Kevin Currie-Knight on Self-Directed Learning in College

Off-Trail Learning

Kevin Currie-Knight (kevinck.net) is a philosopher, historian of education, and Teaching Associate Professor at East Carolina University’s College of Education. Following a stint as a high school special educator, Kevin began training future public school teachers at the college level and experimented with giving them high levels of autonomy. We discuss the results of Kevin’s experiments, his unique definition of “self-directed learning,” the benefits of letting students choose their own grades, the tension between learning and credentialing, why students cheat, and whether the Ph.D. model of learning could be applied at the high school level. Kevin’s 2019 paper, “When College Students Direct Their Learning: How a College Professor Redesigned an Undergraduate Course in Education to Incorporate Self-Directed Learning”, can be found here: https://othereducation.org/index.php/OE/article/view/230