Criticality in undergraduate education: Is a non-critical classroom experience a lesson in deceit?

Abstract

This article is an exploration of the potential of a more purposeful application of criticality in undergraduate classrooms. Conventional pedagogy, often lecture-based, does not prepare students well for life, a career, or service toward the common good. A more critical approach in the classroom stimulates critical thinking, critical consciousness, and critical being. Criticality in teaching and learning allows for an honest assessment of history, culture, and the reality of human interactions. It positions students well for career success and strong civic engagement. It also serves to refresh and enhance faculty understanding of established material. Criticality in the classroom redounds to the wellbeing of the institution, the community it serves, as well as advancing knowledge itself with the enrichment of new perspectives. Anything less is at best a repetitive exercise of fact regurgitation, or at worst, outright deception.