THE ROCKEFELLER UNIVERSITY

1230 YORK AVENUE NEW YORK, NY 10021

 

November 28, 1988

JOSHUA LEDERBERG

PRESIDENT

Dr. Paul F. Brandwein
Box 326
Unionville, New York 10988

Dear Dr. Brandwein:

Harry Passow was good enough to pass on to me your extensive.
comments November 88, and your book on "The Gifted Student as
Future Scientist". I certainly respect the data and statistics
where they are available; my own observations are quite idiosyn-
cratic.

What is, by contrast with my own experience, notably lacking
in your discussion is the role of the student peer group. which
my recollections of Stuyvesant High School include as vividly as
my impressions of the teachers. It is perhaps too easy for me
to take the teachers for granted. They were the only ones I had
whereas I had a lot of comparison concerning my age peers through
elementary school, and the youngsters I would meet in the neigh-
borhood vs. those I knew at school. Now I was not one of those
marginally gifted where you worry about an AGCT score of 120
being too stringent; and it was literally true that most of my
teachers in high school had only a little to offer me about the
cognitive content of science, that I had not already learned
on my own, and even less about the atmosphere of doing signifi-
cant research: I had to wait until college to get that. I was
nevertheless most. grateful for the encouragement and considera-
tion that I receive on the part of the great majority of my
teachers; others were as officious or sometimes burned out as
one must realistically have to expect... There was occasionally
some of that "ressentience" that Paul Goodman talks about; but
happily that was a tiny minority, although those folks could
sometimes give me a disproportionate amount of grief. You must
not ignore how one bad teacher can undo the good work of 10 ex-
cellent ones. But all this is by way of saying that different
students do have different needs. I was already very firmly
committed to science and what I most needed was professional |
mentorship of a kind that did not become available to me until
after high school.

There are also secular trends you want to attend to -- I
wonder if any of that comes out in your data? Right through
WWII the scientist was some kind of hero as exemplified in
Dr. Paul F. Brandwein
November :28, 1988

-2-

stories like Arrowsmith. Images of science became far more
problematical after that. So peer influences must be even more
critical today, in connection with the changes in popular cul-
ture; and one may well need corresponding adaptations in educa-
tion for science.

My comments are surlier that I intend them to be. I profit-
enormously by a whole range of institutions that gave me a mo-
bility that I could have found no where else in the world; and
how could I complain about the outcome? (I suppost I am expres-
Sing some lingering desire to have had John S. Mills’ father
to bring out my full intellectual capabilities at an even earlier
stage and more fully: for the most part I had to organize my
education on my own; and as bright as I was, I suppose I never
was able to put an appropriate level of discipline into that
enterprise, and perhaps do not to the present day.)

I am very grateful indeed to the small handful of you and
your colleagues who have so deeply dedicated yourself to the
care of the gifted and the. nurturing of school education for
science. You are needed ever more urgently than ever; and I
hope you will let me know in what ways I can be of service to
the mission we share.

Yours sincerely,

 
  

gshua Lederberg

cc: A.H. Passow