Black Mountain College

Black Mountain College was founded in 1933 by a group of teachers and students as a coeducational college of liberal arts, where ultimate control should rest with the Faculty; where free use should be made of established methods of education, together with new methods, in order to develop a general education suited to modern times; a college which was to be a community in which teachers and students should share responsibility. From the first the College has operated according to this plan, and has found increasing proof of its value.

As a liberal arts college it is necessarily concerned with the essential problems of the times. Today these problems are world-wide. They have grown beyond the horizons of individual, group or nation. But they must be understood by individuals and solved by individuals. This generation will have acute need of both vision and practical competence.

To educate today then must mean to broaden outlook and to provide a setting where theory can be confronted with evidence, a laboratory where thought can be tested by action. Black Mountain College as a community is such a laboratory. While carrying on the traditional disciplines of college education, the college seeks to combine the cultivation of imaginative thought with training in accurate reasoning; it attempts to develop foresight by emphasizing the search for fundamental principles that underlie transitory forms, and to show that knowledge must be linked with a will to act. It can reveal to what ends cooperation and competition each lead, and bring into balance work directed toward individual development and work done in the general interest of a group.

The College, from its beginning, has recognized and sought to develop the special function that a community can serve in general education. A community is of a more homogenous structure than society at large but has many of its contrasts and conflicts. Common purpose unites the various groups; it bridges differences of age and of talent, of background and of temperament, and thus furthers actual understanding. Young men and young women, educated together as a corollary of community life, come to realize their relation as co-equals more than as opposites. In a community where all join in the necessary work and where no distinctions are made because of financial status, everyone has an equal change to find a place. Teacher and student find common ground in their concern for the whole; and the student, meeting informally with his teacher, comes to realize that learning is not confined to classrooms but pervades daily life. The persuasive force of example can replace formal authority. In a community, too, the usual difference in evaluation between intellectual and practical work readily gives way to a realization that both are interrelated parts of one whole. This interpretation of work is fundamental in the educational philosophy of the College; it breaks with the tradition which, concentrating on an intellectual education, loses sight of a practical one.

In a community attendance develops naturally into participation. A community not only gives a frame to activities; it embodies the contributions of its members. Each individual gives as well as receives and comes to identify himself with the group. Where consideration for the whole controls conduct written regulations are superfluous, doubly so where there is close contact between teacher and student. Consequently, the College has no rigid rules.

Furthermore, the College has no required courses. The entering student is rarely certain about his interests; and even when he believes them to be definite he may change his mind as new fields open to him. But since he must learn to make his own decisions, the selection of his courses is left to him. However, he does not make his choice by trial and error. He discusses his plans with a faculty advisor with whose help he assumes the responsibility for finding the best way to develop his abilities. He may, of course, seek additional advice from other members of the Faculty. The advisor is aided by recommendations from the whole Faculty, who periodically discuss both the intellectual progress of each student and his progress as an active member of the community.

A student usually begins his studies by exploring in the various areas of learning and at the same time he begins to discover his own inclinations, abilities and weaknesses. He should investigate the fields which have been of interest to him and also those to which he previously has been indifferent but which may open new perspectives to him. He should study in the Sciences and the Arts, the Social Studies and literature to gain sufficient understanding of the peculiar nature of each field and the relation of one field to another. Before specializing in any one subject he should become aware of the unity of learning obscured by the modern departmentalism that has resulted from the accumulation of knowledge.

After this period of general orientation and self-discovery, usually two years, the student limits himself to a field for concentration. In this special field he is expected to gain a substantial and organized body of knowledge. To do such specialized work the student must demonstrate that he is prepared for it. He formulates a plan of studies in his particular field and in related ones. If the Faculty believe the student has acquired an adequate background of general knowledge and that he has made progress in learning to act intelligently and reliably, he is permitted to take the senior division examination, which precedes specialization.

Since learning is not regarded as a training of the intellect alone, the examination tests not only a student's knowledge and memory, his powers of observation, reflection and imagination, but also the maturity of his feelings and the way he expresses himself; it tests whether he can concentrate, draw sound conclusions, and arrive at moral judgments. The Faculty take into account both his performance and his development, since development indicates potentiality.

The length of time a student works in a particular field and in related areas depends on his achievement. After completing his proposed program of studies, he can apply for graduation; he has to demonstrate, however, in a series of comprehensive examinations, what he has accomplished. Before permitting him to take the final examinations the Faculty consider the student's achievement over the period of his stay at the College, approximately four years, and decide whether he is sufficiently independent in judgment and disciplined so that the can act with insight and forethought. The examinations are given by professors from outstanding universities and colleges who judge the student's work in his special field. The recommendation of the examiner provides a measurement of the work according to the standards of long established universities and is a principal factor in the decision of the Faculty regarding a student's graduation.

