A 95th-Year Reflection From the Applied Psychology Trenches

• In Event: 58.011 - Acquired Wisdom: Lessons Learned by Distinguished Researchers

Abstract

After 80 years of academic and professional study, inquiry and practice, one has reason to expect some degree of competence and a measure of wisdom. I have been asked to reflect on these experiences and their possible outcomes. As I think about what has been gained or what could be called a product, it is perhaps my certainty concerning uncertainty. I find myself convinced that there is little or nothing of which I can be certain. My intuitions and predictions are often reliable, but I am no longer confident that I am correct or that I have THE solution. It was in my early forties that I began to relax my hold on the veridicality of ideas and theories. It was from the behavioral scientist, Donald Hebb and the Christian theologian, Howard Thurman that I began to understand that theories do not have to be true/valid in order to be useful.

Early in my career, I developed an interest in increasing the number of high achieving students in schools who come from African American, Latino, and Native American families. These research interests morphed into a concern with research on diverse human characteristics and pedagogy and my advocacy for increased educational opportunity for low-status populations. A focus on Black men who have overcome odds against success to become high achievers drew my attention to the study of factors related to the academic achievement gap between high and low-status populations. My additional research interests include the advancement of the concepts of "affirmative development of academic ability" and "supplementary education" both of which focus on improving the quality of academic achievement in diverse learners.

A continuing concern with disparities in the academic and career development of learners from different social divisions influenced a recurring concern with the measurement sciences and pedagogy. I addressed these issues several times in the course of my educational psychology publications, but it was at the beginning of my 10th decade of life that I was invited to chair the Gordon Commission on the Future of Assessment in Education. In that role, I challenged the testing enterprise to give as serious attention to the development and nurturance of intellective ability as it has traditionally given to the measurement of developed ability and achievement. The Gordon Commission argued that assessment can and should inform and improve teaching and learning processes and outcomes.

This paper is a biographical commentary on my career in which I describe my growth from the pursuit of certainty, through uncertainty, to a measure of wisdom. In this paper, I will elaborate concerning the exploration of these issues and make some recommendations to colleagues so that they may profit from my academic journey.

Author

• Edmund W. Gordon, Teachers College, Columbia University