Selected Papers

from the

Texas Seminar

on the Core Curriculum

1993, 1994, 1995

Sponsored by the

University of Houston

and supported by

The National Endowment

for the Humanities

Fall 1995

The Texas Center for Undergraduate Education at the University of Houston is sponsor of the " Texas Seminar on the Core Curriculum," a three-year, state-wide project funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities. Over 300 faculty and administrators from public colleges and universities, community colleges, baccalaureate institutions, research univer sities and comprehensive colleges and universities in Texas, selected by an external panel, have participated in the semi nars. A highlight of the seminars has been the summer planning workshops, lectures and presentations held on the Univer sity of Houston campus in 1993, 1994, and 1995. Printed here are just some of the papers presented by the speakers from all three years.

The intensive planning sessions held each summer gave participants the opportunity to interact with faculty representa tives from colleges and universities across the country acting as consulting institutions, sharing their own successfully implemented and innovative core curricula through selected readings, hands-on workshops and presentations. The semi nars were designed to provide opportunities for universities and their faculty and administrators to create coherent under graduate curricula that prepare students for the 21st century. The seminars provided opportunities for theoretical and practical reflection about the nature and goals of undergraduate education, and were designed to assist the selected institutions in working systematically through the complex processes of devising and implementing coherent, integrated core curricula. Specifically, they were designed to guide the establishment of new core curricula in the participating colleges and universities; create local, regional and statewide networks of colleges and universities committed to compre hensive reform of undergraduate education; and provide a forum for nationally prominent scholars to describe creative solutions to specific problems facing higher education. We hope that participation in the Seminars helped to cultivate leaders equipped to create a more coherent, integrated educational experience for Texas students.

We also wanted the Seminars to serve as the focus for the development of new programs to foster the continued study and improvement of higher education in Texas. By the end of the program's second full year, each of the participating cam puses had developed, debated, refined and begun to implement a core curriculum which not only conformed to their institution's unique mission but also satisfied the legislative intent of House Bill 2183. In 1987, the Texas Legislature required all 101 public universities and community colleges to implement a core curriculum by 1995 (House Bill 2183).

Our goal was for the information shared during the Texas Seminar on the Core Curriculum to provide a framework for statewide reforms in undergraduate education that respond to the present and future needs of the citizens of Texas.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

My thanks to the Co-Directors of the Texas Seminar on the Core Curriculum, Dr. Cynthia Freeland and Dr. John Ettling; and Conference Coordinators Denise Kohn, Katherine Oldmixon and Michelle Miller, and Pam Macaul. Special thanks goes to our keynote speakers, Dr. Wayne Booth, Dr. Carlos Cortés, and Dr. Troy Duster; and faculty and administrators from the consulting institutions: Brooklyn College, Washington University, Richland Commu nity College, Trenton State University, UCLA, SUNY-Buffalo, and Utah State University.

Many faculty and staff from the University of Houston gave their time and energy to making this project a reality, and I thank you all, too numerous to mention here, for your commitment and efforts. Also, I greatly appreciate the continued support of the President's and Provost's office administrators of the University of Houston. I'm especially grateful for the assistance of my office staff throughout the project, including Dr. Brian McKinney and Dr. Cay Osmon.

And lastly, my thanks to the National Endowment for the Humanities for its generous grant in support of this very important project.

Dr. Shirley D. Ezell

University of Houston

W

e're gathered here to try

dent cultural relativist: no culture has ever survived without educating adults who can reproduce, perhaps modify, and carry it forward. Sooner or later the vast majority of cultures have either frozen or disintegrated and have been swept aside by what appeared to be barbarians.

In most cultures I know anything about, the older generations have tried to save the younger generations, and thus the whole culture, by educating the kids in strict codes: a set of fairly simple rules forbidding certain vices: first some shalt nots like the Ten Commandments or the code of Hammurabi, then some fairly complex rituals of initiation into adult membership. Such codes have often worked, for awhile, but they are always on the defensive against youngsters who ask rude questions about where the codes come from, or even fight openly against them. Soon everyone is hurling charges of wickedness back and forth, like "a wicked and adulterous generation" and before you can say "Ham, Shem and Japeth" we have near total wipeout: God says to himself, there's nothing we can do about that bad lot, let's just forget it and start over.

The obvious failure of rote codes to stand up under criticism has in many cultures produced educational philosophers who have tried, as we are doing here, to think behind or beneath the codes to discover the true principles that should govern the best education.

Wayne C. Booth

University of Chicago

to think, for the ten millionth time in human history, about the aims of education, not just the aims of education for chemists or physicists or historians or musicologists or computer scientists or English teachers, but the targets we should all be aiming at for all of our students: the aims of general education. Too many teachers who are NOT at this seminar have never bothered to think much about that kind of aiming. But all of you, voluntarily coming to a conference like this, have already thought a lot about aiming. But we know that every teacher is willy-nilly aiming at something, whatever the subject matter and techniques. And by coming to a two- week conference like this you confirm that we simply have to keep trying to become better archers.

To aim well, at anything, is a much more complex task than we usually realize. Indeed, anyone who pretends to proclaim the aim of education is claiming a terrible lot: such a claimant must claim to know not just the why of the aiming, not just the direction of the shot, not just the likely skills of the archer, but the likely qualities of the target, including whether it will be harmed or harming it will matter much.

It's no wonder, then, that debates about the aims of education started early in recorded history, if not before that, and have continued unresolved for millennia.

The history of those debates among would-be master archers has been full of grotesque simplification

s, as the would-be Robin Hoods have looked askance at this or that product of their educational programs the various adults around them, all products of current education and gasped: "My God, my God, how could we have allowed that to happen? Our educational system is a total failure, my neighbor Samuel here doesn't even know a deer from an antelope, and Hephsibah, my housemaid, is so clumsy she can't even thread a needle, and my cousin George doesn't even know that it's evil to marry one's deceased wife's sister. Let's get down to business and educate our children right."

Sometimes such simple laments have been justified: we could claim and marshall evidence to support our claim, that every annihilation of a human culture has been caused by a failure in general education. If we think of educational aiming not just as asking what schools should doubt asking just how our children should be brought up into adulthood that is, educated in the sense of being drawn out from birth into responsible, effective maturity, it's clear that most educational efforts throughout history have eventually failed. Any culture surviveseven the animal culture of any lower speciesonly by producing adults who can somehow carry on that culture, not only maintaining the justified values of the past but meet ing and mastering new challenges. That is one universal that underlines the claims of even the most ar

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Wayne C. Booth, The Aims of EducationCome the Millennium

Wherever one turns these days one hears claims that western civilization is following all those other dead cultures into ultimate annihilation. [Just this week I read a thoughtful piece in the latest issue of Philosophy and Literature taking for granted that western civilization has already lost it, is indeed already in the abyss. Ivan Klima, holocaust survivor, attempting to think about the causes of diverse 20th century atrocities committed by highly educated people in highly civilized nations, claims that the various barbarities in this century show that the very values that we honor as central to our culture have them- selves led to the atrocities. Klima does not use the phrase general education, but his claim about the fall could be considered as an unusually challenging entry in a long list of claims that our culture is failing or has failed because we have educated ourselves in the wrong way.]

Such claims are of course usually accompanied by some simplified nostrum that will save us. [For Klima the cure, advanced with modesty, would be some kind of general education (not, of course, just in schools and colleges) that would teach at every stage the necessity of limits a repudiation of the perfectionism that has destroyed us. At least Klima has done some hard thinking about our woes and their causes.] Too many oth ers have simply consulted their own egos: when I was a lad, by God, we learned Latin, or we read the right hard books, or we learned good grammar.

This evening and throughout this conference, we ought to be interested instead in some real thinking, not mere campaigning for this or that traditional code or simplified revolution against it. For those of you who think that the genuine values of our culture are on their last legs but must be somehow restored, this will be inevitably thinking of a somewhat desperate kind.

[For those of you who, like Klima, feel that our plight has been caused precisely by inherent flaws in those so-called genuine values, the thinking will perhaps be even more difficult.] For those of you who, like me, are entirely unclear about whether we're dying or about to experience a grand re-birth, it should still seem important to ask, once again, just what we should be trying to do, as we gird up our loins for the thousandth time and try to produce to repeat my earlier formula adults who can carry us forward, not only maintaining the justified values of the past but meeting the inevitably new challenges of the present and future. To hope for creative adults of that kind we must develop an education that, in the words of our seminar brochure, engages students actively (and permanently) in the learning process.

Now such an introduction as that surely requires me here to lay out in advance just the right outcomes for this Seminar. And of course I do have, at the back of my mind, a fairly detailed picture of just the one right college program I would set up if I were given absolute power. Unfortunately, like every utopian institution and constitution, my college of utopia would be established in total ignorance of the circumstances each of you faces on your own campus: the administration, the political forces outside the campus, the specific forms of learning and ignorance your students bring with them as freshmen.

the ground up . . . ."

So you'll find me here [though actually in Utah hacking away in two senses of the word], for the rest of our time together, dwelling mostly on the negativesI have just done in rejecting the notion of a universal educational constitution. Your only hope, I want to claim, if you want to develop core curricula that will really work and not just exist as noble documents in the president's or director's office, is for a curriculum built from the ground up that ground being you earth-bound crea tures here and your fellow teachers and their students back home. A short way of making this central point will sound rude, and goes like this: do not, do not simply put into place any one of the curricula that will be described by other visitors here. Treat them with respect but skepticism, for two reasons. First, the reports will, we can predict, be idealized; with most honest of intentions, the reporters will exaggerate their successes and downplay their failures. And secondly, even if the curricula have been really successful back home, they have not sprung up from your ground. Take their best principles back home with you and then, attending to your genuine resources and circumstantial

Still dwelling on negative warnings, then, let me make more explicit my already hinted suspicion of two disastrous responses to the present seeming chaos. On the one hand we see the widespread, and to me groundless, claim that to argue about the aims of education is pointless, since all educational aiming is simply relative to the personal ego-interests or power interests of the archers.

On the other hand we have self-righteous battlers who tend to justify their claims by the very popularity of various battalions in the first camp: these are the self-styled traditionalists who know for a certainty and proclaim fervently the one true aim of education is to defeat all these modernists and post-modernists and recover from the past precisely what we need, which is . . .

But here of course the recovery programs vary, just as the so-called relativisms do. Underlying the baffling variety is the claim that at some time in the past educators or at least some of themwere on the straight and nar row way to educational paradise, and then the fools and knaves led us off that path into the current mess.

Just how deep runs the torrent of such nostalgia-thought has been revealed both with the successes of William Bennett and Lynn Cheney in marshalling troops behind their plausible lists and by unprecedented sales of the works of Allan Bloom and E.D. Hirsch; Bloom with his call for return to the unquestionably great classics of western thought; Hirsch with his re

duction of basic education to a set of 5,000 or so terms that every literate person must know. I'm not going to spend time today trying to show just what has been wrong with the nostalgia-thinkers. But, those, who like me, deplore the influence of these simplifiers should be aware of one ironic fact: it was almost certainly such thinking that helped to produce the funding for this seminar. We probably wouldn't be here if it were not for the Blooms and Hirschs, the Bennetts and Cheneys. I'd be much surprised if there were not at least a few "up there" in the decision chambers who said, "Let's fund the seminar, in the hope that out of it will emerge a common core curriculum that can be imposed on all twenty of those colleges. And then true education will be restored, at least in those twenty colleges." Our official statement on this seminar neither says nor implies anything as worrisome as that, but I'm sure phrases like "incoherent and fragmented curricula," that is, our enemy and "take back the initiative to create coherent undergraduate curricula" would appeal to those imposers I am imagining. On the other hand, our enabling brochure must have worried some of them a bit with its fortunately stronger emphasis on "experimentation with new courses and new ways of engaging students in the learning process." To me the two phrases, "coherent curricula" and "engaging students in the learning process" can be contradictory, when the word "coherent" carries any one authorization and exclusive notion of just what it might be.

Now of course I'm tempted at this point to continue the negative tone of this talk by moving on to a more detailed attack on the archers I think are aiming wrong, the relativists, and the various dogmatists who aim too confidently. But to do so would fall into our national pastime of thinking

The Aims of EducationCome the Millennium, Wayne C. Booth

demonologically: if we can just identify the devil, then we may have some chance of slaying him. The obvious fact is that our problem is not to identify the devilat least not during this two-week seminar. Our prob lem is to find ways of thinking together productively, as we discover just how many diverse views of proper archery are gathered in this hall.

You may even feel a bit inclined to fight to the death for your preferred outcome. Consequently, unless we have no true seminar but only a pretense at one, some sort of passionate debate, not to say fighting, is likely to occur; when you've taken part in as many curricular battles as I have over the years, you know what to expect.

By this time, in trying to write a fresh talk on a potentially stale topic, I was beginning to feel a bit desperate as you can no doubt tell by my backing and filling, qualifying and disqualifying. Fussing about the desk, up there in the Utah mountains for the past couple of weeks, working through draft after draft, printout after printout, I felt increasingly puzzled about how I could possibly proceed without violating my own insistence that curricular reform must be grounded in a particular time and place and campus community that is, you, the reformers, not in some outsider's program.

My wife observed my tension and suggested that we go for a hike up Mount Timpanogas, a 12,000-foot peak sort of just behind our cabin. So we climbed and though I began to feel better, I felt no lights of insight flashing. But as we approached the top, at about high noon, my wife exclaimed, "What's that?" pointing to a leather packet tucked under a huge boulder. We opened it, of course, and lo and behold, what did we find but a sheaf of eleven papyrus sheets, each with a short message at the top, in large block letters. The fist sheet read sim

And lo and behold, when I did turn to the other sheets I found on each one a commandment each of them obviously composed, by whatever gods of education there may be, in the same spirit of negation in which the first half of this talk had been written. So I hastened home, knees creaking as they always do these days on the descent side of a hike , meditated for many hours, and finally composed a short commentary on each commandment. Whatever consistencies or incoherence you may detect as I read these comments is, of course, my fault not the gods'.

Oh, one more preliminary: I apologize for the fact that the commandments seem directed more to how not to fight about reading lists in the humanities and social sciences than problems in other sciences. But with a little translation maybe the "no-no"s will fit across the curriculum.

COMMANDMENT ONE: Thou shalt not fight to put in the Core Curriculum any work unless thou thyself hast lived with it a bit and want to live with it further, in the kind of prolonged intimacy that one experiences with any work one really attempts to teach well.

It didn't take much thought about this one to see what it means: it means you don't fight for a work simply

because it is called a classic or, at the other extreme, simply because it represents this or that daring or neglected new constituency. You don't fight for it because some person or group you admire touts it. You don't fight for it simply because it will, you hope, convert your students to believe something you or your preferred group already believe. In short, you don't recommend any work that will simply deepen the intellectual rut you are already in.

To me, this command implies a search for works that will challenge your students to challenge you, and thus lead to joint inquiry. A work will educate you best only if your students become actively engaged, aggressively engaged in dialogue with you about what the work is trying to do to them. In short, don't choose a work because you merely like it or love it; choose it because you need and desire further experience with it and believe that your students are likely to help you profit from it. They will help you most by fighting back. You should ask yourself at every moment in the debates: what will make my students the kind I am likely to find here in this institution this year, the kind that may be different from those entering my sister institution across town what will make these particular human beings in all their complexity both want to argue back at me and the work and be able to argue back productively.

This commandment got me so turned on that I almost filled my remaining time talking about how it absolutely commands that all core requirements be met in courses based on discussion groups rather than lectures. For the kind of fighting back, the active rather than passive learning the gods command here, students need a large daily dose of genuine discussion in fairly small groups twenty at the most, ten or twelve as the ideal. Whatever use of lecturing

you decide on and there will always be some matters best handled by a good lecturer no genuine education in any subject remember we're not thinking of mere training, rote duplication, but genuine education can occur without give and take. But the gods probably have another list of commandments about teaching techniques, and someone else will have to find that leather pouch.

COMMANDMENT TWO: Thou shalt not fight for any re quired work unless thou art convinced that the work itself will carry some irresistible educational power for the students.

Well, this one obviously requires us to ask, will the students who read a work, and then read it again, and then really study it, sitting alone in the dormitory room or library, or working it out together, grappling with what the author has tried to say, will they, even without your looking over their shoulder, or be led to a higher spot on the path toward mature thought and feeling, those virtues that all continuing education depend on?

Many a work that is worth reading for other reasons simply will not pass this test. Works that are chosen because they preach this or that preferred ideology or impart this or that desired emotion are tempting to any teacher who believes in that ideology or hopes to share that emotion. Courses that center on this or that current phenomenon let us take the caricature provided by current courses in the Madonna Phenomenon such courses may be entirely defensible when offered to mature students who have passed through a rigorous core experience: a student who has already developed a love of learning and has begun to practice some serious thinking, a student who has encoun

What kinds of works am I thinking of when I ask for works that educate on their own? They needn't be classics; they need only be works that in their own procedures attempt to teach readers how to read well by thinking critically. In some of the best works, both classical and modern, such teaching is right on the surface, as if the author were thinking about our problem. More often it is merely implied in how the authors deal with their opponents or sources.

Consider for example what any careful writer about ideas accomplishes by providing a section of "Objections to my argument" and then trying to meet those objections honestly. Almost every worthwhile thinker I know will, at an appropriate point, say or imply something like, "It might be objected to my case that such and such is true. This objection has much to be said for it." Then will come some powerful restatement of the

arguments for the objections, followed by: "But to these arguments I reply, first, that . . ." A student making his or her way through such argument, essentially a dialogue between authors and their best critics, is learning how to think, how to argue not to win but to arrive at more defensible convic tions. That student is also learning something essential about reading and the point is that the learning does not depend only on the teacher's ines capably limited brilliance.

I don't have to tell you that the works, ancient or modern, that do this well and honestly are rare. The ones from the past that do it well are the ones we generally think of as classics: they have been found, by generation after generation, to be teachers. The ones that do it well today, and that are thus most likely to be appealing to our students, are even rarer. But they exist: genuine philosophers like Charles Taylor or Hilary Putnam or even Jaques Derrida, in his surprisingly frequent attempts to demonstrate why another reader's readings are just plain wrong, or what can be said against his own claim.

But the class of works that are themselves educational is not confined to education about argument. Even more important in a time like ours, is the even trickier matter of moral education not the implanting of some level of moral desire that we must leave to the family and the church and the gang membership but the schooling of thought and choice about desires. And here we inevitably turn to what are called literary works. Whether we believe that virtues in the sense of fundamental desires can be taught, it is obviously true that some novels, some poems, some plays can teach the essential capacity to think and feel oneself through intricate, tough moral decisions. That teaching will not work, of course, with any student who lacks the essential virtue of desiring to

The Aims of EducationCome the Millennium, Wayne C. Booth

live not just well but right. But even in our fragmented world most students come to usas Aristotle would say desiring to live not just well but right: that is desiring genuine happiness. And they can imbibe, through literary experience, an increasing sensitivity to the nuances of choice in their pursuit of that happiness.

It's impossible to illustrate this point adequately in a brief talk: you'll know what I mean if you've ever read with full attention, or taught a class to pay full attention, to the way in which any fine novel portrays choices and personal encounters of its characters. The really fine novelists teach us what it means to face a conflict of values honestly, and to recognize just what is wrong with forms of behavior that seems to this or that fictional character justified. They can even teach us, sometimes quite explicitly, about what kinds of education are deplorable.

Listen to this passage, from a novel I just happen to have read this summer for the first time, Henry James's Roderick Hudson . Rowland, who is the closest there is to a moral center, is listening to the mother of the beautiful young Christina Light, the spoiled woman who is on the verge of marrying, against her own deepest oral institution, the unloved but wealthy Price Cassimassima. In the passage, her mother is praising herself for the moral education she has administered to her lovely child. She has explained that at first she had thought that her little girl was plain and therefore scarcely worth bothering about. And then one day

a child came wandering along [my] path a little girl of four or five . . . She stopped in front of me and stared at me and I stared at her queer little dress, which was a cheap imitation of the costume of one of [the] contadine. At last I looked up at her face, and said to myself, "Bless me, what a beautiful child! What a splendid pair of eyes, what a magnificent head of hair! If

Wayne C. Booth, The Aims of EducationCome the Millennium

From that time I lived only for my daughter, I watched her, I caressed her from morning till night. I worshipped her. I went to see doctors about her, I took every sort of advice. I was determined she should be perfection. The things that have been done for that girl, sir you wouldn't believe them; they would make you smile! Nothing was spared; if I had been told that she must have a bath every morning of molten pearls, I would have found means to give it to her. She never raised a finger for herself, she breathed nothing but perfumes, she walked upon velvet. She never was out of my sight, and from that day to this I have never said a sharp word to her. By the time she was ten years old she was beautiful as an angel, and so noticed wherever we went that I had to make her wear a veil . . . Then I saw that she was as clever as she was beautiful, and that she only had to play her cards. She had mas ters, professors, every educational advantage. They told me she was a little prodigy. She speaks French, Italian, German, better than most natives. She has a wonderful genius for music, and might make her fortune as a pianist, if it was not made for her otherwise! I traveled all over Europe; every one told me she was a marvel. The director of the opera in Paris saw her dance at a child's party . . . and offered me an enormous sum if I would give her up to him and let him have her educated for the ballet. I said, "No, I thank you, sir; she is meant to be something finer than a princesse de theatre." I had a passionate belief that she might marry absolutely whom she chose, that she might be a princess out and out. . . . before she could read, she had the manners, the tastes, the instincts of a little princess. She would have noth ing to do with shabby things or shabby people; if she stained one of her frocks,

she was seized with a kind of frenzy and tore it to pieces.

And Mrs. Light goes on and on about just why she has decided to educate Christina, not quite to marry royalty that would be too dangerous these days, she thinks but to marry into the higher aristocracy, a Prince. And then Henry James has his text clinch the kind of education I'm talking about. Not waiting for some classroom teacher to emphasize just how horrible Mrs. Light's educational program is, he has his spokesman, Rowland, put it to us pointblank: "Rowland listened to all this with huge compassion for the heroine of the tale. What an education, what a history, what a school of character and of morals!" What a school of morals indeed. Very much like the school of morals that many a parent these days is unthinkingly imposing on young beauties or gymnasts or tennis or bas ketball prodigies. Winning the prince or the prize and the money that goes with winning that is all.

I can't think of any major novel, if it really meets commandment one, that is, that it serve your education, as a teacher and learner that does not include a rich critique of destructive moralities of the kind we think of as having dominated the American eighties but that are just as alive to day. Incidentally, if you doubt that novels can have this kind of morally educational power, you ought to have a look at the essays and books of Martha Nussbaum or, to be quite frank, at my book, The Company We Keep.

COMMANDMENT THREE: Thou shalt not fight to place in the Core Curriculum work that is not likely to lead to conversation outside thy particular classroom across cam pus and on out into the

larger world.

Number three tells us to seek what is general not just in the sense of what skills every student should master but in the sense of what worthwhile expe rience should be generally shared. But doesn't this merely underline the first commandment? It will not do to turn teachers loose to teach only what they love; they should want to teach works that their students will discuss with other students in the dining halls and dormitories. [It must occur to you that this third commandment would rule out Roderick Hudson , unless you could talk your whole campus into requiring it, which you almost certainly couldn't. So: Roderick Hudson is out, and if you consider Henry James you'll have to turn to works more widely read, such as The Turn of the Screw or Daisy Miller. But I should hasten to admit that for many a college perhaps for yours Henry James is not the right requirement, and you would do better to work with a more accessible kind of moral instruction of the kind found in a work like Huckleberry Finn.]

COMMANDMENT FOUR: Thou shalt not fight to have in your Core Curriculum any work that is not likely to enable thy students to engage in conversation with other people in the world beyond your campus.

It's all very well to insure that students have read works we admire, or even works they can discuss with other students in the school cafeteria. But if they are to continue their education after graduation, in conversation with other educated folks, they should have encountered at least a few of the "greats" that most graduates of most decent colleges will know. The com mon core consists in part of an accumulation of cultural capital for a life time. That capital should beto some degree, at leastof a common cur

rency, first on the local campus, then throughout life.

[After all, with whom could I ever discuss Roderick Hudson, if my college had required it and my most beloved college teacher, P.A. Christensen, had convinced me of its worth? I know personally only two people who have read it.]

This test of trans-college usefulness is even harder to meet now than it was a few decades ago. It is hard to know just what works other colleges are likely to teach: the very problem that justifies a seminar like this. This difficulty is the chief reason some see for supporting a national curriculum: "if only some wise director of NEH could impose on all col leges a requirement that every student should know the following ten books in order to graduate, would not our national debates be improved?"

There is, even in our seemingly chaotic current world, in fact, widespread agreement on a few truly great authors. You can still do your students a favor by ensuring that they learn to lovenote how I put that at least one or two of the greatest of Shakespeare's plays; at least one or two of the great novels of the western tradition; at least one or two of the rigorous philosophers of the western traditionnot just the dramatically appealing and essential dialogues of Plato but one or two of the more linear thinkers like Aristotle or Hume or Mill. But there I go, naming names when I promised not to.

COMMANDMENT FIVE: Thou shalt not fight for a core curriculum that imposes a single educational or po litical or moral dogma.

Again, this one seems to risk redundancy but then, who has ever claimed that the gods worry about redundancy? But surely if the first four commandments are sincerely obeyed,

The Aims of EducationCome the Millennium, Wayne C. Booth

this one will take care of itself: for example, any thoughtful work that deals honestly with opponents' objections will inoculate against any simple-minded single dogma. But there are subtler dogmas that can only be countered by institutional requirements of breadth: so far, for example, I have used illustrations only from literature and philosophy or political philosophy. But what about hard thinking in the natural and biological sciences? How about works of psychology and sociology, of legal history and theory, and so on?

Of the dogmas that creep up on us perhaps the most insidious are those that elect one genuine, undeniable human value over all the others, and then make the curriculum serve that value alone. Of course, I have myself today elevated one value above all others: the education of people who will be actively engaged in the learning process and go on educating themselves. But the dogmas that I fear are those that are far narrower, like the dogmas about how true thought is achieved dogmas proclaimed, by devotees of hard, logically proved propositions as the only path to genuine education casting to one side beauty and goodness or human service and all that we are taught by our feelings. We are still crippled by the post-positivist dogmas of educators who present one sole model of rationality: this or that so-called scientific method; this or that road to critical thinking; this or that list of logical fallacies. Almost as threatening are the devotees of artistic quality and purity who turn art into religion and, like too many literary critics, choose to ignore moral questions about truth. Or we could lambast here the passionate prophets who, like some remaining Marxists and some religious fanatics, would sacrifice everything for the sake of this or that program of material or spiritual improvement or

salvation leaving both beauty and hard thought about truth in the garbage pail. What this commandment really entails is that we must give up any single notion of how truth, or beauty, or goodness are achieved in the world, or of just which one of these qualities should be supreme.

COMMANDMENT SIX: Thou shalt not fight for any Core Curriculum that leaves the instructor no freedom for one or two in dividual choices through the year.

Though the gods seem here to be assuming that the bulk of the syllabi should be shared, in order to meet commandments II and III, they are recog nizing that for a teacher to be absolutely frozen in even the brightest committee's list, year after year, can be deadly; even the best of works can grow stale. So each instructor should be allowed, in every term, to say "I'm tired of X," or "I learned over the last two years that I just can't teach Y well." "So I'm going to substitute Z this year." Butand this in my experience can be an immensely important "but" for the self education of faculty and I'm surprised the gods did not add it we should always insist that every instructor present to the course staff a solid case for any such departure from the list, demonstrating why the excep tion achieves one or another of the values implicit in the list of command ments.

COMMANDMENT SEVEN: Thou shalt not commit adultery!

COMMANDMENT EIGHT: Thou shalt not construct core curricula that are merely miscellanies, first one work and then another work.

Just what the pattern should be will depend largely on what other re quired courses the student must take: If your college has shamefully given up all requirements in history, the common core list must surely include a few powerful works clustering around the problem of just how so-called factual evidence and interpretation is constructed by historians and then by their readers. Similarly, if students are not required to take a philosophy or rheto ric course, the required list surely must include works that grapple with just how we can or should decide to test our convictions or change our minds. And if students are not required to take any courses in art or music, surely the required list should include not just written works but experiences that en tail close, responsive, and critical looking and listening. And finally, if other required courses have nothing about how to criticize movies or TV or rock video, then a unit of video-critique may make sensethough here it will be far harder that anywhere else to meet my commandment that the work be edu cational in itself.

COMMANDMENT NINE: THOU SHALT NOT FIGHT FOR ANY CURRICULUM THAT WILL LEAD STUDENTS TO THINK THE WORLD IS MORE COMPLEX THAN IT IS.

This one worries me a lot. Hasn't my whole talk been working to persuade all these seminarians that the

10

educational world is threatened by a bunch of over-simplifiers. But then I read . . . .

COMMANDMENT TEN: THOU SHALT NOT FIGHT FOR ANY CURRICULUM THAT WILL LEAD STUDENTS TO THINK THE WORLD SIMPLER THAN IT IS.

In other words, if thou must bring up Occam's Razor, or the Law of Parsimony, teach it with examples showing where it won't workwhich is in nine out of ten choices in the life that students and teachers, or limited human creatures must live.

I guess all this means that what we have to fear are lists that ignore both complexity and simplicity. There is no one enemy out there seeking to destroy us: we have met the enemy and they is usus in our temptations on the one hand to oversimplify, to buy this or that panacea that is offered with sufficient air of learning or tradition or novelty or other seeming claim to authority; us in our temptation on the other hand to believe that because the world God has placed us in is fantastically complex, there are no human values worth devoting our lives to. There are many. They are often experienced as in conflict but they are no less genuine for that.

My talk today, to repeat once more, has tried to serve one value that I think worth fighting for: the educating of self-educators, men and women who will continue to explore life vitally and fully after they leave our charge. That kind of life, the life of intellectual and moral exploration, need not be thought of as the only kind of life worth living; we need not echo uncritically Socrates' claim that the unexamined life is not worth living at all! But in our culture, with its fantastic multiplication of appeals and programs and possibilities, it's hard to imagine really productive, ultimately satisfying life without the kind of education

we're challenged to explore together here.

We know from experience, of course, that most curricular planning of this kind is at best only half-successful; some has been plainly disastrous. We should remember that many of our worst public destroyers are products of our best schools and colleges. Many of those institutions had curricula that would look highly respectable from almost any point of view. It is clear, then, that nothing can guarantee successful voyaging in our troubled waters. But those of us who have known the joys of living in inquiry, in exploration, know that to make plans for such a life for our students is one of the unquestionably worthwhile ways to spend one's days or years.

I wonder what the gods of education would have to say to that over-simplified conclusion? p

Ten Commandments

for those who fight about the Core Curricula

Wayne C. Booth

I. Thou shalt not fight to put on the core curriculum any work unless thou thyself hast lived with it and want to live with it further in prolonged intimacy.

