Copyright ©2011 by Oliver DeMille. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. Nothing in this work may be copied, stored or transmitted in an electronic or other format without written permission from the publisher.

This book is for informational purposes only. Nothing in this work gives legal, medical or financial advice, and nothing herein takes the place of personal assistance and/or advice from competent professionals.

Published by TJEdOnline.com Published in the United States of America

ISBN: 978-0-9830996-5-9

“What image does a first-rank college or university present today to a teen-ager leaving home for the first time, off to the adventure of a liberal education? He

has four years of freedom to discover himself—a space between the intellectual wasteland he has left behind and the inevitable dreary professional training that

awaits him after the [bachelor’s degree].

“In this short time he must learn that there is a great world beyond the little one he knows, experience the exhilaration of it and digest enough of it to sustain

himself in the intellectual deserts he is destined to traverse. He must do this, that is, if he is to have any hope of a higher life.

“These are the charmed years when he can, if he so chooses, become anything he wishes and when he has the opportunity to survey his alternatives, not

merely those current in his time or provided by careers, but those available to him as a human being. The importance of these years for an American cannot

be overestimated. They are civilization’s only chance to get to him.”

–Allan Bloom, The Closing of the American Mind

Contents

Introduction: College Education and the Idea of Greatness

Blueprints App 1. Know the Real You (While Most People Are Choosing a Major) App 2. Know Your Inner Leader (While Most People Consult Their Class Schedule) App 3. Know Your Mission (While Most People Change Their Major) App 4. Know Your Career “Power Points” (While Most People Seek Good Grades) App 5. Know the Great Ideas (While Most People Try to Understand the Library) App 6. Read the Classics (While Most People are Asking, “What’s Your Major?”)

Technologies App 7. Master the Cards (While Most People Cram) App 8. Change the Calendar (While Most People Try to Manage Their Time) App 9. Read to Learn (While Most People Read to Read) App 10. Write to Master (While Most People Write to Pass)

Horizontals App 11. Turn Study Groups into Colloquia (While Most People Use Study Groups to Prepare for Tests) App 12. Turn Study Groups into Orals (While Most People Trust Multiple Choice) App 13. Seek Simulations (While Most People Wait for Others to Lead Them) App 14. Boost Your Vocabulary (While Most People Skim Over Unknown Words) Verticals App 15. Master the Three Assignments (While Most People Just Solve Problems) App 16. Study Peer-Reviewed Journals (While Most People Only

Study Textbooks) App 17. Study The Masters (While Most People Research Magazines) App 18. Personalize Your Professors (While Most People Are Just a Number) App 19. Overcome “Ringism” (While Most People “Just Wanna Fit In”)

Conclusion: The Catalyst of a Great Leadership Education

Additional Reading One More Thing About the Author

Introduction

College Education and the Idea of Greatness

Nearly everyone who goes to college wants to succeed. Unfortunately, many fail to stay in college for more than a year and many others never graduate. Worst of all, even where career training is adequate, leadership education is often missing.

The idea of greatness and discussion of the truly important things in life are frequently absent in even our most prestigious schools. Yet some students do get a quality leadership education.

What makes the difference? The answer is that getting a Leadership Education is up to the student. Students who

know what to look for and what to do can get an excellent Leadership Education at virtually any school. The key is to apply the 19 Apps covered in this book.

These 19 Apps will help students get a great career and leadership education. In fact, even just a few of these will make a significant difference in helping college students get the education of their dreams.

The 19 Apps nearly always improve a student’s career preparation, grades, learning, test scores and preparation for life, leadership and happiness. Indeed, any person who applies all 19 Apps simply cannot fail to do better than he/she would have otherwise.

The 19 Apps work. I have experienced them personally and witnessed them applied by many students. They work in the arts, the sciences, in liberal arts majors and technical fields of study.

They work for young freshmen, upperclassmen with lots

of extracurricular activities, working adults in night or online courses, and adults who return to school.

