Tuesday Interview - Self-Education, Life-Long Learning, and the Importance of Intellectual Maturity

Join me Tuesday, November 27th, for a one-hour live and interactive FutureofEducation.com interview with author and self-acknowledged autodidact Charles D. Hayes. I contacted Charles after finding his books Self University (published in 1989) and Proving You're Qualified: Strategies for Competent People Without College Degrees (1995). I told him that I'm particularly interested in the topics of self-education, life-long learning, and accreditation and how they are changing because of the Web, and he agreed to an interview, but insisted (smile) that we also discuss his newest book, September University: Summoning Passion for an Unfinished Life.

September University goes one step further than his previous books by discussing the imperative for those in our society who are in the second half of their lives to (as one reviewer put it) "step away from superficial things and commit to becoming wise guides for the generations that come after them." Because our education dialog seems trapped between the weird worlds of 1) expectations of compliance, conformance, and dependency, and 2) perceptions of the value of education being primarily measured numerically and financially, I'm hopeful to hear from Charles about how the significant demographic of baby-boomers-turning-seniors has the potential to reshape a more mature discussion of education.

Date: Tuesday, November 27th, 2012
Time: 5pm Pacific / 8pm Eastern (international times here)
Duration: 1 hour
Location: In Blackboard Collaborate (formerly Elluminate). Log in at http://futureofed.info. The Blackboard Collaborate room will be open up to 30 minutes before the event if you want to come in early. To make sure that your computer is configured for Blackboard Collaborate, please visit the support and configuration page.
Recordings: The full Blackboard Collaborate recording is at https://sas.elluminate.com/p.jnlp?psid=2012-11-27.1725.M.9E9FE58134BE68C3B413F24B3586CF.vcr&sid=2008350 and a portable .mp3 is at http://audio.edtechlive.com/foe/charleshayes.mp3.

Author and publisher Charles D. Hayes is a self-taught philosopher and an impassioned advocate for lifelong learning. At age 17, he dropped out of high school to join the U.S. Marines. After four years of duty, he became a police officer in Dallas, Texas, and later he moved to Alaska, where he has worked for more than 35 years in the oil industry. In 1987, Hayes founded Autodidactic Press, “committed to lifelong learning as the lifeblood of democracy and the key to living life to its fullest.”

Hayes’ first book, Self-University, won PMA’s Benjamin Franklin Award for nonfiction in 1990 and was called the best book on self-education of the decade by educator Ronald Gross. Early in the year 2000, his book Beyond the American Dream: Lifelong Learning and the Search for Meaning in a Postmodern World was selected by the American Library Association’s Choice magazine as one of the most outstanding academic books of the previous year. His other books include Existential Aspirations: Reflections of a Self-Taught Philosopher; September University: Summoning Passion for an Unfinished Life; The Rapture of Maturity: A Legacy of Lifelong Learning; Training Yourself; and Proving You’re Qualified. His recent novel, Portals in a Northern Sky, has readers across the country declaring they are going to read or reread classic literature.

Promoting the idea that education should be thought of not as something you get but as something you take, Hayes’ work has appeared in USA Today, Library Journal, Training magazine, Training and Development magazine, in the UTNE Reader, on Alaska Public Radio's Talk of Alaska, and on National Public Radio’s Talk of the Nation...

In 1989, Hayes inaugurated Self-University Week, held annually during the first seven days of September to celebrate the joy of lifelong learning. Since then, his web site Autodidactic.com has continued to provide resources for self-directed learners—from advice about credentials to philosophy about the value lifelong learning brings to everyday living. In September 2004, Hayes initiated SeptemberUniversity.org, a web site created specifically for aging baby boomers. (From http://www.autodidactic.com/authorbio.htm)