II. Thou shalt not fight for any required work unless thou art convinced that the work itself will carry irresistible educational power for the students.

III. Thou shalt not fight to place in thy core curriculum any work that is not likely to lead to conversation outside thy particular classroom.

IV. Thou shalt not fight to have in the core curriculum any work that is not likely to enable thy students to engage in conversation with other people in the world beyond thy campus, espe cially after graduation.

V. Thou shalt not fight for a core curriculum that imposes a single educational or political or moral dogma.

VI. Thou shalt not fight for a core curriculum that leaves the instructor no freedom for one or two individual choices throughout the year.

VII. Thou shalt not commit adultery.

VIII. Thou shalt not fight for core curricula that are merely miscellanies; first one work then another work.

IX. Thou shalt not fight for core curricula that lead students to think the world is more complex than it is.

X. Thou shalt not fight for core curricula that lead students to think the world is more simple than it is.

11

Brooklyn College

Brooklyn College's Core Curriculum, let me tell you something about my relationship to itor as they say in the vernacular, to tell you where I'm coming from in my description and observations on the Brooklyn Core.

My career at Brooklyn College is evenly divided between what I think of as pre-Core and Core epochsabout a dozen years before the core was inaugurated in 1981, and a dozen years since. I was serving a term as chair of my department when the Core was designed. I spent one year as coordinator of one course in the package titled "People, Power, and Politics." I teach a section of that course nearly every semester, and from 1990 to 1992, I was a member of the Faculty Council Committee responsible for overseeing the entire Core Curriculum.

My talk will be organized in four parts. First, I'll present some background on Brooklyn College; second, the process by which our Core came about; third, the structure and content of Core courses; and finally, a summary of the way the core has been implemented at Brooklyn College.

First, about Brooklyn College. It is one of nine four-year colleges which, along with a medical school, a law school, a center for Ph.D. studies, and eight community colleges, make up the City University of New York. Brooklyn was originally a branch of the City College of New York, which was founded in the Pre-Civil War era,

A

s I begin talking about

12

Daniel S. Claster

Brooklyn College

and known then as the Free Academy.

As City College, it provided opportunities for poor immigrants and their children to obtain a post- secondary education otherwise available only to the well-to-do. Brooklyn College became an independent unit in the 1930's and in time established its own reputation for academic excellence. Its graduates, as a group and individually, have achieved extraordinary distinction. At one time it was said that among Harvard Law School students, the only college that was better represented than Brooklyn was Harvard itself. One study showed that Brooklyn College ranks eleventh in the country in number of graduates who have acquired a Ph.D. One of our alumni is a Nobel Laureate, and last year one of our graduates won a Rhodes scholarship.

There were about fifteen thousand students when I first came to Brooklyn, but that number more than doubled by the early seventies, when an open admissions policy was instituted, and then, when tuition was imposed for the first time in the university's history as a result of New York City's fiscal crisis in 1975, the numbers reverted to less than twenty thousand and have leveled off at around thirteen thousand in recent years.

The student body's ethnic and racial composition is increasingly diverse, and there are increasing numbers of students whose first language is something other than EnglishSpanish, Chinese, Russian,

French Creole, Korean. There is need for remediation in basic skills among a number of our students, and we have a good program; but unfortunately this is one area that seems particularly susceptible to budget cuts in these difficult times. Placement in remedial courses is based upon basic skills exams given to all entering students. Students are barred from many courses until they pass basic skills exams, and there are limits on how long one may remain enrolled as a remedial student.

According to university bylaws, the faculty has control over curricular matters. At Brooklyn, this control is exercised by the Faculty Council, made up of the chairperson and an additional delegate from each department, both elected, and a few additional at-large faculty representatives.

Now, what was the curriculum prior to the Core? Brooklyn's graduation requirements in the 1950's and early 1960's were fairly typical, I believe, for institutions of our type. General requirements, which still prevail, are two semesters of English, a speech course, and three semesters of a foreign language, although a few students are exempted from the speech course and the first semester of English, and many from the language requirement on the basis of their high school work.

At the second level there were distribution requirements, giving students options among various basic courses in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. And

finally, the standard majors, requiring half a dozen courses, and in some cases many more, in the chosen field of concentration.

However, as many of you remember, along with the civil rights and women's rights movements of the 1960's there was considerable effort among students to reject, as "irrelevant", the kind of curricular requirements that were extant at Brooklyn and many other liberal arts colleges. One of the demands of the student power movement was for complete freedom of choice as to the combination of courses that could be presented in satisfaction of the requirements for a B.A. or B.S. degree.

Although there was some justification in students' demands that faculties pay more attention to their needs and interests, many institutions went too far, in my judgment. Instead of working on needed curricular reform with a view of the changing nature of the intellectual world, and of student relations to that world, many colleges and universities relaxed the requirements for liberal arts degrees to such an extent that the old ideathat there was any body of knowledge with which a liberal arts graduate might be conversant seemed to be fading into oblivion. Although Brooklyn had by no means gone as far as many other institutions in the reduction of general requirements, the faculty and administration were concerned that graduate schools, employers, the public at large, and most of all our own graduates themselves be able to recognize that a Brooklyn College degreetraditionally worn as a badge of honornot lose its luster.

The Coming

of the Core

As early as 1977, the Brooklyn College Faculty Council endorsed in

Exemplary Core Curricula: Brooklyn College, Daniel S. Claster

t felt they had been ignored in the original proposal offered amendments, which resulted in increasing the size of the core from a little more than 30 credits to almost 50; in other words, what was originally envisioned as a year's worth of courses, to be taken in conjunction with other courses during the first two years, had become a package that would occupy students almost fully for their freshman and sophomore years.

Some of us despaired that it would ever be possible to fashion a core curriculum that would be acceptable to a majority of our very diverse and independently minded faculty. Nevertheless, a new committee was formeda better committee able to take the broader view and willing to undertake the very important task of consulting and working with a broad spectrum of the college community, including students, to come up with a manageable package, and one that would reflect a 1980's view of liberal education.

The Brooklyn College Core Curriculum: Structure and Content

The Core, as it was approved in the spring of 1980 and has been taught over the past twelve years, comprises ten courses, or actually thirteen courses, because three of the rubrics contain two courses. You will be hearing next week in some detail about two of the courses, the music course and the non-western cultures course, from my colleagues Paul Shelden and Antonio Nadal, but, I'll give you a brief overview now.

The courses are divided into two tiers. The first tier, Core Studies 1 through 5, is planned for entering freshmen, and the second tier, 6 through 10, is geared toward slightly more advanced students. Students are expected to complete the first tier in the first two to three semesters and to finish Core requirements in another two or three semesters.

Core Studies 1, Classical Origins of Western Culture, deals with

principle the establishment of a common core curriculum, and a committee began work on it. Ideas about core curricula were beginning to be discussed in higher education circles throughout the country at this time, of course, and Harvard had inaugurated versions of what they called core curricula around this time.

However, early on it was decided that Brooklyn College's Core would be different. Although some people thought our core should offer more choice within the Core than the models prevailing at the private institutions because our less selective student body might not be able to handle requirements that every student take a real college-level course covering, for example, modern physics, or the Greek dramatists, the view prevailed that the Brooklyn Core take seriously the concept of the common experience. This was and has continued to be a distinctive feature of our Core the principle that students who have fulfilled the requirements of the Core will have a shared foundation on which their more advanced courses can build.

Without going into great detail, let me say that the first proposal for a core curriculum, which was presented to the faculty in January 1980, was not passed. A major problem, in my view and this may be constructive for those of you who are working on core curricula yourselves is that the committee authoring the proposal was too heavily weighted toward one area of the curriculumthe traditional humanities, in this case at the expense of the social and natural sciences.

Thus, when the original document was proposed at Faculty Council, all those disciplines tha

Daniel S. Claster, Exemplary Core Curricula: Brooklyn College

Core Studies 5 is called "Introduction to Mathematical Reasoning and Computer Programming." Some sections are taught by the computer science faculty, others by the math faculty. Originally, the idea of the computer component was that all modern liberal arts graduates should be familiar with a simple computer language just as they are expected to know a foreign language like French or Spanish or German. BASIC was originally the computer language of choice, but now there is variation among sections. The math component was originally probability theory; that, too, has changed to a degree.

Now for the second tier. Core Studies 6 is known as "Landmarks of Literature." It was originally taught by members of the Department of English and the Department of Comparative Literature. We no longer have a Department of Comparative Literature, but its members were merged into the English Department. Actual works assigned vary, but all students read some prose, some poetry, and some drama, with

representation ranging across recent centuries and among authors in English and other European languages. Increasingly in recent years, African and Asian authors are treated as well.

Core Studies 7 and 8 are the science components: 7.1 and 7.2 are chemistry and physics, 8.1 and 8.2 are biology and geology. Each course includes both lecture and laboratory components. Originally, students signed up for 7.1 and 7.2 together, taking one the first seven weeks and the other one the last seven weeks of the semester. Similarly, they enrolled for the biology and geology courses together. The idea was to help integrate the presentation of the sciences, but this proved cumbersome in practice, and now students enroll for each Core science offering as a separate two-credit course that is stretched out over the full semester.

You'll hear about Core Studies 9, "Studies in African, Asian, and Latin American Cultures" from Professor Nadal next week. Its inclusion reflects an awareness that our students need to expand their intellectual horizons beyond Europe and the part of America that lies north of Mexico and the Caribbean.

The idea here, in brief, is to expose students to at least two of those cultures (originally it was three). The common experience is not exposure of all students to the same cultures. It is a team-taught course. One class might be taught by a specialist in Indian history and a sociologist who has studied Nicaraguan society, another by an anthropologist familiar with central Africa and an expert on Chinese literature. What is common is that each of the instructors goes beyond his or her discipline to cover themes in that society that are important in all societies. I'll leave it to my colleague, Tony, to explain it to you next week, how in heaven's name this all works out.

Finally, as a kind of capstone to the other courses, Core Studies 10,

"Knowledge, Existence and Values," is taught by the Department of Philosophy. As the title indicates, the course deals with questions of ethics, cosmology, and epistemology as they have been addressed by philosophers over the years.

Implementation

Along with the curriculum document that describes the substantive courses, the faculty enacted a rather extensive set of procedural regulations. Since these are an integral part of the Core Curriculum itself, I'll mention briefly some of the most important.

Because a substantial number of Brooklyn College students enter with some deficiencies in basic skills, and in order to insure that the core curriculum would not be watered down to a level inconsistent with real college-level work, it was decided that students not be admitted to Core courses until they had overcome those deficiencies. The City University administers assessment tests for verbal and mathematical achievement to entering students. Those who do not pass are assigned to remedial courses. Based on this assessment, students are not permitted to take math and science core courses until they have made up deficiencies in this area, and they may not take other core courses until they have made up deficiencies in the verbal area.

Who must take a Core sequence? Essentially, everyone who gets an undergraduate degree from Brooklyn College. The major exception is for transfer students, who are permitted to offer equivalent introductory courses from other institutions to substitute for Core courses. Other exceptions are very limited: for example, students intending to be science majors may substitute introductory courses within their disciplines for the science core. In fact, the faculty has resisted efforts

by some departments with extensive major requirements to exempt their students from the Core. The faculty have said, in effect, if students wish to take a specialized major so extensive that they will not have time for the 34 credits of our core, they will have to do it at someplace other than Brooklyn College.

The document also addresses the issue of how common the "common experience" is. There is variation among courses, but less now, I believe, than twelve years ago. Courses that began with a very high degree of uniformity have come to allow instructors more flexibility; other courses in which syllabi were more varied from class to class at the outset have moved toward greater standardization.

The course I teach, "People, Power and Politics," is perhaps not unrepresentative. When we began, all instructors used the same textbook and the same extensive book of readings. We no longer have a common textbook, but we all use a common set of readings now in its sixth edition, published by the Brooklyn College Press which makes up about half the total reading for the course. Instructors choose the other half of the assigned readings according to their own preferences, but within the framework of an agreed- upon syllabus. The scope of midterm tests and term papers is discretionary with the instructor, but the final exam counts for 40% of the term grade, and half of the final is a common exam. It is made up by a committee of instructors who teach the course and is taken by all students.

The documents also provide a mechanism for changing Core courses. Normally the coordinator of a course submits a proposal for an experimental section to the faculty oversight committee. When approved and offered, the experimental section is evaluated, as a basis for deciding whether those changes should be

Exemplary Core Curricula: Brooklyn College, Daniel S. Claster

incorporated as the "common experience" in all sections.

I would not suggest that the specifics of our Core should necessarily serve as a model for all core curricula although I hope some of these specifics would provide some inspiration for those of you are planning to go forth and do likewise in designing, or redesigning, your own core curriculum. What I think is more important than the substantive material covered in our Core, though, is the process of implementation that has made it a viable and vital part of our curriculum so much so, in fact, that it's really hard to think about what Brooklyn College would be like without its Core.

First, as I'm sure you'll hear from other speakers, is the issue of faculty involvement. There's no question in my mind that the achievements of the Brooklyn Core are in large part due to the fact that faculty commitment to it is wide and deep. At the outset it was stimulated by the faculty committee that put together the final version. Starting with some ideas from the discussion of the previous, failed, draft about disciplines to be included, the committee consulted with departmental, and in some cases interdepartmental, committees to develop outlines for the constituent courses, with a mandate that the Core

"What I think is more important than the substantive material covered in our Core, though, is the process of implementation that

has made it a viable

and vital part of our curriculum . . . . "

I should note that there was student representation on the drafting committee for each course. The chairman of that college-wide committee played a pivotal role. I know of no better way to describe that role than to compare it with a description of a peacemaking functionary, known as a monkalun, in a preliterate Philippine tribe that was studied by the eminent anthropologist R. F. Barton around the time of World War I. "To the end of a peaceful settlement," wrote Barton, the monkalun "exhausts every art of Ifugao diplomacy. He wheedles, coaxes, flatters, threatens, drives, scolds, insinuates. He beats down the demands of the plaintiffs or prosecution, and bolsters up the proposals of the defendants until a point be reached at which the two parties may compromise. If the culprit or accused be not disposed to listen to reason or 'shows fight' when approached, the monkalun waits till the former ascends into his house, follows him, and war-knife in hand, sits in front of him and compels him to listen."

Now I don't want to come to the land where the Bowie knife was made famous and suggest that something like that needs to be introduced into civilized academic circles. My point is that simple viable core curricula do not emerge from simply carrying on business as usual. It takes a receptive faculty, but given the frequent preoccupation with things like turf, FTE's, and disciplinary majors, it also takes an unusual degree of, frankly, political spade work to insure that the program will be enacted, and that it will be supported not only by those directly involved in the core, but also by those not directly involved.

Part of the issue of faculty involvement has to do with another issue of Core policy that was agreed upon early in the process of formulating the core. Each department

Another related element that I think has been essential to the vitality of the core is the expectation that core courses would not be simply a repackaging of existing courses. Some of the core courses, like the interdisciplinary non-Western cultures course you'll be hearing about from Professor Nadal next week, simply didn't exist before 1981. They had to be created de novo. Others, like the music course that Professor Shelden will talk about next week, are very different from the introductory courses that predated the Core.

For disciplinary courses the difference is that, while the usual introduction is sometimes seen as the presentation of preliminaries that must be gotten out of the way to enable students to go on to the real work of advanced courses, it is recognized that the great majority of students in a core course will not be going on to other courses in that discipline. This frees core courses of the burden of so-called "foundation" courses. But it also challenges them to concentrate on just what their disciplines can contribute to the total entity known as liberal education. It is the process of developing and teaching courses with this mandate that has, I suggest, had much to do with the Brooklyn faculty's commitment to our Core.

And of course, as I'm sure you will hear from all the other speakers who have had experience with core curricula, administrative support is vital. In Brooklyn's case, the commitment was demonstrated by both the president and the provost of

the college when they themselves undertook to teach core courses in their own fields at the Core's inception and continued to do so on a regular basis. Moreover, they became, if I may say so, the head cheerleaders for the core, devoting much of their energies to proselytizing among the faculty, students, alumni, the local community, and indeed, practitioners and administrators of higher education at the national level.

Some other, what we might call support mechanisms for the core:

1. In the year between its acceptance and implementation, there was a public hearing of the draft syllabus for each course. Most attendees were faculty and administrators, but some students attended as well. These hearings served the function of letting faculty know what was going on in the planning process for their own as well as other core courses, and they also provided feedback to the syllabus drafting committee.

2. Each summer since the implementation of the Brooklyn College Core, there has been a faculty development seminar. Funded at various times by the NEH and the Mellon Foundation, these seminars have been devoted in part to the presentation of the content of the various courses, but also in large measure to issues of pedagogy evaluation of student papers, methods of stimulating discussion, techniques for encouraging students to integrate their experience in various core courses.

The first seminar, in 1982, has achieved legendary status at Brooklyn College something like the famous Woodstock, New York rock music festival in 1969. I was not present at Woodstock, but I did take part in the 1982 faculty development seminar. It was a memorable experience. About 80 members of the Brooklyn College faculty a diverse group with respect

to geographic origin, age, and ethnic and racial background, but with a high proportion of middle-aged cynical New Yorkers and similarly inclined Easterners emerged from those three days as though they had experienced a religious revival.

There have been a number of efforts to explain that experience. Partly, I think, it was simply a reaction to the opportunity for people from different disciplines to get to know one another in a congenial setting, but even more, I think it had to do with the emphasis on pedagogy. It has often been noted that most of us acquire higher degrees and are offered academic appointments on the basis of having been trained to do research, with little or no training in how to teach. If the subsequent seminars have not achieved quite the level of spiritual experience attained by that first one, they have, nonetheless, continued as a vital component of the Brooklyn Core because they have continued to emphasize pedagogy.

3. Ongoing Core related symposia. At Brooklyn College, the Humanities Institute is the College's principal unit for arranging, and, within a very limited budget, financing public lectures, symposia, and conferences on academic subjects. A sizable proportion of these presentations have been related to the Core. Sometimes the presenters are a few of our own faculty who have gotten together, for example, for a discussion on social, political, and economic theory titled "Why study Marx"? Or a geographer from outside was recently invited to address the topic, "Why study maps?" in conjunction with efforts to introduce an atlas that would be used by students as they progress through various courses in the Core. Such presentations are scheduled to coincide with class hours for at least some sections of relevant courses.

Now, how is it all working? There has never been a formal external

evaluation of the Core, but the college did carry out a comprehensive internal survey after six years of experience with the core. Not surprisingly, there was considerable student resistance to the whole idea of the core at the outset. It was not imposed retroactively upon students who had begun Brooklyn College under another set of requirements, and the college did its best to inform the first class of students subject to Core requirements they had not anticipated. Probably, we did lose some students because of the Core, but it's clear that we have attracted many very good students, from Brooklyn and other boroughs of New York City, who would not have come to us except for the Core. Moreover, we commonly see students who came to us with very limited, vocational expectations of college, often resulting from parental pressure, but who end up choosing areas of concentration with broader intellectual foci as a result of core courses that they would never have chosen on their own. What emerged more specifically from our internal evaluation was that students gave most of the particular Core courses high marks, in terms of interest and value; essentially, they adopted the faculty and administration rationale: that the Core provided Brooklyn College graduates with something worthwhile that they were not likely to have achieved without that structure. There has been some student pressure for choosing, say, eleven of the thirteen courses, but the faculty powers-that -be have resisted, and we have not seen students leaving Brooklyn in droves because of our perceived inflexibility.

Finally, I should mention that there have been some suggestions that there should be some "revitalization" of the Brooklyn College Core after more than a decade of experience with it. As I've indicated, many of the individual courses have been changed substantially over the years, but the overall structure is essentially the one we started with in 1981. There is, of

course, a degree of inertia when any substantial curricular change is contemplated, and some of the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" mentality. However, I think the general reluctance to transform the Brooklyn Core is grounded in a more positive feeling. Our sense is that what we have achieved in our core curriculumthe definition of a liberal education for this era, the scope of the particular course, and the realization of a common experiencehas a continuing vitality for us, the faculty, and for our students. p

Exemplary Core Curricula: Brooklyn College, Daniel S. Claster

Utah State University

at Utah State University

log. Consequently, a student may navigate through "Broadening Knowledge" via random selection or taking reputed "easy" courses, which is commonly the case when advising is lacking or major requirements don't specify otherwise. When the "Broadening Knowledge" requirement is completed in this manner, there is a high probability that there was no coherence to this educational experience, no interdisciplinary relationships were established, and no integration of knowledge was achieved.

As an alternative to "Broadening Knowledge," LASP requires students to complete an orientation course (LAS 125) and two "clusters" for a total of not less than 47 credits (on the quarter system). Is the LASP option better just because it requires 17 more credits? Noit's the "clustering" of courses that is critical.

The Cluster Concept

A cluster consists of small sets of related courses organized around a central theme. Choices of courses are still present (an inevitability of the system), but they occur in small discrete categories within each cluster.

he Liberal Arts and Science

T

18

Program (LASP) is jointly sponsored by the College of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences (HASS) and the College of Science at Utah State University. Science faculty have been full partners involved in every aspect of its creation and evolution. Today, I would like to describe some of the contributions which have been made by faculty of the College of Science and then, as a science faculty member, briefly react to the impact of LASP at the department level.

LASP: What it is and what it isn't

The Liberal Arts and Science Program (LASP) was intentionally designed to be an alternative to the current General Education program which is required of all undergraduates; it was never intended to replace the existing General Education program for some inherent reasons that should become obvious as I continue.

Specifically, LASP addresses only the "Broadening Knowledge" component of General Education; it is not a substitute for other components such as "Written Communication," "Learning Skills," or "American Institutions."

Broadening Knowledge and LASP:

a comparison

The Broadening Knowledge component of General Education consists of credit requirements in each of 4 major areas: Humanities and Arts (HU), Social

Science (SS), Life Science (LS), and Physical Science (PS) for a total of 30 credits (on the quarter system). There are ranges of credits established in each of these areas, weighted away from the major. For example, a chemistry, physics, or geology major would be allowed to count only five credits in Physical Science (PS), up to six credits in Life Science (LS), but must take five to 16 credits in both the Humanities (HU) and Social Science (SS) areas. For a music or art major, the low credit requirement would be in HU and SS and the high credit requirement would be in PS and LS. Once minimums in these four areas have been met, a fifth area, called Integrative Option (IO), becomes available which consists of courses integrating knowledge from at least two of the areas previously mentioned. It has an upper limit of nine credits.

So what is the problem? Where is the need for LASP? The problem arises because each area listed above is represented by what is popularly referred to as a "Chinese menu." At present, there are approximately 32 HU courses, 33 SS courses, 14 LS courses, 20 PS courses, and 35 IO courses listed in the university cata

Construction of a Cluster:

idealism versus reality

The LASP Curriculum Committee has established guidelines for submitting cluster proposals. Every cluster must have the following components:

r a statement or narrative describing the cluster theme

r specific cluster objectives (related to the eight LAS student learning or development goals)

r rationale for categories or groupings of courses used in the requirement block

r course requirements

r capstone requirement, with a brief description of its special attributes which distinguish this course from

"regular" courses

[r Depth of knowledge component for LAS majors]

Some of our idealism in the early days of the LASP program was quickly tempered by reality. To give you an idea of what we went through, we thought we would:

r Accept a given course only when taught by a specific faculty member. Doesn't work: This fosters resentment and charges of academic elitism. Teaching assignments may change at the last minute.

r Restrict choices or have no choices; take only "this" course to meet "that" requirement. Doesn't work: As numbers of LAS students increased with time, class sizes increased, teaching effectiveness and methods changed, some very desirable outcomes were no longer possible, such as close interaction with faculty. Small departments could only offer some classes once a year.

r Require student participation in non-credit seminars or reading groups to increase faculty-student interaction, to stimulate cluster and program identity, and for tracking purposes. Doesn't work: There was no faculty compensation for this time and

USU Science & Society Cluster

Science and its technological and social consequences are of critical current importance. This cluster aims to provide you with: (1) introductions to several areas of the physical, life, and social sciences; (2) an understanding of scientific assumptions, methods, and theories, including their strengths and limitations; and (3) an awareness of the philosophy of science and the scientific bases to urgent social issues.

Cluster Core Requirement:

10 LAS 125 (3) World of Tomorrow

Sci 150 (1) Introduction to Science

In addition to the core, each student must complete a minimum of 20 credits, including at least three credits in each of the sections described below:

A. Physical Sciences Select at least one course:

PS Chem 101 (5) Introduction to Chemistry 1

PS Phyx 120 (5) General Physics Survey 2

PS Geol 101 (5) Introductory Geology 3

1The series PS Chem 121-123 Principles of Chemistry may be used as a substitute.

2 The series PS General Physics 221-223 General Physics-Science or PS Phyx 111-113 General Physics may be used as a substitute.

3The two classes PS Geol 111: Physical Geology and PS Geol 200 Earth History may be used as a substitute.

B. Life Sciences Each student must take:

LS Biol 101 (5) Biology and the Citizen 4

4The series Biol 125-127: General Biology I, II, III may be used as a substitute.

C. Social Sciences Select at least one course:

SS Econ 200 (5) Economics I

SS Anth 101 (5) Introduction to Anthropology

SS PolSc 101 (4) Government and the Individual

SS Anth 110 (5) Human Origins

SS Soc 101 (5) Introductory Sociology

D. Integration of Knowledge On completion of sections A, B, and C, select at least one course:

10 Phyx 216 (3) Energy Phil 325 (3) Medical Ethics

10 Biol 308 (4) Evol & Env Iss. Phil 327 (3) Envir Ethics

10 Biol 310 (3) Bioethics Phil 490 (3) Philosophy of Sci

PS Chem 142 (4) Molecules/Life Polsc 418 (4) Nat Res & Env Policy

Econ 355 (4) Econ & Environ. Soc 333 (3) Medical Sociology

10 Hon 309H (2) Sci Perspect. Soc 462 (3) Sociology of Nat Res

E. Capstone Course After completing course work in sections A through D, each student must complete:

Sci 430 (3) Science in Society5

5Limited enrollment. Teamwork, multi-disciplinary thinking, discussion emphasized. Topics link science, technology, and society.

The Role of the College of Science, Donald W. Fiesinger

Donald W. Fiesinger, The Role of the College of Science

5. Clusters have advantages for faculty management.

r In interdisciplinary clusters, as opposed to interdisciplinary courses, faculty teach on their home ground in discipline-based courses assuring a large number of competent faculty in liberal education courses.

r Using discipline-based courses assures faculty and departmental "ownership" of the courses and commitment to the program.

r Because of the variety and options available, students, are "spread out" among departments, assuring that no department becomes overwhelmed by providing service courses.

r That each cluster is developed and monitored by its faculty gives the faculty a sense of ownership and pride in liberal education.

6.Clusters foster continuing improvement and change.

r Regular cluster faculty workshops assure cluster coherence and consideration of appropriate changes in courses, substitution of courses, and even termination of courses and clusters.

r Regular interaction among cluster faculty encourages sharing of teaching methods and philosophies.

7. Clusters in conjunction with the orientation course facilitate portfolio assessment of student learning.

r The orientation course provides a common baseline or entry point for initiating portfolio construction.

r The cluster structure provides opportunity for intermediate contributions to portfolios.

r Capstone courses in the clusters provide a terminus at which portfolios can be completed and collected.

students resist extra work when they don't receive credit. [Tracking of LAS students at the institutional level still has not been resolved.]

In the early days of the program, around 1986-87, we pulled together clusters using a pool of existing courses. Department heads had been interviewed by the program director to obtain their recommendations for appropriate courses and their best teachers.

[At this time, I was part of a committee working on a proposal for a cluster entitled "Structure as a unifying principle," which had a theme none of us were comfortable with; it was too general. After struggling for over a year and losing faculty interest, we dumped "Structure" and picked up "Science and Society." Now here was some meat for Science faculty!]

Let me use the Science & Society cluster as an example. The cluster requirements (see previous page) are in the abbreviated format used for distribution to students pursuing the LAS Area Studies Certificate to satisfy the Broadening Knowledge portion of General Education. Note that many courses carry Gen. Ed prefixes (IO, PS, SS, LS, HU). LAS students, however, are not bound to the credit minimums within areas as mentioned previously.

THE LASP ADVANTAGE

There are a number of advantages derived from this combination of the orientation course and the cluster concept:

1. The orientation course enhances the critical freshman year.

r The orientation course provides an interdisciplinary freshman year experience in a relatively small group which is firmly rooted in academics. Extensive research has shown that this type of course is a significant factor in contributing to student retention and su

ccess.

2. Al1 clusters address the program's learning objectives.

r Courses within clusters are selected to address specific learning objectives. [To be approved, a cluster must meet at least 7 of the 8 objectives.]

r Courses within clusters are selected and retained in a competitive process which helps keep them focused on program learning goals. [Clusters and courses are reviewed by cluster faculty in annual workshops and by the LAS Curriculum Committee every five years.]

3. Clusters recognize diversity while building toward common objectives.

r A variety of clusters is provided, each having elective options within clusters, to recognize the differing backgrounds and interests of individual students while they pursue the same learning objectives.

r A limited pool of courses within each cluster means students reach the capstone experience with similar though not identical backgrounds, thereby enhancing the shared experience.

4. Clusters address educational breadth and depth with coherence.

r Clustering a limited number of courses about a common theme provides coherence and opportunities for defining connections among disciplines.

r Because each cluster must cross at least three of the areas of natural science, social science, humanities, and arts, the clusters of courses provide breadth of information and epistemological knowledge greater than that required by the distribution program.

r Because each cluster includes advanced as we

so there is a problem with consistency of delivery. The challenge then is to find a way to ensure that all students have an understanding of how science works, not just "the" scientific method, but an understanding of the diverse methods of scientific discovery.

Science 150 -- Science Orientation

The Dean of the College of Science, James A. MacMahon, took the initiative on this issue working with his undergraduate advisory committee. This group was charged as follows: "What should every science major know about science as a way of knowing?" [Ideally, we should ask the same of any B.S.-degree student in the university, not just those in the College of Science.]

On our campus there are other "college orientation" courses, which serve to introduce students to a particular college, its structure, departments, and programs. The College of Science course to be designed was not to be a course of this type.

The final product is described in the current university catalog as follows:

Sci 150 - Science Orientation (1 cr.)

Orientation to the different disciplines in the college [represented by its departments: Chemistry & Biochemistry, Physics, Biology, Mathematics & Statistics, Geology, Computer Science] and their relationship to each other. Introduction to the scientific method.

The course objectives are:

- to expose students to that phenomenon referred to as "The" Scientific Method and to elaborate on how scientists approach knowledge,

- to expose students to the diverse approaches that a variety of scientists use to address common information or problems,

- to approach science as a "way of knowing" rather than as a body of facts, and

- to impart specific knowledge about a topic of contemporary interest.

