University of Virginia Library

Place And Function Of Chaos

(33) For truly staggering success, this productive chaos
might possibly begin to develop in the months preceding the
actual school year—changes in scope and scheduling, trading
and bartering among faculty for times and rooms, the working
out of fortuitous tie-ins and team teaching. This happenstance
may in fact be quite likely, and if so it may help counteract
one attitude that is probably going to occur with the design of
any "artificial" community: the attitude, at the beginning of
the year, which says in effect, "Here I am, ready and willing to
be communitized; now communitize me." If the community
gradually develops the year before the participants move to
Birdwood, this should theoretically minimize the
"getting-used-to-it" period and maximize the amount of
intellectual activity and growth.

(34) But at any rate, smooth logistics and perfect
organizational structure are not the things we are striving for.
We are striving for personal and intellectual satisfaction at
year's end—a communal and shared satisfaction that will
induce starry-eyed alumni to reminisce about "our year at
Birdwood" before getting around to "the ACC championship
that year."

(35) "Communal satisfaction" is a phrase that leads us into
consideration of the overall design of the college or colleges we
are talking about. Now that we have gotten the faculty and
students out there, owing to a mixture of self-interest and
desire for mutual stimulation, what are they going to find that
will enhance this aim rather than detract from it?