[2613] in Discussion of MIT-community interests
Re: [Mit-talk] Recommendations for new GIRs
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Jessica H Lowell)
Mon Oct 16 23:02:07 2006
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2006 23:00:08 -0400
From: Jessica H Lowell <jessiehl@mit.edu>
To: Tyson C McNulty <tmcnulty@mit.edu>
In-Reply-To: <Pine.GSO.4.62L.0610162237460.13020@w20-575-80.mit.edu>
Cc: Tim Abbott <tabbott@mit.edu>, mit-talk@mit.edu, bc-talk@mit.edu,
random-hall-talk@mit.edu, ec-discuss@mit.edu,
Laura Nicholson <lnicks@mit.edu>
Errors-To: mit-talk-bounces@mit.edu
There's going to be a survey and online forum up soon, and a town hall meeting
at 2pm in the Bush Room next Sunday. The SAC to the Task Force, which is a
group of students, will be compiling opinions and writing a student report in
response to the task force report over IAP. You can get involved with them by
emailing edcomm-sac@mit.edu.
- Jessie
Quoting Tyson C McNulty <tmcnulty@MIT.EDU>:
> This thread is great and all, but could someone remind me (us) what
> the next point of action is if we want to voice our opinion about
> these potential changes to the people in charge? A petition? A
> survey? It seems like there should be something we could do besides
> repeatedly agree with each other.
>
> Because yes, it bothers me a lot.
>
> -tysoff
>
> On Mon, 16 Oct 2006, Laura Nicholson wrote:
>
>> Originally, I was really pleased with summary of the HASS suggestions- I
>> was glad that someone with the power to change things said, "hey guess
>> what, the HASS requirements make everyone want to eat lead! We should
>> fix that." However, the more I read of the actual recommendations, the
>> less I liked. It seems to me that they've basically taken the concept
>> of the "HASS-D," narrowed the number of choices in class and timing
>> associated with it, turned them all into CIs, and then renamed them
>> "foundational electives." Yuck.
>>
>> Of course, the most upsetting of the proposed changes is the "HASS First
>> Year Experience," which in my opinion promises to make students hate the
>> HASS requirements more than the current overly-complicated guidelines.
>>
>> Throughout the entire report, the task force promotes a theme of
>> "unifying" the first year, which bothers a lot of people. While reading
>> the report, I was kind of bothered by the underlying question, "Why is
>> it so important to "unify" the first year?" And reading between the
>> lines, I found something of an answer that in turn *really* bothered me.
>>
>> The report list several fundamental "themes" that comprise the
>> educational philosophy of MIT, namely a persistent passion for learning,
>> intellectual diversity, an innovative approach to core knowledge,
>> collaborative learning, and education for responsible leadership. On
>> page I-23, the report goes on to claim: "Our early consultations with
>> our colleagues and students confirmed our strong initial sense that
>> themes such as these are not sufficiently well communicated to MIT
>> undergraduates. Ideally, the first year will begin with a dialogue
>> between new students and faculty about this philosophy. More
>> importantly, students must be encouraged- and given the time- to reflect
>> on this philosophy and become active participants in the educational
>> process throughout their tenure as undergraduates."
>>
>> Are they serious? With the exception of the "innovative approach to
>> core knowledge" (which strikes me as some obligatory tip of the hat to
>> those who think TEAL works), those were the reasons I *applied* to MIT.
>> And I imagine that's true for a lot of people here. But according to
>> the task force, undergraduates are unclear about MIT's educational
>> philosophy, so they should be forced into cookie-cutter first year
>> classes to learn how to be MIT students.
>>
>> Am I completely reading this wrong? Am I nitpicking about something
>> weird? Or does this bother anyone else?
>>
>> -Laura
>>
>>> On Fri, 13 Oct 2006, Jessica H Lowell wrote:
>>>
>>>> The Task Force on the Undergraduate Educational Commons (the task
>>>> force that was
>>>> reforming the GIRs) released its final report today.
>>>>
>>>> Full Report (158 pages):
>>>> http://web.mit.edu/committees/edcommons/documents/TF_FullReport.pdf
>>>>
>>>> Summary & Recommendations (11 pages):
>>>> http://web.mit.edu/committees/edcommons/documents/TF_SumRecs.pdf
>>>>
>>>> There are some things I like in there, and some things I don't.
>>>> I'm distressed
>>>> that, despite the fact that no student that I've spoken with
>>>> favored the idea
>>>> (and many left comments on the feedback site to that effect), the
>>>> Task Force
>>>> kept in their idea of a Freshman Experience humanities class - and
>>>> in general,
>>>> I find the trend to regard freshmen as separate from the rest of
>>>> the undergrads
>>>> disturbing. For the science core, there seem to have been two
>>>> proposals favored
>>>> by some faction of the Task Force, and I like the one that they
>>>> chose not to
>>>> endorse, that would have combined their computation & engineering
>>>> GIR and their
>>>> project-based experience GIR and still required everyone to take,
>>>> for instance,
>>>> chem and bio, better.
>>>>
>>>> On the other hand, I like the idea of more streamlined procedures
>>>> for students
>>>> to follow who want to study abroad, and merging the HASS
>>>> distribution and CI-H
>>>> requirements.
>>>>
>>>> What do others think?
>>>>
>>>> - Jessie
>>>>
>>
>>
>
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