This course is required

of all majors in the College of Science (which now includes most science education majors) and now by all students pursuing the Science & Society cluster in LAS. It is recommended that students take this course within their first year on campus. It is taught twice a year (fall and spring quarter) by the dean and a team of faculty drawn from each department in the college.

Again, the purpose of this class is to introduce students to that body of knowledge and habit of inquiry that we call "science." This is accomplished by examining a topic of current societal interest from the perspective of the disciplines represented by each department in the college. The topic investigated to date has been "Global Climate Change," a topic that is constantly in the news and the subject of considerable scientific debate. [There will be a turnover in participating faculty this fall and the topic will probably change.]

The dean gives the initial presentation (What is Science?) which serves as an introduction and orientation to the course. He presents the course objectives, the participating faculty, and the theme or topic to be examined. The second week, the dean continues with the discussion of "science" but within the context of "Global Climate Change," the theme to be examined for the remainder of the quarter. This is followed by a succession of faculty presentations. Each faculty member prepares a handout which contains pertinent information, readings, and selected questions. The tenth week consists of a panel discussion with all faculty participating. Faculty are encouraged to attend throughout the quarter [and they commonly interact or interject

The Role of the College of Science, Donald W. Fiesinger

Development of new Science courses

One of the eight student learning goals or program objectives is entitled: "An Understanding of the Methods and Systems of Natural Science," whereby students are expected to learn to understand and use the methods of scientific investigation, recognize the socio-political implications of scientific research, and recognize the relationships between scientific research and a burgeoning technology.

I think most of us would quickly respond "No problem. My (or our) Chem, Physics, Biol, or Geol 101 (or XXX) meets that objective." And this is where we began, by pumping our intro-level courses into clusters. On closer scrutiny, however, we found that these courses needed some attention. For example, instructors tend to implicitly address the methods of science in many intro courses, rather than doing it explicitly. Some revisions were required, some changes in our attitude had to be made; we needed to rethink what the outcomes of a 100-level intro course should be.

We recognized that many "intro" courses were content driven and designed to meet the needs of diverse constituencies. For example, Elementary Education majors are required to take 100-level courses in Chemistry, Physics, Biology, and Geology. Certainly the LAS learning goals are appropriate for education majors but the faculty responded: "we only have ten weeks, and I've got to cover so much content material, and . . . ." I'm sure you've heard these arguments many times. Some science faculty were reluctant to change courses specifically for LAS when it could seldom be demonstrated that LAS students were enrolled in a class in any significant numbers. In addition, most intro. courses are taught by different faculty from one quarter to the next and from one year to the next,

Week Topic (dept. or discipline)

1. What is Science? (Dean of College of Science)

2. Global Climate Change and "The" Scientific Method (Dean)

3. Air Pollution, Chemistry of Ozone (Chemistry)

4. Paleoclimate: proxy records, use of oxygen isotopes (Geology)

5. Mid-term Exam

6. Modeling Weather: visualization and simulation of a severe storm (Computer Science)

7. Temperature of Earth's Atmosphere: long-term and short-term records, mathematical models, correlations, theories (Physics)

8.Associations and Causal Relationships (Statistics)

9.Bio-diversity: anthropogenic vs. geologic change; scientific vs. non -scientific issues (Biology)

10. Integration (Dean and other Science faculty)

11. Second Exam - finals week

Examples of typical questions distributed to students:

- Of what value is the scientific method to society at large?

- How does the scientific method differ from methods of inquiry or study used in the humanities?

- How are the various types of Global Change interrelated?

- How does the earth's temperature indirectly influence the distribution of organisms?

- Where in the atmosphere is the GOOD ozone and where in the atmosphere is the BAD ozone? What distinguishes the concept of good and bad for ozone, since molecules in themselves are neither good nor bad.

- Since Earth's climate has changed drastically many times over 4.5 billion years, why are we worried about one more change? Why do we worry that we are responsible for the change?

- How critical is the geological concept of "uniformitarianism" to our ability to infer Earth's paleoclimates?

- What is the role of computer science in scientific research? in the study of global change?

- If there is a causal relationship between two quantities, do you expect to see an association between measurements on the two quantities? If there is an observed association between measurements on two quantities, does this mean they are causally related?

- What is a biological species? How many are estimated to inhabit the earth? What are the causes of uncertainty in this estimate?

- What are the practical and non-practical reasons for preserving diversity?

For the exams, each faculty member provides a "question" and four "questions" are used on each exam (6 departments = 6 questions + 2 from the dean = 2 exams of 4 questions each). Each faculty member is then responsible for grading his/her own question.

Development of a Science capstone course

The Science and Society cluster was activated out of necessity before a satisfactory capstone course had been established. For the first two years, a Philosophy of Science course was accepted. There was a strong desire among the Science faculty participating in this cluster to develop a new course that would be a true integrative experience. Concurrent with this discussion was a major push within the College of Education,

specifically the departments of Elementary Education and Secondary Education, to involve more Science faculty in their curriculum and in the training of teachers. The Biology, Chemistry, Physics, and Geology departments identified faculty who were willing to participate in these ventures. Within about two years, the science specialist in Secondary Education obtained NSF funding to design new courses to improve the training of science teachers at the middle-school and high-school levels (a response to national concerns about scientific literacy in general and the introduction of Science, Technology, and Society (STS) concepts in the state-wide science curriculum). It turned out that the Science faculty participating in the NSF project were the same ones involved in developing the Science & Society capstone.

The NSF project resulted in development of two courses, one a laboratory practicum for Secondary Education Science majors, and the other, Sci 430 - Science in Society, a course which not only met the needs of Sec. Ed. Science majors but also the capstone needs of the LAS Science and Society cluster. [A strong working relationship with Sec. Ed. has continued and we now share joint administration of a number of science teacher education degrees.]

Sci 430 - Science & Society

Sci 430 has undergone considerable evolution since its inception. Originally designed as a team-taught course, it is now taught by one person. By design, the course was to have small enrollments to facilitate group projects and discussions (which we have retained at 25 students per quarter) and a lead instructor with periodic assistance and participation by the remaining three Science faculty. The four departments involved, however, had to address other demands for interdisciplinary participation, such

as the Honors Program, other LAS clusters, other commitments to the College of Education, etc. which strain their financial resources and personnel and make this kind of team teaching impractical. [The College of Science has provided some compensation and it is hoped that as the LAS funding situation improves, additional support may become available.] Regardless of these changes, the course is described in the university catalog as follows:

Sci 430 - Science & Society (3 cr.)

An investigation of the interactions between current scientific topics and societal goals and concerns. Intended as a capstone for the LASP Science and Society Cluster and science teaching majors.

This course has been taught twice a year and fills quickly at its cap of 25 students. [This coming academic year, 1993-94, it will be taught three times, once each fall, winter, and spring quarters.] This class is scheduled twice a week for an extended class period (110 minutes each) to facilitate discussions, demonstrations, and presentations. Some faculty prefer to teach in a classroom with adjoining laboratory facilities to allow them additional flexibility for demonstrations and student lab experiments. [A brief comment with respect to enrollment: although the campus-wide computerized registration system gives students priority by class rank, prerequisite screening is still necessary and this is done by the HASS-Science Advising Center.]

From the brief catalog description above, it does not appear that there is a significant difference between Sci 150 Science Orientation and Sci 430 Science & Society, other than the number of credit hours. Granted, goals are somewhat similar in that we expect students to develop an appreciation for how science works, but the student preparation, teaching methods, and anticipated outcomes differ

considerably. The information which follows is a composite of this course as it has been taught within the last year.

As the name of the course indicates, a primary objective of this course is to develop an appreciation for the role of science in society, realizing that as important as science is, it's role is poorly understood by much of society. Therefore, this course seeks to improve the student's understanding of how science works (a concept introduced in Sci 150), but now, placing more emphasis on the interaction between science and society.

The course objectives are to:

- stimulate critical thinking.

- develop an understanding of data, how it is collected, used (and abused), and reported. [Science must recognize the existence of natural variability. How do scientists deal with it?]

- investigate interrelations between science and society. [What is the role of society in directing scientific research? What is the responsibility of science to society? What are the ethics of science? Why is it important for all citizens to have some level of scientific literacy (as well as ethical, moral, political, and economic concerns and standards).]

- understand science as a "way of knowing." [Realize that science has controversy, that it is not just "a body of facts." Understand how new knowledge is gained.]

A number of interesting techniques have evolved to address these objectives. One of the more interesting ones is use of the card game "Eleusis" to simulate scientific inquiry. For those not familiar with this game, it is a very unique card game that requires both inductive and deductive reasoning. Briefly, a dealer establishes a secret rule demonstrated by a play of cards; other players make hypotheses about the secret rule and play cards to test it. For those

The Role of the College of Science, Donald W. Fiesinger

unfamiliar with the game, I would recommend an article by Romesburg (1979) which describes Eleusis, its analogy to the scientific method, and its effectiveness in reinforcing science teaching.

Another exercise used early in the course is the demonstration of the difference between "feeling" and "knowing." Two presentations are given on the same topic (either by the instructor or by two faculty), one reflecting a "feeling-oriented" argument while the other is "data -oriented." This is then followed by a discussion of what transpired and how well each position or argument was substantiated.

Advertising has been used as a means to foster critical thinking. For example, an issue of "Consumer Reports" which evaluated dish -washing liquids, was used and compared with claims made in TV commercials and magazine advertisements. After discussion, students devised an experiment to further evaluate claims. With "subtle" guidance from the instructor, students defined the problem, set up the experiment, collected data, and wrote up results. Sufficient data was obtained to lead into a discussion of variability, the need for understanding basic statistics, and what is meant by terms such as "best" and "good" in product advertising. Questions arose over the validity and significance of personal endorsements and opinion polls.

Concepts of data collection, variability in measurements, and the need for statistics have been developed using an exercise as simple as giving students 6" rulers and having them measure the length of a 6' or 8' table.

Introducing the interaction of science and society relies heavily on outside readings in the "not-so-technical" scientific literature, such as weekly news magazines, science sections of major newspapers, "New Scientist," "National Geographic," "Omni," "Discover," "American

To provide additional meaning to the interaction of science and society, one faculty member uses a mock town meeting. This places students in a number of different roles and forces them to see the many facets of a single issue. A case study is presented (such as use of salt on highways vs. loss of roadside habitat or use of pesticides vs. impact on humans), a scenario is established, some statistical data presented, and possible questions for the town meeting posed:

- Are arguments presented by conflicting sides based on opinions or facts? (and how can you tell the difference?)

- Of the statements which are facts, how do you know which ones are certainly true, probably true, or possibly not true?

- What are the "trade-offs," costs versus benefits, of a particular course of action? Is the "trade-off" worthwhile?

- Research the topic in current magazines and newspapers. How much agreement (or disagreement) do you find in these various sources? How do you decide what to believe when you find conflicting statements?

- Are there legitimate concerns on both sides of the issue? Are there objective reasons for citizens to oppose the issue?

- Are there alternatives available? How are alternatives presented and who has the obligation to present them?

Students are divided into groups representing the Town Board, a Sierra -type club or environmental watch group, local businesses or industries to be negatively (or positively) impacted, concerned citizens, etc. The members of the Town Board must conclude the meeting with either endorsement or rejection and defend their position. This makes for very interesting interactions.

Later in the course, students are required to make presentations on an STS topic of their own choosing. To "sustain" student interest, each student must provide a peer review of another student's presentation and turn in a report prior to the formal class presentation. The presentation should relate the topic to science, technology, environment, law, politics, ethics, religion, and/or economics. The student must introduce the topic, present data and interpretation, present societal concerns, and discuss possible resolutions to conflicts or problems posed. The presentation must conclude with a device to stimulate discussion. In one class the presentations conclude with a vote requiring a decision as "informed citizens." Questions that might be addressed in the preparation of these presentations include the following:

- Of what value to society is a public scientifically informed about this topic?

- What are the ramifications of the topic and what are the current attitudes of the public toward the topic on the local, regional, national, or global scale with respect to science, technology, law, politics, etc.?

- How sound are the scientific data which gave rise to the public attitudes expressed above? Has the topic been sufficiently researched? Was the research objective? Was the research supported by a disinterested party? Who stands to benefit from solutions to the problems? (and how?)

- Are scientists in agreement about the topic with respect to cause and effect, seriousness, and best solutions? What is the basis for any disagreements?

- What is the chronology of the topic? Did the problem only recently develop or has it been present (but unrecognized, or "not a problem") for centuries, thousands of years, or millions of years? What is the impact of technology on the topic?

- Identify the basic science and technology related to the topic. What

are the limits to problem solving, scientific discovery, technology, etc. as related to the topic?

- Examine the impact of societal concerns on research, application of technology, problem solving, and decision making as related to the topic.

- What action should be taken by concerned responsible citizens?

- Use costs versus benefit analysis to critically examine your findings. What are the two most obvious trade-offs? Are economic considerations too weighted? Are present benefits to be offset by future costs? Are material values given more consideration than other values?

Because the presentations are to stimulate knowledgeable discussion of the topic, students must provide a reading list for classmates one week prior to their presentation. The presentations are graded on the basis of the clarity of statement of the topic, the scientific component of the discussion, the STS interactions with presentation of opposing view points, and attempts to stimulate discussion. Consideration is also given to the logic and the quality of the presentation (language skills, correct use of grammar, eye contact, etc.).

The course concludes with a final exam and here again we find a number of different techniques used. One faculty member has produced a number of files on "STS" issues, such as use of "untested" food additives, downstream pollution, environmental hazards and government regulations, and testing new drugs on humans. Each file contains an introductory narrative, a few selected readings, and a series of questions (not unlike those posed for the presentations). The files are placed on reserve in the university library and students select a topic of interest and complete the questions as a take-home exam.

Summary

What I have attempted to do today is show you some of the efforts that have been made by the faculty in the USU College of Science in collaboration with the Liberal Arts and Sciences Program. These efforts have not been overnight successes nor have they been universally embraced by all faculty and students. Simply put, they represent our best response for the time, resources, and personnel available. A major benefit of these efforts has been the renewed interest among faculty in the way we teach rather than just what we teach. Departments have not been fully compensated for faculty time except when extraordinary resources have become available, such as a curriculum development grant or discretionary funding from the College.

With respect to student credit hours (SCH), the College of Science accrues no benefits from SCH. Consequently, the SCH from Sci 430 goes to the respective instructor's department whereas SCH for Sci 150 is divided equally among the 6 departments in the college. p

Acknowledgments

The development of the courses described within this report is the result of the efforts of a large number of faculty from the College of Science. Two individuals have made outstanding contributions to these efforts and deserve special recognition: Peter T. Kolesar of the Geology Department and Richard J. Mueller of the Biology Department, the two Sci 430 instructors for 1992-94. I would recommend that any inquiries for further information about the course Sci 430 "Science in Society" be directed to: Peter T. Kolesar, Dept. of Geology, Utah State University, Logan, UT 843224505, (801)

797-3282,[Internet: PETES@CC.USU.EDU].

References

Newton, DE., 1992, Science and social issues : J. Weston Walch, Publisher, Portland, ME, 235 p. (distributed by Instructional Horizons, Inc., 297 Addison St., San Francisco, CA 941312624)

Romesburg, H.C., 1979, Simulating scientific inquiry with the card game Eleusis: Science Education, V. 63, p.599-608.

Donald W. Fiesinger Dept. of Geology Utah State University Logan, UT 84322-4505 (801) 797-1274 Internet: FATAQ@CC.USU.EDU

The Role of the College of Science, Donald W. Fiesinger

University of Texas at Austin

A Radical Look at Curriculum Reform

in a Multicultural Era

his essay is just what the

n the disciplines and the core that have always been present, even if unnoticed. Because of the questions it raises and the tensions it revealsnot creates, but revealsmulticulturalism is at the heart of this discussion about disciplines and the core.

Exhibit B: Knives: Disciplines and

their Cutting Edges

Disciplines develop through research. Research changes our knowledge and thus is always putting the ways things areincluding the way the core isat risk of change. In addition, research interests are specialized. Cutting edges, by definition, are narrow. If you're a scholar who's spent years understanding the nuances of a particular 30-year period of Irish literature, to "cover" "world literature" in a freshman core course can feel ridiculous at best and, at worst, painfully unprofessional. Every generalization is a kind of lie, and a course with broad coverage is of necessity full of such lying by omission.

Scholars, who value depth of knowledge, must act counter to this value if they teach the Divine Comedy in a world literature core course when they don't know Italian or any of the research in the field. It's not surprising, then, that research universities are typically more resistant to core curricula than colleges, or that the alternative to core coursesarea requirementswas a reform

T

26

al arts honors degree program with a core curriculum that has been in place for over fifty years; helping to create the legislatively mandated core curriculum of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board; and writing global scenarios for Shell International in Londonthe future of the world for the next 30 years.

Exhibit A: Cores

A core is the center of somethingthe core of an apple, for example. So when we call a set of courses a "core curriculum," we are acknowledging these courses to be the center of the education we're offering our students.

But what makes these courses central? Typically, two things: commonality and culture. We think of core courses as teaching what everyone ought to know, what we ought to be able to assume is common knowledge. And we tend to think that what everyone ought to know is the best that has been thought and spoken in our culture, plus geography, math, and some exposure to science and the scientific method.

Now along comes something called "multiculturalism," and the whole apple cart is upset. I'm over-dramatizing, of coursebut not by too much, because this new element in the conversation about curriculum raises questions about the nature of the core itself, and exposes tensions betwee

title suggestsa look at curriculum reform, not an argument, or a history, or a suggested core curriculum, even though it might sound like each of these at times. It's radical because it attempts to look at the root of things. ("Radical" means "of or pertaining to a root.") It's a look because it is organized around four central images, or "exhibits": cores, knives, temples, and seeds.

The debate about multiculturalism can almost always be heard in the background, and is foregrounded when needed for particular points, although my subject is not the debate itself. I feel I need to say this in order not to be misunderstood as I lift and drop and lift and drop this terribly sensitive subject. As an academic, deeply devoted to higher education, I feel a kind of gratitude for the way this debate has raised fundamental issues in a new way.

Following are some of the fundamental issues, as I see them from the vantage point of a liberal arts faculty member with four other relevant assignments during the past decade: serving as associate dean of graduate studies, which gave me an overview of the differing concerns of various disciplines in my institution; serving as director of a liber

nationally popularized by a research university, Harvard.

The cafeteria corethat is, specifying area requirements rather than specific core coursesallows faculty to offer courses in their own research disciplines, which, it can be argued, encourages better teaching as well as learning on the cutting edge for the students. Of course, the cafeteria core has its drawbacks, too: students may come away with an arbitrary collection of specialized courses and no general context in which to place them, or no way to connect any course they've taken to any other course.

The conversation about a core curriculum arose, in part, in response to this lack of connection and to the absence of any common knowledge among college graduates. We have very little sense these days about what it means to be an educated person. Gone are the days when a John Stuart Mill could know just about everything about anything considered worth knowing. So does an educated person know a lot about a little? Or a little about a lot? And given that the lot to know grows exponentially every year, what part of all that lot is an educated person accountable for?

Until quite recently, our discussions about the core curriculum usually just ignored these fundamental issues. Most of the time we looked at core curricula that had been used in the past and tinkered with them a bit, using a humanities version of "back to basics" language, or we talked about a "classic core curriculum." Programs like Plan II at the University of Texas received numerous calls from administrators across the country, in part because we had kept the same basic core curriculum for over fifty yearsat least in terms of course titles. What's happened within those courses is another matter. But on the surface, we have a classic core curriculum that is so old-fashioned, it's come into fashion again in that typical pendulum -swing reactiveness of reform

movements.

In fact, core curriculum reform might simply have produced another round of "back to basics" had it not been for the fundamental question now being raised by multiculturalism: how do we talk about a coreabout culture and commonalityin a multicultural society in which we appear to have less and less in common?

One standard response is to ignore the question. Instead of completely rethinking what a core curriculum might mean, given this new awareness of our context, many of us simply add a "multicultural dimension" to the curriculum, or designate courses we're already teaching as fulfilling a "multicultural requirement." Some of us also might try to add a new multicultural course or two to the required core.

But, at least in some universities, where the conversation about educational policy is carried on among the various disciplines rather than among administrators, the issue of a "multicultural requirement" implicitly raises other questions related to the very mission of the university.

Exhibit C: Temples

What is a university for? Until relatively recently, universities were temples for the passing on of culture to future leaders of society. A "liberal" education was reserved for gentlemen, those who were free from the necessity of labor.

The university is still held accountable for producing leaders and for passing on the culturebut now more than ever, its mission also includes the advancement of knowledge, including the training of students who are dedicated to advancing knowledge in the disciplines. In that sense, the university is still an elite institution, not expressly designed for the general good of all individuals, except indirectly, through its contributions to research and

Cores, Knives, Temples, and Seeds, Betty S. Flowers

leadership, both of which benefit society as a whole. Perhaps of necessity, faculty members in a research university pledge their primary allegiance to their research disciplines and to those students also dedicated to the disciplines, not to the university as a whole. This has profound consequences for core curriculum reform.

For example, part of the argument supporting the cafeteria core is that the kind of generalized learning a classic core represents should be a function of high school, especially for the kind of bright, able students we recruit for our universities. This argument, however, is usually made on behalf of one's own discipline. Science and engineering faculty tend to complain that their colleagues in liberal arts disciplines are not offering enough basic history, literature, and writing courses, while liberal arts faculty see no reason why they should be responsible for the literacy of all students when science and engineering faculty do not accept the responsibility of numeracy for all students. And if the core is so important, why should the relatively underfunded liberal arts side of the university be required to spend disciplinary energy on general education?

Even popular culture has picked up this internal conversation, although, typically, it goes for personalities rather than ideas, portraying scientific faculty as too specialized to care about undergraduate education, and humanities faculty as too self-indulgent to do anything about important core courses except to use them to convey pet theories.

But these caricatures miss the real issues raised by the multiculturalism debate. The first is that multiculturalism per se is not a discipline. There is no body of knowledge or evolution of research methodology or peer review or anything else that makes up a discipline known as

Betty S. Flowers, Cores, Knives, Temples, and Seeds

The second issue arises from the first. Given its lack of disciplinary status, multiculturalism or multicultural courses have no natural pool of adequate resources at hand, whether in faculty, resource materials, or time. For the disciplines, time is perhaps the most important, even if it is the least obvious to those outside the disciplines. Engineering students, for example, have to take so many courses to satisfy requirements for their discipline that they have almost no room at all for a core curriculum, much less electives. An additional course can be a real hardship. Substitution of African-American history for Western Civilization to fulfill a core history requirement (a typical kind of worst-case scenario often presented by people opposed to adding any required courses) seems to cut at the idea of the core and takes us back to the worst aspects of cafeterianism. Thus, the debate about a multiculturalism requirement in the core not only highlights the role of the disciplines, but also suggests that the intellectual resources for curriculum reform must come from the evolution of the disciplines themselves.

This leads to the third important issue concerning the disciplines and the core: the past just isn't what it used to be. It used to be that cores evolved slowly, with a book or course being added or dropped every few years or so to make room for a new priority or a new research emphasis in a particular discipline. In this way, the temple of learning has always been a little bit like the temple of Janus, with its double-faced god looking in both directions at onceto the past for "the best that

has been thought and spoken" and to the future, by way of cutting-edge research. The working model relied on a liberal arts core to convey the culture of the past to undergraduates, and a scientific research mission oriented toward graduate students.

But a surprising thing happened in the liberal arts disciplines. When the composition of the faculty began to change, so did the stories of the past. For example, women began to wonder how they got left out of the story of the past, and so they began to look around in different source material such as diaries of so-called ordinary peopleand to employ different research methods and to ask different questions. African-American scholars began to tell a different story about our origins as Americans, as did Hispanic scholars. The stories of a few, whether king or hero, began to give way to the stories of the many. And the old story of the past, the story that informs the traditional core curriculum, began to look more like a sub-discipline and not the storythe coreitself. For example, the story of Columbus could no longer be told as "our story." In fact, the collective "we" seems to have no common story at the moment to pass on to students, and multiculturalism, the gadfly in the core, reminds us of that fact by its very existence. Or, to use another image: multiculturalism reveals not that the emperor has no clothes, but that the clothes have no emperor, no central animating authority to provide continuity and coherence from one costume or course to the next.

Without an authoritative past, all kinds of questions arise. For example, what besides tradition puts Western civilization in the core when it's arguably more important to know about the history of Japan than Henry the Navigator? Why is the Odyssey so often part of the core and not scientific method, or computer literacy, or basic statistical understanding, or technology and its relation to economic

developmentall of which, it could be argued, are closer to the core of our current culture than Homer? Why is the core almost always defined in terms of the liberal arts, when what we need to have in common these days is the capacity to surf on the internet?

Let me summarize what I've said so far in a slightly different way: Multiculturalism, with its lack of disciplinary status and resources, has brought into the open the relation of the disciplines to the core, and at the same time has foregrounded the diversity revealed by new disciplinary research. This perceived diversity has led us to question the traditional, core story about who we are.

Some of us, aware that the story we used to tell about the past no longer has its old authority, appeal to Newman's idea that a cultivated intellect is a good in itself. That argument for a core curriculum still contains within it the invitation to a radical conversation, a conversation about roots. What do we mean these days by a "cultivated intellect?" At this point someone usually chimes in with the reminder that Hitler's henchmen had studied the classics.

Another argument for the core appeals to the value we place on "the best that has been thought and spoken." But this appeal is essentially an appeal to aesthetics, and a radical conversation about aesthetics seems even less likely to occur than a conversation about the cultivated intellect.

That's what it looks like from within the temple. Now let me tell this story again from outside the templefrom what we academics are fond of calling "the naive perspective." I'll use my own discipline, literature, as the example in this story, but I could tell a similar story about other core disciplines. This is what people outside the temple used to think was going on insideand what some people still assume does go on.

Before the inclusiveness of our

cultural heritage began to be questioned, the teaching of literature served two purposes, one public, and one private. The public purpose was community building. Critics speaking from the margin might point out that the underlying purpose was the building of an elite community. Even if these critics are right about the nature of the community, the process of community building was the same. Literature expressed our values and moved us to feel them, to have experiences that embodied them. Perhaps if we could weep with Hecuba, we might be moved to fulfill our public or familial obligations. If we could admire both the courage of Achilles and the nobility of Hector, we would be prepared to call forth the best from within ourselves when we were tested and to sacrifice ourselves for a larger cause. Literature provided models that stirred us to emulation and experiences that deepened our compassion.

The private purpose for the inclusion of literature in the curriculum, the one that gradually began to supersede the public purpose, was the enlargement of the capacity for individual freedom. Many heroes of western literature enact the familiar drama of breaking away from society in order, eventually, to redeem or reform it, or, at the least, to expose its flaws. By courageously breaking away from the accepted norm, the individual found a deeper truth. And by reading these stories of individual courage, the reader was given a personal mandate for expressing hisand sometimes herindividuality. We valued skill in reading literature because we believed it developed our human capacity to imagine something different.

To some extent, the public purpose of socialization and the private purpose of liberation were contradictoryand that is one reason why literature classes traditionally spawned lively discussions about values and decisions. It may be hard

to believe now, but we talked about the characters as if they were real people, who could be judged and even loved.

The state of academic knowledge is different now. We study characters as constructs of language, and we are told that even the self is a social construct. We know that the philosophical search for truth is an enterprise with no hope of an outcome. We know that history is the story told by the victor. We are even told that the literature of freedom and dignity "stands in the way of further human achievements.'' 1 Poets may agree with Wallace Stevens that "The final belief is to believe in a fiction, which you know to be a fiction, there being nothing else," 2, and philosophers may agree with Wittgenstein that "Ethics and aesthetics are one and the same," 3 but nobody has figured out how to use such ideas to hold a society together.

Of course, this is an oversimplified description of the relation between academic knowledge and implicit public values in this post -industrial, post-modern, post-literate culture. We may, however, draw one significant conclusion from this perspective on where we are now: the argument from authority is no longer persuasive. We can no longer teach certain texts simply because they've always been taught. What this means for the study of literature at all levels is that although we can encourage the process of curriculum building, we can no longer mandate the content of the curriculum.

So, without an emperor, what are we to do? How do we talk about a coreabout culture and commonalityin a multicultural society in which we appear to have less and less in common?

Exhibit D: Seeds

Here is my modest but radical proposal: if, in this multicultural moment, we have no common and usable past, why not begin to design

Cores, Knives, Temples, and Seeds, Betty S. Flowers

our core curriculum from the future? By this I mean, instead of thinking of the future as a projection of the past, we might look at the present from the perspective of the future we want. To create such a core, however, would require us to engage in those radical, or root conversations about what we value. As the old saying puts it, "If you don't know where you're going, any road will get you there." If we have no particular goals for a core curriculum, there's no point in building one.

I'm enough of a traditionalist to feel that while we may not be able to agree on a rational basis for the content of a core curriculum, we can agree on what attributes this culture wants its educational system to cultivate. In order to start such a conversation about values, I'll venture a description of what I think we Americans value most. Some of us may not agree with these values, but even so, they are a powerful unseen influence in the curriculum debate. Because the core curriculum debate for higher education must take account of core values for the entire curriculum, I have not restricted my description to colleges and universities, but have thought in terms of the goals of the entire range of educational experience.

What we want:

( 1 ) We want self-reliant, independent people who solve their own problems . We can argue that we should take better care of the dependent people in our midst, especially our children, but the fact is that we value independence more and that we have constructed our society to reward independence. This fact should make us look with a little less derision at studies that attempt to clarify the relation between self-esteem and success in education, and it should lead us to re-assess pedagogical techniques that tend to couple educational experiences with humiliation.

For example, one reason so many students dislike poetry is the

(2) We want productive people who are capable, successful, and proud of their work. Sometimes we talk about "competitiveness," but perhaps a phrase we hear more often in relation to schools is "to strive for excellence." We expect people who have learned to value this ideal in school to beat competitors in world markets.

(3) We want innovative people. We want scientists and discoverers and inventors. We value the new, especially when expressed as a product or an advance in technology.

(4) We want people who can appreciate culture . We may not be as supportive of artists as some other cultures, but we do want people who can take pleasure in human products like art and music and literature, and who are not simply addicted to consuming material goods or alcohol and drugs.

(5) We want good citizens. We value our tradition of civil disobedience even though polls show that most of the time, we don't agree with the protesters. We want our neighbors to obey the law and to respect us and our property. We want informed voters who will help preserve our democratic values and our way of life.

(6) We want parents to take responsibility for raising their children, and we want the children themselves to grow up with a sense of responsibility. We feel quite strongly about the value of the traditional family, even though statistics show that such configurations are not typical of most American families now. Even so, we want individuals to feel responsible for those nearest them.

This model is extended to the community as wellwe want individuals within the community to reach out to help those less fortunate. We value the individual impulse to do good more highly than collective solutions to general social problems. We would rather have a society of volunteers than one of social engineers.

