ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on creating educational contexts in university classrooms that encourage students to take charge of their own learning. It aims to show that university classrooms can empower students, be user-friendly, build social contexts of inclusion, and build creative opportunities of long-term value both to self and community. It analyzes higher education as professional certification. The chapter explores the role of amateurism in constructing alternative learning environments. It argues that new university reality reinforces the need for less-structured and more user-friendly classrooms. Today's university education is as much about fulfilling the demands for certification in a credential society as it is about satisfying the desires of scholarly curiosity. Thus, today's university is centrally about socialization that trains students according to the dictates of professionalism. The chapter argues that the current postsecondary education system would greatly benefit from an approach that emphasizes less-structured classrooms, community connections and involvement, and storytelling.
