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November13, 2007
L4L Forum 11/13/07
Facilitator: Scott Yenor
General Education reflects what we believe students need to know/be able to do. Over the last century, its structure has been changing. To keep things concrete, we’re going to look at some examples. (current BSU structure, 1962 University of Michigan core, Columbia current)
Changes have occurred in Size, structure, content Size – has been shrinking BSU current: 1/3 of what it takes to graduate UM 1962 – ½ of what it takes to graduate
At Turn of century - 80% of what it takes to graduate
Structure Changed to provide more student choice
Content Used to be more mandatory courses
UM 1962 15% of curriculum were mandatory BSU current: 6 of 128 credits are required (E101, 102)
What do we want the core curriculum to accomplish? Don’t worry about barriers
Bill Clement (Geoscience) – if students all shared a common experience, it would help bring them together. Western Civ/Great Books, by having students all read the same books, they had something to discuss socially but also on an academic level.
Scott – what would the core look like, given that concern?
Bill C - All the students now take these two English classes, could we have another required class with texts from a variety of fields? So everyone has the same opportunity to contribute from their field?
Scott – why did we get rid of the idea of mandatory classes?
Bill C – students whining
Jim Girvan – in professional colleges, the # of credits needed has grown. – it explains the size change. However, you could still require one course instead of a choice, w/o changing the size
Craig Hemmens (Honors College) – What is the benefit of having a common experience?
Steve Grantham (Institutional Assessment) - what are the essential things? Someone has to make decision about what is included in a shared course? Then we get “Why is your stuff more important than mine?”
Bill C – we all think our disciplines are much more important. We see our knowledge as stuff you need to know. We’ve sacrificed general knowledge for specific knowledge. Students didn’t see the benefit of those general courses. We didn’t have a good answer for them. Or the content of the course wasn’t broad enough.
Beret Norman (Modern Languages and Literatures) – there is also the effect of professionalization of education.. “What will this do for me in my job?” (It was nice to see in 1962 that language was still required)
David Saunders (Music) – We’re sitting here now to get back to our roots. Professional education is important, but we need to get back to the idea of creating good citizens. Requiring certain courses rather than a menu? I’m not sure we need to increase the # of courses. I like the idea of a student to be able to pick from courses based on their interests, as long as any course will get at the basic prep of citizenship.
Larry Rogein (Education) – Schools adopted an assembly line education. If we teach them how to learn, then they’ll do fine in business. If we only teach them stuff, then we haven’t prepared them. There are multiple levels of knowledge from declarative on up to structural. How are ideas connected to each other? We should be working at the highest level. I’m not sure that courses is the problem. Maybe it is the process we need to focus on.
Scott – is the BSU general ed progress? Compared to UM (1962) or Columbia? (where there is a set of required courses w/ required syllabi)--- looking at Columbia syllabi---
David Wilkins (Geoscience) – The Columbia plan - is this different because it allows people to explore different paths? This looks like it would work for students who don’t declare a major for the first two years.
Scott – looking at the Columbia model: They use our learning outcomes language about process. They also focus on content.
Bill C – these things can be taught in any class. But if students have all read the same books, there some common knowledge. It provides a starting point. There are a lot of books that my generation thinks are important, but students aren’t reading them.… they are boring; they make a course more rigorous. What books are read may be less important as having something in common.
David W – there are Learning community models in which there is one common course for the LC. One discussion course – connected the ideas from the other courses. This creates the room for application of ideas. Have a course that is designed to have students bring thing together. Maybe team taught.
Marilyn Moody (Library) – one reason universities went away from UM/Columbia model was that there was a general sense that it wasn’t inclusive. It was geared to middle class white men. When universities changed, the curriculum changed. That is a piece of it. Great books supports the attitude that there is a fairly narrow band of culture and all kinds of other things are not included.
Scott – so is the BSU core progress?
Marilyn M – I’m just saying this is part of why we moved away from it.
Susan Shadle (CTL) – Our set up doesn’t encourage connections. Courses are in departmental silos. It is hard for courses to be intro to the discipline AND do process.
Larry R - I see little change from UM to BSU. What is the purpose of education? Creating citizens? Be informed, vote. Is that an old piece of our culture that is obsolete, or it a set of values… or is it about enculturation, is it about process?
Bill C – why can’t it be both process and a set of courses? It doesn’t have to be called “the great books”. It isn’t so critical which books they read, just that they read the same thing
Larry R – I don’t care if they even read the whole books. I’d like them to read parts of things – then see what engages them.
Bill C – if we all had the same background, then we know what to draw from.
Larry R – So is that educationally beneficial or convenient?
Bill C – It allows people to have a shared discussion. It doesn’t change anything except that students and faculty know ppl have read these books.
Helen Lojek (English) – students no longer have a shared experience in HS. For example, I can’t assume they’ve read Huck Finn.
Scott – should students be able to leave the university w/o taking a 2 course sequence in American History?
Bill C – yes
Helen L – no
Ginny Gilbert (Nursing) – no. My students don’t have the learning process down even at the (declarative) knowledge level. It takes quite a bit to get them to procedural knowledge They aren’t coming to us with a lot of knowledge. If they had the background before, then they could get out of it, but they don’t have it now.