If a core curriculum were constructed to develop these values, it would have to be shaped by pedagogical objectives rather than specific texts. More difficult yet, many of these objectives could not be measured in standard ways. That would not deter meI would rather have a classroom in which teachers and students were aiming at the very highest ideals than one in which the teacher was teaching character identification so that students could pass an objective exit test. If we could make students memorize every fact that cultured people think other people should know, they might do well on an exit testbut a year later, they wouldn't know the difference between Hamlet and omelette, and worse, they wouldn't care. If our culture makes no sense to students, if it doesn't become important to their lives, we've not accomplished our purpose.

A Curriculum that Embodies these Values:

(1) If we want self-reliant, independent people who solve their own problems , we should offer courses that produce knowledge leading to confidence in the worth of individuality and of one's own individuality.

These courses would emphasize sameness and difference. I can imagine courses offered here from the social sciences, especially history, as well as languages, geography, learning theory, and mythology. In the last twenty years, we've learned a great deal about human development and about how people learnand yet very little of this

is taught directly to students. I would look at such course proposals not simply for content but for how their designs incorporated the mandate to encourage "knowledge leading to confidence."

English courses offered in this category would be organized to stress the cultural heritage of different groups and would probably be taught historically.

(2) If we want productive people, we should offer courses that produce knowledge leading to confidence in creating expressions of one's own individuality.

Courses in written and oral communication would be especially important here, although I think students would respond well to multi -disciplinary courses that encouraged them to experiment with music and art in the same setting in which they practiced writing more effectively. Building confidence requires starting with the base students already have. Teen-age students, for example, pay a great deal of attention to self -expression in consumer goods and hairstylesand yet they see no link between themselves and their writing, or, for example, between applying focused attention to details of grammar in their essays and achieving certain very specific effects of self presentation in dress.

Rhetoric and argumentation are natural here, not as a reflection of Aristotelian thought, but as among the best ways to insure that the student's own individuality survives in a society overwhelmingly dedicated to persuasion of various sorts. Older students may not care that "All men are mortal; Socrates is a man; therefore, Socrates is mortal." But when they are introduced to the logical fallacies, they become fascinated, so eager are they to learn new ways not to be taken in. Some are then seized by the intellectual joy of building and destroying arguments, and here critical

theory can be introduced.

(3) If we want innovative people, we should offer courses that stress curiosity leading to appreciation of nature .

Science and ecology and the study of human nature belong herebut again, the emphasis is not simply on the subject matter, but on the encouragement of curiosity. Younger children are naturally curious about the human body, for example; older ones need lab experiences in science classes, even if, for practical reasons, these labs must be simulated on a computer.

(4) If we want people who can appreciate culture , we should offer courses that stress curiosity leading to appreciation of created objects.

It is more important to teach the love of poetry than the content of any particular poem. This is not to say that the love of literature can be taught only by reading texts students like. But unless we are teaching under an ideal of curiosity leading to appreciation, we will tend to introduce "great books" as texts to be covered rather than as pleasures to be discovered.

(5) If we want good citizens, we should teach courses that generate concern leading to thoughtful participation as a world citizen .

Courses in government, geography, history, and other traditional disciplines belong here. But a major emphasis in each of these courses would be the generation of concern about issues and the fostering of analysis of them rather than simply the dissemination of information.

Literature courses taught under this rubric could include the study of foundational religious texts like the Bible and the Koran as well as mythology and world literature in translation. In these courses, relatively more attention would be paid to content rather than to language and

form, as might be the case of the literature courses under "curiosity leading to joy."

(6) If we want parents who take responsibility for raising their children, we should teach courses that generate concern leading to thoughtful participation as a mentor.

We all teach simply by acting as we do. Parents teach children by precept and example. Students should be made aware of what they have been taught, of what they are teaching by example, and of what they would like to teach. The knowledge in human development and child rearing that we have recently gained should become an important part of the curriculum.

In more practical terms, students should practice teaching other students as a way of learning themselves. Credit/no credit courses in volunteerism are springing up on college campuses. Some critics argue that courses such as these simply dilute the curriculum. I would argue that if these courses are taught in conjunction with thoughtful discussion, analysis, and writing, they become a way of tying the curriculum together and of linking intellectual concerns and capacities with the problems we face in practical life. In this area we can perhaps begin to meet the injunction, "Only connect."

Summary: A core curriculum reflecting the values of our society might include the following objectives:

· Knowledge Leading to Confidence in the Worth of the Individual

· Knowledge Leading to Confidence in Expressing that Individuality

· Curiosity Leading to Appreciation of Nature

· Curiosity Leading to Appreciation of Created Objects

· Concern Leading to Thoughtful Participation as a World Citizen

· Concern Leading to Thoughtful Participation as a Mentor

Cores, Knives, Temples, and Seeds, Betty S. Flowers

A few years ago, I attended a national meeting on excellence in the liberal arts curriculum. I went from workshop to workshop listening to what professors had to say about the core curricula they were revising and what they were doing to upgrade the general education of their students. Each group of educators offered a different paradigm. What they all seemed to have in common was a challenging reading list for the studentsa not surprising result when professors get together. While I was interested in this aspect of the new models, what interested me most was that in spite of the wide diversity of new programs, in spite of the fact that many of these programs were operating on assumptions that clearly clashed with others, all of them worked.

Why is it that so many different and conflicting models of a core curriculum worked? It clearly was not the models themselves. What all these professors who were excited about their new core curricula had in common was that they had been supported by their institutions or by grants to get together to plan. They believed in what they were doing. The students felt their passionate interest and responded. In every case, students ranked the new program highly and did well on assessment testsno matter what the curriculum.

That leads me to the conclusion that the core must be constructed by the teachers of each institution, for they are the ones who should know best both their subjects and their students. Ideally, the process of creating the core brings together teachers for discussion about what is most important in what they do. We should think of the core not as a list of books but as an ongoing attempt to connect teaching with our values.

Perhaps the best general education for all students does not stress a specific mandated core curriculum as the highest priority, but the intense

The core must be developed from within, not mandated from without and it is this process of development, this dialogue among colleagues and across institutional and disciplinary boundaries, that should be supported by granting agencies.

To critics who long for this dialogue to produce a single, unified core curriculum as a reflection of what we would hope to be a unified culture, I feel compelled to say: the central heritage of our American past arises not out of a unitary cultural vision nor even out of singular visions of individuals, but out of the differing backgrounds and practices of individual communities. We are most faithful to our tradition when we support community building and the individual visions of those differing communities. We are most useful to these communities when we support conversation among them and knowledge and appreciation of our differences as well as of our shared values.

Conversations about what we value are the roots for a core in which we could find the seeds of the future. Such conversations are difficult, but not impossible, even in a secular society. We may never again be able to agree on a common story of who we arethe past has become much more interesting and diverse. But perhaps we can begin to find our commonality in the future to which we

32

aspire. As a multi-culture, perhaps we can begin to see the core, which is the heart of our curriculum, as a way of relating to each other through our diversitynot because we have a common past but because we are striving to understand how we can create a common good. p

Notes

1. "We admire people to the extent that we cannot explain what they do, and the word 'admire' then means 'marvel at.' What we may call the literature of dignity is concerned with preserving due credit. It may oppose advances in technology, including a technology of behavior, because they destroy chances to be admired and a basic analysis because it offers an alternative explanation of behavior for which the individual himself has previously been given credit. The literature thus stands in the way of further human achievements" (B. F. Skinner, Beyond Freedom and Dignity , 1971 [New York: Bantam/Vintage ed., 1972], p. 55).

2. "Adagia," Opus Posthumous (New York: Knopf, 1957), p. 163.

3. "If there is any value that does have value, it must lie outside the whole sphere of what happens and is the case. For all that happens and is the case is accidental.

What makes it non-accidental cannot lie within the world, since if it did it would itself be accidental.

It must lie outside the world.

So too it is impossible for there to be propositions of ethics.

Propositions can express nothing that is higher.

It is clear that ethics cannot be put into words.

Ethics is transcendental.

(Ethics and aesthetics are one and the same.)"

(Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus , 1921, O.F. Pears and B. F. McGuinness, trans. [London: Routledge, 1961], p. 71.)

Clyde Freeman Herreid

State University of New York at Buffalo

by Curriculum Reform

SUNY at Buffalo - A Case Study

L

et us take as a given the

rm. Moreover, as grizzled veterans of the University, they simply didn't believe that any administration or faculty would support the necessary bold changes that would be needed. Being cynics, they wouldn't play the game. It was seen as an exercise in futility.

Without science faculty input, curriculum reform was impossible. The Vice Provost's solution was creative. He asked the Dean of Natural Sciences and Mathematics to set up a committee of his faculty to deal with the question of how we at Buffalo could solve the scientific illiteracy problem. He didn't mention a word of the Undergraduate College. He asked for the Science Committee to simply think about the science teaching. The committee was rapidly assembled and the first couple of meetings went as expected.

There was the usual agonizing over the nation's ills, the blaming of our inadequacies on parents and K-12 schooling, and the proposing of national prescriptions which were largely out of our hands. Then the Science Committee got down to business. In a meeting or two they hammered out the principles and courses which might be part of a new science and math curriculum package. They didn't expect the plan to come to much. They submitted their report to the Vice Provost who seemed pleased. They thought their job was done. They had acquitted themselves

sorry plight of science education in the U.S.A. Few doubt this assertion, whether one is impressed with the results of comparing the science literacy of U.S. school children with that of other nations, or the loss of student interest in science through our nation's educational pipeline, or Miller's survey of our country's lack of scientific literacy, or the steady parade of articles by economists and politicians decrying our loss of international leadership.

Yet there are few reasons to believe that any serious reform is at hand. As always, there are instances of creative teachers producing special experiences for their students, but there are few cases of an institutional response to the problem. The nation's schools have yet to come to grips with the issue. In rare instances where something novel is being tried, few people know of these efforts and practically no information has been collected about their successes and failures. In this article, I tell of the efforts of a major public university, the State University of New York at Buffalo, in its attempt to deal with the issue of scientific illiteracy.

Nine years ago, Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education, James Bunn, had a vision: He wished to create a small college curriculum within the walls of a large public research university. He saw the need to re-invent a new liberal arts curriculum, to return to a core progra

m of course work leaving behind the cafeteria style selection of courses which made up the curriculum of so many colleges and universities as legacies of the Vietnam era of academic permissiveness.

With appropriate well wishes and seed money from his administrative superiors, he sent out invitations to senior faculty across the university to come together and explore the vision. Forty or so faculty made up the original members of this incipient Undergraduate College. Over months, they began to formulate their mission, define the goals and discuss possible courses. One group was largely absent from this process: the scientists. With one exception, no one from the National Sciences and Mathematics or from the Health Sciences faculties volunteered to be part of this process.

Why were the scientists absent? First and foremost in their eyes, research had a higher priority than teaching. Anyone seen contributing to these discussions clearly had their priorities wrong. After all, we were a research university, weren't we? This argument, while compelling to most scientists, did not explain the absence of the great science teachers who were also loathe to get involved. They stated they did not have the long term tolerance for the interminable philosophical discussions on education and curriculum that they knew would be necessary for curriculum refo

33

Clyde Herreid, Science Literacy by Curriculum Reform

(2) They assume that students have a math, statistics or computer science background.

(3) They focus on both content and process. That is, their goal is to teach the terms, concepts and principles of the field as well as showing how the scientists of the discipline make discoveries.

(4) They will show the impact of technology on the field and show how the field affects society.

(5) They will not survey all parts of the discipline, but will focus upon only a few fundamental concepts. "Less is more" is the rallying cry.

(6) The laboratories will have an emphasis upon simplicity teaching experimental design, data collection and analysis.

(7) The laboratories will be inexpensive, not solely for the financial advant

SUNY/Buffalo

Math/Science Requirements for Non-Science Majors

(6 semesters)

1st Yr. Mathematics (2 semesters)

Mathematics, Computer Science, or Statistics

2nd Yr. Basic Science (2 semesters w/1 lab)

Astronomy Chemistry

Geology Physics

Biology

3rd or 4th Yr. Great Discoveries in Science (1 semester)

Microworld Macroworld

Quantum Physics Cosmology

Atomic Theory Plate Tectonics

Molecular Genetics Evolution

3rd or 4th Yr. Scientific Inquiry (1 semester)

Case studies in Science

Figure 1

34

age, but because many principles are better taught if fancy equipment is not involved. They are more likely to be "Mr. Wizard" experiences than involve the use of mass spectroscopy.

(8) The laboratories do not have to follow traditional patterns but may involve field work and experiments at home ("kitchen experiments," or "experiments in a zip-locked bag"). They may be case study experiences and discussions. The term laboratory is probably not appropriate. The alternative word "practicum" has been suggested. We are looking for "experimental learning," " hands-on" work, "reality-based" experiences.

The Upper Division Courses

The most unique feature of Buffalo's Science Curriculum is its two required upper division courses,"Great Discoveries in Science" and "Scientific Inquiry." They are single semester courses taken as either juniors or seniors, preferably in the order shown in Figure 1. Great Discoveries was designed to cover

Or

Or

well with a minimum of posturing, philosophizing and pontificating. They went back to their laboratories.

Of course, the Vice Provost wasn't through with them, nor was his successor, or the Undergraduate College or the Faculty Senate. The scientists had to argue and defend their proposal with ever deepening commitments. A few years later they turned around to find their original proposal largely intact, and it was soon part of the Undergraduate College's new undergraduate requirements for all entering freshmen in arts and sciences in the fall of 1992. A new era in science education had begun at Buffalo.

Buffalo's Science and Mathematics Curriculum

Arguably, Buffalo has the most extensive science and mathematics requirements in the country. It consists of six courses of work and 21 semester hours of credit. Figure 1 shows the highlights. The program consists of a year of mathematics which will be typically taken in the Freshman year. This may be either traditional mathematics such as calculus, or may be statistics or computer science. Obviously, these experiences are not equivalent but they allow different options for students with different career plans.

In the second year, students take a two semester sequence of a basic science course including one semester with laboratory. Although traditional courses in biology, chemistry, physics, and geology will fulfill the requirements, special courses are being developed to fit the needs of the non -science major. They are not watered down versions of typical major courses. In fact, some faculty argue these courses are the preferred way to teach all students.

The new courses have several characteristics:

(1) They are an in-depth look at a single area of sc

Science Literacy by Curriculum Reform, Clyde Herreid

three of the great paradigms of science. Its scope is more limited than a similarly named course at the University of Denver. There are two versions of our Great Discoveries course: Macroworld and Microworld. In Macroworld the paradigms are the Big Bang Model of the Universe, Plate Tectonics, and Evolution. These are large scale events in time and space. The Macroworld paradigms are largely historical and observational in the collection of data. They examine the fundamental question, "How did things come to be?"

In Microworld the paradigms are Quantum Physics, Atomic Theory and Molecular Bonding, and the Central Dogma of Molecular Genetics. These deal with small scale events in time and space. The Microworld paradigms are largely experimental in terms of data collection. They tend to deal with the fundamental question, "How do things work?" In both courses, students obviously learn the essential content of the Macroworld and Microworld paradigms, but they get other insights. Each course looks at the historical and sociological development of the idea: i.e., students hear about the views that preceded our current models, the observations and experiments that forced us to abandon the old paradigms, the people involved in making the discoveries, the problems that the new paradigm solved, and the problems which are not yet resolved. In short, we follow Thomas Kuhn's approach described in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.

Why were these paradigms chosen? The concepts were obviously large and comprehensive enough that they represented the major paradigms of our sciences of biology, physics, chemistry and geology. They were not ideas which would likely be superseded in the life-time of the student. The discoveries that students would read or hear about over the years could easily be fit into the framework of the paradigm. Also, the paradigms

conceptually fit together, the topics deal with similar philosophical issues or the ideas in one paradigm help explain ideas in another paradigm.

Which Great Discovery course will a student take? This is determined by their choice of a basic science course. If they took a course in physics or chemistry as sophomores, they would be assumed to have a good understanding of Microworld types of science. Consequently, to gain experience in other scientific approaches they must take Macroworld. On the other hand, if they took a course in astronomy, geology or environmental biology, they would have to take Microworld. The integrated program is designed to guarantee exposure to a broad base of scientific content by coupling together a detailed hands-on experience in one field with a focused look at 3 paradigms with a different type of approach.

"Scientific Inquiry" was planned to show how scientists actually do their jobs. Most science courses, especially those for nonscientists, do not effectively communicate this element of science. Their misconceptions about the process of science may be enormous. They usually have no idea how long it takes to run an experiment, the difficulty in planning an experiment, collecting data or analyzing it. They have only vague ideas about how papers are written, how mistakes can be made, why experiments on data can be ambiguous, or the need for experimental replication. They are misled by the kind of experiences they have in their student laboratories which are not novel or even discovery-based but are descriptive, demonstrative, and confirmatory in nature. This is practically the antithesis of a researcher's experiences in a laboratory. It is no wonder that students are apt to be bored and confused. The boredom exists because their is little element of surprise. The confusion

exists because they believe science is confirmatory. Students do not understand how discoveries are made. Solutions seem to drop from the sky. They are confused about the differences in "textbook science" and "frontier science." Textbook science is largely settled. As presented by most authors, there are facts and principles to be learned and appreciated. Hence, student labs are logically similar.

Students have little understanding of the confusion, discipline, patience, tedium or excitement in the day of an average scientist trying to inch his or her way toward the solution of a mundane problem. They do not understand the humanness of the process. So they can't understand how scientists make mistakes, how they can contradict one another or why we don't know the answers to problems. They are easily misled by statements by pseudo-scientists. They don't understand why we must have basic research rather than only applied research. Scientific Inquiry was designed to bring a sense of the real process of sciences to the students and to help them develop skills in critical thinking about science.

We choose to use case studies in science to reach these goals. The ideal cases come from "frontier science", reports of "discoveries" making it into newspapers or on T.V. Cases involve public policy issues and implications. Thus, these cases have immediacy and relevance built into them. The cases are not to be settled issues, so that scientists are seen grappling with differences of opinion and uncertainty. Inadequate experiments and fragmentary data are the norm.

Cases involving AIDS, cancer and smoking, global warming, toxic waste disposal, endangered species, acid rain, DNA fingerprinting, genetics and homosexuality and cold fusion are ideal. To summarize, the course's emphasis is to expose students to the process of science rather than its content.

Clyde Herreid, Science Literacy by Curriculum Reform

Progress and Problems

Development and planning of courses have proceeded unevenly. As committees have wrangled and chairs have pleaded for resources, we have been fortunate to have received a U. S. Department of Education grant. This award from the Fund for the Improvement of Post Secondary Education (FIPSE) allowed us to set up a training program for faculty who would teach Microworld, Macro-world and Scientific Inquiry. The grant was of psychological as well as practical importance. On many occasions in the final public debates about the merit of the curriculum, the FIPSE Award was cited as evidence that people outside Buffalo believed in our program. It is problematic whether the science program could have survived intact without FIPSE support.

The FIPSE grant provided summer support for a couple of dozen faculty to pass through a training program to teach our novel courses. As part of the program we hired students to act as critics of faculty lectures, demonstrations, case studies and discussions. This unique approach was widely hailed by participants as the ideal way to try out novel teaching methods and new course material.

Coming out of the summer faculty workshop were teams of faculty prepared to teach pilot versions of the courses. As a result, over the past three years we have sorted out many of the glitches and problems. It is obvious that it is too early to tell what the impact of the new curriculum will be. We have had good evaluations on individual courses but until the entire curriculum has been in place for several years, we will not be able to know the educational benefits of the program.

But today three benefits seem evident. One, numerous faculty from different departments are actively

36

talking together in ways that were previously absent. New friends and new collaborations have developed. Two, faculty exposed to new teaching methods in the summer workshop are now teaching science in new ways. They are trying out cooperative learning, team learning, and case studies even in their traditional classes with great success. Three, we have solved an external problem facing all general education courses: poor attendance. Whereas, absenteeism is as high as 33% to 50% in general education classes, in the new courses it has dropped to 5% to 10%. Maybe we're doing something right. p

f we want to answer the

I

y, it changes. I leave every classroom, changed in some way. My knowledge is altered. I acquire new knowledge just because a process has occurred.

By the way, do you know how the Industrial Revolution culminated? The faculty at the University of Glasgow had a demonstration model of the Newcomen Steam Engine to teach students about steam power in their natural philosophy class. In 1763 the model needed an overhaul so they went to their young instrument maker.

Of course the instrument maker's name was James Watt. His natural curiosity changed steam power and it changed Western Civilization beyond recognition. That's the kind of synergy that should flow from the classroom and so seldom does these days.

But a good classroom does still more. It also changes the preservation of knowledge. Teaching is winnowing. You see, ever more clearly, what part of knowledge is gold and what part is dross. Teaching is where preservation begins. Preservation continues with the students themselves. Surely the most important facet of preserving knowledge is the part where we embed it in our successive generations.

Let's apply this parsing to research. The word itself is confusing. Why don't we use the word search to describe the quest for new knowledge? We don't; we put the prefix re in front of it. The word suggests we're plowing over ground other people have already tilled.

Yet, research does involve

John H. Lienhard

University of Houston

question, "What's an appropriate University Core?" we have to back up. Let's begin with the question, "What's a bachelor's degree?" For that is the single first degree we give, and we give it to all our students. "Baccalaureate" becomes a fit metaphor for much that we do wrong.

The word "bachelor" traces to the 14th century. The word "bac-calaureate," by the way, is simply a Latinized version of the English word bachelor. Bachelor comes first. Baccalaureate is just a made-up word. It's the kind of academic fancification we so often confuse with reality. The word Baccalaureate becomes a kind of metaphor for much that we do wrong.

Now: we've always used the word bachelor for our first level of university certification. By long tradition, it's always meant a person grounded in the Liberal Arts. And the Liberal Arts is the body of knowledge meant to prepare anyone for the role of a free citizen in a free society. That's what universities tried to achieve in the 14th century. I hope it's what we're still trying to achieve today.

And how do we accomplish Liberal Educationthis education to give us the freedom to make choices? We use something called the University. Trouble is, the universitythe place where we execute this primal functionis a place were we also execute a bewildering array of related functions.

I don't think there's much hope of sorting out Liberal Education if we can't first say, in clear terms, what the Univ

ersity itself is all about. Let's talk about that first.

The University, any university, has only one purposeonly one. All we do must be measured against one and only one purpose. Our sole purpose is: The acquisition, dissemination, and preservation of knowledge. Anything that doesn't serve that purpose is not our business. And I also firmly believe that everything we do has to reflect all three parts of that purpose.

Universities everywhere reduce this simple and obvious objective to a terrible uninformative mantra. It goes: "teaching-research-and-service teaching-research-and-serviceteaching-research-and-service." The problem with this version is that it can mean anything. We break what we do down into these three pieces. Then we play with the pieces and forget to re -assemble them.

Our threefold charge has to be recast in terms of knowledge and nothing but knowledge. Our only reason for beingis to acquire, disseminate, and preserve knowledge.

And remember, I've also asserted that anything we do must reflect all three partsacquisition, dissemination, and preservation.

Once you parse things this way, teaching, research, and service take on a whole different coloration. At first blush, you might take teaching to be a matter of pure dissemination. But it isn'tnot when you do it well. I acquire new knowledge every time I walk into the classroom. When I hold what I know up to the lens of student curiosit

37

John H. Lienhard, What is a Bachelor's Degree?

Our College of Optometry runs a large clinical facility. The purpose is to train students. It serves not only the dissemination of knowledge, but the acquisition and preservation of knowledge as well. The people in optometry are very clear that their clinic only exists to serve knowledge -based objectives. Sure, people's eyes are treated inexpensively, but that by itself would never justify the existence of the clinic at a university.

I think we have to apply tests like this to all the things we do. We define the university by what we do. If we stop weighing our activities against such tests, then we let the academy drift until it turns into some kind of ill-defined monster.

I want to say something more about the preservation of knowledge. Since it's the function we always think of last, maybe it's the function I should stress hardest. Thomas Carlyle was content to call the university, simply a collection of books. I take his " books" as a metaphor for preserving knowledge. It's our failure to remember that does the worst mischief to the academy. We acquire knowledge, then we forget it.

Yesterday, Carol Schneider said something very important to me. She said that students who haven't learned to care about what they've learned haven't learned. That's what I mean by forgetting. And it's not just the students. We constantly replicate last year's research because we forget that someone else already did it. Look at the acid paper books of the 19th centurythat intellectual treasure! We're letting it rot away and be lost in

reworking. I've spent the last six years studying the most primary form of knowledge acquisitionthe process of creative invention.

What I've found is that the great inventors and scientists are very well informed. At the same time they search the inside of their heads for ideas, they search the external world for possibility. Invention is recognizing ideas out of context. And you can't do that until you know some contexts. In that sense, research in any field ties intimately with both dissemination and improved preservation of knowledge. Once we parse research against the clean yardstick of knowledge, several things change.

Most of us have a hard time separating research from the outward markers we use to judge promotion and tenure. When some people say research, they think of publication in certain periodicals or in certain presses. I've actually heard some administrators apply the word research to extramural funding. Talk about absurdity! That reminds me of the man who tried to heat up his living room by holding a match under the thermostat.

So what is research, really? Research is reordering knowledge. That's one important way we preserve knowledge into the future. It's also acquiring new knowledge. And it's telling people about that reordering and acquisition. It is nothing else. It is not one thing else. Extramural funding can help research, but it can also be an impediment. It's a tail that's often been known to wag the dog.

Now, how about service? That also crosses several lines. We disseminate information directly in the classroom. But we also inform a broader publicas a service. My radio program is a kind of university service to the community. But it's a dissemination service. It also represents my own reordering of knowledge, and a lot of original acquisition of knowledge. If I lose sight of thatif I let the program fall back into

our libraries without proper preservation. That's because we forget that anything not-current has any value except as an antique.

It is a consequence of Betty Sue Flowers' "Knives" (see page 26) that we live in an eternal present. Only the last 10 minutes of recorded history means anything to us. We give no credit to a scholar for critically reviewing scientific research over the last 30 years. Most research done in 1960 might just as well not have been done at all. We encourage students to resell their textbooks because we figure there's nothing in them they'll need to know to get a grade in the next course. In other words, once we remove the forgotten preservation function from our handling of knowledge, we might as well forget acquisition and dissemination as well.

Finally, an example of what I mean by testing our teaching against this tripartite objective: Yesterday, at Carol Schneider's session, there was a lively discussion of the dangers of calling on students to reveal themselves subjectively. I think everyone agreed that it was an important and effective means for causing students to grow intellectually. Yet it is a dangerous thing to do. We are not, after all, trained psychotherapists. We provide trained people for students who need them.

I think my statement of objective covers this problem. My objective in the classroom is to acquire, disseminate, and preserve knowledge. I ask my students to function subjectively and creativelyto write, to design, to stretch themselves, to change. All that serves the increase of knowledge. It's only when I forget my objective that I start meddling with my student's souls.

So what I offer this morning is not a core course format. In fact, I don't think any core course format is worth a great deal by itself. After all, all courses must be Liberal Education courses. I'm about to go back into class

to teach engineering thermodynamics this Fall. That had better be liberal education or I shouldn't be doing it.

The Core is in fact a crutch to get around the fact that we aren't doing liberal education in every other course we teach. The real value of a core is that it takes us faculty back from our disciplines and forces us to rethink what we should really be doing to educate our students.

What determines whether or not students receive a Liberal Education an education to make them freeisn't institutional organization. It's what you and I do in class. And you and I will only do the right thing in class if we're very clear on why we're here in the first place. p

John H. Lienhard, What is a Bachelor's Degree?

address you on a topic I consider very dear to me and which I consider a sine qua non for university faculties, administrators and students when considering any form of curricular revision or reform in American higher education. In the past few years we have been hearing much about multicultural education, pluralism, and diversity as an evolving paradigm in the teaching of American culture and civilization at all levels. The debate has generated much controversy as we begin to asses the racial, ethnic, class, gender and linguistic differences that characterize American society in the last decade of this century. Throughout the nation, educational leaders are grappling with the dynamics of post-industrial society, galloping toward the future in a cybernetic frenzy while still mired

with the problems of structural unemployment, homelessness, inner city poverty and its attendant effects on our youth, high drop-out rates, teen pregnancy, drugs, and single parent households among most vulnerable and younger members of our society. It is not my purpose here to dwell on these issues nor purport to advance a program that will attempt to deal with these problems. Too often, education is put forward as the panacea of America's ills without considering the multiplicity of factors that come into play when analyzing even one of these problems.

I have begun with this

t is certainly a pleasure to

I

40

Antonio Nadal

Brooklyn College

introduction to establish a framework for my discussion of one of the ten courses that Brooklyn College includes in its core curriculum: Studies in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Back in 1980, when the College was deliberating what type of core it would put in place for all its students, the sturm and drang of what constituted a well rounded education in the humanities, the natural and social sciences was the topic of the day.

As might be expected, several academic and political agendas arose that eventually crystallized into a spectrum that ranged from the conventions of a traditionally Euro-centric and Western curriculum to curricular models that would highlight nontraditional areas. These include Women's Studies, area and ethnic studies, or theme-oriented offerings that focused broadly on problem- solving to study global problems such as environmental protection, the North-South developmental dichotomy in the world, multi-national corporations and their effect on national sovereignty, and quite heady topics that made for a truly rich process of discussion in the myriad cross- departmental committees that were formed.

At times, common sense did not rule the day and arcane matters of academe prevailed over such considerations as the types of students we would be teaching, levels of preparation and even literacy in the English language. Some senior faculty members blithely dismissed the

incredible transformation of the Brooklyn College campus in a mere decade.

Presently, the student population is majority foreign-born and representative of over seventy countries. What little input we got from students in designing the core, and this was most regrettable, usually came from third-generation immigrant white students who largely viewed themselves as English-speaking and American. Initially, and to some extent even now after our twelve-year experience with the core, students of color and the various ethnic groups on campus, were left out of the process. This was not out of malicious intent by the administration and faculty but is simply the reality of a student leadership that is culled from the ranks of the College's student government. These students are traditionally white ethnics of the third generation.

I do not wish to dwell further on the problems and obstacles that we encountered in establishing a core at our college, most of this is terra cognita for you by now because Professor Claster has already addressed you on the general aspects of the Brooklyn College core, so I would like to talk about the subject of the paper.

Most of the faculty and students at Brooklyn College back in 1980 agreed that if Brooklyn was to adopt a core curriculum it would be necessary to include a course or courses on what we traditionally referred to as the non -Western world. Some preferred the now obsolete term Third World, while

others opted for other conceptions such as developing, dependent or even captive nations. Eventually, and to avoid pointless discussion on what would be the most politically correct title, most of us accepted the somewhat generic "Studies in Asia, Africa and Latin America." These three areas were cited because they comprised three-fifths of the world and were largely absent in the rest of the core. A major reason for this is that by administrative design the core courses would be offered through the traditional academic departments of the College. Early on no one saw as feasible that the core curriculum of B.C. be constituted as a separate department functioning in partnership, but separate from, the other College departments. As such, Core Studies 9 (the one course on Non-Western cultures) had no institutional base. From the outset this proved to be an administrative flaw.

