[287] in Discussion of MIT-community interests
Re: Affirmative action
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Doug Heimburger)
Sat Apr 28 13:42:38 2001
Message-Id: <200104281741.NAA21793@contents-vnder-pressvre.mit.edu>
To: Richard Tibbetts <tibbetts@MIT.EDU>
cc: Morgoth <morgoth@MIT.EDU>, Victoria K Anderson <vkanders@MIT.EDU>,
mit-talk@MIT.EDU
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Sat, 28 Apr 2001 11:50:48 EDT."
<20010428112042.E12372@multics.mit.edu>
Date: Sat, 28 Apr 2001 13:41:39 -0400
From: Doug Heimburger <dheimbur@MIT.EDU>
> That said, I have often thought that it would be cool if MIT were a
> bit more academically challenging in certain areas. There are a couple
> of problems with this:
>
> - Some fields (such as course 15) don't lend themselves to such
> "improvement". We already do it better than everyone else, its just
> still easier than course 8.
Hey now. I wouldn't characterize Course 15 as "easier" than Course 8,
I would characterize it as "different." After all, I know plenty of
Course 8 stars would would probably (in my estimation) not do too well
in 15.761, where participation is 40% of your grade and the professor
randomly calls on folks during class -- try not doing reading and
keeping up for that one! (The TA even makes notes of who is making
"useful" comments for grading.)
As a former Course 15er, I took a lot of ribbing for being it (but
hey, I was the "Sloan Master" to many, since my Reg Day form once said
a class I was taking was restricted to Master's students). But I still
think that Course 15 is difficult in different ways from Course 8 --
try having to be articulate in class five days a week while keeping up
with activities. Other courses let you slack between problem
sets/etc. Course 15 generally doesn't.
I will agree that some (definitely not all in a big way) Course 15
classes are a joke. But putting the entire major up to such
stereotyping is as bad as some of the other insulting and
stereotypical responses on this list.
--doug
--
Doug Heimburger dheimbur@mit.edu
MIT Class of 2000
Seattle, WA
