Anubis (
)Since the pandemic began, we have all made transitions. For me, I transitioned to full-time work from home. For our kids, who do not attend a brick-and-mortar school, the change was not as drastic. For some other families who found themselves juggling the challenges between two adults working from home alongside their children doing school from home as well, the transition was overwhelming. Many college students also had a difficult transition from an independent student life on-campus, to attending classes held over Zoom while living at home. One upside of distance education, however, is that since location no longer served as a limiting factor, classes that were not accessible to those remote from a college campus suddenly became available for remote open-enrollment, including advanced classes in relatively obscure subjects with normally very few students.
As those of you who follow me either here, or on social media know, I have been availing myself of some of the academic riches not readily available to the public in remote locations far away from the home campus of some outstanding professors. I have concurrently taken credit and non-credit classes at Harvard Extension School, Harvard Divinity School, and the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago. I took survey classes in Middle Egyptian Hieroglyphs and Coptic, a class in Abstract Algebra and Statistics with programming in R, and a graduate seminar in Yogācāra philosophy. Similarly, Orion is now taking a summer intensive course in Classical Tibetan.
I had planned, and very much wanted, to take “Reading Euclid’s Elements in Greek” (Math S-139) online at Harvard this summer. I am/was really excited about this course as it includes not only the content stated in the title of the course, but also covers three non-Euclidian geometries (spherical, hyperbolic, and Minkowskian), the use of vectors and calculus alongside geometry, along with readings from Strabo. Even more compelling, the course includes writing R scripts to display the geometrical figures, and solve geometrical problems. And even more impressive is the team of three professors teaching the course, which has a maximum enrollment of 16 students (of which there are only 10 enrolled as of today). You would think a course like this would be part of the core curriculum at school like my alma mater (the University of Dallas), but sadly, I cannot find anything like this anywhere else, and I cannot afford the $3400 tuition by the deadline of 6/17. (Please contact me this week if you would be willing to fund me in this endeavor this summer!).
Now, what makes me sad, is that with all of the emphasis in “getting back to normal,” this summer will end up being the last opportunity to avail myself of classes such as the above. Starting in the fall, I expect that campus life will begin to return to normal and the sort of obscure courses that attract my interest will return to a traditional classroom delivery method, and thus become inaccessible to remote students. This will be great for traditional university students but for me, not so much. Unique course offerings, like Math S-139, will again only be available to those who live in close proximity to the brick-and-mortar classroom in which they are taught. That leaves people like me (well, ok, no one is really like me) who live in the remote boondocks in a lurch. If community colleges and local universities were really dedicated (with sufficient funding) to providing high quality continuing and adult education, then this would probably be less of an issue. But none of the state universities or private universities in my state even offer classes in Classical Greek, much less Coptic or Middle Egyptian, Tibetan, non-traditional math classes, or classes in medieval Indian schools of philosophy.
I do have a few backup plans. I have a Moog Claravox theremin on order, so if you happen to hear screeching noises coming from my vicinity, it is likely not anguished lamentations, but just me practicing my new instrument. If Math S-139 is not online next summer I hope to either go the to PGI Convention to play with things that go BOOM, or return to Pilchuck to play with hot glass, high voltage, and noble gases.
Of course, I could be wrong. Perhaps some form of hybrid education will become the norm. Or, maybe more post-grads will strike out on their own and offer classes outside the university system? It is possible that things will never return to the way they were. I am fine with that, and I hope that is the case!