To ameliorate the situation, the faculty suggested that the course be coordinated by, but not be a part of, the Anthropology Department. This meant that a coordinator from that department would arrange to recruit faculty to teach the different areas of the course, develop schedules and handle day-to-day matters between students and faculty.

Given the enormity of these academic responsibilities, not to mention the delicate politics involved, it seemed much to ask of a person who had no real power to deal with entrenched and often hostile chairpeople who saw this course as a political concession to the College's minorities. Core 9's design as an inter- and multi-disciplinary course that would deal with three broad areas of the world was both a plus and a minus in the situation of our college. On the one hand, it allowed for much innovation and collaboration between departmental faculty and their areas of expertise.

The course, since its inception,

was team taught. Faculty from the social sciences, the humanities, and the natural sciences have taught in the course. Three instructors, each expert in one of the three areas of the course, would meet to coordinate modules. Typically, the Africa instructor would teach for five weeks around a series of topics or themes that would be picked up and discussed in the other two areas to afford continuity and uniformity to the course. The three instructors would carefully plan out each module and agree on readings, modes of presentation and evaluation. Each instructor would assign a short, theme driven paper and a module exam. The final examination would be comparative and comprehensive. In order to maintain continuity in the team teaching, instructors would be selected by their departments upon consultation between the coordinator and the respective departmental chairperson, usually just before the end of the Spring semester.

The College secured outside funding for special seminars that would allow prospective instructors to work during the summer in the design of their respective sections. This component of the course has had phenomenal effects. Faculty in the diverse academic areas of the College have had the opportunity to foster collegial and personal relationships that have contributed enormously to their academic growth.

In terms of cost effectiveness, Core 9 has been criticized because it features a classroom with three instructors who are both teachers as well as students. The sections are typically large, but with three instructors administrative burdens can be shared and the other two instructors may serve as mentors to their students when not teaching. The course allows for constant intellectual cross- fertilization as the team teaching teams are re-constituted given the availability of human resources. Political scientists,sociologists, anthropologists,

economists, linguists and scholars from other areas can develop in the teaching of their disciplines as they focus on the problems, issues and concerns in the developing world.

Students have generally found Core 9 to be a challenging, if not an oftentimes difficult and demanding course. In our experience, the course works best when instructors are sensitive to the diversity inherent in our students and use it to enhance the topics covered in the course. By common agreement, all instructors are now required to adapt the basic areas and themes of a generic master syllabus to the section they are teaching. But the content of each section is different and instructors are afforded the freedom to introduce and discuss topics that may be germane to the experiences of the students in those sections.

For example, students from the Caribbean, Africa, China, the Middle East, etc. are encouraged to speak of their experiences and cultural insights in discussions on race, religion, family structure and influence of geography on specific cultural patterns. Because the course can openly treat a variety of academic agendas that personally relate to our student's lives, it proves to be invaluable in the fostering of human relations on a campus that has experienced rapid and continuing racial and ethnic change.

On the other hand, and there always is another hand in academic matters that are both innovative and controversial, this course is weakened by its lack of institutional support due to its "homeless" status. This coming year it will be housed in the Judaic Studies Department and will be coordinated by the chairperson of that department. This is a considerable improvement on the past when coordinators had to negotiate with departmental chairs who were usually their seniors and outranked them. There is also the matter of continuity and uniformity. It is not easy to staff a

Antonio Nadal, Reflections on Teaching a Modular Course

Some instructors believe Core 9 to be a sort of "vacation" from teaching a full-time section and are routinely absent when their colleagues in that section are presenting, or refuse to do anything different than what they have been used to over the last 20 years. Still others view the course as a place to exercise a favorite hobby horse. For example, a two-week trip to South America in the Andes will serve as backdrop to teach about Andean cultures and their "quaint" lifestyles.

All this notwithstanding, the course continues to be the jewel in our core. In addition to all the salubrious effects it has had on the faculty and students who have been involved in it, the course has made a small but significant contribution toward the improvement of cross-cultural understanding on a campus that is as diverse as U.S. society but in microcosm. In the past few years, we are revising our core to see how other courses can be infused with the socio-cultural elements that are presented and discussed in Core 9. Majority as well as minority are well-served by infusing college courses in the social sciences and the humanities, particularly with concepts and ideas that will inform and give direction to the future leaders and educators of this society. p

42

et me begin with a long

eral education curricula that were subjected to review and given healthy doses of internationalizing medicine, though he also notes that one institution, San Diego State University, "proposed to infuse all upper division general education courses with international materials and perspectives."2 The acknowledgment of differing approaches to internationalizing curricula is made succinctly by Ann Kelleher when she observes that, "[u]ltimately, each campus decides and acts separately to internationalize."3

You will understand, I trust, if I draw my most specific illustrations not from California but from Texas A&M, but since I realize that some of you may be hesitant to set up Aggies as models, I will be careful to speak in terms of principles and paradigms as much as possible. The right beginning may be, nonetheless, to tell you, as our students say, where I'm coming from and what kinds of experiences influence my interest in this topic and my remarks today.

One of my beliefs is that one has to speak more broadly about international perspectives and internationally-oriented experiences on a campus before one can speak meaningfully of an internationalized curriculum. A university faculty cannot, in other words, simply decide to implement an international requirement in a core curriculum without having spent time developing and nurturing other and related

L

Paul A. Parrish

Texas A&M University

epigraph:

[T]aken as a whole, little has been done to position Texas colleges and universities to assist with . . . world leadership. Over the course of the past several decades, courses and programs in the liberal arts have shriveled as student interest and public funding shifted to various scientific, technological, and professional programs. Undergraduate education itself has received insufficient attention from policy makers and from college and university administrators at the highest levels.

As a result, particular programs and emphases that are very much needed to help Texas achieve the new international agenda are lacking. One sees this in the small number of students majoring in foreign languages, in the lack of a serious and sustained international component in the core curriculum, in the lack of attention paid to the study of other nations and cultures in undergraduate education, in the existence of only a few graduate programs in regional studies (Asia, Europe, Africa, Latin America, the Middle East), in the small number of scholars who are able to travel overseas, and in the lack of research money in the humanities and social sciences to assist scholars in understanding and interpreting international developments and in deepening theirand ourknowledge of foreign cultures.

So reads a portion of the 1991 document titled Texas in the 21st Century: The International Agenda , a report prepared for the Governor and Legislature of the State of Texa

s by the Texas Committee on the Humanities. I begin with this rather negative historical assessment of the standing of international study because the comments provide a useful overview of important elements I want us to consider today. The authors of the report go on to say, more optimistically, that, "[f]ortunately, there is plenty of evidence that indicates that this situation is now changing.''1

I believe that in fact the situation is changing, and I hope to offer some suggestions about how we might together propel the change so that our studentsall of our studentswill be better prepared for the interconnected world that we are already witnessing.

It is fashionable nowadays to speak of "internationalizing" or "globalizing" all kinds of thingsbe it a campus, a curriculum, or an attitude. Beginning this way. I do not mean to trivialize the concept or to divert our attention from the substance of the topic. I mean, rather, to suggest a need to define what exactly we mean by internationalizing the curriculum, which also means, surely, internationalizing the faculty and ultimately the students.

In an article published in the Phi Beta Delta International Review, Charles Jernigan of California State University, Long Beach describes the efforts of various of the nineteen campuses in the CSU system to respond to a system-wide initiative to internationalize their curricula.

He reports that most campuses focused on specific courses within the gen

43

Paul A. Parrish, Internationalizing the Core

Propelled especially by the appointment of William Mobley as President in 1988, Texas A&M has for some years worked hard to be, and to be viewed as, an institution with an international mission. That goal has become part of our official institutional mission statement and is manifest in numerous projects, collaborations, and committees that are evident throughout the campus. We have a Provost's level, university-wide committee we call the International Programs Enhancement and Coordination Committee, or IPECC.

Under the umbrella of that committee are numerous standing subcommittees, including one that I chair called the committee on Enhancing the International Dimension of Curricula (EIDC). I make no great claims about the beauty of that title, and I'm not at all sureif you are one of these people who like pronounceable acronymshow EIDC is said as a word. But the unpronounceable acronym does point to an important fact about this committee's activities, and that is that we see our task as being broadly about increasing the international agenda on the campus in a variety of ways and through several means. We are concerned with internationalizing the university's Core Curriculum, in other words, but we are attentive to related international issues as well.

Let me now suggest what I believe to be some of those supporting areas before I comment more specifically on internationalizing the core itself. Here, too, I will be reflecting on some of our recent experiences at Texas A&M while describing them in ways that will be, I hope, illustrative of opportunities on your own campuses.

These related international agenda items, as I describe them here, are as

follows: (I) infusing international perspectives throughout the university curriculum; (II) creating specific courses with an international focus, including, if relevant to your campus, courses that would be taught out of country; (III) enhancing study abroad programming and exchange opportunities; (IV) supporting foreign language programs; (V) creating international tracks within existing majors or self-standing international studies majors; (VI) providing incentives and rewards for faculty engaged in efforts to internationalize teaching and research. And seventh and last, of course, developing strategies for internationalizing the core.4

Let me enlarge on these in order.

(I) We might typically think of specific disciplines as the most promising when it comes to promoting an international agenda: history, languages, political science, business and economics, geography, for example. But to be successful the environment must speak much more broadly to international perspectives.

There are few departments that could not profitably include global perspectives within existing or newly created courses. Disciplines such as communication, agriculture, education, literature, and sociology, to cite only a few, are clearly ripe to take advantage of perspectives that will increase understanding of and appreciation for international contributions and interactions in the global village of the world. I dare say that no department need feel left out or disadvantaged in the process. I think it critical to have, as much as possible, the entire campus community buy into the value of global perspectives.

(II) Depending on the situation on your own campus, the active encouragement of new or revised courses that address an international agenda may be especially valuable. I am thinking here, for example, of those

situations in which an institution has developed close linkages with a partner institution out of the country, and specific courses might be created to enhance that relationship, particularly if the arrangement involves an opportunity for student exchanges or out-of-country study.

Or, if an institution has developed study abroad opportunities for its students, the creation of courses designed for that opportunity may be desirable. Texas A&M has a Study Center called Santa Chiara in a little villageCastiglion Fiorentinonear Florence, Italy. The College of Architecture at Texas A&M runs a fall program in Italy during which students take four field studies courses that all carry a college rather than departmental labeli.e., CARCand thus all students in that college, regardless of departmental affiliation, take these courses knowing that they will fully count toward the degree. Students in the College of Liberal Arts, or indeed any of the colleges at Texas A&M, may study in Italy in the spring or summer and take specially designed LBAR (Liberal Arts) designated courses. These also carry a college rather than departmental label and are given a catalog description broad enough so that quite literally any faculty member in the College of Liberal Arts, if given a study abroad assignment, could teach two of the courses, depending on whether her or his discipline was out of the humanities or out of the social sciences.

This is a good example of a characteristic that will be evident many times in these remarks: addressing one of the seven areas I identified earlier will often mean inevitably addressing others as well. The LBAR courses satisfy university core curriculum requirements in humanities and social sciences, and thus students enrolled in these courses have internationalized their own core regardless of whether or not the university mandates an international component.

(III) I have, as you notice, already drifted into the third itemenhancing study abroad programming and exchange opportunities. The study abroad experience can truly be a life changing one, and its impact is surely greatest when the courses and the language of instruction are identified with those of the host country. For practical reasons, it is not always possible to attain this ideal.

Texas A&M had an opportunity to seal an arrangement that would give us primary use of the facility that we have made into a Study Center in Italy, and we jumped at the chance. It would not surprise you to learn, I think, that the courses taught at the study center are Texas A&M courses taught by Texas A&M faculty to Texas A&M studentsall in English. We teach Italian in College Station and we encourage students to enroll in that class and to work on language skills while in Italy.

But the simple truth is that if we required proficiency in Italian in order for faculty to teach at Santa Chiara and some level of competency among students, we would seldom, if ever, have a program we could sustain. No more than a handful of faculty would be available to teach, and the maximum student potential would be precariously small. So we are making what I am convinced is the right decision by broadening the opportunity for faculty and students alike. Summer language programs usually provide a fuller immersion experience, and there are occasionally opportunities for language immersion experiences that go beyond language instruction itself. Next summer, TAMU will be offering for the first time a program that includes an advanced course in Spanish literature and a course in sociology, both of them to be taught in Spanish in Mexico. It is this kind of stepbuilt on the foundation of successful study abroad programs run in cooperation, in this case, with the Universidad de las Americas

(University of the Americas) in Pueblathat is representative of the deeper international experience that I believe should be our goal.

Similarly, exchange programs, in which students are enrolled and take courses in a partner institution, provide significant academic experiences, though usually for a comparatively limited number of students. In these instances, the student is typically more completely immersed, not only in the language but in the full environment, social, cultural, and academic, of the host country and institution. An important responsibility of the home institution is to assure that the student's academic work is fully applicable back home. There is no surer way to kill a promising opportunity than for studentsand parentsto believe that a semester or year overseas, even if a stimulating experience in every other way, will result in the loss of substantial progress toward a degree.

I have found, as perhaps many of you have, that a certain degree of, shall we say, creativity and flexibility is sometimes required to decide that that course taken on Goethe and Nietzsche at the University of Tubingen is indeed close enough to the Texas A&M course on German Culture and Civilization to establish an equivalence, but that is exactly the kind of decision we are often called on to make if we are to facilitate to the student's advantage the kind of foreign study experience that surely we all want to support. Sometimes "counting" a course means counting it toward the major or a support area, sometimes it means counting it toward the core. But I hope that we all have in mind a core that brings with it enough flexibility to encourage this kind of study opportunity.

(IV) If we are truly committed to internationalizing the curriculum, core or otherwise, we cannot do so without a willingness to invest significantly in language programs. From its inception

Internationalizing the Core, Paul A. Parrish

in 1988, the Texas A&M Core has included a language component, but no one would tell you that it is very strong. Indeed, students can satisfy that requirement prior to coming to the university, by taking two years of a language in high school. More recently, university committees have recommended strengthening the requirement so that some level of competency in a foreign language is required for admission to Texas A&M and something approaching fluency in another language would be required for graduation. In terms of official practice, we haven't gotten to that point yet, but the recommendations have been taken seriously. There are, of course, serious consequences from such a requirement that have to be considered, a significant one being staffing needs. Quite frankly, even with the softer language requirement presently in place for most students at Texas A&M, we find it difficult to have enough beginning language sections to meet the demand. If we implement a policy that will require all students to have two years or more of a language, someone will have to come up with a lot of money to allow us to hire many more faculty. Realistically, that may not happen any time soon.

Support for language instruction also means support for language study out of the country. Whether your institution has its own study abroad program or has an arrangement with an institution in another country or participates in a consortial arrangement with other U.S. institutions, it is important to assure that students have an opportunity to study a language in an environment where the greatest gain can be made which means a country where the language in question is the native language.

In the globally-connected world of the present and the future, it will be increasingly important for us to have students who have mastered one or more languages in addition to their

(V) There is no better way to get students' attention than through introducing a requirement into the curriculum. You might have read recently, for example, about the action of the faculty council in my college at Texas A&Mthe Liberal Arts Councilto require six hours of study in what we call U.S. and International Cultures, what gets dubbed more simply as "multiculturalism." I will have opportunity to speak about that during the panel session this afternoon, but I mention it here simply to underscore the seriousness with which a curricular action is taken if it is a requirement of all students. A further way of signaling the seriousness of certain curricular choices is through the creation of special tracks or options within existing majors or, indeed, the creation of new majors. Many English departments have underscored the significance of the writing element of the discipline by creating writing specialties or whole majors in rhetoric and composition. Along this same line, we have seen the rise of options and majors dedicated to environmental studies or ethnic studies.

We are witnessing, I believe, similar developments in international studies. Some of these options are, of course, inherent in particular disciplines, but others, at my institution and elsewhere, are of more recent origin. Students are able to study geography with an international emphasis or political science with a focus on international relations or business with eventual certification in

international business.

More recently, Texas A&M and other universities have responded to the need for more preparation in international issues by creating a new undergraduate major. Our new degree, which we simply call International Studies, is aimed at filling a niche that is not otherwise occupied, even within disciplinary majors that allow a strong international emphasis.

The B.A. in International Studies is interdisciplinary and, for some students, will be intercollegiate. We offer it quite unapologetically as a Liberal Arts degree, and thus its strength is not so much a single career orientation as a more broadly aimed study of international issues and perspectives. Its major components are the following: (1) a minimum of three years of study in another language; (2) a significant study abroad experience, which we define as minimally a full summer or semester. It is expected that this will ordinarily be a regular academic experience in the classroom but it may be certain kinds of internships as well; (3) 36 hours of course work in the major, divided into three categories: (a) 18 hours of core courses in history, political science, economics, and social or cultural studies; (b) 9 hours of course work in designated electives, which are courses with a broader or more generic international focus; and (c) 9 hours of course work in concentration electives. These are courses that are area specific, though we will also allow students to cover the world's map more generally if they choose; (4) an 18-hour minor that we expect to be drawn from a single department.

The INTS degree at Texas A&M is too new to have concrete results approval for its implementation was only granted last fallbut there is already a very healthy interest in this opportunity among students, faculty, and parents, and I am confident that it will prove to be a popular choice among students who are, it seems to

me, ever more aware of the connectedness among nations.

(VI) Accomplishing what I have commented on thus far requires time and effort of the facultyin creating or revising courses, preparing and administering study abroad programs, developing and implementing international study tracks or majors. One of the realities about college and university life is that there is much to do, much that is required of faculty to do, and choices have to be made. Along with the encouragement to commit time and effort to internationalize a campus must come, I think, concrete incentives and rewards to faculty who do so. This is not a matter of buying

faculty off to get them to do something they really don't want to do; no incentive or reward will bring success in that instance. It is, rather, a recognition that the demands on faculty are heavyto be good teachers, effective researchers, and constructive university citizens. If a college or university has determined that particular goals are important for example, a more globally focused curriculumfaculty are much more likely to believe their importance if, so to speak, we put our money where our mouth is.

There are many ways of doing this, and I believe that one of the most importantbecause it so clearly speaks to an institution's curricular prioritiesis course development support. I spoke earlier of the committee with the unpronounceable acronymthe committee on Enhancing the International Dimension of Curricula.

That committee determined that it was not going to put out any special admonition or encouragement or pronouncement to the faculty about developing courses or curricula unless it was able to announce as well course development funds as an incentive. In the main, we have held true to that intention. We have created special

funds in support of international travel and curriculum development. As with all such efforts, there isn't enough money to support all worthy projects, but at least we have indicated an intention to support the faculty's creation of a more global curriculum.

A further dimension that enhances the sense of recognition and reward for international activity is realized through annual reviews and reports of faculty. There was a time at Texas A&M when international activity and in this case I mean literally an activity that occurred out of country was, in some colleges, considered a deficit because it took a faculty member away from the College Station campus. Stories about offices that were taken away or research support that dried up still circulate among some faculty. We've moved far beyond those times and encourage departmental and college administrations to applaud such activities as those I have described here. In some instances, faculty annual report forms give specific opportunity to list and describe teaching, research, and service activities with an international dimension. In this respect, as in all others, much is gained by persuading the university community at large that interest in international matters is more than lip service.

I hope that at least some of the remarks I have made thus far bear on our primary interest herethe core curriculum. As I said near the beginning, I do not believe it possible to isolate the question of "internationalizing the core" from other closely related areas. Now let me go to the heart of the present concern more directly.

Just as we must seek consensus on the broader questionswhat do we mean by internationalizing a campus? Or internationalizing a curriculum? so we must grapple first with what we mean by internationalizing the core. Do we mean that an institution's curriculum will be so thoroughly

internationalized that we can be certain that students who fulfill core requirements will simultaneously be internationalized in the way that we want?

If that is not yet reachableand for some of us it would not bewe presumably mean something rather more concrete about specific requirements and specific courses. But what is it? Do we mean that all students will have one course dealing wholly with another country? Or two courses? Or more? Do we mean that a number of different courses in the core should include some attention, but not necessarily total attention, to international perspectives? If so, how much is enough? Three-fourths? One- half? One-third? And what makes a subject " international" in this context? Shakespeare is definitely international if we mean by that everything not immediately pertaining to the United States, but does a survey course in Shakespeare qualify? Or one in Anglo-Saxon history? Or one in, say, Primitive Art?

I have little doubt that individual institutions, and certainly individuals within institutions, would give varying answers to these and other questions. My principal point here is that the questions cannot be skirted and the answers must eventually form the rationale for whatever we do and whatever courses we decide are the right ones for students to take.

As I suggested earlier, we are presently embroiledand embroiled is unfortunately the right wordin a bit of a controversy at A&M resulting from action taken by the Liberal Arts Council to impose a U.S. and International Cultures requirement on Liberal Arts students, and impending action that will be considered by our Faculty Senate in the fall that would result in a similar, but different, requirement for all students at the university.5

I am certain that the principal reason the debate has made its way into

Paul A. Parrish, Internationalizing the Core

newspapers across the state is that we have chosen to create a single requirement embracing two components, one U.S. and the other international. Virtually all of the concern that has crossed my desk has focused on the U.S. cultures requirement, not the international one. There are a number of reasons for that but I should again reserve those comments for this afternoon.

More relevant to the topic at hand are the different approaches the two faculty entitiesthe Liberal Arts Council and the Faculty Senatehave thus far taken to the international portion of the requirement. Neither body has concluded its work: the Liberal Arts Council has endorsed the requirement in principle but there are as yet no specific courses on any approved list; the Faculty Senate has not yet begun the formal debate on the university requirement. Thus, in neither case is it clear what exactly will result. But the outlines are suggestive.

The heart of the Liberal Arts proposal says that all students in the College of Liberal Arts will be required to take six hours of course work in U.S. and International Cultures, of which three hours must deal with racial, ethnic, or gender issues in the United States. The implications of this resolution are that approved courses must deal wholly, or at least primarily, with whatever we finally determine to be "U.S. Cultures" and "International Cultures."

The Faculty Senate resolution to be debated this fall specifies that a course will be considered appropriate for the requirement if one-third or more of the course deals with diversity issues. If both resolutions are formally adopted, there will no doubt be a need to reconcile them for clarity and for the benefit of studentssort of like a House and Senate Conference Committee, I suppose. But for the moment, they appear to go in related but slightly different directions, the one pointing more toward courses that are

When I spoke to conference organizers about my remarks, I suggested that we title this session "Internationalizing the Core" since that phrase is sufficiently familiar, and it immediately communicates its subject. But as I also pointed out at the time, it means different things to different institutions and thus provides an opportunity for serious discussions of various alternatives.

At Texas A&M I am known as a determined idealist, so allow me to close on that note. I do think that it is important, in the final analysis, to settle on the details of what we are about, but I also think we should not lose sight of common goals regardless of whether or not our ways of reaching those goals differ. There are practical, moral, and humanistic reasons for advancing our students' understanding of other countries and other cultures. On the practical side, we are without doubt in a global economy; if the Nikkei Exchange sneezes, Wall Street may well get a cold. Few of our studentsfew of us in this roomwill not be affected by economic, social, and political interaction as we move into the 21st century. A student who is under-informed is a student whom we have not served well. That aside, there are compelling reasons to encourage an understanding of U.S. and international diversity simply to make the world better. Such study is sometimes said to emphasize divisions or separateness. I see it differently. We aren't all the same, but if we seek to

48

be able to act together, nationally or globally, we had better learn more about each other and learn to get along together, if the human community is to survive and prosper. p

Notes

1. Texas in the 21st Century: The International Agenda . A Report to the Governor and the Texas Legislature. As Requested by H.C.R. 236, 71st Texas Legislature (Austin: Texas Committee for the Humanities, 1991), pp. 15-16.

2. "Internationalizing the Curriculum of California's Undergraduates," International Review, 1(1990): 15.

3. "One World, Many Voices," Liberal Education, 77, 5(1991): 6.

4. Ann Kelleher identifies 8 "attributes" that are vital in the "internationalizing process" of a campus. They are: (1) a general education curriculum that provides insights into world issues and graduation requirements that include facility in a second language; (2) one or more interdisciplinary curricula that allow students to major in an international specialty (3) increasing numbers of students who participated in a study abroad experience; (4) increasing numbers of faculty with international expertise and experience and second language competency; (5) an institutional emphasis on campus diversity, including a substantial number of international students; (6) an institutional mission statement encouraging of international activity; (7) effective institutional relationships with relevant community groups, such as sister city organizations, chambers of commerce, and other groups; and (8) a primary administrative office that initiates and oversees programs that promote the international mission ( op. cit., p. 7).

5. As of August 1994, there has been progress but no certain resolution. The Faculty Senate voted in November 1993 to implement a six-hour U.S. and International requirement for all students at Texas A&M, but the President of the university has not yet given his approval, choosing instead to appoint a committee to study the implications of such a requirement. The College of Liberal Arts was allowed to implement at this time only the international portion of its requirement, but not the requirement for a course in U.S. diversity. A final decision on implementation is expected during the Fall 1994 semester.

Karen E. Rowe

University of CaliforniaLos Angeles

From Policy to Pedagogy

Core Curriculum offers faculty and academic administrators a rare oppor tunity to create, imaginatively and with daring, humanities core curricula re sponsive to the complex needs of a border state, in which the push toward multiculturalism derives not from abstract intellectual ideals but from the historically lived reality of American cultural pluralism.

In this challenging foray into the meeting ground between multicul -turalism and the humanities core, California institutions, such as UCLA, share with Texas public universities and community colleges a sense of imperative mission, born of the mestizo legacy that dates back to the first Spanish contact with indigenous Aztecs and southwestern Indian peoples and forward to the recent decades of migration and immigration that have transformed Los Angeles and Houston into global metropolises. My purpose here is to reflect upon the intersection of multiculturalism and the humanities core from both an institutional and a programmatic perspectiveand to do so with a focus squarely on the pragmatics of re-educating ourselves, as faculty, for curriculum transformation. In short, how can we do what many educators claim must be done to re-envision American education for the twenty-first century?

So often in the vociferous debates in which accusatory condemnations run headlong into impassioned de

he NEH Texas Seminar on the

T

fenses of political correctness, multiculturalism becomes set against the humanities core, as if the two are unalterably and mutually exclusive choices as foundations for a liberal arts curriculum ( Multiculturalism). My intent, however, is to recuperate and in habit the "borderland" of the and by making it into a site where the concerns of scholars/teachers who have learned from and incorporated the rich diversity of ethnic and gender texts and perspectives come together with, thereby transforming in the process, the traditionally envisioned humanities core so frequently equated with the great men, great ideas, great books approach to western civilization advo cated by Allan Bloom, Edward Hirsch, and Dinesh D'Souza. Such clashes in today's intellectual circles are, I would submit, echoing resonances of the very cultural encounters that created today's American ethos.

Our collective odyssey, unlike Homer's through the Mediterranean, will move from institutional policy to classroom pedagogy by following two eventually intersecting pathways: first, how we at UCLA have through fac ulty development seminars attempted to re-educate ourselves in order to translate institutional missions into undergraduate curricular praxis; and sec ond, how three experimental models of humanities programs, clusters, and sequences reflect a broader institutional vision of how best to educate all students for a multiethnic society in

which the core values still remain critical thinking, humanistic inquiry, and liberal learning.

We need to acknowledge immediately that "multiculturalism" has be come the euphemism of choice in recent discourse, in part because it neatly side-steps the confrontational politics that terms such as race, ethnicity, gen der, and sexualities provoke because they in turn evoke haunting specters of separatism, prejudice, and discrimination. More positively, however, multiculturalism usefully repositions us to think of cultural groups claiming and owning their differences, whether in origin, locale, behavior, language, modes of speech and artistic expression, religion, or socially defined roles (Stimpson). "Multiculturalism" reinforces the concept that cultures are constructions rather than natural categories rooted in essentialist genetics and that cultures can be perceived, studied, and accessed rather than merely feared (Barth; Sollors). Indeed, "culture" and "cultures" are constantly reconfigured, since they are always already caught in the flux and flow of change over time. Social and political equality is also "created" and enacted institutionally at the boundaries and within the borderlands wherein diverse cultures, through constant negotiation and often interpenetration, become part of the multifaceted fabric of human society, not irreducible and im mutable enclaves of isolationism and power. As Carlos Cortés has ar

49

Karen E. Rowe, Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core

One institutional example of such evolutionary change within American academic culture might be the history of negotiated relationships themselves between ethnic and gender studies programs and the so-called "mainstream" departments or disciplines. Whereas two decades ago such programs fought for the mere legitimacy of the field of study as methodologically and aca demically rigorous, today most universities and colleges acknowledge the disciplinary shifts wrought by a new focus on ethnicity and gender as legiti mate categories of analysis, whether in the social sciences, arts, life sci ences, or humanities. The interdisciplinary methodologies and pedagogies created and generated by once "marginalized" groups, whose ethnic and gender-specific missions remain essential, have nevertheless found their way irrevocably into the commonly accepted practices of "mainstream" research and teaching. The push toward multiculturalism and American cultures requirements has made knowledge once deemed "no knowl edge at all" into critical knowledge not only for empowerment of new groups of students, but for understanding among all students who will live in a multicultural, multiethnic world. Institutional equality between ethnic and gender programs and traditional disciplines may not yet have been achieved, but in fascinating ways the

boundaries that once denoted barriers have instead become borderlands where the most trenchant issues of modern society and education can be heard, debated, and absorbed into the collective consciousness. This aca demic process only mirrors the struggles within society itself, in which new claims for voice intermesh with old claims to retain power and privi lege within the provinces of not only education but as well employment, economics, governmentor any other realm.

In the following discussion, the term multiculturalism is used con sciously for both political and practical reasonsthough variously in flected. Most frequently, it signals a new inclusivity within American edu cation that makes ethnic and gender groups more visibly part of the curricu lum. In other contexts it also refers to the academy's shift toward broader world perspectives and comparative cultural studies that decenter the domi nance of western European civilization. I deliberately focus on ethnicity and gender when speaking about curriculum transformation projects and the specifics of curricular change. These changes within institutions of higher education, whether at the level of policy, programs, or pedagogy, should in turn be understood as signs of the more encompassing shifts to ward a renewed respect for American cultural pluralism and toward a repo sitioning of the United States within a world community reconceived as a multicultural village.

