We are in thrall to the language of transformation. It instantly rallies the human spirit. It promises radical personal growth. It hints at transcendent forces that we’ve all but buried in our pragmatic, I-am-the-prime-mover-of-my-life sort of age. And it taps into one of the most powerful ideologies of consumer life—the endless project of self-invention and reinvention. […]
The goal of transformation is left open-ended, unstated, and uncertain, as if we have done our jobs as educators when we increase the sheer number of possible choices available to young people without helping them figure out which ones are actually worth pursuing. Ironically, in leaving these questions unanswered, we do not actually avoid advancing a conception of what the good life entails. On the contrary, we suggest to young people that change for its own sake is itself a worthy modus vivendi. We are setting students on a path of perpetual transformation, making them into people who are always searching for experiences that stretch and strain their prior commitments and who, in the last analysis, lack existential purpose. Such continual up-endings can have an addictive quality, luring us toward nowhere in particular, so long as it is shocking and surprising. In the end, transformation becomes valued precisely because it does not fulfill the timeless human longing for greater wisdom, purpose, and character. Rather it “frees” us from the hard work and moral integrity that are required to achieve these fundamental goods. […]
Not all transformations are created equal. Although transformative education is often cached out with the logic of option expansion just described, this is not the only kind of transformation we might experience. In fact, if we reflect on experiences that have actually exerted a transformative effect on our lives, we generally focus on the very opposite of increased options or choices. . . . When we talk about such experiences, we concentrate on the greater sense of purpose, understanding, and meaning that the experience has brought to our lives, not the naked plus sign between it and our prior perspective. In other words, we value our transformations less for the Big Change it effects and more for the New Good that has begun to reshape our lives.
. . . Transformative education in its most compelling form points students toward real human goods that inspire them to become better people than they are right now. It increases the richness, depth, and perspicacity of students’ views of themselves and the world around them. It awakens a desire to fill their lives with ever-expanding value and meaning. And it encourages them to pour their hearts into vocations, practices, and ways of life that have proved to be both intrinsically valuable and conducive to human flourishing, in the best cases over millennia. Transformative education is not merely about increasing life options; it should help students wholeheartedly commit to those that are deeply worthwhile.