Be an intentional learner outside class, too

For some, college is a new concept. For others, this is their last semester. For everyone, it is important to challenge oneself to be an intentional learner outside class and college itself.

If you are paying attention during lectures, you will gain a wealth of data. But in order to take that data and turn it into a wealth of knowledge, you need to understand the context of the information and how it fits in with everything else you know.

The more you know, the more you are able to understand.

Knowledge is more than a collection of information and data. Knowledge is data and information gathered and applied. Experience, reflection, anticipation – they each play a role.

If you’ve ever visited our nation’s capitol, you’ve probably been to the Library of Congress, which houses Thomas Jefferson’s extensive personal library.

The sea of books in Jefferson’s original library – 6,487 in all – inspires one to realize the necessity for knowledge in a variety of areas, not just in one’s specialty.

“I cannot live without books,” our third president said. Jefferson is famous as a political figure, but his reading material consisted of everything from politics and classics to science and architecture. It’s hard not to empathize with his thirst for knowledge in a variety of subjects.

With a new subject or different instructor, it can become laborious to be interested in each new class every semester. But class time aside, it’s important to keep up with current events. Reading a newspaper or following news on Facebook and Twitter will help you stay in the loop, regardless of your major.

But be careful. (Read my column “Information overload and the pursuit of knowledge” - uccsscribe.com.) Maybe you think you read a lot already. From online news and Facebook to texts and Twitter, it may seem like we obtain a lot of knowledge on a daily basis.

“As we constantly shift our attention among various bits of information all day long, we begin to lose our ability to distinguish important information from trivia. What becomes important is simply the fact that the information is ‘new,’” said Nicholas Carr, author of “The Shallows” and a 2011 Pulitzer Prize finalist.

Merely witnessing an intake of information does not mean we are experiencing an inflow of knowledge. We may be adamant about quantity, but unless we strive toward quantity and quality, excellence is lost.

“Where is the Life we have lost in living?” writes 20th-century English poet T. S. Eliot in “The Rock.” “Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?”

If you’re reading this far into an article, you’ve gone further than most. Our collective attention spans are becoming increasingly smaller, and it’s becoming harder and harder to burrow through large amounts of text.

After the British destroyed the Capitol and Library of Congress in 1814, Jefferson sold his book collection – more than twice the size of the government’s original library – to the government to build a new library. Maybe your personal library will never grow large enough that you can offer to sell it to the U.S. government like Jefferson. That’s OK. The point is to get started – become well-read and cultivate a thirst for knowledge.

Whether you’re just entering or just leaving the college experience, work to make it a success. Listen and apply yourself in class, but don’t stop there. Read, write, grow – be an intentional learner in and out of lectures. Your educational experience will be multiplied exponentially.