MULTICULTURAL POLICY

FOR THE ACADEMIC

BORDERLANDS

Many of the institutions in Texas as well as Southern California share the changing reality of an ethnically diverse, increasingly international so ciety. UCLA's student body, for ex

ample, is demographically over 65% ethnic majority and over 50% female, reflective of the multiethnic population in Los Angeles and California itself. In 1992 students of color accounted for 67% of the 3,227 domestic freshmen (an increase of 10.9 percentage points since 1988), comprised of 1.4% American Indian, 7.5% African Ameri can, 19% Hispanic, 32.7% Caucasian, and 39.l% Asian (Filipinos and Pacific Islanders included); another 45.5% of 1,743 domestic transfers were students of color (1992 Admissions 11, 12).2 Educators, whether in K-12, col leges and universities, or graduate and professional schools, have seen this changing demography as a challenge to education, because it compels us all to ask again the fundamental questions, ones similarly raised by the great pub lic educational reform movements of the late nineteenth-century when waves of eastern European and Asian American immigration similarly rede fined American cities and the west: How do we conceive to whom we are teaching what and how are we teaching it? By creating programs for cur riculum reform and transformation we engage in the difficult process of re examining our courses as much as ourselves, the content of what we teach, the pedagogical methods appropriate to new audiences and learning styles, and the attitudes that we bring to our interactions with students.

As humanists and educators, however, we are not brought to curriculum change simply by the shifting demographics, as important as they are in the reconstitution of values and vision within American society. Instead, we find ourselves drawn as powerfully by changes in our disciplines, nowhere more so than in the last decade's requestioning of the liberal arts and what, therefore, constitutes a "core of knowledge" (Boyer and Levine; Campbell and Flynn; Cheney; Gaff) or, as feminist scholars have asserted dif ferent "ways of knowing" (Belenky;

Hawkesworth; Minnich). Revisionist thinking has led to canonical revolu tions in literary studies, reflected nowhere more visibly than in the now second edition of The Heath Anthology of American Literature (1994) and The Harper Anthology of American Literature (1987), not to mention The Norton Anthology By Women (1985) and soon-to-be published Norton Anthology of Afro-American literature. In history, the emergence of theories of social groups, cultural studies, women's history, the Foucaultian deconstruction and reconstruction of periodization, new approaches to the "western" United States post -Frederick Jackson Turner, and the analyses of race and gender as salient determinants of political and social change have fundamentally altered the "historicized" landscape of the American "where" and "the narratives" of who we as Americans are or hope to become. When faculty participate in institutes, such as the Texas Seminar on the Core Curriculum or the Ford Ethnic Women's Curriculum Transformation project at UCLA, we come to gether as educators in public universities responsive to demographics, as scholars molded by our disciplinary training, and as human beings shaped and reshaped by our cultural, social, gender, class, and ethnic backgrounds, whether we live in the southwest borderlands or on the pacific rim.

Because of the substantial and visible shifts in the student body, UCLA may have come to curriculum transformation and development more ur gently and rapidly, but the change would have been nevertheless toward revisionist, inclusionary, ethnic and gender responsive, and interdiscipli nary rethinking, particularly in the humanities and social sciences. Certainly the legacy of the post-civil rights and Vietnam decades of the 70's and 80's created a milieu, within the academy as in society, ripe for the reexamina tion of American education. While

nationally leaders denounced American education in now famous reports, such as A Nation at Risk (Bennett; Lund; Nation) thereby fueling still active federal and state initiatives to place greater emphasis on undergraduate teaching, even at major research uni versities, the shape those revisionist efforts would take was already being determined more locally and variously by the state demographics and the re aligned disciplinary emphases within major institutions. At many campuses, innovative curriculum has meant a reinscription of western civilization courses and a traditional humanities core, imitating in most respects earlier programs established at Columbia, the University of Chicago, and Stanford (Allardyce), while at other institutions the intellectual ferment has permitted multicultural education to assume a leading role (Hill; Thompson and Tyagi). To the credit of a few national programs, such as the Association of American Colleges initiative, "Engaging Cultural Legacies: Shaping Core Curricula in the Humanities," and more recently "American Commit ments: Diversity, Democracy, and Liberal Learning," the intersections of a humanities core with multiculturalism have been encouraged (Schneider; Schmitz, Core; Liberal Education issues).

The rationales for many of UCLA's curriculum transformation projects were based upon documents from national commissions, the University of California's Smelser report on lower division education, and UCLA's own Long Range Development Report as well as Chancellor Charles Young's summary remarks from the 1987 "Arrowhead Conference on Affirmative Action and Ethnic Diversity," which set clear policy directives for curricu lum integration. The policy, succinctly articulated by Chancellor Young, ef fectively ended a phase of institutional and national debate over the effects of diversified admissions standards and

Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core, Karen E. Rowe

student populations on the quest for "excellence." Rather than "either . . . or" choices, the policy set UCLA, as it has set other University of Califor nia and Texas state institutions, in pursuit of "Excellence through Diversity." Such a policy sent a clear message that for faculty in public institutions of higher learning, there is no incompatibility between research and teaching excellence and the need to educate about and for ethnic and gender diver sity, even more so within the context of a multicultural state and region. Such an educational policy is also fully compatible with the missions particu lar to state institutions, as much so in Texas as in California. Under the mas ter plan of higher education in the state of California, the University of Cali fornia serves

(1) to create and transmit new research and knowledge, mandating that we be cognizant in scholarship and teaching of changes in our fields of

knowledge;

(2) to train students as future state citizens in a multiethnic state and na tion, thereby requiring us to understand the multicultural realities with which our students will engage over a lifetime;

(3) to educate students both in the liberal arts tradition of critical think ing and with professional skills for the labor force, a challenge that again re quires the teaching of "approaches to" and "concepts of" ethnicity and gen der, so that strategies of analysis inform our students' working lives and intercultural communications.

For community colleges historically it has been the fourth mission to provide the first entrance into higher education at reasonable cost, thereby serving far more to prepare students for transfer into four-year institutions or directly for employment. In California and Texas, more acutely for re cent immigrants, the fundamentals of language, American liberal arts edu cation, and democratic pluralism are

Clear-cut institutional and educational policies, while not sufficient in themselves to generate change, nevertheless are essential principles upon which curricular programs must be built. What significantly enabled the multicultural integration efforts at UCLA was not only the administrative and faculty leadership, but the widely (though not unconflicted, nor univer sally) embraced attempt to translate policy and vision into curricular praxis (Chancellor's Conference on Undergraduate Education , 1992). Translation into practice would mean neither a jettisoning wholesale of humanistic inquiry rooted in Eurocentric modes of analysis, nor a full-scale and naively blind embrace of teaching

acquired in high school and the community colleges. All institutions of higher education have historically held forth the promise of access and equity for groups and individuals to the American dream. Instruction and a curriculum, therefore, that engages all students in the analysis of cultural in teractions and that envisions the study of race, class, and gender as relevant to the quest for democratic citizenship are an essential part of the educational

mission, not a dilution of excellence, nor a political distraction from the "pure pursuit" of knowledge. Carlos Cortés aptly translates these assump tions into an operational definition of "multicultural education" that "is not the exclusive study of ethnic groups by members of those groups or by schools with large multiethnic populations. All students, regardless of the composition of their school, community, or region, need multicultural edu cation that engages the full spectrum of our country's racial and ethnic di versity, because all students live in the same multiethnic nation . . . . Through multicultural education, students should learn the nature and signifi cance of these experiences . . . both Pluribus experiences of individual groups and the Unum experience of Americans as a whole" ("Multicul -tural" 3, 4).

In California many legislative and university reports similarly endorsed the need for all students to communicate effectively across ethnic bound aries as a critical goal for a public university that prepares its students to function cooperatively in multicultural settings and the workplace. But the educational philosophy that directed UCLA's efforts derived from the 1987 Arrowhead Retreat, in which the report on "Diversity and the Undergradu ate Curriculum" went one step further, arguing that ethnic diversity and gen der cannot be divorced, but are integral to the pursuit of a fully humanis tic education:

diversity in the multiethnic context . . . should be considered as part of the mainstream or intellectual center of the curriculum. It should not be an occa sion on which students are forced to choose between understanding ethni- city or gender

multiculturalism for the sake of mere "tolerance." By valuing the very edu cational processes of reformation and transformation that derive from colle gial research and debate, the courses and curriculum changes that would emerge from faculty development projects respected disciplinary orien tations but encouraged interdisciplinary investigations, envisioned human (enti)ties as diversely constituted identities, valued cultural groups as simi lar and different, but always interactively constructed and engaged. The courses would not be mere hybrids, but reinventions, reconstructions of knowledge more fully inclusive of the cultural and gender diversity, but al ways with the intent to bring students into dialogue with new ideas, alternate modes of inquiry and analysis, and thereby a habit of mind that valued exploration before judgment, pluralism more than monoculturalism. Cort és usefully humanizes these ideals by cogently reminding us that we educate students, rather than mechanistically teach courses. The goal is to bring into being the "Multicultural Person'a young person with the multicultural competencies (knowledge, skills, and attitudes) for living with effectiveness, sensitivity, self-fulfillment, and understanding in a culturally pluralistic na tion and increasingly interdependent world' " ("Multicultural" 3).

LEARNING TO LIVE IN THE

BORDERLANDS:

CURRICULAR CHANGE

AS PROCESS

Although shifts in institutional policy and academic environment cre ated a new intellectual borderland in which to undertake multicultural cur riculum transformations, without carefully conceived faculty development opportunities, the necessary process could not have occurred. Conse quently, in 1988-89 UCLA's Center for

During its three-year effort, FEW sponsored seven seminars in Ameri can and Related Literatures, Sociology, Psychology and Cognate Fields, His tory, Interdisciplinary Studies, and American Ethnic Studies, culminating with the Spring 1991 seminar on "The Americas: Crossing Borders, Cross ing Cultures," which brought together faculty from geography, urban plan ning, and women's studies ("UCLA . . . Seminar Syllabi"). Our activities also included evaluation of transformed courses, program development for Teaching Assistant training, and implementation of Phase 3 of UCLA's Curriculum Integration Projects both through a two-seminar focus on GE composition courses under the Curriculum and Writing Integration Project (CWIP 1991-93) and through expanded discipline-based seminars in the arts and for Teaching Assistant Consultants under the Ethnic and Gen der Curriculum Integration Project

(EGCIP 1993-96). In 1994 we were designated by the University of Cali fornia President's Office as the Southern Region Curriculum Integration Center, with a mandate to provide facilitative leadership for other U.C. campuses and regional community colleges in devising systematic ap proaches to multicultural course development and integration.

With seventy-five participating faculty (including two to three facili tators per seminar) and some forty graduate students, the original FEW seminars yielded nearly ninety revised or new syllabi, including ten to fifteen General Education courses with large yearly enrollments, many of which meet the requirements of UCLA's resolutions for multicultural course devel opment adopted later in Spring 1993.3 Experience with the seven seminars in dicated that a ripple effect occurred with faculty often proposing one course to be revised or created, yet producing (and continuing to do so over time) additional courses, creating innovative pedagogical strategies, and generating new bibliographies and research derived from the seminar con tent. Many faculty reconceptualized existing courses, often large introduc tory and/or GE courses, such as "Major American Authors," "The Social History of American Women," the "American History" three-quarter se quence, "Psychology 10," "The Psychology of Gender," "Communication Studies 10," and "Introductory Sociology." Newly designed or proposed courses included "Chicano/a Cultures in Literature and Film," "Fiction by Women of Color," "Women of Color in the U.S.," "Gender and Work," "Ethnic Minorities in the American City," "Towards a Multicultural Women's History," and "Gender and Race in Science and Technology."

The scope of the FEW Project set it apart from twelve similar projects funded under the original Ford initiative which took place through other national women's research centers

Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core, Karen E. Rowe

(Fiol-Matta and Chamberlain). A winter 1991 evaluation by the Northwest Institute for Research on Women noted that FEW was among the most multiethnic, having incorporated new research on all four groups of women specified by FordAfrican American, Hispanic, American Indian, and Asian American. FEW participants constituted a broad range of nationally known scholars drawn from widely varying fieldsincluding ethno-musi cology, history of science, geography, urban planning, and psychologyonly slimly represented in other projects. FEW also engaged four to seven graduate students in each seminar, offering a unique dimension of profes sional training and research development for current teaching assistants and future educators. With the freshness of new critical approaches and willingness to challenge received knowledge, graduate students also pushed faculty usefully toward further reflections on Caribbean and African diaspora literatures, postcolonial discourse and history, lesbian writings, the body and cultural constructions of sexuality, third-world women's issues, French feminisms, film theory, and representations of women in popular culture.

Because seminars met for three hours a week for ll-week quarters to hear consultant speakers and discuss extensive readings, the experience was intense, engaging, and progressive. Faculty commented most frequently on an unanticipated outcome of FEW: the unprecedented opportunity to meet regularly with colleagues in their departments to talk seriously about un dergraduate teaching, pedagogy, and curriculum.

Although FEW as a project coincided with institutional efforts to pro pose an American cultures or diversity requirement, its design sought to ad dress the broader curricular challenge of transformative knowledge and pedagogy within general education, disciplines, majors, and interdepart

Karen E. Rowe, Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core

Although it was initially the Ford Foundation's specification and new directions in women's studies that determined the focus on ethnic women, this very displacement of normative academic models that privilege white, middle class, masculinist perspectives became an opportunity as much as a challenge. The focus arose from legitimate critiques within disciplines of a failure to recognize white privilege

and male, heterosexual, middle-class assumptions intrinsic to the curricu lum, privileges that Bell Hooks in Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center, Peggy McIntosh in "White Privilege," Johnnella Butler in "Trans forming the Curriculum: Teaching About Women of Color," and Toni Morrison in Playing ln the Dark, to name only a few, problematize. Simi larly, within women's studies there have been failures to respond inclu sively to ethnic women's experience as different and equal, while in many facets of ethnic studies there has been a similar failure to respond to women's experience as perceived through a gendered lens. What became essen tial, therefore, in the seminar process was an attempt to read and think about scholarship that not only critiques exclusions, but that offers viable models of canonical change, or critical reconceptualizing of categories them selves (Andersen; Baca Zinn; Collins and Andersen: Chan; Lauter; McKenna; Rothenberg; Ruiz). Documented oppression, victimization, in equities, and exclusions together with the realities of under-funded ethnic and women's studies programs are real. Yet, attempts to integrate or transform curriculum often flounder, relegated once again to the margins, labelled as "special interests" for the few, or denounced as "politicized" advocacy, if avenues for change, validations of new perspectives, excitement about alter native theoretical models, dialogues among cultural positions, and recon structions of hierarchies of power are not mapped out in the terrain of the borderlands between institutional tradition and radical revolution (Butler and Walter; Schmitz, Integrating). Emphasize the positive in order to fa cilitate progress may seem cliched, but in the trenches where multicultural work is done, "if you build it, they will come," and programs aimed at rede signing/constructing syllabi present a surer strategy for the success of proactive curriculum development.

Process becomes critical, likewise, for overcoming the dynamics of defense, often arising naturally from the comfort we feel as faculty grounded in our disciplines, secure in our pedagogical style, and confident of our authority as "knowers" and "teachers." "There is no research," "there is no really good literature," "how do I fit in new material, without sacrificing the old," "you can't do it all in one quarter," "but the anthology doesn't include it"the plaintive wails of woebegone professors caught in the flux of change echo hall to hall, classroom to classroom. But the underly ing issues these defenses raise are serious and serious-minded. Though patently inaccurate in claiming that there is "no research," the availability of that research in refereed journals, on-line at the library, in readily pro vided bibliographies, in contemporary publications makes it far easier and less daunting for faculty to identify new research. The importance of projects and seminars that engage in group reading, prepare and share bibliogra phies, develop computerized databases, such as the FEW 5000 item cata logue, or O. Funmilayo Makarah's Films and Videos By and About Eth nic Women, becomes clearcut, because access makes substantive content (not anxiety) the center of discussions.

More trenchantly, claims about "no good literature," for example, open up debates about key issues in the humanitiesthe nature and creation of canons, the criteria for esthetic judgments, the authority of "voice" in au tobiographical and narrative discourse, the privileging of supposed "rational ism" over "subjective personalism," the elitism of genre that values canta tas more than corridos (Gates; Lauter; Rocklin). Or in Psychology, where fa cilitator Sandra Graham reviewed the topics published in major journals, it became clear that the very criteria of what constitutes "good" experimental research often excludes studies of women, ethnic groups, and doubly so

Similarly, the defense that follows frequently upon a recognition of the quantity of new and good research directs our attention to a seemingly more practical curricular concern, "how do I fit in new material without sacrific ing the old, because you can't do it all." Underlying such a litany, however, is the latent presumption that courses must and do offer a dominant perspec tive and "coverage" of the field, making it impossible to deviate from the traditional canon or, in many cases standard anthologies, which offer "ob jective" interpretations of materials, deemed so because "they've always been taught." Unquestioning adoption of the older Norton Anthologv of American Literature, or numerous in troductory psychology textbooks might give the illusion of canonical consensus or objective science, while

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including few if any women or ethnic voices, or relegating gender to a sepa rate section and eliminating ethnic studies or culture altogether. By ac knowledging that all courses involve subjective determinations of what to teach and how to teach it, FEW faculty explored alternative models of course organization, whether by supplementing readings with new choices of examples, books, and assignments; making "canon formation" the centerpiece of discussion; or in several instances selecting alternatives, revising, or jettisoning anthologies altogether.

Transformation takes place, for example, when a traditional chrono logical survey of "Nineteenth-century American Literature: 1801-1865" re positions students to think about topical subheadings, such as "The Fron tier and American Indians," "Expansion and the Conquest of Mexico," "Slavery," or "Social Reform." Texts speak differently to other texts, when James Fenimore Cooper and Black Hawk, Little Crow's oration and Herman Melville's "The Metaphysics of Indian Hating" are juxtaposed; when Harriet Jacobs' Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861) and Frederick Douglass's My Bondage and My Freedom (1855) become central discourses; or when Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Blithedale Romance (1852) and Rebecca Harding Davis's Life in the Iron Mills (1861) set transcendentalist utopian experiments next to working class realities, despite the shared "romance" genre. No one class, nor any single faculty, exercises sufficient curriculum control to "do it all," yet at the level of programs the choices we each make should offer widely dif ferent perspectives, often through the contrapuntal dialogues among and di versity of voices that have created the humanistic traditions, texts, and his tories in American culture.

Privileging theoretical constructs, ones that often arise out of the study of middle-class, white, and male popu

Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core, Karen E. Rowe

lations, discourses, interpretations, and visions often distorts or skews toward a dominant culture model our students' understanding of themselves and their position in American society. Overcoming this defense involves learning to retell the very story of American society and of our own lives, thereby re-envisioning key concepts of individualism, progress, and democratic justice that we take for granted, and in that process challenging chronological histories, hierarchies, and values. Consider the narrative, often taught in "The History of the Family," in which the rise of the "nuclear family" from New England's Puritan foundings, through the nineteenth-century ideology of "Republican motherhood," gives way inevitably to a "fall," traceable, accord ing to the Moynihan Report and others (Ginsburg), to the disintegration of the "black" family in America, the rise of single-parent households, immi grant overcrowding, and the threatening spectre of a welfare state. When, however, Gina Morantz-Sanchez redesigned this course, the chronological and theoretical foundation shifted markedly, beginning with the study of kinship systems, multiple family models within different cultures, and the "differences" that result from women's and children's roles variously defined. What values inform and configure the tribal American clans and families among the Laguna Pueblo, Narrangansetts, and coastal Miwok may differ markedly from Black family histories in the south, while widely

varying family customs among Mexican American, Asian American, and Euro-American immigrants reflect cultural and religious heritagesas often with intra-ethnic as inter-ethnic variation. No single chronological history or nuclear family model enables us to account for historical or present social realities.

Similarly, in literary studies unexamined, and often unarticulated "esthetic values" of the "good, the true, and the beautiful," may deter

Karen E. Rowe, Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core

Theoretical remodelings cannot be divorced, however, from pedagogy, as seminar participants became increasingly aware as sessions pro gressed. In part, the underlying critique of disciplines that results from exposure to the new research only exposes more powerfully the binary thinking that creates easy categories of Self and Other, the Center and the Margin, the Dominant and the Subordinate. Whether in research or the classroom, women and ethnic peoples have too casually, even unknowingly, been cast in the role of the "they" deviant from the mainstream, the groups in sociology who lack "status" and are

"minorities," the abnormal in psychological constructs, or the exotic in lit erature. King-Kok Cheung, facilitator for the American and Related Lit eratures seminar, writes the following in "Reflections on Teaching Literature by American Women of Color:"

While ideals such as rationalism and competitive individualism may be shared by people of color, ethnic women frequently present competing sets of beliefs. Instead of seeing and judging diverse cultures from Eurocentric perspectives, these perspectives must themselves be in- terrogated and oppositional viewpoints be entertained. For instance, when we encounter ghosts and spirits in works

such as Paule Marshall's Praisesong for the Widow, Toni Morrison's Beloved, Silko's Ceremony, and Ana Castillo's Mixqiahuala Letters , we must not jump to the conclusion that the characters are superstitious or hal lucinatory, or, what is equally problematic, assume thst those beliefs are shared by all members of the ethnic group under discussion . . . Unless we refrain from relegating literature by people of color to the realms of the benighted or the exotic, it can never become a site for possible transforma tive thinking (20).

Models of intellectual inquiry that reinscribe the powerful metaphors of Eurocentric binary thinking inevitably disempower the perceptions, cultural values, and histories of the fifty-two percent and sixty percent ethnic "ma jority" of UCLA's student body. Multiculturalism may have arrived on the university campus in the complexion and make-up of its student body, but multiculturalism has only begun to infuse the curriculum. Whether in the social sciences or literary studies, conflictual dialectics continue to emerge between the claims of female experience, cultural modes of expres sion and values, and the dominant paradigms of a discipline. By unrav eling some of the knotted assumptions that lead to exclusions, marginalizations, and devaluations of ethnic women's experience and voices, all seminars questioned how knowledge enters the academy, becomes published, and becomes the "mainstream," but they also challenged fac ulty to engender alternative "ways of knowing."

Precisely this need for rethinking ways of knowing is what underlies the dynamic processes and ultimately success of the curriculum development seminars. Within this academic borderland, a "space out of time" from the ususl academic duties, and with colleagues mutually engaged, the renego tiations of authority take placenot only rethinkings of one's discipline and courses, but also of the professor's

authority in the classroom, when his/her experience may not be at the cen ter. Authority is never neutral (though we often assume it like an invisible robe, granted with the Ph.D. to be donned before each class), because as faculty we all bring a culturally inflected perspective, a position, a view point, an approach which we rarely share with our students. "Where we are coming from" may be assumed to be as irrevelant as "where the students are coming from," yet the academic enterprise of learning and coming to know implicitly makes the classroom into a site where realities, cultures, styles of discourse, the right to speak, the authority of experience are engaged on an everyday basis. Hence, the seminars were designed to dislocate, decenter, to de-authorize, so that individually and collectively, we could re learn, re-educate, and transform ourselves in order to transform our courses and our pedagogy. In that process all participants needed to experience and to realize that everyone is a stranger in someone else's culture and that ev ery teacher becomes a new learner in the multicultural borderlands.

Relearning in the FEW seminars occurred most frequently at moments of tension, challenge, and even miscommunication, through querying, in teractive exchanges, and even strategic interventions by the director and facilitators. One such confrontation arose when a white male faculty's in advertent reference to the "ghetto" and an African American female student's recoil against the code words or labels that read illiteracy, violence, intra-city poverty into all African American experience made all too audible the un spoken assumptions embedded in racialized discourse. Painful, yet illu minating examinations of even one such rupture within a seminar often opened up faculty to rethink how classrooms can transform conflict into con sciousness, conduct into content for analysis.

Relearning over time and in mul

"American" experience of Pacific Islander, Thai, Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and East Asian peoples. Teresa LaFromboise argued for a theoretical rethinking of the bipolarism of psychological research that sees white males as normative and all "others" as deviant, and proposed instead a matrix model of experimental psychology that uses culture, gen der, and ethnicity as variables when studying the lived experience of indi viduals and groups.

The aim, therefore, in all seminars was not simplification or a reification of cultural stereotypes, but rather a sophisticated comparative multi -culturalism. Hence, the seminar structures themselves shifted from high lighting research on four discrete ethnic women's groups to seminars in which thematic units stimulated more dynamic multiethnic and cross-cultural approaches and, as a result, more complex syllabi transformations. For in stance, in fall 1990 the American ethnic studies seminar brought to the fore front similarities and differences among ethnic women's cultural re

sponses to space and spirituality, reflected not just in the written word, but in storytelling, ritual, and song. A far richer understanding of border identi ties, remembered histories, (in)visibility and what Toni Morrison has called "unspeakable things (un)spoken" emerged. Abosorption, not glossing, became crucialbecause knowing what needs to be known, "what's missing from this picture," enables one to teach by challenging limiting theoretical constructs and dis ciplinary methodologies. The seminars provided the opportunity to be gin this processto work through rather than retreat from the complex ity of intra-ethnic difference and intercultural understandings.

When Cherríe Moraga asserts, "I am a woman with a foot in both worlds. I refuse the split. I feel the necessity for dialogue," she articulates cogently the personal reality and institutional position that grounded the FEW project (58). By refusing the split be tween ethnicity and gender, the various faculty development seminars foregrounded dialogues, multivarious and often conflicted, that enabled scholars/teachers to conceptualize gender, race, and ethnicity and to grapple with complex interactions and syncretisms through which people and cul tures identify themselves and are perceived. In any given session, the os tensible topical focus might be African American, Chicana/Latina, Ameri can Indian, and/or Asian American women, but the fundamental issues circled inevitably and productively around the ways gender and ethnicity participate in cultural formations, enactments, and transmissions. That we are all implicated in multicultural identities and societies became the recur rent insight throughout the seminar process. Similarly, a binary system of Self and Other, that underlies much of western European thought and deploy ments of power, became inherently suspect, replaced by a perception of matrices in which complex

Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core, Karen E. Rowe

interdynamics of race, class, gender, ethnicity, religionin short multiple human identities and culturesinterconnect. What might initially have seemed "marginal" to the academic mainstream, that is, the study of eth nic women, became instead the catalyst for revisionist thinking about what constitutes the "center," and who claims (or is granted) the authority to speak and to define categories of exclusion and inclusion.

WHEN THE HUMANITIES MEET MULTICULTURALISM:

RE-MODELING THE CORE

What constitutes the " human" in the humanities became a concommitant question within the curriculum development seminars, since multiculturalism inherently challenges on the one hand reductively homoge neous or unitary concepts of all humanity, and on the other hand trans -cultural notions of "objective" humanistic education divorced from (or tran scendent beyond) cultural differences. Cultures are, after all, the shifting, evolving constructs that give meaning to individual lives within complex so cieties. Those who would bring multiculturalism together with the hu manities core claim, and I think rightly so, that humanistic study at its best asks our students to think critically about and respect the ethnic, racial, gender differences (and similarities) that make cultures vibrant with life, ideas, beliefs different from their own (AAC, Connecting Learning ; AAC, Program Review; Cortés, "Pluribus" ; Curriculum and Multiculturalism; Schneider; Schmitz, Core).4 How in praxis might such models of multicultural humani ties enter into the core curriculum?

When and how do we learn to inhabit the borderland of the "and" that fully integrates multiculturalism with humanities education and liberal learn ing, thereby sustaining a commitment to a diversified curriculum and to the

Karen E. Rowe, Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core

However, within the broader schema of general education require ments for both humanistic inquiry (or humanities as a division) and multiculturalism (or American pluralism), some models of programs, clus ters, and sequences offer viable alternatives (Schmitz, Core). In recent years UCLA has created three such models that offer feasible experiments that engage some students rather than a centrally required humanities experience for all students: (1) The Hu manities Program; (2) Humanities Clusters; and (3) an American Cultural Expression sequence. Although these programs can be expanded to handle more students, no single model will meet the needs of all students. 5

e pluribus unum of American society and education? In more practical terms, what do actual courses and curricular models look like that embody a multicultural humanism that moves faculty and students beyond the resis tances detailed above. Examples from the preceding discussion have already given some intimations of how course design, text selection, reconcep -tualizing of theoretical categories, new starting points, greater interdis -ciplinarity, thematic rather than chronological organizations, texts that speak to other texts, "interactive" or matrix cultural models, cognizance of intra-ethnic differences, and new pedagogies that "teach the conflicts," become important alternatives and guidelines for curriculum redesign (Graff, Beyond; Graff, "Teach"). Pro grams, however, respond to the need for cohesively unified multiple course offerings or sequences that offer more depth than a mere "dip" into the single multiculturally transformed, often discipline-specific, course.

None of the three program models discussed below are, however, "core" in the sense that all students are required to take the series or sequences. In large research institutions, the demands of 3,750-4,250 entering freshman each year, not to mention the nearly 1,750-2,000 tranfers for whom comparable community college re quirements would need to be negotiated, make a single model of the hu manities core curriculum a Herculean (and Sisyphyean) enterprise. It is im portant also to take into account the realities and constraints of pre-exist ing General Education structures, departmental prerogatives in teaching courses, and the unbridled independence of undergraduate students. Among UCLA's students and, no doubt, those in Texas institutions, we have a wide variety of full and part-time undergraduates, of commuters and campus residents, and those returning, transferring, and working, many of whom regularly work 20-30 hours a

While the first model builds upon a long-standing and traditional hu manities program, the second and third models have been experimentally tested during 1991-94, utilizing new infusions of resources either from in ternal Deans' and instructional development funds or external Ford Foun dation monies. The three models of curricular programs illustrate strategic designs that correspond also with the additive, integrative, and transforma tive stages of curriculum development that Margaret Anderson ("Interac tive"), Paula Ries, Betty Schmitz (Integrating ), Schuster and Van Dyne, Tetrault, and others have documented for women's studies projects. In our Humanities Program, the changes have been additive, though even modest expansions of the canonical texts taught create significant differences in the multicultural inclusiveness of the program as a whole. Humanities Clusters offer an integrative model that brings together existing courses into a three course, quarter-long immersion, stressing thereby the need to create interdisciplinary linkages that use differ ent research methods, yet a thematic focus to create coherent multicultural perspectives. American Cultural Expression, newly designed under a Ford Foundation grant, branches out from the traditional humanities core disci plines to include the arts and social sciences, doing so in a way that focuses on Los Angeles as a laboratory for multicultural learning, on freshman dormitories as classrooms, and on community performances, museums, parks and streets as the sites and substance for studying multiethnic cul tures and artslearning without walls.

