Self Made Scholar

How to Ghost College Classes

Steve Jobs says that dropping out of college was one of the best decisions he ever made. Why? Because after quitting school he was able to sit in on courses that actually helped him learn. He’d walk into whatever class he wanted and just blend in with the crowd. “The minute I dropped out I could [...]

Ivy League Education at Home Part 7: Quantitative Reasoning

“The essence of mathematics is not to make simple things complicated, but to make complicated things simple.” - S. Gudder When you hear the phrase “quantitative reasoning,” does it bring you back to days of high school Algebra and Calculus? Does it make you remember the anguish of learning formulas without a purpose explained to you? [...]

Harvard Classics vs. Great Books of the Western World

There are two book collections designed to give the average reader an in-depth liberal education: the Harvard Classics and the Great Books of the Western World. The volumes in the Great Books and the Harvard Classics collections were hand-picked by influential presidents of major universities in the first half of the twentieth century. During a time [...]

Practical Learning: Reuniting Thinking and Doing

“If thinking is bound up with action, then the task of getting an adequate grasp on the world, intellectually, depends on our doing stuff in it.” The word “intelligence” conjures up images of books, classrooms, and serious-minded professors. But, real learning is just as likely to involve wrenches, ballet studios, and repairmen examining the parts of [...]

5 Ways You Can Support Self-Education on the Web

The web is an amazing collection of no-cost resources for lifelong learners. I’ve shared hundreds of resource links on this blog and there are millions of others available to help anyone in their pursuit of learning. I often take learning-oriented websites for granted. But, every once and a while, it’s important to consider how these [...]

Big, Hairy, Audacious Goals

Want to bring your learning to the next level? It may be time to set a Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal. It’s easy to come up with small, overly-realistic goals. But, these lack the passion that draws people out of their comfort zones to take on serious risk. True learning occurs when you do things that are [...]

Ivy League Education at Home Part 6: Moral Reasoning

Did you know that many classical colleges dedicate entire courses to the art of decision making? The ability to make correct choices – to distinguish between good and bad possibilities - is so important that liberal arts programs require every student to complete work in this area. In matters that count politically and personally, most college-aged [...]

The 3 Forms of Learning & Why You Won’t Want to Ignore Any of Them

There are three kinds of learning essential for success in just about any field: niche knowledge, skill development, and liberal understanding. Unfortunately, most people focus their energies on just one or two types of learning – whatever comes most naturally. By neglecting the forms of learning that feel less familiar, they hinder their progress. By familiarizing [...]

Ivy League Education at Home Part 5: The Arts

The arts are an essential part of any classical education. Examining a painting or listening to a masterpiece can draw out the humanity in all of us. By understanding the history and theory behind the arts, you can prepare yourself to more fully appreciate what you see and hear. In this lesson, I focus on both [...]

Great Thinkers on Self-Education: Socrates

“The unexamined life is not worth living.” Who is Socrates? Socrates (c 470 BC – 399 BC) was a renowned Greek teacher, now recognized as the father of Western philosophy. During his life, Socrates often disrupted the status quo by questioning the public and creating controversy. His views on knowledge and truth have influenced the way [...]