Renaissance Education

There has been a page about reviving Renaissance Education over at the main Bastiat Free University site for quite a while. It is an overview of what makes the BFU approach different from bureaucratic age education.

There is now a new Squidoo lens that details what is encompassed by the label of modern renaissance education. There are techniques, books, and ideas that can help you self-educate in the classics. This will be a fine guideline as you pursue wisdom and understanding.

There is also the start of a Top 100 classic Books List that you can add to.

Renaissance Education: understanding, wisdom, and a keen eye for logic can be developed by anyone willing to put in the effort required.

You will enjoy the benefits for the rest of your life.

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Visions and Views - The Bureaucratic Age

You've heard me talk about how the Industrial age is over, and the Netcohort Age has begun.

Sometimes I'm a bit slow.

I have spent a great deal of time explaining that industrial age bureaucracies were not just in industry, but in all of the too bigs: government, education, religions, unions, etc. I then spent time explaining a rational for economies of scale and how that lent itself to a one size fits most society.

I had not considered that some prefer to use the industrial age moniker as a way to misdirect attention from where it belongs. Those that want to blame capitalism for all the worlds ills for one, others that don't want you looking at unjust too big governments as arising from the same family business as industry. There are others.

It is similar to how governments have recently changed the debate on every one's right to privacy into a witch hunt of private companies that have weak privacy policies. That leaves government free to be as intrusive as they wish. As recently as President Johnson privacy was an acknowledged universal right: "Every man should know that his conversations, his correspondence, and his personal life are private." - Lyndon B. Johnson

Laws were passed to require "privacy," from business intrusions while all other bureaucracies assumed an open policy. Those same laws had many loopholes to allow big business to join into the mining of your private life. The result? All bureaucrats can use what was recently our discretionary property.

So we see that industry is blamed for any ills of the last few hundred years while governments and other bureaucrats claim to have created the benefits.

As you can guess from the title of this journal post, I think it is time to acknowledge the source of much of mankind's current woes - bureaucracies. We are leaving The Bureaucratic Age, nee industrial age.

Yes, there were great advances made under bureaucratic umbrellas - but most were due to individuals that heroically fought inertial resistance and persevered.

"People who create things nowadays can expect to be prosecuted by highly moralistic people who are incapable of creating anything. There is no way to measure the chilling effect on innovation that results from the threats of taxation, regulation and prosecution against anything that succeeds. We'll never know how many ideas our government has aborted in the name of protecting us." - Joseph Sobran

Mankind has always seemed to be on the cusp of disaster.

It is only in innovation, made possible by individual visionaries, that we will be able to maintain the progression of civilization. It is time the Bureaucratic age ended. We need the self-tailored society being created by the Netcohort.

There ain't no rules around here!
We're trying to accomplish something.
Thomas Edison

I will try to remember to call it the bureaucratic age in my future writings.

If something evil is about to fall -- it should be pushed!

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Peer To Peer Education - The Netcohort Institute

It's time to turn the page.

The Netcohort Institute does not just require a better user interface than BFU - it requires a whole new approach to education. The time spent developing the current platform was not wasted, we successfully found many approaches that will not work.

Lets start from bare ground and put out a few ideas of what we think is needed.

A way for creative project teams to form, self-regulate, and manage reputation for future projects. To really have value we need a web 2.0 approach - let the students develop the courses they need - let all students vote their projects up or down.

What we need is

• An open system like Wikipedia or Mozilla

• A community / communications organization like an online poker room with a general lounge and breakout rooms

• A reputation measurement similar to what e-bay had

• A voting system like Digg employs

and a lot of stuff we haven't thought through yet. Maybe that is your job also.

You have the audacious dreams - you can make them come true.

What sort of resources can a P2P educational network offer? As a start look at this Squidoo lens on the Royalton Raid created by Evelyn Saenz as a course for unschoolers. While not college level, it sure is interesting, and provides a compelling picture. To adjust to a college level course you could take the frame work at the BFU lens under the heading Create Your Own College Course.

In fact Squidoo is a resource we may want to use for course creation. It is easy, enjoyable, and you can actually earn a little money with it.

Think of thousands of students creating courses, thousands of students voting on what is most valuable, you deciding on what is most valuable to you.

Then think of thousands of students joining on project teams and creating value for all of us.

The rest of the institute will not be so easy - it will take visionary volunteers that want to shape the future of education.

This is just the start, the reputation you build within your teams will qualify you for inclusion in serious start up projects - within a Netcort Institute incubator, or on your own.

Want a first assignment?

Make a lens, Put a BFU or Netcohort stub onto Wikipedia - or add to one already there. Put a comment here, or on Evelyn's lens.

This is too big and too important for just me, The Netcohort Institute needs all of us.

Allan

Allan Wallace Lensography

You've read my rants and opinionated claptrap; but perhaps you want to know how I really feel.

My Squidoo lenses have allowed me to weigh in on a number of subjects, notably:

1) enabling sharing

2) seeking cures for the common education

3) social interaction while retaining personal identity

4) acquiring and protecting property (money)

There is also a catchall section for etcetera, etcetera, & etcetera.

All of these have been compiled into a new lens; a Squidoo lensography of my ideals, aspirations, and passing fancies. It is up to you to decide if it is a body of work -- or just an intellectual corpse.