During his studies the student should have come to realize the emphasis placed on a widening of his views and on an understanding of the relation of general principles to specific facts. He should also have come to recognize a similar emphasis on the development of initiative, on a constructive response to problems. Too often today education tends to develop receptive qualities and to neglect productive abilities. In most fields so much knowledge has to be acquired before new contributions can be made that a student is frequently confronted with results without being brought to understand the creative approach that led to the original discoveries. Naturally he cannot be expected to make new discoveries, but he can be brought to acquire an attitude that leads to discovery. The pedagogical problem of helping a student to combine the acquisition of knowledge with such constructive thinking is different in every field. To develop adequate teaching methods for accomplishing this has been from the first one of the aims of the College.

In the fields of art, music, drama, and writing, work can be made primarily a training in such a constructive approach; for only by writing can one learn to write, and only by painting can one learn to paint. Work in the arts, besides having a function of its own, can thus become an instrument of general education. It, therefore, has a place equal to that of courses that usually occupy the center of the curriculum. Work in the arts activates Imagination and inventiveness and a sense of organization; it increases sensitivity of perception and emotional response to form. Feeling needs discipline no less than intellect. Through work in the arts students learn to rely on their own experience and to grow independent of interpretations by others; they are led to discover how to give thought and feeling a tangible form.

As an indispensible complement to the traditional liberal arts training, our time requires the development of practical ability. The College as a community provides a natural opportunity for demonstrating to the student the various kinds of work which together keep a social organization functioning. He realizes that a share of work falls to him as a member of the community, as it does to professor and hired worker. Engaged in planning, building or farming, doing office or library work, he can acquire skills and develop resourcefulness together with an understanding of good workmanship; he learns to evaluate work for its quality rather than for its kind. He experiences the discipline necessary to coordinate his work with that of others and the obligation he has toward others to complete a given task. He comes to know the power of joint effort. Finally he may learn to direct the work of others. He will realize, however, that where the prime emphasis is on education the development of ability takes precedence over immediate efficiency of workmanship, though efficiency remains an ultimate goal.

As members of the community, teachers no less than students give part of their time to practical work that usually lies outside the activities of college professors. They have also undertaken the administration of the College, partly as their natural share of responsibility in the College community and partly in an attempt to imbue all work within the College with that attitude which prevails in educational matters. The Faculty, however, not only contribute their work to the College community, but with a student representative are themselves the governing body of the College. They are responsible both for the actual conduct of its affairs and for its educational principles. Though the College is free from outside control, it has established an Advisory Council to which it turns for advice from a detached point of view and for consultation on special questions regarding its work.

Legal responsibility, including trusteeship for the property, rests with the Faculty, but they are by no means the only ones to carry responsibility. Students from the first have won for themselves a share in control by helping to start the College and subsequently by performing essential tasks in building and operating the College. Every new group, composed of students coming from all parts of the country, learns how it can make some significant contribution to the growth of the College. Students have campaigned to raise necessary funds, have done much of the actual construction of college buildings, and have helped to run the plant and farm. They make their own regulations, such as are necessary; for obviously some agreements are needed to avoid chaos through individualistic interpretations of rights and obligations. Students are represented on important committees because they share in the responsibility for the College.

Problems affecting the whole College, if sufficiently important, are considered in community meetings. If a general understanding cannot be reached in one meeting, the problem is taken up again, or it is turned over to a committee to deal with or to make new proposals for general discussion. The question is debated until a solution is found that will preserve the unity of the College.

Participating in the government of the College and in community work, the student is in a position to draw parallels between social and political problems he meets in the College and those he meets outside. He will be better equipped to understand and contribute to the solution of national or even world problems, when he has encountered them on a scale which permits him to observe effects of decisions.

Studios and work at the College, however, are more than merely a parallel with life outside of the community. Teachers and students are active beyond the College boundary: the Faculty in lecturing, exhibiting work, giving musical and dramatic performances and doing research work; the students in participating in the performances. Such work is a part of modern life and at the same time organically a part of the College community.

Though a closely knit unit, Black Mountain College is far from being an exclusive group. It believes more in the breaking down of barriers than in erecting new ones. It believes that a pattern of living tried out in a small group has its application in a wider one. It believes that the unification of theory and practice is a safeguard against illusions as well as against narrowmindedness. But such a unity will not be a safeguard only; it will show how one can take part in the shaping of the days to come.