If you want a superb, truly excellent college education, learn and utilize all 19 Apps; they are powerful steps. I call them steps—instead of principles or guidelines—because the order in which they are applied actually matters. Subsequent steps won’t be as effective unless the student is already implementing earlier steps. They build on each other.

Of course, you probably won’t use them as expertly at first as you will after some practice. But as you attempt to apply them you will naturally improve.

Learning should be fun. It should usually be exciting, interesting and enjoyable. It should at times be challenging and even overwhelming, but the 19 Apps help turn even the most impossible studies into manageable and enriching experiences.

Blueprints

Apps 1-4 deal with knowing what you really want, need, and should get out of your education.

It is said that the beginning of wisdom is to “know thyself” (Socrates said that the unexamined life is not worth living), and in our world of extreme career specialization this is even more vital.

To really get the most out of your college experience, you need to take care of yourself as a high priority. Too many students ruin their studies by not taking care of their health, finances, schedule, relationships and so on.

You are not a college student first, but a person having a college experience. This differentiation is profound, and it can make all the difference between success and failure in school and in life.

Likewise, you are a person first, you are a leader second, and you are on an important life mission third; your career role (from accountant or engineer to

doctor, lawyer, artist or entrepreneur, etc.) is a fourth priority. The first four apps address how to effectively balance and succeed in all of these important roles.

Apps 5-6 are all about ideals. Too often education is focused on passing the bare minimums and the accepted “realities” of life rather than what really matters. This tends to lead to mediocrity.

By knowing the great ideas and including the great classics in all arenas of learning, one is sure to find greatness in the curriculum.

Why would anyone settle for anything less in their university endeavors? If greatness isn’t a consistent part of your learning, how can you expect to get a great education?

Technologies

Apps 7-10 introduce technologies of Leadership Education. The common usage may have you thinking of handheld digital devices, but that’s not how I’m using it here.

The word “technology” refers to “skills, knowledge, expertise, know-how, equipment, machinery and tools” used to improve our abilities.

The Leadership Ed Technologies are: Master the Cards, Change the Calendar, Read to Learn, and Write to Master. Each is central to getting a truly excellent education during college, and this book will teach you to apply each of these powerful technologies.

Horizontals

Apps 11-14 teach the Leadership Ed Horizontals. These connections are essential, and they are horizontal because they center on relationships with other students and peers you will work with as you study. This is geared

to on-campus studies, but still applies if you are pursuing your learning online or independently.

As with everything else in this book, you will want to individualize and personalize the details to fit your situation and help you get a truly great education.

Verticals

Apps 15-19 deal with the Leadership Ed Verticals. These are vertical relationships because as a student you need to work effectively with your teachers. This includes professors, coaches, mentors and others (including some non-traditional teachers you may not yet know about).

How you approach these important guides deeply matters, and can make a big difference in the quality of your education. These steps will help you truly draw the most value from your college experience.

All the steps deal with how to make your learning and your education a training in leadership abilities, skills, knowledge, ideas, principles and habits. These leadership steps are what separate a good education from a great one.

App 1

Know the Real You

This is actually easier than it sounds. It is vitally important, and every other step and all success you hope to have in life is built on this foundation. But it is usually not a difficult step. It consists of asking and answering a few key questions, and then of remaining true to yourself.

Here are the questions. Take the time (usually about an hour total) to really answer them:

1. Why are you going to college? List every reason you can think of. 2. What is the obvious reason you are going to college? 3. What is the real reason you are going to college? 4. If you could leave college with a great education, but not the diploma,

would it be worth your time and money? If you could earn the degree but with a mediocre education, would you want it? (Take some time on this one; the obvious answers aren’t always true for you. Be prepared for some unexpected insights!)

5. After graduation, how do you plan to use your degree? 6. After graduation, how do you plan to use your education? 7. When you look back on your college education at age 90, what do you

want to think about it? Then: What do you want to feel about it?

