For the first time in nearly 30 years, the University of Colorado may revamp the undergraduate core requirements of the College of Arts and Sciences.
The current arts and sciences core — the courses needed to complete a degree within CU’s largest college — hasn’t undergone major revisions since it was implemented in 1988. Some faculty members feel enough has changed in the world that it’s time to reconsider what should be required to earn a liberal arts degree.
“It’s just a very different way that students learn, that we gain information and it warrants reviewing the fundamentals of education, seeing how we can better equip our students to live in this type of a world,” said Cora Randall, chair of CU’s atmospheric and oceanic sciences department and one of the faculty leaders of the committee looking at the college’s core requirements.
Randall said the rise of technology, globalization and the demand for interdisciplinary education led the faculty to take another look at the core during a multi-year process involving feedback from students and faculty in every department of the college.
Any change to the core would be significant because of its importance to a student’s college experience, Randall said.
“It’s the foundation of a liberal arts education,” she said.
Today’s undergraduates must take a minimum number of credit hours in written communication, quantitative reasoning and math skills, foreign language, historical context, human diversity, United States context, literature and the arts, natural sciences, contemporary societies, and ideals and values.
Though no decision has been made, professors are talking about making the core requirements simpler and more flexible for students. Instead of those rigid, content-based categories, Randsall said they are considering requirements in each of the college’s divisions: social sciences, natural sciences and arts and humanities.
That distribution-type core requirement, which is popular at colleges and universities around the country, focuses less on subject matter and more on critical-thinking skills.
As an example, Randall pointed out that students won’t necessarily become experts in biology, chemistry and physics, but should have an understanding of the scientific method, which is used in all three fields.
“It’s impossible to teach students all of the content,” said Ann Schmiesing, a professor of German and Scandinavian studies also leading the core revision effort. “What we can do is expose them to methodologies so they are life-long learners and literate in those ways of thinking.”
Students would also focus on diversity, writing and math, and could more easily add a second major or minor.
Under the proposed model, which is more flexible, students are likely to finish their core requirements more quickly and they should have an easier time scheduling courses, Randall said. Students would have more choices and faculty would have an easier time updating their courses so that they fit within the requirements and evolve with society and technology, Randall said.
The revision committee eventually needs the approval of two-thirds of the arts and sciences faculty for any major changes to the core requirements, a vote that could happen sometime next spring.
Sarah Kuta: 303-473-1106, kutas@dailycamera.com or twitter.com/sarahkuta
