This document is a memorandum, or short philosophical statement on the meaning and purpose of university education, with references to ideas from Ralph Barton Perry and Russell L. Ackoff, among others. Two manuscripts were donated to GMU Library Special Collections in the same folder and supposedly kept together- one a neatly typed 5-page document which had been mailed in October 1989 to the Provost Clara Lovett and to GMU's President George Johnson. The second was a draft manuscript using the same title, but it had a different text. Also in this file folder were handwritten and typed notes by John Warfield, dealing with the Great University project, and a photocopy of a paper by Jacques Derrida titled: "The Principle of Reason: The University in the Eyes of its Pupils". It is believed that copies of the Derrida article were included in the mailings to the president and the provost.
