The purpose of education is to replace an empty mind with an open one.
Interpretation
Education transforms ignorance into understanding and openness.
This quote emphasizes that the fundamental aim of education is not merely to fill a student with knowledge, but to foster a mindset that is curious, adaptable, and open to new ideas. It suggests that true education enriches the mind, encouraging critical thinking and exploration rather than rote memorization.
In practice
In a graduation speech to motivate students about lifelong learning.
Over the years, I've evolved a somewhat heretical but time-and mind-saving approach to books, articles, editorials that deal with weighty matters. More often than not, by beginning at the end and contemplating the conclusions, one can determine if it's worth going through the whole to get there.
Those who enjoy responsibility usually get it; those who merely like exercising authority usually lose it.
To live long and achieve happiness, cultivate the art of radiating happiness.
If you never budge, don't expect a push.
It's never a good deal when only one party thinks it is.
How would you know what happy is if you've never been otherwise.
I believe in women. I desire . . . to do those things that would advance women in moral and spiritual, as well as educational work.
I went away in my head, into a book. That was where I went whenever real life was too hard or too inflexible.
It would be suicide in the American academy to show too early an interest beyond your doctoral specialization: charges of everything from charlatanry to ambition would be levied and tenure denied. I've seen this first-hand.
The great thing about working out at a gym is that if you put in effort, you get very obvious results. The same should be true of college. A professor’s job is to teach students how to see their minds growing in the same way they can see their muscles grow when they look in a mirror.
Every woman needs to know when she's being discriminated against and what the reasons are why she isn't getting equal pay so we can close that pay gap.
Where I grew up, learning was a collective activity. But when I got to school and tried to share learning with other students that was called cheating. The curriculum sent the clear message to me that learning was a highly individualistic, almost secretive, endeavor. My working class experience...was disparaged.
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