Schooled in the art of learning

Perhaps my view of the central purpose of an English university first degree is overly simplistic: to facilitate and encourage the transformation of a person from being reliant on being "taught" (in the school sense of the word) to being capable of "teaching" oneself in any area of interest for the rest of one's life.

From this perspective, I find the reflections and conclusions of Anna Tobin (THES, July 26) and much of the subsequent contributors' correspondence to be positively unhelpful. I do not believe that the important transformation I refer to can be achieved by "teaching" in the school sense of the word. Rather, bad teaching as described by Tobin may even be helpful in encouraging the switch from students' learning being the responsibility of the teacher to being the responsibility of the students themselves.

The central purpose of an English first degree is achieved by giving the students exposure to: the highest calibre of academic mind; staff experienced and successful in pushing back the frontiers of knowledge; and a rigorous critical academic culture.

My position on this matter is rather unfashionable. However, if an English university education is to be little more than "advanced school", I do not want such provision subsidised from taxation. With the half-life of knowledge being so short, such a system does not yield a sufficiently high cost/benefit ratio.

S. Taylor Hyde, Cheshire