The Humanities Program

UCLA has long offered a traditional humanities sequence of "World Literature" within the lower division, which studies "major texts in world literature, with emphasis on Western civilization" from "Antiquity to the

Early Middle Ages," "Late Middle Ages to the 17th Century," "Age of Enlightenment to the 20th Century" (lA-lC) ( UCLA Catalogue 230). Comprised also of the 2A-2C series, sub titled "Survey of Literature" for the same periods, all of these courses can fulfill the humanities General Education requirements, and 2A, 2B, or 2C also meet the English Composition requirement. All students are not re quired, however, to take the full sequence. Even operating within the chronological model with a focus on "major texts," individual instructors vary the syllabus considerably. In one variant of Humanities lA, for example, Sophocles' Antigone stands next to The Odyssey , while issues of "the polis and family," "Dido's Passions," "Self and Other" in Ovid's accounts of Echo and Narcissus, or Arachne and Philomela, the cult of romantic love, and women in the Laxdaele Saga appear prominently as daily lecture top ics, thereby bringing to the fore gender as a fundamental category within literary anaylsis. Dated catalogue copy for lC retains the almost exclusively male pantheon of enlightenment and twentieth-century authors: Swift, Voltaire, Diderot, Rousseau, Goethe, Flaubert, Ibsen, Strindberg, Dostoevsky, Kafka, Joyce, Woolf, and Stevens (230). A 1992-93 Humanities 1C offering featured, however, a blend with newly adopted "classical" texts authored by both men and women, including Choderlos Laclos' Les Liaisons Dangereuses (1782), Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice (1813), William Wordsworth's "Lyrical Bal lads" (1798), Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights ( ), Gustave Flaubert's Madame Bovary (1857), Thomas Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles (1891), Henrik Ibsen's famous "A Doll's House" (1879) and "Hedda Gabler," (1890), Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse (1927), and Gabriel Garc ía-Márquez's Chronicle of a Death Foretold (1983). Though predominantly European and canoni

cally non-controversial, these texts immediately call forth comparisons across cultures and foreground issues of gender, class, and sexuality.

The most innovative change recently in the Humanities sequences has been the inclusion of lD, "Great Books from the World at Large," which fo cuses on the "study of major literary texts usually overlooked in courses that focus only on the canon of Western literature," with "texts from at least three of the following areas in any given term: African, Caribbean, East Asian, Latin American, and Middle Eastern literature" ( Catalogue 230). One such syllabus from Spring 1993 runs the dangers of reinscribing cultural nationalisms by grouping texts according to geographical locale, but the intertextual resonances of cross-cutting "human" themes (cultural change, death, modern despair, renewals from pain) create an exciting adventure for students who otherwise might never read international authors, such as revisionary historians J.M. Coetzee and Miguel Angel Asturias, Africanists Chinua Achebe and Buchi Emecheta, Latin Americanists Carlos Fuentes and Gabriel Garc ía-Márquez, Asian writers Hsaio Hung and Yasunari Kawabata, or Middle Easterner Naguib Mahfouz. The rich potentiality of multiculturalism as a global revisioning of humanity and literature does not stand alone in this course, because it forces us also to requestion a series that "tags on" the "world at large," as if a mere adjunct to perspectives on "western civilization" that dominate Humanities lA-C, 2A-C.

Multicultural expansions of the canon have also generated courses that move considerably further away from a western dominated core and chrono logically configured series. In the upper division Humanities courses, which have primarily been defined by comparative literary approaches and studies of conventional genres, newly designed courses range from "Arche typal Heroines" from antiquity to the

Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core, Karen E. Rowe

modern period, paralleling the existing 106 "Archetypal Heroes in Litera ture," C170 on the "Alternate Traditions: In Search of Female Voices in Contemporary Literature;" M174 "Film and Literature of the Spanish -Speaking World;" and 158 "Colonial Encounters;" and 168 "Korean Ameri can Literature." Classicist and comparativist Katherine King (a FEW participant) initially taught an Honors Division version of "Archetypal Hero ines" entitled "Imaginary Women," for 15 (with 150 students applying), when she created the most radically revision ist humanities course, although one adaptable to upper division or even the lower division core. Organized according to the archetypes of "The Er rant Wife/Mother," "Helen," "The Woman Warrior," and "The Infanticide," each segment deliberately jux taposes ancient and contemporary texts. Euripedes' Medea and Ovid's "Tereus, Procne, and Philomela" from the Metamorphoses link with Chicana myths of La Llorona in Gina Vald és's Puentes y Fronteras: Coplas Chicanas (1982) and Sandra Cisneros's Woman Hollering Creek (1991) and with Toni Morrison's Beloved (1987). Classical Greek and Roman excerpts (Virgil, Homer, Aeschylus), epic cycle frag ments, and ancient tribal American Indian stories of "Yellow Woman," come into dialogue with European writers Christine de Pisan and Christa Wolf as well as contemporary American fictions by Louise Erdrich, Judy Grahn, and Maxine Hong Kingston. King's course routinely disrupts com fortable categories and cultural assumptions by reorienting the thematic focus to make women central players (as characters and authors), by explor ing the origins of female myths, and encouraging comparative cultural dia logues rather than isolating readings by national origin. The deliberate disrup tion of perspective occurs from the very first day, when a film, "Where the Spirit Lives" introduces the "cultural imag- inary," followed not by Helen

and Medea, but rather the errant wife/mother of American Indian myths "Yellow Woman." Transformative in terms of its textual selections, organi zation, and mixing of genres, "Archetypal Heroines" forces students to con template new questions, connections, even while fostering a habit of critical inquiry into fundamental human issueslife, war, loss, sacrifice, memoryand the cultural myths we imagine to account for our experi ences.

Caveats about the humanities program from the perspective of multiculturalism are apparent, of course, since individual course de signs, an added Humanities lD, or one elective course may challenge but not immediately or necessarily yield reconceptualizations in the overall pro gram. The "core" humanities sequences that fulfill College of Letters and Science requirements, and which most students are likely to select, fea ture traditional periods in western civilization, privilege European authors (French, German, English), emphasize a "great" books orientation, view women's experience from a "male" gaze and presumptions of dominance, and treat the "world at large" as the "Other" from the western concepts of self, civilization, and cultural centrality. Esthetic values and originary ideas of "culture" may go unquestioned, when "heroic" archetypes are predomi nantly masculine, while female traditions are seen as "alternate," reactive rather than consistently integrated within literary representations of hu man experience.

The proportionate emphasis of six courses in western civilization and one on the world underscores dramatically what is considered canonical. A clear example of an "additive" model of curriculum integration, even the Hu manities lD still carries with it remnants of the great books (Nobel prize -winners now from the world at large). In another sense, though, lD makes visible and problematizes what is the

new post-colonial canon, largely represented by English speaking writers from former crown colonies, African diaspora writers, Spanish and Portu guese inhabitants of the New World. The significance of additive courses or program changes should not, however, be underestimated, because texts are only a partial index of multiculturalism's impact on the hu manities core. What the "dialogues," "revisions," "disruptions" noted above indicate is that faculty can bring to the study of even classical texts radically new techniques of reading, provocative thematic reconceptualizations, new "narratives" of history and culture, an awareness of cultural differ ences in what "self" or the individual means in relationship to society, and how gender relations and ethnic encounters are diversely constructed. In the very process of curricular rethinking, additions stimulate and give rise to often startlingly creative integrations of multi-lens readings of multiethnic cultures.

Humanities Clusters

In order to engage students in an intensive humanities experience, dur ing 1991-94 UCLA also pilot-tested one-quarter "clusters" of three General Education courses that offer a second "core" model designed to be integra tive and interdisciplinary.6 The Humanities Cluster Program gives stu dents a unique opportunity to enroll in specially selected, coherent groups of courses organized around a historical period, theoretical approach, or central problem or theme. Such a model already extends beyond the additive ap proach of humanities sequencing by necessitating a focused integration of various disciplines and a thematic unification. Students are enrolled in two normally scheduled departmental GE

courses, usually offered to large numbers of students, but with special dis cussion sections arranged for the cluster students. In addition, for each clus

ter, one course is drawn from the Humanities 1 or 2 sequence, or from En glish 3 "English Composition, Rhetoric, and Language" or 129 "Interme diate Exposition." Variants of the latter two are designed specifically by Writing Programs Lecturers to integrate the cluster content through ap propriate further readings, group discussion, research topics, and choice of writing exercises formulated after consultation with all cluster faculty. En rollment is limited to 20-25 students, who attend regular lectures for each departmental course and, when available, the special discussion sections, but who also have the advantage of meeting as an exclusive group two or more times each week, whether in specially designated writing sections for Humanities 1 or 2 or the composition seminar. Because they are selected from pre-existing departmental courses, clusters also enable students to fulfill substantial general education requirements, either by special ar rangement as a whole cluster or individually applied to humanities, writ ing, and social science categories.

Although Humanities clusters are open to both new and continuing stu dents, they have a special advantage for students new to UCLA (whether entering freshman or transfer students) because they offer a coordinated pro gram of courses and a stimulating and supportive environmentacademic, intellectual, socialin which to become familiar with the institutional demands and lifestyle at a large university. As one student indicated, "the most beneficial aspect of the clusters experience was attending classes with the same people. It made me feel comfortable and allowed me to create for myself a support group. Study sessions together were the best" ( HCP Flyer 2). That comraderie, an unanticipated ben efit that strongly reinforced the intellectual process of integrating content, resulted directly from the frequent, small-group meetings which were an effective counterbalance to larger,

Integrating multiculturalism became an essential, almost dominating dimension, of the humanities clusters, in part to respond to the needs of a heavily ethnic majority freshman class, in part because the experience of eth nic, gender, and regional studies faculty (including FEW participants) lent itself to the interdisciplinary collaborative design of the cluster model it self. Cluster themes and historical periods did include western civiliza tion groupings, such as "The Art and Literature of Western Antiquity," "Manipulations of Sign Systems," "The Renaissance: Art and the Literature of Shakespeare," and "The Worlds of Western Antiquity," the latter of which offered a combination of Art History 50: Ancient Art, History lA: Introduction to Western Civilization, and Hu manities 2A: Ancient and Early Medieval Literature. More common were clusters that foregrounded diverse groups in order to address international and American cultural legacies: "Latin American Literature and History," "Native American Culture," "Encoun

as applied to a historical period, theme, or humanistic prob lem, is reinforced by the coodinated reading materials and requirement to write about those materials in integrative ways. Special events also en hanced integration: a panel discussion by all cluster faculty in which students interrogated the methodological differences and linkages; integrative semi nars/workshops on cross-disciplinary topics; guest lectures by professors from related fields; handouts on "Strategies for Clustering" to foster student study groups; collective creative projects such as the "Trail of Truths: Windows into Native American Cultures," a creative anthology developed and published by students; or a culminating student research conference. Thus, multiculturalism integrated within the humanities cluster content, and integrative strategies for humanistic learning that deepened cultural understandings, when effective, enabled students to learn as much about the methods as the materials of analysis.

Advantages for large universities of the cluster model are apparent: use of pre-existing courses; fulfillment of general education requirements; writ ing linked to discipline-based content; connections across disciplines, yet ex posure to different analytic paradigms; more intimate settings for student learning communities; closer contact between students and faculty; varied topics with broad-based appeal; a combination of traditional and multicultural clusters. Yet, despite the evident advantages of this special pro gram, new university students seemed reluctant to surrender the more general privilege of selecting their own unique and diversified study list; signed up at the last moment, when most courses had closed their enrollment, rather than elected the "challenge" of this option; feared a commitment to three courses (a full schedule for many Fall quarter freshman) in which they would have to drop all three; took peer counselors'

Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core, Karen E. Rowe

tering the Other: Spain & America," "Art and Literature in the Global Vil lage," "American Women: Their History, Their Literature," and "African American History and Literature." An exemplary cluster aimed at freshmen, "Encountering the Other," enrolled students in History 8A: Culture, Ethnicity, and Gender in Early Latin America, Spanish M42: Civilization of Spain and Portugal, and English 3: The Quincentenary Question. A more advanced cluster, with an appeal to transfer sophomores, such as "Ameri can Women" combined English M107A: American Women Writers (cross-listed with Women's Studies), History 156D: Social History of American Women, 1800-1920, and English 129: Intermediate Exposition, all of which bring ethnically diverse perspectives on gender into play.

Though often focused on a geographical region or ethnic-specific group, nonetheless, these clusters provided students with the intellectual tools to see cultures through multiple disciplinary lenses, thereby teaching them different ways of knowing, different ways to think about the forma tions of cultural and ethnic groups, and the varying discourse styles that ex press group identityoral stories, theater, dance, murals and music. Al though students often experience frustration in attempting to synthesize unsynchronized material, this reflects a widespread weakness in American education that, nonetheless, has potential value if recognized as an intellec tual rite of passage. Cluster faculty attempted to anticipate and teach to the challenges of interdisciplinary learning. By integrating knowledge from several related humanities disciplines, the intensive cluster sought to strengthen the student's ability to make connections, to see unities within chro nological periods, to trace different emergences of ideologies and ideas, and to hone writing skills and critical analysis. Consequently, the exposure to different disciplinary and intellectual approaches,

Karen E. Rowe, Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core

The intellectual potential for multicultural humanistic study offered by intensive immersion models are plentiful indeed. By opening for stu dents a "window" into cultural legacies through breadth, coherence, and depth of concentration, we provided a more connected view of shared cul tural heritages and engaged students in the humanities as an area of important inquiry, not merely as a fleeting experience on the way to a different degree and career. The humanities clusters provided an opportunity to promote a social and intellectual community among diverse students rarely avail able at large institutions. What such clusters gain by way of building upon already existing courses is dialogue and debate, a multi-disciplinary model of learning, and an accessible route for faculty to retain authority in their field while testing the waters of collegial team-teaching and collaborative planning. What such clusters lack is the imaginative power of a mutually conceived curriculum, in which faculty begin from scratch to design a self-consciously and thoroughly integrative experience for students, so that daily lectures speak coherently to each other, and a genuinely interdisciplinary ap

proach to humanistic multicultural learning.

American Cultural

Expression Sequence

Because of the demographic shifts and commitments to multicultural edu cation, an increasingly important goal of UCLA's general education has been to provide students with curricular and community programming that intro duces them to their own and other peoples' diversity, with Los Angeles as the critical context. Funded by the Ford Foundation, we inaugurated a pilot project in 1991-1993, to create a new humanities and arts sequence, "American Cultural Expression," which would "celebrate, through a complementary program of cultural activities and courses, the ethnic het erogeneity of southern California." 7 This "transformative" third model of a humanities core was designed as a year-long "branch" sequence that com bines a required multi-disciplinary, multicultural core lecture with flexible choice of usually smaller, more advanced discipline specific courses that focus on two or more ethnic communities in Los Angeles. While the in troductory lecture grounds students in critical theories, methods, and con cepts, the specialized courses examine the unifying thematic of American cul tural expression with increasing depth and a diversity of disciplinary and pedagogical strategies. Beginning in Fall 1991 with a core general edu cation lecture for 100 to 150 students on culture and esthetic values, the se quence then led to Winter and Spring 1992 offerings in history, urban cul ture and geography, music, and theater history, each with a focus on Los An geles as a site for diverse cultural and artistic modes of expression. Informal discussions to accompany artistic events were coordinated with courses to help students and community members access the arts of cultural tradi tions that might be foreign to them.

Assessment of the courses revealed a high degree of student interest and about a 30% carry-forward from the root course to the branch serieseven when it was not required but voluntary. Such a model can easily be con verted into a regularly offered American Culture and Esthetic Values gen eral education sequence, capable of fulfilling humanities and arts require ments or providing one variant of a humanities core with the added ben efit that the thematic focus can be adapted to the regional locales and ur ban "sites" of many colleges and universities.

The "transformative" nature of this humanities sequence derives in part from the inaugural esthetics course, taught by English professor and project director Raymund Paredes, which directly addresses the issues of multiculturalism. Titled "Aesthetic Value in Literature and the Arts: A Multi-Cultural Approach," English 100 interrogates the very notion of aes thetic value as it has developed in western and certain non-western cultures and in the United States. Readings include, among others, Terry Eagleton's The Ideology of the Aesthetic (1990), Sally Price's Primitive Art in Civilized Places (1991), Paul Lauter's Canons and Context (1991), Mark O'Brien and Craig Little's (eds.) Reimaging America: The Arts of Social Change (1990), and Lucy Lippard's Mixed Blessings: New Art in a Multi-Cultural America (1990). In the context of a historical overview of esthetic judgment, the course acquaints students with how values within an American cultural context take shape and change over time. Students are asked also to consider the qualities of traditionally neglected expressive forms, including storytelling and celebrations by Native Americans, the corridos of Mexican-Americans, and the spirituals and folklore that shape Afro-American literature. The course also takes account of how new demo graphics, immigrant populations, vary

ing cultural histories, and new configurations of urban space are reshaping the evolution of expressive forms, nowhere more vibrantly so than in con temporary Los Angeles. The 1991 students also participated in frequent im passioned debates as they learned that value systems are tied to cultural his tories, which do not develop in a vacuum and yet maintain unique fea tures.

Students from the Fall "Esthetics" course were encouraged to enroll in at least one, but preferably more, of the specialized branch classes (more than 30% did so) that were redesigned or newly developed to reflect multiethnic voices and cultural contexts. Two such courses with a focus on Los Angeles were offered each quarter, thereby per mitting students flexibility in their self selection and scheduling, yet also con tinuity in their intellectual growth. Geography, under the leadership of James Johnson and Michael Curry (former FEW faculty facilitator), cre ated a new seminar, "Symbolic Landscapes of Los Angeles," in which stu dents gain a broad understandingthrough art, literature, film, and rap musicof the city's complex landscapes and cultural enclaves. Although the course begins with an analysis of the development of Los Angeles' offi cial symbolic geographies, such as el pueblo de Los Angeles, Chinatown, Hollywood, the beaches, the freeways, and new downtown, it emphasizes pro gressively how traditionally marginalized groups have used art to define their visions of and their positions within the city. How such cul tural and artistic expressions reflect intergroup competition and conflict gives way to an evaluation of recent efforts to bridge communities and cul tures through integrative arts and festivals in Los Angeles reconceived as a multicultural urban space. Similarly in Winter 1992, Professor Steven Loza created Ethnomusicology 115, which analyzes how musical/cultural con texts converge within the metropolis.

Grounded in theories of esthetic anthropology and the history of cultural migrations, the course surveys both musical forms identified with ethnic groups, such as African-American gospel, jazz and the blues, or Chicano mariachi and Latin salsa, and how the confluence of cultures in Los Angeles has generated hybrid or cross-over musical styles from contemporary rock to rap.

The hugely popular (350+ students) Spring 1992 lecture, History 164: The History of Los Angeles taught by Professor George Sanchez focused on the key themes of immigration, the role of newcomers in ur ban decision-making, and the role of media in shaping mass culture. From the frontier dreams generated by Spanish Missions, Indian settlements, and the Ranchero economy to the hey-day of Hollywood, prohibition, and Jazz, to the war-time zoot suit riots and Japanese internment, to the present day Disneyland culture side by side with the Watts Riots, this course situates studenes in the historical flux of Los Angeles and the artistic mediums rep resenting it. Consequently, films, such as "El Norte," "Chinatown," "Ramona," and "Sunset Boulevard" become as integral as readings from Alejandro Morales's The Brick People (1988), Mike Davis's City of Ouartz (1990), Neal Gabler's An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood (1988), and Nathaneal West's The Day of the Locust (1939). In the same quarter, Theater Arts' faculty Edit Villarreal, Patricia Harter, and Beverly Robinson developed a new course, "Cross-Cultural Currents in Theater," which, through readings, live and filmed theater performances, and guest presenters, emphasizes interculturalism by comparing the Eastern and Western traditions and seeking their common threads. With project funding Film and Television also recast "History of the American Motion Picture," an introductory course on the complexity of American

Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core, Karen E. Rowe

culture and the diversity of American experience since 1950 and its relation to the appearance of television and the rise of popular youth music. Because all of these courses engage students even beyond those in the "American Cultural Expression" sequence, they bring more powerfully into the major and general education curriculum the multiculturalism that enrichens our understanding of the arts and humanities.

Theory would mean little, however, if not supported by experiential learning through audio and visual materials, visits from guest artists, and active attendance at university or community arts events. Expected to attend complementary arts events (museum exhibits, community festivals, dra matic productions, local arts series, public space sculptures and murals), students were engaged in monthly participatory discussions held in the resi dence halls and required to integrate classroom readings with the "arts ex perience" through their own writing assignments. Courses, such as History 164, also involved field internships at organizations as widely varying as the Asian Pacific American Legal Center, Central American Refugee Center, the Dunbar Museum (a South Central Afro-American Museum), Tri Star Pic tures, and Inter-Faith Hunger Coalition. In the geography class, students were required to board a bus at the far west end of Los Angeles and traverse the city via Wilshire Boulevard, noting the cultural changes along the street as well as in the bus. Rethinking his ethnomusicology helped Professor Loza frame his new book Barrio Rhythm, which now serves as a major text in contemporary arts education. Moving students outward and back into the ethnic communities from which the expressive arts radiate throughout Los Angeles became an essential pedagogical component, so that the laboratory for learning would not stop at the classroom door.

Making students cognizant of

multicultural arts involves, however, more than just an innovative curricu lar modelit requires that the humanistic study of the arts translates visibly from the academy into the community, so that cultural literacy continues to influence students' attitudes and cognition long after their formal education ends. The Ford Foundation grant enabled us, therefore, through a UCLA Community Forum Series, to offer pre-discussions to art and performance activities on campus, to sponsor specific programming at the residence halls, and to develop a series of calendars that illustrated the diversity of art and performance venues available to students and the larger community. Regardless of the richly diverse offerings in art and performance, student audiences often attended activities representing their own ethnic heritage, while "outsiders" felt uncomfortable when doing so. Thus, the educational goal was to encourage cross-cultural participation in order to find common ground in how cultures express themselves and how we can come to un derstand multiculturalism through art.

The three calendars of events from Winter 1991 through Fall 1992, under the title "Cultural Expression in the Arts" highlighted pre-performance dis cussions and some events in the residence halls. For example, community and campus members met at the Wight Art Gallery to hear an anthropology professor's on-site analysis of photographs depicting poverty worldwide. In the residence halls, counselors and student leaders proposed a discussion and slide show of "Euroamerican Ethnic Art; Pilgrimage Sites" that intro duced students to the Rose Parade, Doo Dah Parade, Gravesites (includ ing Forest Lawn), and Disneyland, events and sites that, like festivals, exaggerate diverse cultural expressions through community developed pop art. A second such event on parades and festivals centered on Cinco de Mayo, the Chinese New Year, and the African Market place. Spring 1992

featured three topical sections: Reconsidering War (posters and art); Arts in Los Angeles; and Film Festivals. Film festivals showcased not only ethnic -specific events, such as Afro-American student work and Asian Pacific filmmakers, but also "Seeing in Colors: A Celebration of Cultural Diver sity by Five Emerging Filmmakers," which featured students' multicultural perspective on issues including childhood and racial discrimination, fol lowed by a discussion with the filmmakers.

In retrospect, the development of "American Cultural Expression" as a new model of humanities core education could have occurred at no more opportune time than the year preceding the Los Angeles riots of May 1992. Faculty engaged throughout the curricular and community planning em phasized how the focus on Los Angeles prepared them and their students with tools for understanding the challenge of diversity and the natural blending of cultures that should bind us together rather than pull us apart. Thus, even beyond the multicultural theories and thematics that inform the courses, what distinguishes this model of a humanities core as "transforma tive" is the pedagogical innovations that link the academic education of our students to the multicultural community and nation within which they will live their lives. By creating a laboratory without walls "American Cultural Expression" attempts to link students more closely to the varieties of artistic mediums, to the Los Angeles community as a site for active student learn ing, and to modes of critical thinking, an archaelogical semiotics if you will, that enables students to read complex cultural encounters through history, lit erature and artand, consequently, the signs of their own times.

CONCLUSION

By using contemporary experience as the entry into the past, all three

models of multicultural humanities core programs, whether additive, in tegrative, or transformative, capitalize on our inherent curiosity about our selves and others, while enabling students to master varied disciplinary ap proaches to understanding fundamental human concerns. They reinforce the values of liberal arts education, critical thinking, and self-expression through writing and the creative arts, while opening the mind to multicultural perspectives, new ways of knowing, and new challenges to search out what still needs to be known. In a humanities core curricu lum infused with multiculturalism, students learn to see how ethnic groups diverge and converge, how gender and sexuality construct our experiences, and how culture is always in the process of being and becoming. Conse quently, as a community of learners, we begin to reread the landscape of American society as a richly symbolic multi-culture in which the e pluribus governs the unum of our daily lives, our cultural standpoint, and our glo bal realities.

It is in the innovative pedagogies illustrated by all of these models as well as the efforts to broaden, deepen, integrate, and recreate students' intro duction to the humanities and arts that we discover that border land of the "and." We inhabit this site together as faculty who are learning along with and from our students about the mani fold diversity of their cultures and ours, their humanity and ours.

As we embark on a new odyssey, it is not therefore by accident that I also come back home again to Los Angeles and Houston, the heritages and es thetics of these cities, and the theater of diversity that defines American cul tural expressions within them. With our perspectives rooted in the geogra phies of the southwest and Pacific rim and in indigenous and immigrant his tories, we are rediscovering an even richer borderland of "ands" between the ancient Mayan, Aztec, Indian, and

NOTES

1. Carlos Cortés spoke during week one of the 1993 Texas Seminar on the Core Curriculum, and his writings distributed to the participants usefully contextualized my second week presentation on the pragmatics for imple menting a new vision of multicultural education. Cortés addresses with com pelling rationales the "why" and "what is" of multicultural education, while I discuss strategies for "how" we insti tutionalize it within the undergraduate curriculum. See also his essay, "Pluribus & Unum: The Quest for Community Amid Diversity." Change 23 (September/October 1991): 8-13, in a special issue devoted to Diversity on Campus; and The Curriculum and Multiculturalism, a second special issue of Change 24 (January/February 1992).

2. In 1993 the 69.5% ethnic majority of 3,250 entering freshmen was com prised of O. 7% American Indian, 7.7% African American, 17.5% His panic, 30.5% Caucasian, 0.4% Other, and 38.1% Asian American with an ad ditional .2% Pacific Islander and 4.9% Filipino broken out separately ( 1993 Admissions Report). Similarly, in 1994 the 71.3% ethnic freshman class was constituted of l.l%

American Indian, 7.5% Afrian American, 14.2% Chicano/Mexican Ameri can, 5.3% Latino/Other Spanish American, 28.7% Caucasian, 0.4% Other, and 38.0% Asian American, with 0.4% Pacific Islander, 4.4% Fili pino (De Cardenas 1).

In the same periods, UCLA's total undergraduate domestic student popu lations have remained relatively stable in ethnic composition, including 58.6% of 23,180 (1992), 61.7% of 22,405 (1993), 57.4% of 23,527, be cause it reflects the lower percentage (45%) of ethnically diverse students among the approximate 1750-2000+ domestic transfers each year (Office of Academic Planning and Budget).

Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core, Karen E. Rowe

In 1993 UCLA also reported that "graduation rates within six years among all ethnic groups rose to 74.4%, an all-time high," and that UCLA's "graduating class composition has shifted from less than one-third per sons of color in 1986 to nearly one-half in 1992," from 30% to 47% (Lebo 1).

3. In addition to the 90 revised or new syllabi, FEW project participants gen erated 20 bibliographies and 10 other projects, including textbook revisions,

teaching packets, and departmental guidelines for teaching and for course

content. If courses were taught only once, students affected would number

14,000. In May 1993 the Legislative Assembly of the UCLA Academic Senate adopted three resolutions regarding the integration of multicultural issues into the undergraduate curriculum. The resolutions did not call for an American cultures requirement, such as at many University of Califor nia campuses, but instead strongly encouraged the faculty to infuse multicultural issues into the curriculum. Resolution 1 reaffirmed the im portance for "all undergraduates" of studying "multicultural interactions" and developing "the ability to analyze complex, multicultural lssues from dif ference perspectives."

Resolution 2 encouraged faculty and the administration to "support the de velopment of new courses, and the revision of existing courses, and other measures to develop" the prestated ability, while Resolution 3 provided for annual reports to the Assembly by the Council on Undergraduate Education on "specific measures adopted," the "success of achieving the objectives," and "the possible need for further efforts, including the need for curricular requirements." Funding for the newly formed Multicultural Studies Commit tee supported a first year (1993-94) of significant individual and group/semi nar course revisions (35), which are

presently being taught and evaluated.

Karen E. Rowe, Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core

of diversity and a continuing faculty dialogue about the ways initiatory [and

continuing] experiences in a field can contribute to, and lay the foundations

for, the widest range of students to achieve success. " Association of American Colleges, The Challenge of Connecting Learning (Washington, D.C.: Association of American Col leges, 1991), pp. 17-18. This publication represents the first of three vol umes devoted to Liberal Learning and the Arts and Sciences Major, in which the focus was the revitalization of majors, particularly through the con sciousness and development of multiculturally inclusive curricula. As with most of the AAC projects, a broad range of institutions and faculty were consulted about revising the majors and strategies for sustaining the val ues of coherence and continuity while also opening often closed areas of aca demic investigation to the new infusions of research on gender, ethnicity, and international cultures.

In Core Curriculum and Cultural Pluralism Betty Schmitz reviews the many humanities core programs rede signed as a result of the AAC's "Engaging Cultural Legacies Project: Shaping Core Curricula in the Humanities," which was funded by the National Endowment for the Humani

ties, directed by Carol G. Schneider, Executive Vice President of the Asso ciation of American Colleges, and within which UCLA was a planning (and eventually resource) institution. Attention to curricular continuity of multicultural inclusiveness has been an over-arching theme, indeed an inform ing principle, that links reforms in general education and core programs to the rethinking of departmental majors and interdepartmental programs. Hence, the challenge of connecting learning is both a reflection of the need to con nect learning to the social and political lives students lead, and conse quently to continually evolving notions of cultural pluralism in the United States, and the need to create coherent educational sequences that promote connected learning across disciplines and throughout the undergraduate cur riculum.

5. Although there have been on-going reforms of the general education re quirements at UCLA, until recently there has been little impetus from the College of Letters and Science and Academic Senate committees that oversee undergraduate education toward reinventing a humanities pro gram (or core) that would be taken by all students and necessarily cut across the divisional (Humanities, Social Sciences, Life Sciences, Physical Sci ences) and school boundaries (School of the Arts; School of Theater, Film and Television; School of Engineering and Applied Science; and newly formed School of Public Policy and Social Research). A new infusion of funding from the Hewlett Foundation for 1994-95, under the direction of Provost Brian Copenhaver, will be used for symposia that bring together faculty and administrators to examine possible core programs as well as reforms of general education. In those discussions the relationship of many multicultural courses already in existence, ones developed through previ ous projects and within ethnic and

women's studies programs, to general education and a humanities core will, we anticipate, be central to emerging concepts of any commonly required curriculum.

