On the Question of Quality

When I sat down to write about the idea of "quality," I was at first stumped. What is quality? I could give you a dictionary definition, or better yet, the etymology of the word (it is Latin in origin, if you were wondering, originating from the word "qualis" ) but that probably wouldn't do you very much good. So I started wandering. After reading Pirsig's Wikipedia article, the one quote that stood out to me was "Man is not the source of all things, as the subjective idealists would say. Nor is he the passive observer of all things, as the objective idealists and materialists would say. The Quality which creates the world emerges as a relationship between man and his experience. He is a participant in the creation of all things. The measure of all things..."  (Chapter 29 of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance). Then I looked at my notes from in class, and what I had written down was literally: Quality: the idea that we do not "see" it, but "experience" it. This is how I would like to look at quality: 

I reflect back to when I was looking at colleges my junior year of high school. I was essentially examining the "quality" of the university. How did I do that? By looking at "qualities" such as what the student to professor ratio was, what kinds of opportunities there were for research as undergraduates, how did employers view the graduates from the program, what kind of scholarships did the school offer, how the program I was interested in ranked nationally, and the list went on. Before I even set foot onto the university campus, I'd judged the school for its "quality." But are these measurable "qualities" superficial or can they be used as a measurement to view "quality." 

Now after attending the university for the past few years, my perception of how I view its "quality" has drastically changed. I do not mean to say the "qualities" listed above do not matter, but they are perhaps not the most important. They are what I would deem the surface of the matter, and we must dive deeper. I remember talking to many of my friends back home who were going to a "fancy" school out of state, and they made it sound like I was "settling" by going to Montana State University. Does a school have more "quality" because it has a big name like Northwestern?

I am a true believer in the phrase, "the experience is what you make of it." Like Brady said in his blog, you can't judge a math student for his quality of writing, so how can you? I would say we look at the quality of a student based on their influence on society as a whole. Now this is a broad and nebulous statement I know, but isn't that what its all about? When a graduating student applies for scholarships for graduate school, what do those scholarships generally look at? They look at how the student has influenced the society around them, and if the student has that potential for the future. Making a jump to the professors, we could say the same about them. When a professor is getting tenured, many universities look at how that professor is active in the community around them, i.e. how they influence the people around them. Based on this, their "quality" is judged from the experiences they've had and make themselves. I think this is what "quality" is all about: the experience. You don't "see" quality, but "experience" it.