The Rhetorician as an Agent of Social Change

While reading this article, a typical notion of college came to mind. For many students enrolled in a large university, such as UCF, the campus and college social life immediately surrounding the campus creates a “bubble” for college students.
This bubble serves as a great learning experience for students as they are able to go through their education alongside like-minded peers who are also determined to achieve a college degree. However, the bubble somewhat hinders the students from experiencing the full reality of the responsibility awaiting them after college, once they have entered the professional field and are considered adults. The bubble also hinders students from capitalizing on community opportunities available to them because class, assignments, and school-related studies take up most of their time. I agree with the message behind the following quote: “I believe that in doing our scholarly work, we should take social responsibility for the people from and with whom we come to understand a topic. I’m echoing Freire who shows that when we theorize about the opressed, we must do ‘authentic thinking, thinking that is concerned about reality, does not take place in ivory isolation, but only in communication.'”  What’s the point in education without learning practical methods to apply that education in the community and to society? Knowledge is ineffective as pure knowledge. I believe knowledge must be applied and active in order to be useful. This service-learning project our class will be doing is a great way to incorporate the application of knowledge while also acquiring knowledge.