In this passage, Davidson lays out some of the most pertinent themes of her essay, including crowdsourcing vs. credentialing, or more generally: non-formal vs. formal education. The two key terms, “crowdsourcing” and “credentialing,” are nearly complete opposites. While crowdsourcing involves groups of unique people trying to determine a solution, credentialing is a more limited method involving professionals with an “hierarchical-base,” one that relies on a uniform, educational background. Using her main example of crowdsourcing throughout the essay, Davidson writes about her experience with a crowdsourced iPod experiment at Duke University. With so many students and professors from different backgrounds all contributing to one thing, the iPod evolved through innovations such as podcasting, social media, and stethescope recording. Unlike limited and expertise-orientated formal education, this groundbreaking new technology was widely accessible and curiousity-driven. This is Davidson’s core argument against “the one-size-fits-all model of standards” (61) that we use in our school systems.
Although Davidson argues passionately for change in the educational system, she does so with a respectful tone. Instead of condemning formal education by focusing on its flaws, she bolsters her argument by directing the attention of the reader to the benefits of a non-formal education. In other words, her positive reinforcement outweighs her negative criticism, and this can be seen in the third sentence of the passage: “While formal education...of us collectively” (51). Even though Davidson observes a negative of formal education, that observation is overshadowed by the positives of crowdsourcing. Additionally in the passage, Davidson’s use of first person plural (“we” or “us”) adds to her theme of connectivity through crowdsourcing. Positive reinforcement is further demonstrated with Mrs. Davidson’s example of effective non-formal education near the end. All in all, this passage establishes a distinction between the two methods of education to set up for the rest of the essay.
I like the attention to the positive attitude of the writer. She is not negative when approaching the popular school of credential thinking. This is important, because while she is trying to prove that crowdsourcing may be the better form of education, she is not directly banishing credentialing to the bygone era. By having this positive tone, she is admitting that credentialing does have its benefits, such as when an expert is needed to be called in to solve a problem multiple people have already been unable to solve. Finally, as you mentioned, the use of “we” does push her agenda that crowdsourcing should be the way of the future slightly.
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