She describes higher education's relationships and non-relationships to the marketplace. She uses research as an example. Another role of the university, she maintains, is it's ability to be a critic, a role that must be protected. She explains why one of the major points of intellectual pursuit is to question, which is often in conflict with the need to be useful. Conversation 4 Nancy Dye describes how a liberal education is good at helping people develop flexible ways of thinking.
Political correctness is called into question.
President Dye offers her perspective on how people can become more comfortable with the ambiguity which increasingly surrounds us. She suggests that institutions of higher education must embrace a fair amount of conflict to be effective in their mission, then tells us what she thinks the real challenge is for American culture. Conversation 5 Being able to deal with conflict, to disagree and stay engaged, is essential to democracy, Dye contends, and amplifies on that idea. In describing how fundamentally people can be different, she uses the ways we learn as an example. On the one hand, people are going to disagree in a college or university, but we must all be committed to disagreeing in ways that respect individuals.