Scott – I’m on a board that administers tests to incoming frosh and outgoing seniors. At elite colleges, freshman score better than seniors on American history and gov’t tests.
Ginny G – so we’re “teaching stuff out of them”
Beret N – Events such as the Distinguished Lecture Series offer so many things that connect. But students aren’t reaching back b/c they don’t have the background. They won’t care unless it effects them. Even when I try to dumb things down, they don’t care until it matters for them moving forward.
David S – in music history course I teach enlightenment in Europe. It is beyond my discipline but I include it b/c nothing happens in a vacuum. If we had a course or structure of course in western civ, then when they got to specialty courses, you could expect them to have a certain background of knowledge.
Heidi Estrem (English) – How much of this is about how faculty view our work? There is a tension between process and content. How would our courses need to change? Think beyond courses. E.g., Distinquished Lecture series. Are there ways to require or compel experiences that aren’t courses?
Bill C – like Service-Learning. I’m surprised there is so much resistance to having a required course with a set list of books. Ppl are afraid. Is it a slippery slope?
Craig H – I’m not resistant to one course. I’m curious about what it means. I see the value of a course. Or are we thinking about re-doing the whole curriculum. The size of Columbia is similar to our Core S
cott – Columbia has 8 required courses.
Bhaswati Ghosh (COBE) - do we have common syllabi for our Core courses.
Robin Allen (Social Work) – what about transfer students? Which may go way up when Community College opens? Doesn’t state board control core? Aren’t we required to have core certification for transfer? What about budgeting? Who gets credit for an indisciplinary course? For the courses that are large, can we achieve the lofty goals?
Mary Frances Casper (Comm) – E101, 102 are not shared experience b/c you can test out of them. (State Bd allows this). Sr. students get thrilled when they see connections. It is helpful to have depth that we can go back to. If everyone had something to build on, that would be helpful. Our country is founded on these ideals.
David S – I think we’re too worried about being exclusionary. It doesn’t mean that other things aren’t important, but we may be losing sight of our cultural roots.
Marilyn M – we have a lot of nostalgia for the good old days. I react to the Columbia list and feel it is exclusive.
Helen L – now anthologies are much more inclusive
Mary Frances C – how can we have student recognize where things came from? They know so little about where our contry has come from, even though they come in and are very patriotic. Isn’t it our job to help them know.
Bill C. – One of our fears is that we won’t teach them what they want/need to know.
Susan S. – we get stuck in the structure of our universities. Hard to really vision what we can accomplish.
Facilitator: Scott Yenor
General Education reflects what we believe students need to know/be able to do. Over the last century, its structure has been changing. To keep things concrete, we’re going to look at some examples. (current BSU structure, 1962 University of Michigan core, Columbia current)
Changes have occurred in Size, structure, content Size – has been shrinking BSU current: 1/3 of what it takes to graduate UM 1962 – ½ of what it takes to graduate
At Turn of century - 80% of what it takes to graduate
Structure Changed to provide more student choice
Content Used to be more mandatory courses
UM 1962 15% of curriculum were mandatory BSU current: 6 of 128 credits are required (E101, 102)
What do we want the core curriculum to accomplish? Don’t worry about barriers
Bill Clement (Geoscience) – if students all shared a common experience, it would help bring them together. Western Civ/Great Books, by having students all read the same books, they had something to discuss socially but also on an academic level.
Scott – what would the core look like, given that concern?
Bill C - All the students now take these two English classes, could we have another required class with texts from a variety of fields? So everyone has the same opportunity to contribute from their field?
Scott – why did we get rid of the idea of mandatory classes?
Bill C – students whining
Jim Girvan – in professional colleges, the # of credits needed has grown. – it explains the size change. However, you could still require one course instead of a choice, w/o changing the size
Craig Hemmens (Honors College) – What is the benefit of having a common experience?
Steve Grantham (Institutional Assessment) - what are the essential things? Someone has to make decision about what is included in a shared course? Then we get “Why is your stuff more important than mine?”
Bill C – we all think our disciplines are much more important. We see our knowledge as stuff you need to know. We’ve sacrificed general knowledge for specific knowledge. Students didn’t see the benefit of those general courses. We didn’t have a good answer for them. Or the content of the course wasn’t broad enough.
Beret Norman (Modern Languages and Literatures) – there is also the effect of professionalization of education.. “What will this do for me in my job?” (It was nice to see in 1962 that language was still required)
David Saunders (Music) – We’re sitting here now to get back to our roots. Professional education is important, but we need to get back to the idea of creating good citizens. Requiring certain courses rather than a menu? I’m not sure we need to increase the # of courses. I like the idea of a student to be able to pick from courses based on their interests, as long as any course will get at the basic prep of citizenship.
Larry Rogein (Education) – Schools adopted an assembly line education. If we teach them how to learn, then they’ll do fine in business. If we only teach them stuff, then we haven’t prepared them. There are multiple levels of knowledge from declarative on up to structural. How are ideas connected to each other? We should be working at the highest level. I’m not sure that courses is the problem. Maybe it is the process we need to focus on.