8. Do you have any selfish, egotistical, or bad motives regarding your college experience?

9. What are the most important things you want to do in your life? 10. What are the top five things to which you want to dedicate your life? 11. When you look back at your entire life at age 90, what do you want to be

your greatest accomplishments? 12. How do you expect your college education to relate to these things (the

last three questions)? 13. How do you need to change your view of college to accomplish what

you really want from your university studies? 14. How do you need to change your behavior to really accomplish what you

most want from your college experience? 15. What do you need to do to take better care of yourself? Make a plan to

follow through on this. 16. How happy are you? What would it take for you to feel truly happy every

day?

Go back and read through all your answers again. What are your overall thoughts and feelings about you, your life, your studies and things you need to change? Write your answers.

This can be an overwhelming and life-changing experience. It can cause you to ask a number of new questions. Even if you don’t have all the answers right now, trust that they will come. Make the little changes you’ve felt you need. As for the big changes, ponder them during the days and weeks ahead. If you feel the need, talk to your parents, spouse, friends and/or mentors about what you are thinking and feeling. Listen and learn from them, and take the time to really think about and clarify what your deepest thoughts are on these important topics.

Knowing yourself is a process, not a destination. It is the process of continually questioning, finding answers and improving yourself as you progress toward what you really want. Life is often like a buffet; and just like with food, it is only as we taste or experience something that we know whether or not we like it. The on-going process of examining our experiences helps us tweak our course

as needed to get to what we ultimately want. Of course, wise parents, mentors and others can greatly help us by telling us what is ahead, and it is essential that we learn to listen to the right voices and follow the right counsel.

Just the process of asking and attempting to answer these questions helps us follow the advice to “know thyself.” It is important to return to these questions often.

App 11

Turn Study Groups into Colloquia

You’re using the cards, so you usually won’t need a study group to prepare for the exam. In fact, most study groups are an academic waste of time (though some of them may have significant social value).

If you make copies of your cards and hand them out to everyone, a few will cram them and do well on the exam. A few others will ask you about your study system and learn how to do this long term to get a great education.

But study groups are excellent places for colloquia. A colloquium (the singular form of colloquia) is a discussion, preferably about a book or work that all the participants have read and studied.

If you attend a school that uses a colloquia model of learning such as Oxford, or learn from professors who utilize the Socratic Method, or something similar, you will get a lot of colloquia in your everyday courses.

At most schools, however, students experience far too few colloquia. This is a shame because discussing the ideas you are learning with your peers is essential to great leadership education.

You learn things from other students that you would never learn just through reading and lecture, and you even learn a great deal as you participate in dialogues and hear yourself saying things you didn’t realize you had considered before.

Dialogue is vital to expanding your thinking, recognizing the limitation of your own logic and insights, and inspiring you to study harder as you see others excel and achieve things that you hadn’t thought were in your reach. Colloquia are part of any great education.

It is easy to turn study groups into colloquia. Simply go to the study group with a list of questions about the book(s) in the class.

As the group is establishing its study plan, let the other participants know that you have a list of questions and you hope the group can share their views on the answers.

Cliff’s Notes has lists of such questions for many books, and you can find other questions in the appendix of my book A Thomas Jefferson Education. You can even research questions online—or just write your own.

Hand out a copy of your list of questions at the beginning of the study group. Most of the participants will be glad for the list and use it to improve their studies. And most study groups will take time to discuss at least some of your questions. Take part in the discussion and ask the opinion of students who remain mostly quiet.

If your group doesn’t finish your list or runs out of time, propose an additional study group to address the questions on your list along with whatever else the group needs to cover.

As you do this over time, you will experience a lot of colloquia and find that they significantly improve the quality of your learning experience. Do your best to help the group succeed in other ways beyond colloquia.

As valuable as colloquia are, most people have to experience them several times to realize just how great a learning tool they are. Do as many colloquia as you can, and involve others as much as they show interest.

The colloquia method of learning has to be experienced to be valued. It is truly a superb type of learning that helps you increase nearly all your thinking, questioning and other learning abilities. You’re doing a favor to every person

in your study group when you bring a list of deep questions and ask for everyone’s views. They will share profound and exciting ideas that you have never thought of and that your professor may never mention.

By the way, if you are pursuing your college education through the online or distance-learning formats, it is still essential to find ways to engage in colloquia. Current technologies offering group-meeting formats are widely available. Use them!

