A true liberal arts education requires that students and teachers be together. Oakman, who has written extensively on the subject of the pedagogical implications of technology, doesn't shun the role of technology in the classroom. He maintains a website, encourages dialogue by email and uses the Internet for some of his research. But he tempers the new information tools and resources with established learning practices. E ducators must, Oakman stresses, meditate on what these new tools will do to the way we teach, learn and live.
Technology does modify our environment.
You don't even really have to think about it. Traditional learning methods require you to work harder. Provost and longtime philosophy Professor Paul Menzel agrees. Students have even been known to download finished papers and pass them off as their own. Some PLU professors have already faced this situation and say it is a far greater prob-lem nationwide.