills that employers want, which it clearly does.

    The APA needs to hire a PR firm to help promote the image of philosophy. We can't win the PR battle if we aren't playing.

    Reply
  28. Renee Smith

    I would like to second Dan's (27) comments about reaching out to students in K-12. Young people are familiar with math, science, history, and languages in their pre-college academic lives, but only very rarely do they learn anything about philosophy. Then, in college, students find philosophy only because it satisfies some general education requirement. If young people had an earlier exposure to philosophy, they might be more inclined to study it in college, and more friendly to philosophical pursuits generally.

    I was very fortunate to have been involved in a wonderful philosophy outreach program as a grad student at CU Boulder. Grad students visited public schools as guest speakers, led a week-long summer program for HS students on campus, and taught semester-long courses at a nearby charter HS.

    At my current institution, I directed a summer program in ethics for sixth graders for 4 years and this program has now become an after-school program for middle-school kids. I have developed a course for my undergrads in philosophy for children, though I have not yet taught it, where the college student would organize a philosophy club at elementary schools (my course was modeled on Tom Wartenberg's course at http://www.teachingchildrenphilosophy.org)

    I currently serve on the APA's committee on pre-college philosophy instruction(CPIP), which organizes the PLATO conference for pre-college instruction in philosophy (http://plato-philosophy.org/) and works closely with the Squire Family Foundation (squirefoundation.org)which does amazing work promoting philosophy instruction in K-12.

    At the eastern division meeting this month, CPIP will host a panel presentation on HS Ethics Bowl competitions. Getting involved in this sort of outreach surely will help to promote philosophy in the general public.

    Reply

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