App 18

Personalize Your Professors

There are at least four major types of teachers at nearly every college/university. I call these types scholars, professors, philosophers and coaches.

It is important to keep in mind that your professors have paid a price to be where they are, and too many students make the mistake of wanting their profs to cater to their particular style or preferences, rather than really discovering the unique strength and genius of the professor.

As an adult learner, it is your job to optimize the potential and outcome of your relationships with your teachers, and in so doing you will greatly increase your effectiveness as a student.

To get the most out of your education, figure out which type (or combination of types) each of your instructors most resembles and work with her accordingly.

Scholars focus on research, publishing, and an area of expertise, and they tend to see classroom teaching as an important but secondary focus. Scholars value accuracy and depth, specialized expertise, consistency, research, writing and publishing.

Professors are invested in teaching. They care about the classroom, and work hard to ensure that each assignment, exam, lecture, activity and

class period is of the highest quality. They tend to see the process of attending class, doing assignments and taking exams as the keys to learning. Professors tend to value breadth and accuracy, authority and rules, teaching students, and improving the classroom experience.

Philosophers are interested in ideas. They love concepts, ideas, models and new ways of seeing models, thinking, rethinking and the process of reading, discussing, pondering and coming to new understandings. They value depth and creativity, new twists on old ideas, and often teach with a motivational communication style.

Coaches are concerned with individual students. They want to build a relationship with each student and help support each pupil in his learning toward his best potential. They tend to value breadth and creativity, long walks and talks, appropriate bonding and frequent discussions.

Of course, every teacher is her own mix of characteristics, and it usually doesn’t take many class periods with your teachers to begin to see which of these traits they most exemplify. But it is a great educational key to know how to best work with each type of teacher. Here is a basic guide summarized from our book Leadership Education:

• When working with Scholars, learn facts, details, precision, consistency and accuracy, along with the tools and techniques of the field of study. Learn about her area of expertise and specialization, and be sure to study the scholarly journals where she publishes and that she reads on a regular basis. If possible, get involved with some of her research.

• When working with a Professor, learn discipline in your study habits, submit quality work, and learn about the passion of studying a field of knowledge in depth. Pay attention to teaching methods, since the professor-type cares as much about teaching and learning as about the topic he teaches.

• When working with a Philosopher, learn how to think, how to see nuance, a passion for ideas, and the interconnection of all fields of knowledge. Open your mind and think big thoughts, explore challenging and new ideas, and be open to learning new topics and from new sources. Learn to study with an eye toward applying everything you learn to the real world.

• When working with a Coach, learn to submit and trust, and to emphasize personalized and individualized studies under his tutelage. Think a lot about your big dreams and goals, and share them with him. Seek his help on preparing yourself to achieve your goals and use your educational experience to help the process.

Ideally, you will learn from all these types of teachers during your college experience. Even if it pushes you outside of your comfort zone, be sure to work with all rather than just one or two types of mentors.

Your teachers are a vital part of getting a great education, and you will work with them most effectively if you learn to adapt to their strengths and gain from their expertise, experience and wisdom.

About the Author

Oliver DeMille is the author of A Thomas Jefferson Education, The Coming Aristocracy, FreedomShift, Leadership Education (with Rachel DeMille), Thomas Jefferson Education for Teens (with Shanon Brooks), The Student Whisperer (with Tiffany Earl), A Thomas Jefferson Education Home Companion (with Rachel DeMille and Diann Jeppson), and many other writings and audios on educational, political and leadership topics.

Oliver served for nearly two decades as a full-time mentor and professional educator. His students have gone on to successful careers and leadership in many fields, and acceptance to graduate programs at many institutions, including Harvard University, Pepperdine, the University of Oklahoma, Florida State University, George Washington University, Acton MBA, St. Johns College and many others.

Oliver is a founder of the Center for Social Leadership and he is a popular keynote speaker at corporate, academic and civic events. His daily emails and weekly blogs are available at http://OliverDeMille.com.

Connect with Oliver on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.