General education
The Academic Senate meeting Tuesday could leave an imprint on students for decades to come.
The A-Senate will vote on a new general education model, dubbed "model C," an amalgam of proposals from this fall's rejected models.
This model, some senators propose, makes considerable improvements through the addition of intensive courses in quantitative literacy and writing.
Under the current model, university program courses must meet a "writing across the university program" requirement, which mandates 50 percent of the course grade be from meaningful writing, public speaking or calculation.
The model's revisions will eliminate this, replacing it with an "intensive" sub-category, wherein courses conducive to written analysis are required to meet a higher percentage of written content.
There's some merit to this idea. It would require students at some time to put forward a more concentrated amount of written work, which would, ideally, better ensure that graduates are capable of both a complete sentence and a certain degree of critical thought.
Creating a distinction between writing intensive and predominately writing absent, the A-Senate implicitly proposes that certain University Program courses can be adequately evaluated through mostly perfunctory means, such as multiple-choice exams.
Sen. Robert Stecker, a philosophy and religion professor, noted a strength of the current model: that students expect to write within a large portion of their university courses.
Likewise, a competent essay shows something more than a successful scantron; it shows a deeper understanding of the material, a footing for critical thinking.
If the general education dilemma is that concerned students are not benefiting adequately from their university program courses, creating two categories of educational requirements is not the solution.
Whether in an introductory biology course or a philosophy course, critical thought remains paramount. It embodies the simple ideal that a university is a place of learning, not of degree acquisition.
That said, a writing intensive requirement is sound, but only if the remainder of UP courses maintain some standard of writing, as is presented in the writing across the university requirement.
However, if the writing intensive model is adopted, certain practical issues must be addressed. Professors are able to grade only so much paperwork.
CMU prides itself in its small class sizes and intimate setting. If students are to benefit from this, professors must have enough time to devote to each one.
With fiscal uncertainty looming, hiring additional faculty may seem unattainable, and keeping the best from both models may be impossible.
If this is the case, it is best to prioritize writing across the university, and append a writing intensive requirement at a later and more auspicious date.