Allan Wallace Lensography

enjoy,

Allan

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Samuel Adams - This Beer's For You

"If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains set lightly upon you; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen." - Samuel Adams

"How strangely will the Tools of a Tyrant pervert the plain Meaning of Words!" - Samuel Adams

"Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: First a right to life, secondly to liberty, and thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can. "
Samuel Adams

The Constitution shall never be construed... to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms. - Samuel Adams

"The natural liberty of man is to be free from any superior power on Earth, and not to be under the will or legislative authority of man, but only to have the law of nature for his rule." - Samuel Adams

"We cannot make events. Our business is wisely to improve them." - Samuel Adams

BFU Quarterly Update

This week we've sent out a new update, I'll let it tell its own story:

Greetings,

This will be more of an update on salient resources than a "state of the college" report.

For those of you that have not kept up with the blog, there have been a couple of specifically useful ideas presented within the BFU Weekly Journal pages

1) How To Create A College Degree Substitute: http://bfuniv.blogspot.com/2008/02/how-to-create-college-degree-substitute.html

2) A new Higher Education Model: http://bfuniv.blogspot.com/2008/01/new-higher-education-model.html

I have found that blogs have a limited life on their entries, I may eventually put these ideas into a Squiddo lens. A fine post on the high achiever, Dr. Pereyda, has almost disappeared in Google's eyes, while in a lens it would continue to attract the attention she deserves. http://bfuniv.blogspot.com/2008/02/dr-margarita-pereyda.html

In fact here are several lenses that have growing popularity and maintain their google edge.

1) Start Your Own Business Ideas: http://www.squidoo.com/mybusinessideas

2) The Importance of Education (it may be different than you thought): http://www.squidoo.com/educationalimportance

3) How to raise money for charity: http://www.squidoo.com/askformoney

And the newest lens, just a couple of days old; Visionary Leaders - inspiring and leading change: http://www.squidoo.com/visionaryleaders

These will all be a potential learning experience - enjoy.

Sincerely,

Allan

Allan Wallace, Rector
Bastiat Free University
www.BFuniv.net

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Visionary Leadership

I've just created a new lens on Visionary Leadership.

Like most new creations I am not happy with it, yet. I will be working on it, you can help by taking a look and giving me your ideas.

The basic format is contrasting what is not leadership with what is truly visionary leadership. This may not be the best approach. We could instead start with the foundations of visionary leadership and progress through the stages of growth. You may have another idea for the presentation I have not considered. If you think yours is a great idea - create your own Squidoo lens or blog post and I'll link to it.

What is not good leadership is easy - we have examples everywhere around us. Defining visionary leadership is harder; there are many components that need to be operating in congruence. Starting at the foundations of leadership and progressing through those components is probably more than a one page lens can handle.

Take a look at Visionary Leaders - inspiring and leading change and give me your opinion. I promise you will discover the foundation of true visionary leadership before you are done.

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don't think - don't become

"We become what we think about" - Earl Nightingale

How could we become anything else?

You will find this reflected in powerful texts, wonderful works of art, and in the lives of the successful.

In fact in the Bible's Proverbs 23: 6-8 we get a warning of what happens if we let others (news, politicians, professors, and TV?) do our thinking for us.

Eat thou not the bread of him that hath an evil eye, neither desire thou his dainty meats: For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he: Eat and drink, saith he to thee; but his heart is not with thee. The morsel which thou hast eaten shalt thou vomit up, and lose thy sweet words.

As he thinketh in his heart, so is he ...

We need to be proactive - searching out the best and seeking to understand. Think, don't just follow.

We don't have time to dwell on the negative - that will make us increasingly negative also.

Goals alone are not enough. We must constantly redirect our own thoughts toward apprehending our full potential.

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Leadership or Gamesmanship

There are two types of leaders.

The first is most common and includes almost all politicians.

These are the folks that want and use power over others. Their methods may vary, but are always self-serving and uncaring of those they wish to rule. Their primary characteristic is that they are always seeking to present an image of action, rather than actually create solutions. You end up with two main categories.

The first is those who try to anticipate what current ruling powers want and provide it before asked -- or those who try to see which direction the crowd is headed, then run to get in front of the crowd. Their drive is to do whatever is necessary to advance.

"Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then, be trusted with the government of others?" - Thomas Jefferson

There is a second style, more benign, but equally focused on control. These are the gamesmen. They learn the rules of the game, then maximize their efforts at winning. You find them in bureaucratic (regulated) businesses more than politics, as they advance they adapt quickly to more difficult levels of rules. Most discover, and some use, "game cheats" to get closer to victory.

There is a third, minuscule, minority. These are those that see a need and realize they can galvanize others to assist them in meeting that need. This is what politicians claim to do as they run to get in front of the crowd so they can personally profit.

"There are men in all ages who mean to govern well, but they mean to govern. They promise to be good masters, but they mean to be masters." - Daniel Webster - 1782-1852

The quality of tools used to achieve a goal are important.

The goal itself is also important. There are several hot issues currently debated where leaders on both sides know the truth, but one side is willing to back lies and slander so they can profit over the short term. The crowd may be wrong, but leading the crowd is highly profitable. In the long term almost everyone will finally realize they have been bilked.

A true leader is someone that creates an opportunity for many to assist in positively changing the future; and then empowers their efforts. True leaders realize it is better to fight a difficult battle that will eventually see victory than lead a powerful movement that is doomed to fail.

You can be a true leader.

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