Research On The Higher Education Ideas And Practices Of Derek Bok

Derek Bok is one the most famous thinker and practitioner of higher education in America and the world since the seventies of the last century,he is also one of the greatest presidents in Harvard history.Therefore,a thorough,systematic and deep investigation into his higher education ideas and practices is very meaningful itself.Moreover,his successful transition from a specialist in one particular academic field to an outstanding university president and eventually to a great educator sets a good example for Chinese university presidents and gives us valuable lessons and enlightenments,which makes this research project even more meaningful.This thesis uses Bok's higher education ideas——"The social responsibilities of a university" as its primary logical baseline,while applying the case study of Bok's transition from a labor-law specialist to an excellent university president and finally to a great educator as its supplementary logical baseline,and makes use of such research methods as documentary analyses and interviews to carry out a comparatively thorough,systematic and deep study of Bok's higher education theories and practices as well as his contributions to Harvard University and American higher education.Bok's theory of "The social responsibilities of a university",which is also the primary logical baseline of this thesis,inspects the whole thing from the perspective of Bok's higher education ideas.While Bok's higher education ideas are originated from his higher education practices.Bok constantly reflects and summarizes his abundant higher education practical experiences,and consequently constructs his higher education theories.Conversely,Bok's higher education theories have guided his higher education practices.Hence,Bok's higher education theories and practices are entangled with one another.The two of them cannot be separated from each other.They together form a unified system of high internal coherence.Bok's transformation from a labor-law specialist to an excellent university president and eventually to a great educator,which is the supplementary logical baseline of this thesis,investigates into the whole thing from the perspective of Bok's professional career.Bok successfully transfers from a labor-law professor to an outstanding university president because of his excellent higher education practices.And Bok succeeds in transferring from an outstanding university president to a great educator because of his brilliant and systematic higher education theories.Therefore,Bok's successful transformation process and the formation of his theories and practices of "The social responsibilities of a university" occur simultaneously.It's the same one process viewed from two different perspectives.It's not two different processes.If we examine the internal relationship between the primary and supplementary logical baselines of this thesis in another way,we could also say that the primary baseline discusses the topic of what the society,the public and the university teachers and students expect of a university,while the supplementary baseline explores the problem of what the society,the public and the university teachers and students expect of a university president.A university and a university president are closely connected with one another,but the two are obviously different from each other.Chapter One explores the life-long experiences of Bok,and especially makes a case study of Bok,s transition from a labor-law specialist to an excellent university president and finally to a great educator.Chapter Two makes a theoretical analysis of Bok's higher education ideas,and eventually summarizes his ideas of higher education as "The social responsibilities of a university",and consequently uses these ideas as the primary logical baseline of this thesis.Chapter Three studies Bok's ideas and practices of undergraduate education from the perspective of a university's functions of cultivating talents as a way to shoulder its social responsibilities.Chapter Four studies Bok's ideas and practices of professional school education from the perspective of a university's functions of cultivating talents as a way to shoulder its social responsibilities.Chapter Five studies Bok's ideas and practices of pursuing academic excellence and the social responsibilities of scientific research from the perspective of a university's functions of academic research as another way to assume its social responsibilities.Chapter Six studies Bok's ideas and practices of higher education commercialization from the perspective of a university's functions of serving the society through technology transfer as a way to carry out its social responsibilities.Chapter Seven explores Bok's transition from a labor-law specialist to an excellent university president and finally to a great educator while comparing Bok with another two great American university presidents of the late twentieth century——Clark Kerr and James Duderstadt.The first part of Chapter Eight studies Bok's contributions to Harvard University while comparing Bok with another two great Harvard presidents——Charles Eliot and James Conant.The second part of Chapter Eight investigates into Bok's theoretical contributions to higher education while comparing Bok again with Clark Kerr and James Duderstadt.