Berkeley taught me rigor and an independent voice. Yes, I was expected to absorb the tremendous amounts of reading in each class, but I was also expected to have a critical sense and a critical voice, my own voice, in the context of each class. I was not told to research the smarter person's findings, but I was given models of authority and was expected to find my place and my voice amidst those authorities, digging into and commenting on the primary texts at hand. I am describing my first three years--freshman to junior--starting in 1979.
Looking back, I so value how my professors were training me to have an independent mind, grounded in methodology and evidence. In the fourth year, I was ready to face the deep waters of research in general and schools of literary criticism in particular. I would not have fared so well without the support for my own findings and without all the practice in being an authority, at being a legitimate reader.
That education has deeply influenced how I teach, how I design classes, how I foster excellence.
