UO PRESIDENT TEACHES WHAT HE PRACTICES
Jan. 8, 1999
Contact Maureen Shine (541) 346-3145
EUGENE–It’s back to the classroom for University of Oregon President Dave Frohnmayer.
Frohnmayer is teaching a winter term Freshman Seminar course on a subject that he finds not only important but very familiar–leadership.
"We’re discussing how people think about leadership and exploring a broad range of models in an effort to understand what constitutes effective leadership," says Frohnmayer.
The three-credit class, "Theories of Leadership," examines models ranging from Plato and the classics to modern approaches including total quality management and feminist theory. Frohnmayer’s personal philosophy is that there are no "natural born leaders" and that true leadership emerges in stages through observation and learning. He also believes that there cannot be leadership without "followership" and that we all do both at one time or another.
"Some of the best leaders are not famous, but are people we encounter in our day-to-day lives who make a positive difference by their actions," he says. "My hope is that the students will find this subject as fascinating as I do and that it will be a learning experience for us all."
Frohnmayer’s class meets from 3:30-4:50 p.m. every Tuesday and Thursday through March 14. The students have an extensive reading list including works by such noted thinkers as Nietzsche and Machiavelli. Students are required to write one paper per week and also participate in group problem-solving exercises in which they observe and demonstrate elements of effective leadership. In its third consecutive year, Frohnmayer finds that his students learn about themselves as well as the subject matter.
"In one session, they play a game of skill and guile called ‘Diplomacy’ in which the object is to control Europe through periods of negotiation, followed by concerted simultaneous movements of nations’ armies and navies," says Frohnmayer. "My idealistic students were distressed to discover how quickly they abandoned their purported values of ethics and honor."
"Theories of Leadership" is one of about 30 Freshman Seminars being taught on campus this academic year by some of the university’s top faculty. The classes are limited to about 20 students and are part of the UO’s First-Year Learning Communities program that includes Freshman Interest Groups, the Robert Donald Clark Honors College and Discover Oregon courses. The program exemplifies the university’s innovative Oregon Model for undergraduate education that stresses smaller classes and closer interaction between professors and students.
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