Scott – is the BSU general ed progress? Compared to UM (1962) or Columbia? (where there is a set of required courses w/ required syllabi)--- looking at Columbia syllabi---
David Wilkins (Geoscience) – The Columbia plan - is this different because it allows people to explore different paths? This looks like it would work for students who don’t declare a major for the first two years.
Scott – looking at the Columbia model: They use our learning outcomes language about process. They also focus on content.
Bill C – these things can be taught in any class. But if students have all read the same books, there some common knowledge. It provides a starting point. There are a lot of books that my generation thinks are important, but students aren’t reading them.… they are boring; they make a course more rigorous. What books are read may be less important as having something in common.
David W – there are Learning community models in which there is one common course for the LC. One discussion course – connected the ideas from the other courses. This creates the room for application of ideas. Have a course that is designed to have students bring thing together. Maybe team taught.
Marilyn Moody (Library) – one reason universities went away from UM/Columbia model was that there was a general sense that it wasn’t inclusive. It was geared to middle class white men. When universities changed, the curriculum changed. That is a piece of it. Great books supports the attitude that there is a fairly narrow band of culture and all kinds of other things are not included.
Scott – so is the BSU core progress?
Marilyn M – I’m just saying this is part of why we moved away from it.
Susan Shadle (CTL) – Our set up doesn’t encourage connections. Courses are in departmental silos. It is hard for courses to be intro to the discipline AND do process.
Larry R - I see little change from UM to BSU. What is the purpose of education? Creating citizens? Be informed, vote. Is that an old piece of our culture that is obsolete, or it a set of values… or is it about enculturation, is it about process?
Bill C – why can’t it be both process and a set of courses? It doesn’t have to be called “the great books”. It isn’t so critical which books they read, just that they read the same thing
Larry R – I don’t care if they even read the whole books. I’d like them to read parts of things – then see what engages them.
Bill C – if we all had the same background, then we know what to draw from.
Larry R – So is that educationally beneficial or convenient?
Bill C – It allows people to have a shared discussion. It doesn’t change anything except that students and faculty know ppl have read these books.
Helen Lojek (English) – students no longer have a shared experience in HS. For example, I can’t assume they’ve read Huck Finn.
Scott – should students be able to leave the university w/o taking a 2 course sequence in American History?
Bill C – yes
Helen L – no
Ginny Gilbert (Nursing) – no. My students don’t have the learning process down even at the (declarative) knowledge level. It takes quite a bit to get them to procedural knowledge They aren’t coming to us with a lot of knowledge. If they had the background before, then they could get out of it, but they don’t have it now.
Scott – I’m on a board that administers tests to incoming frosh and outgoing seniors. At elite colleges, freshman score better than seniors on American history and gov’t tests.
Ginny G – so we’re “teaching stuff out of them”
Beret N – Events such as the Distinguished Lecture Series offer so many things that connect. But students aren’t reaching back b/c they don’t have the background. They won’t care unless it effects them. Even when I try to dumb things down, they don’t care until it matters for them moving forward.
David S – in music history course I teach enlightenment in Europe. It is beyond my discipline but I include it b/c nothing happens in a vacuum. If we had a course or structure of course in western civ, then when they got to specialty courses, you could expect them to have a certain background of knowledge.
Heidi Estrem (English) – How much of this is about how faculty view our work? There is a tension between process and content. How would our courses need to change? Think beyond courses. E.g., Distinquished Lecture series. Are there ways to require or compel experiences that aren’t courses?
Bill C – like Service-Learning. I’m surprised there is so much resistance to having a required course with a set list of books. Ppl are afraid. Is it a slippery slope?
Craig H – I’m not resistant to one course. I’m curious about what it means. I see the value of a course. Or are we thinking about re-doing the whole curriculum. The size of Columbia is similar to our Core S
cott – Columbia has 8 required courses.
Bhaswati Ghosh (COBE) - do we have common syllabi for our Core courses.
Robin Allen (Social Work) – what about transfer students? Which may go way up when Community College opens? Doesn’t state board control core? Aren’t we required to have core certification for transfer? What about budgeting? Who gets credit for an indisciplinary course? For the courses that are large, can we achieve the lofty goals?
Mary Frances Casper (Comm) – E101, 102 are not shared experience b/c you can test out of them. (State Bd allows this). Sr. students get thrilled when they see connections. It is helpful to have depth that we can go back to. If everyone had something to build on, that would be helpful. Our country is founded on these ideals.
David S – I think we’re too worried about being exclusionary. It doesn’t mean that other things aren’t important, but we may be losing sight of our cultural roots.
Marilyn M – we have a lot of nostalgia for the good old days. I react to the Columbia list and feel it is exclusive.
Helen L – now anthologies are much more inclusive
Mary Frances C – how can we have student recognize where things came from? They know so little about where our contry has come from, even though they come in and are very patriotic. Isn’t it our job to help them know.
Bill C. – One of our fears is that we won’t teach them what they want/need to know.
Susan S. – we get stuck in the structure of our universities. Hard to really vision what we can accomplish.
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