6. My thanks to Chris Juzwiak, Cluster Representative and Ph.D. candidate in Comparative Literature, whose first-year narrative about the Humanities Cluster Program provided the informational basis for my discussion here. Chris Juzwiak also developed quarterly flyers and a directive for students on "Strategies for Clustering," from which program descriptions have been drawn. First, Professor Kathleen Komar (Germanic Languages and Comparative Literature), 1991-92, and then Professor Shirley Arora (Spanish and Portuguese), 1992-94, who di rected the Humanities Cluster Program, were advised by a faculty com mittee on which I served. The Humanities Clusters together with the American Cultural Expression project and Curriculum and Writing Integra tion Project (CWIP) were the three initiatives which we pursued through the "Engaging Cultural Legacies: Shaping Core Curricula in the Humanities" project sponsored by the Assocation of

American Colleges.

7. My gratitude to Gayle Byock, Director of Special Projects for Associate Vice Chancellor Raymund Paredes, Chancellor's OfficeAcademic Development, whose cogent evaluative report for the Ford Foundation provided the basis for my discussion of American Cultural Expression. See UCLA's Ford Foundation Project:

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UCLA. Office of the Chancellor. Chancellor's Conference on Affirmative Action and Diversity: A Summary of Proceedings . Conference at Lake Arrowhead, CA., October 30-November 1, 1987. Los Angeles: Univ. of California at Los Angeles, 1987.

UCLA. Office of the Chancellor. UCLA Long Range Development Plan . Los Angeles: Univ. of California at Los Angeles, 1989.

UCLA. Office of Instructional Develop

ment, The Teacher's Guide. Ed. David Unruh. 3rd ed. Los Angeles: UCLA Of fice of Instructional Development, 1990.

"UCLA Faculty Development Seminar Syllabi." Women of Color and the Multicultural Curriculum; Transforming the College Classroom. Ed. Liza Fiol-Matta and Mariam K. Chamberlain. New York: The Feminine Press, 1994. 56-138.

UCLA General Catalogue. 1993-94. Los Angeles: UCLA Publications, 1993.

"What Students Have Said About the Humanities Cluster Program." Humanities Cluster Program Flyer. Los Angeles: Univ. of California at Los Angeles, 1993.

Yamada, Mitsuye. "Invisibility is an Unnatural Disaster: Reflections of an Asian -American Woman." This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color. Eds. Cherrie Moraga and Gloria Anzaldua. New York: Kitchen Table /Women of Color Press, 1981. 35-40.

Young, Charles E. Closing Remarks to the Conference on Affirmative Action and Ethnic Diversity. Conference at Lake Arrowhead, CA, November 1, 1987. Los Angeles: Univ. of California at Los Angeles, 1987.

Multiculturalism and the Humanities Core, Karen E. Rowe

t's delightful to be here in

I

people on, perhaps even change them for the rest of their lives, is a thrill few experiences can rise above.

Moreover, and the reason that I mention my own background with the course, is that I am only one of the many who are dedicated to the conceptual involvement of a core curriculum. The music faculty, for example, is dedicated to teaching an innovative, imaginative course, one that can be vital to the education of the students. With the feeling that, individually, we are each only a small link in the education of our young people, the core should be continually re-evaluated and re-examined. It's really a great course, with much very careful faculty involvement. I'm sure you have all heard the street wise expression, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." Well, we ain't broke, but we continue to try to fix our course, so that not only are the students excited and inspired, but so are we.

Under the direction of our committee chairman, Sherman Van Solkema, (who chaired the original Faculty Council Committee on Core Curriculum that devised what became a nationally acclaimed core curriculum at Brooklyn College), and with the guidance of the director of the Conservatory of Music, Nancy Hager, the music faculty is currently in the process of initiating a revamped Core Music 2.2 course in September. The materials we are developing are still in the working-out stage, but we feel

70

Paul Shelden

Brooklyn College

ory of Music, head of the Graduate Division in Music, and Chairman of the Woodwind Division, as well as Professor of Music and conductor of our active Conservatory Wind Ensemble. I am also a member of Brooklyn College's Core Curriculum Committee, a faculty-student committee responsible for overseeing the core college-wide. I have been teaching in the core since its inception at Brooklyn College since 1980.

As a busy senior faculty member at Brooklyn, where I have been on the faculty since 1973, with a very full teaching load and an active professional career in music, as well, I'm often asked why bother teaching an introductory type music course to undergraduate students. The answer is simple, or at least direct and isn't it the reason, in part, why we are all here today? First, we are very serious about the importance of the Core, and use senior faculty to teach most of the 20 or so sections of our music core. We also work very closely with junior faculty members and graduate fellows (teaching assistants) who are assigned sections. There is a wonderful comraderie here, and we benefit tremendously, in fact, by including younger faculty because they offer so much creative vigor to the course. We all want to teach the course, because, in large measure, undergraduate education is so vital and crucial to the concepts of higher education, and the idea of touching base with my own field of knowledge and experience, in this case, music, in a way where it may be possible to truly turn young

Houston for the purpose of core curriculum. My presentation will be divided into two sections, the prepared text (since we were asked to submit the "text" of our presentation, I feel inclined to actually read it!) and an actual sampler demonstration of my course.

From its inception in 1981, the Core Curriculum at Brooklyn College has been the life-blood of a very vital academic program. Our successes at Brooklyn College with the core have come about not by haphazard explorations but by soul searching, by picking brains apart (if you will forgive the culinary reference), by faculty self-evaluation, and by faculty seminars such as the Texas Seminar on the Core Curriculum.

I will not speak directly on the core at Brooklyn College, about which my colleague Dan Claster addressed you last week. Instead, in following the theme for this week, Developing and Teaching Innovative Core Courses, I will present an overview of the music core at Brooklyn, review our approaches to the course and the state of its current revisions. This week's sessions will also include Dr. Antonio Nadal of the Science Division at Brooklyn College, who will make a presentation Wednesday dealing with the science core.

Before I discuss music as a core studies curriculum, and present a sampler of the course that I teach at Brooklyn, please allow me to share some personal views about teaching in the core and my involvement with the core at Brooklyn College. I am Assistant Director of our Conservat

To introduce the course itself, let me first read the description of the course as it appears in the current booklet which introduces the core to students and faculty each year. This is that original description, and it does not include our current changes but then again, like any "constitution", if it is truly a "living" document, then it allows room for growth and change without having to alter the conceptual challenges of its original intent to its constituency. Here, then, is the brief description of CORE STUDIES 2: Introduction to Art and Music (which is divided into two courses, Art 2.1 and Music 2.2, each 2 hours, 2 credits):

The concurrent courses of Core Studies 2 build a foundation for an informed experience of art and music. They acquaint the student with some of the major achievements in these areas and with the basic concepts used in the analysis and discussion of such works. It should be stressed that the arts courses are not intended as art or music "appreciation," but as systematic and rigorous presentations of historical and technical material. The inclusion of these subjects in the core rests upon conviction that they are essential components in the background of a fully educated individual.

The description of the course itself, Core Studies 2.2, Introduction to Music, and its division into topic areas follows:

Introduction to music from a wide variety of historical periods and world cultures, with the goal of increasing listening skills and intellectual inquiry. The course seeks to acquaint students with such diverse composers as Bach, Mozart, Ives, and Gershwin and to provide contact with contemporary

compositions and the music of other continents (the styles, for example, of Western African drumming, Balinese gamelan, and Indian sitar music.) Live concert performances are an integral part of the course.

Introduction: musical perception and function; music encountered in everyday experience and how it affects us.

World Tour of Musical Instruments: musical timbre and its combination in large and small ensembles; the study of instruments, from piano to violin to sitar and shakuhachi.

Worlds and Music: texted music, its meaning and uses: sacred and secular styles, choral music, musical theater, opera, and solo song.

Social and Utilitarian Forms: works written for a specific purpose, including dance, film, and incidental theater music.

Instrumental Music: various structures and styles, including European symphonies and chamber music, jazz, Indian sitar music, and Korean court music.

It should be added here, that faculty have never been required to follow these descriptions to the letter, but rather, and similar to usual catalogue descriptions, to be guided by the ideological and philosophical content, structure, activity requirements, and overall intent implied here.

The music faculty, at their discretion, have individually adopted one of about three different texts used nationally, with tape cassette or CD supplements: Joseph Kerman, titled, LISTEN , in its secondor maybe this week, thirdbrief edition, along with the accompanying set of tapes or CDs. The new additions to the music core curriculum focus specifically on the special supplement to our world music component.

Introduction to Music, Paul Shelden

The course has been, since its inception, devoted in large measure to developing intelligent listening skills primarily with music that is Western in its emphasis, devoting at least in theory about 80% to the rich heritage of Western musicof course, we refer to "Western" as western civilization, rather than western, wild-west, southwest Texas or other inferences of local western vernacular! We as faculty, after decisions made as a result of the Conservatory of Music Faculty Development Seminar this past semester, have committed ourselves to strengthening the inclusion of the 20% emphasis on non-Western music. The emphasis will be geared toward a universal or global perspective in the course, especially considering the increasingly diverse makeup of our student body. As a supplement to this inclusion, we will be working with a set of audio and video tapes from the JVC Video Anthology of World Music and Dance.

Some of the music examples to be examined will include:

1. A spiritual from St. Simon's Island, Georgia

2. Children's songs in Spanish, English, and Haitian Kreo

3. A farm song from Ghana

4. A popular song from the Sudan

5. A tribal song from the Central African Republic (a song used to celebrate the birth of twins ( as a twin son I like this one)

6. A cult song from Brazil

7. A samba from Brazil

8. A tango from Argentina

9. An instrumental dance piece from Greece

10. An instrumental song from Cuba

11. Blues from the United States

12. An original concert piece employing authentic indigenous material from Puerto Rico

13. Gamelan music from Bali

14. A raga from Northern India

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Paul Shelden, Introduction to Music

As you can see, this is a large cross-section of materials encompassing music of the world, music through which the faculty can teach, according to their own creative inclinations, a great variety of music elements, rhythmic, melodic, metrical, and pitch varieties that are far removed from our western culture (or closer than we realize), as well as social implications, anthropological leanings, etc. At the very least, the students can develop more intelligent, broader listening depth that includes a wider respect, through knowledge, of music that is not their usual fare. The latter is so often the case when dealing with the more avant garde, or even the more tame of Western contemporary music. This point I will cover further when I offer my little sampler in a few minutes.

The brief syllabus for my course I believe copies were already handed outhas not yet been revised to include the new material. However, it gives an idea of expectations from me and the students, topic areas, and requirements. For example, a crucial segment for me is the series of three to four live demonstrations that are part of the course-wide requirement throughout the term. All classes meet in large lecture-hall type groups over the course of the weekly cycle, once each month, to listen to and view samples from a wide variety of musical performance situations, including explanation and discussion, and a period for questions and answers. These may range from demonstrations of Japanese music and dance, to percussion, or opera, or a composer

(a real live composersomething novel for many students!) demonstrating his music and other demonstrations of new concepts in music. Most faculty (if not all) also require attendance at one or two concerts attended on campus the Conservatory presents about 200 ensemble, student, and faculty concerts per year (I have a two-concert

attendance requirement). The students may choose which concert to attend from a list prepared each semester they attend these concerts free of charge. I then have them write reviews as they would if they were music critics for a major or minor or diminished (if you will forgive the musical reference) newspaper.

In fact, I shift around topics that is, I do not follow the numerical sequence on my topic list according to what may be on the schedule for the live demonstrations, or according to the concerts on schedule for a particular month, not all of which are posted in advance of setting up my schedule of assignments for each semester. I do not treat the course as a historical chronology, but rather a stylistic development. I almost always begin with music that is, as much as possible, unknown to everyone. In fact, I explain that I want to strip everyone bare sometimes waiting for dramatic effect of their pre-conceived notions of music. Usually, I use a way-out piece of avant garde music or a special piece of twentieth- century fare. This fall, I will probably use some unusual samples of world music that may be unfamiliar to all. However, I expect to open the course this coming semester, in similar fashion to other semesters, by devoting the first few sessions, essentially to a study of musical aesthetics.

It is at this point that I would like to now proceed with a sample of what I may do with my class. For this purpose, I am asking all of you to indulge me in a bit of fantasy, and allow yourselves to be a Core 2.2 Class at Brooklyn College for the next few minutes, or for the remaining time allotted to me.

In order to set the "classroom" scene, please imagine yourselves as sophisticated, young, eager, good looking, exciting wait, that does not take much imagination, does it? Seriously though, you are to play the role of inquisitive challenging

students, who represent the usual as well as the spectrum of many races and nationalities.

[From this point on, the text below will not be read necessarily, but incorporated into the setting up of, and actual presentation of the sample session.]

I will now digress from reading a prepared text and move into the presentation of a music core sampler. The next section of this presentation, then, will not be in typical lecture format, but instead will demonstrate a give-and-take session, planned to challenge and prod the student's minds in the aesthetics and fundamental considerations of music as an art, a science, a sociological experience, and so forth. During the process, a score of graphic musical notation will be kept on a music stand in front of the group, tantalizing, hopefully, some of the students to question the visual display. This will be brought into the discussion as inquiries are made. The score will be identified as Earle Brown's, December, 1952 . It will be discussed and performed in class.

In the course of teaching these first few sessions on aesthetics ( after the "stripping bare of pre-conceived notions about music" shock!), we usually cover such questions sample questions as:

1. What is music no definitions please, only descriptions

2. What is rhythm, melody, harmony

3. What do you think I listen to on the radio to relax

4. What is the difference between rhythm and meter

5. With Brown's December, 1952, what are the three dimensions of music

We also touch on aspects of:

1. Absolute or abstract music

2. Aleatoric or Chance music

3. Tonality

4. Atonality

5. Bitonality

6. Blues

8. Climax

9. Consonance vs. dissonance

10. Electronic music

11. Serialism

12. Tone row

13. Minimalism

14. Texture

15. Instrumentation or orchestration

We also discuss the overtone series, as a scientific and mathematical phenomenon, how this phenomenon affects sound and tone, how it affects the idiomatic sounds of particular instruments. All attempts are made to draw information into groups of related materials. Every teaching device necessary is employed, from Socratic, to psychological, to theatrical.

Musical examples to be played during the discussions include excerpts from or similar to:

1. Ives, Orchestral Set no.2

2. Crumb, Ancient Voices of Children

3. Varese, Poeme electronique

4. Debussy, Clouds

5. Stravinsky, Rite of Spring

6. Webern, Five Orchestral Pieces

7. Berlioz, Symphony Fantastique

8. Beethoven, Symphony No. 5

9. Salieri, Menuetto

10. Gershwin, Rhapsody in Blue

11. Sousa, varied marches

Samples of musical scores that are displayed for visual impact include:

1. Brown, December, 1952

2. Nilsson, Zwanzig Gruppen

3. Christou, Enantiodromia

4. Feldman, Between Categories

p

Introduction to Music, Paul Shelden

John A. Thorpe

State University of New York at Buffalo

I

n my remarks today I would

n it), at least the course content is within the expertise of the instructor and does not provide a particular challenge.

+ It is consistent with other instructional responsibilities that are assigned to departments. Most departments have a variety of "service" responsibilities. Mathematics departments teach basic mathematics to engineering and science majors. Science departments teach basic science to engineering students and to majors in the health-related professions. Political science departments teach pre-law students. Language departments teach students preparing for international careers. In a very real sense, teaching general education courses in a distribution program is simply another component of service instruction.

+ Often these courses serve also as introductory courses for the discipline. In some cases (e.g., anthropology, geology), these courses serve as recruitment devices for majors.

+ There is little interference or oversight from parties outside the discipline. Faculty can design courses for distribution with few constraints and they can teach the courses with no more monitoring than they would receive in any other courses that they teach. (Such monitoring, of course, is often minimal or non-existent and, to the extent that it does exist, is by peers in the discipline).

+ There is built-in protection of "turf". Nearly always, distribution requirements are set in a political environment that defines the

74

like to share with you some of my perceptions of the role of the disciplines in supporting, and contributing to, general education curricula as well as core curricula.

It needs to be noted at the outset that participation in general education instruction need not be limited to Arts and Sciences disciplines. At the State University of New York at Buffalo, for example, there are general education courses taught by faculty from architecture, education, engineering, health-related professions, law, nursing, and medicine. In fact, one of the most innovative new general education offerings at UB is a course taught jointly by a physiologist and a mechanical engineer. This course introduces students to some of the research that is being carried out in the university's human centrifuge facility, where the effects of large accelerations on astronauts are being studied. Students see the facility in operation, directly with instruments and on videotape with human subjects, and they learn some of the relevant physics and physiology. In addition to learning some science, they achieve in the course a strong appreciation of the value of basic scientific research and of the role that their university plays in that research.

This is a good example of a course that fits neatly into a general education program of the distribution type. In programs of this type, students are required to select one or more courses from each of several categories which, together,

are intended to provide an introduction to various fields considered to be important for a basic education in the liberal arts. These categories may include, for example, language, literature, art, history, philosophy, science, and/or mathematics. Often the categories are described not in terms of specific disciplines but rather in broader terms, such as quantitative reasoning, critical thinking, global perspectives, or multi -cultural studies. Sometimes they are grouped together, or perhaps further delineated, into broader or narrower categories. For example, the distribution program that is currently being replaced at the State University of New York at Buffalo (by a program with both core and distribution aspects) asks students to take up to two courses in writing and library skills, one course (or exemption by examination) in mathematical skills, and seven courses chosen from six "Knowledge Areas": Foreign Languages and Cross Cultural Studies, Historical and Philosophical Studies, Literature and the Arts, Life and Health Sciences, Physical and Mathematical Sciences and Technology, and Social and Behavioral Sciences.

From the perspective of the disciplines, there are several advantages, or "pluses", to a distribution system, such as:

+ It's easy. The requirements are easy to understand and the courses are easy to teach. Although it may be difficult for some faculty members to teach students who are not talented in the field (and oftennot particularly interested i

There are, of course, well known shortcomings, or minuses, of most distribution programs (see e.g. Boyer's College: The Undergraduate Experience in America), such as:

- Lack of coherence. Relationships between the various courses that a student takes in meeting distribution requirements are minimal or entirely absent. Although each of the individual courses may be appropriate and valuable, absent a strong advisement system the courses do not fit together to form a well-designed program of study.

- Lack of depth. Although distribution programs do ensure breadth students learn something about a variety of disciplinesfew of them require any depth of study. With few exceptions, students can and do fulfill the requirements by selecting only introductory coursesoften surveys, often courses taught in large class settings.

- Lack of integration. Integration of the learning that occurs in the various courses taken in a distribution program is usually left to the student. Capstone courses and other integrative experiences are difficult to mount when student programs are individually constructed with few if any common experiences.

- Difficulty of maintaining quality control. Although most distribution programs do have published expectations or standards for courses that are approved for satisfying the requirements, sometimes these standards are not strongly enforced in the approval process and, often, there is no follow-up to ensure that the courses are taught as proposed, especially over a period of years.

Core programs, on the other hand, at least those that involve multi -disciplinary core courses, usually have

a very different relationship to the disciplines. To a great extent, the above pluses become minuses, and the minuses become pluses:

+ Core curricula are designed with coherence in mind. The goals of the program are set prior to, or at least simultaneously with, the design of the courses. These goals are incorporated into the individual courses and are understood by the faculty who teach the courses.

+ Core curricula usually include some course sequences, or at least courses that exhibit an increasing level of sophistication, and therefore achieve at least some depth-of-study.

+ Core curricula often include capstone or integrative courses and, at least ideally, each core course acknowledges the learning that is, has, or will occur in the others.

+ Core curricula are usually associated with centralized administrative structures that monitor, evaluate, and seek to maintain and continually improve the quality of the core courses. Furthermore, core courses are often either team-taught or taught in multiple sections by faculty who meet regularly to discuss pedagogical issues and strategies, exchange ideas, and provide a shared sense of purpose.

On the other hand:

- Teaching multi-disciplinary core courses is not easy. These courses require reaching beyond one's disciplinary expertise, working with colleagues outside the discipline, more time spent on preparation, and more attention to pedagogy.

- Teaching core courses is unlike any other teaching responsibility. It requires an understanding and appreciation of a curriculum that includes material outside the faculty member's discipline and even outside allied disciplines. And it requires working in an administrative structure that is extra-departmental.

Disciplines and the Core, John A. Thorpe

- Although multi-disciplinary core courses can interest students in a disciplinary major, departments have less control and are often skeptical about this possibility.

- Teaching core courses involves conforming to goals and standards that have been set by, or at least in collaboration with, others. Some of our colleagues are strongly resistant to this. Some even go so far as to claim that any constraint on what they teach in their classrooms is an infringement on academic freedom!

- Core curricula may redirect student enrollments, possibly leading to the need to shift faculty resources from one department to another, or even from one division to another.

Even these apparent negatives of multi-disciplinary core curricula can have positive aspects, however. At SUNY-Buffalo, faculty who have been involved in core course instruction report that:

+ Working on curricular issues with others outside one's own discipline can be exciting and productive. One encounters perspectives that one would not find in one's own department. In fact, discussions focusing on curricular and pedagogical issues are rare in many departments, and faculty seem to enjoy being in an environment where such discussions are valued.

+ Teaching core courses often leads to opportunities for faculty development. All of the core courses at Buffalo have associated faculty development workshops that are well attended and much appreciated by faculty participants.

+ Reaching beyond one's discipline in order to teach core courses provides a valuable learning experience for faculty, often leading to new understandings that positively affect one's teaching of other courses, including courses in the major. For example, faculty: their teaching changes as a result of their better

75

John A. Thorpe, Disciplines and the Core

understanding of, and increased sensitivity to, issues of diversity. As more and more faculty teach this course ( in the coming year, about 25 faculty will be teaching the course ), it seems possible that attention to diversity will spread so widely throughout the undergraduate curriculum that eventually a separate pluralism course may be no longer necessary.

+ Some faculty report that preparing and teaching courses has had a positive impact on their research as well as their teaching. At Buffalo, such reports have come from instructors in both American Pluralism and Western Civilization.

Although I cannot claim that core course teaching at Buffalo is universally valued and supported, I think it is fair to say that most of the faculty who might have taught Buffalo's core courses are committed to the concept, have enjoyed the experience, and are prepared to do it again. The disciplines have not sufferedindeed they have, in some ways at least, benefitted.

Notes

1. The Association of American Colleges, in its report The Challenge of Connecting Learning, advocates increased connections between general education and the major. This provides one example of how such connections can occur.

76

University of Texas at Austin

Academic Perestroika

L

et me begin by stating the

nt in this work was the result of an accident. I was a graduate student at the University of California, Berkeley, trying to be an algebraic geometer. I already had been in California a few years, and, as my Easterner friends said, I had become "Californicated." Evidently, they were referring to the fact that I was showing signs of needing human contact. To meet this need, I agreed to work with a faculty member, Blaine Lawson, on developing and piloting a new training program for our department's teaching assistants. The two of us were trying to improve the quality of instruction in introductory calculus at Berkeley. At that point, we were not focusing on minority students, because very few were enrolled in the course. And then a wonderful accident occurred that really changed my professional life.

It was about 1974, and I had a model section of freshman calculus. The idea was that I would teach a section as the "Great Teacher," and try out all of these wonderful innovations I had been reading about. I didn't happen to take note of the fact that I didn't actually know how to teach. But I was determined. I picked a section, and hoped that the new teaching assistants and perhaps some junior faculty would visit, get ideas, and become inspired to work on improving their instruction.

The rub was that the students did not share my interest in innovative instruction, such as it was. They seemed to be interested mainly in

problem that we were addressing, namely, lowering the failure rate of Black students in calculus. Calculus was then, and remains, a major barrier for Black students seeking to enter careers that depend in an essential way on mathematics.

Let me ask you a questiononce a teacher, always a teacherhow many degrees in mathematics, chemistry or physics do you think were awarded to Blacks and Hispanics by the California State University System in academic year 1987-1988? A hint: the system had nineteen campuses serving more than 100,000 ethnic minority students and, of course, several hundred thousand others. Your guess is 500? Yours 100? Well, you're not even close. The answer is eight! Fewer than half the campuses awarded such degrees; only eight Black or Hispanic students received degrees in mathematics or the natural sciences. It is unimaginable, but, alas, true. And it hasn't gotten any better: In 1988-89 there were only three Black students who received such degrees.

At the time we began work on this issue, the problem of Black student failure in mathematics and science was seen by many as principally a political issue, as a question of social justice, as a moral failure of the university. Finding solutions to this problem had little to do with institutional survival. The number of minority students in colleges and universities was relatively small and the number of majority students interested in mathematics and science was relatively la

rge. Minority student failure did not effect enrollment, the life blood of public institutions.

Today we have an added problem: institutional survival in the face of fundamental demographic change. In the next fifteen years, the University of California alone will need 10,400 new faculty members. The California State University System will need even more. Who will they be, where will they come from? The answer, of course, is from today's elementary and middle-school students. If you want to get a feeling for demographic change, take a tour of the kindergartens in the community surrounding this college, or almost any other college or university near an urban area in the United States. On one such tour that I arranged for some of my undergraduates, one young woman's reaction to the extraordinary diversity she saw was: "Where do they keep the White kids?"

What started out for us as a problem of helping certain students pass calculus has become a much larger problem connected to institutional survival and, in fact, the survival of our society. As we look around the world we see country after country being torn apart by ethnic violence. It remains an open question whether we can create a democratic society which respects diversity and enables individuals to participate in all aspects of American life in meaningful numbers. The melting-pot is a great symbol but sometimes it seems like the pot's been on the stove too long. Some of the ingredients have been burned.

It now seems to me ironic that my involveme

Uri Treisman, Academic Perestroika

becoming engineers, M.B.A.'s and physicians; they merely wanted to "get through" this course. I said, "You guys, you're really going to interact with each other and you're going to love mathematics." They said, "Will it be on the test?"

Now, it's three weeks into the term, and I'm pushing and they're pushing back. Then I receive a letter from two graduate students in the School of Education. It said, "We are engaged in a master's thesis study of the validity of students' teacher evaluations." (This was very controversial then: should student evaluations of instructors be considered in promotion and tenure decisions?) "Your students have identified you as either one of the ten worst or ten best teachers on this campus, and for the purposes of our study, we cannot tell you which." The great and wonderful insult was that their plan was to videotape us in action, and show these tapes to real teachers, and see if they agreed with the students' assessments of our teaching.

So let me set the scene: The classroom was set up for videotaping. Twenty-four students were working four to a table. Each table had a microphone and I had a lapel mike. The students were told that their mike would be live only when I was interacting with them. (I, of course, had told them at the previous session that, from now on, I would give credit for classroom participation. I thought to myself, "To Hell with their research, this is my reputation, and I'm going to look good.") It's interesting to note that camera crews always film their own ideas of a good classroom, not yours. This cameraman wanted to film me in front of the room delivering a polished lecture to the students.

Well, it was as if Plato had written the script: The students were arguing heatedly about mathematics. They had rival conjectures about the behavior of the derivative of 1/x when x is large in absolute value. This is stuff you see,

maybe, once a decade. And I had it on film. Two men and two women are arguing away and when I walk away from them, you realize that something is wrong. What's wrong is that my mike and all the other mikes are dead except for the one at their table. Without their knowledge, everything they are saying is being recorded.

Just before I walked away from the table, I looked one of the students in the eye and said, "Gee, that's really good work." The guy next to her looks straight into the camera and he says, "Yeah, this is a really good class." As I walk away, you realize immediately that something is wrong. The students start whispering. Then a woman says, right into the mike, "Shit!" (She was from Texas, where that's a four syllable word. I won't attempt to imitate her pronunciation.) "You ever understand anything that joker is talking about?" From there, it went down hill. When I saw the film, I was a little depressed and demoralized. So much for the great teacher. However, the next class period I got my revenge and showed the film in class.

Because of my work with the T.A.'s, I was becoming increasingly interested in how students actually learn calculus. Do they use the text book? With whom do they speak? What do they do when they get stuck on a problem?the really basic questions about how students learn mathematics. I began to design projects aimed at answering these questions. One of these projects involved having each T.A. interview especially successful and especially unsuccessful students in his or her sections. In the T.A.s ' reports it became clear that it was minority students who disproportionately were failing and this disturbed many of the T.A.'s as well as myself. In fact, in the preceding decade, sixty percent of the Black students who enrolled in and completed first-term calculus at Berkeley earned grades of D or F. In no year did more than two Black or

Hispanic students earn more than a B- in any calculus course at UC-Berkeley. Of course, at that time there were very few ethnic minority students enrolled on the campus. In the typical freshman class of the mid-seventies here were fewer than 150 Black and Latino students in a class of 3,600. Today, thirty-two percent of the incoming freshmen are Black, Hispanic, or Native American. Only thirty-eight percent are White. The Berkeley campus finally looks like it's part of California.

To support our developing understanding of minority performance in calculus we sought a grant from a major foundation. In the course of negotiating we were asked to produce almost instantaneously a clear statement of our initial hypotheses. What to do? We really didn't have a clue. We had to develop our hypotheses quickly so we asked a few thousand people who didn't have a clue either and averaged their answersthe mathematician's idea of social science research.

It will be useful for me to state what we found because I believe that these assumptions are responsible for the failure of many university intervention efforts, and because these assumptions are rarely stated explicitly and almost never publicly. The responses to our survey surfaced four widely held beliefs about the causes of minority student failure. The first was that there is a motivation gap. It's not that the minority students are unmotivated, this argument goes, but that they are not as motivated as certain groups, namely the Asians and the Jews. The implication was that small differences in motivation would have large effects in highly competitive and difficult courses. The few A's given would go to the students who, because of their high level of motivation, were willing to work extraordinarily hard. It was the students who were extraordinarily motivated who would excel and those students were

The second argument named inadequate preparation as the culprit. Minority students enter the university with fewer credit hours of science and mathematics from high school and with substantially lower SAT's. The fault lies not in the university, but in what students bring to the university, namely motivation and prior preparation. In other words, "It's not our fault."

Several faculty pointed to the "vertical" organization of math and science. New topics depend on the topics which precede them; courses depend on the courses which precede them. This characteristic of math and science makes it difficult for students to improve their performance once they are having difficulty. Even if students are committed to improvement, the intensity and speed of freshman courses give them no time to catch up.

The third problem was a conjectured lack of family support or understanding of higher education. The idea was, roughly, that since the families of these kids did not have rich educational backgrounds, how could they pass on to their kids the survival skills they would need in college? Moreover, some faculty members thought that the parents did not push their kids hard enough. Of course, we had never met any of these families, but we seemed to have clear ideas about them.

The fourth idea is a corollary of the great liberal dream: "It has nothing to do with race or ethnicity at all. It must be something else. What is it then? Income. If you control for income, all the differences disappear." Then there were a few older faculty members who had views about the effects of race and heredity and the like. They are gone now, replaced by a younger group of faculty with the same ideas. I want to mention, though, that one faculty member, who held well-known views about the genetic

inferiority of Blacks, wrote the only interesting response to our survey. He said that, according to his calculationshe was big into pseudo -statistics"population characteristics" (by which he meant "race") could account for only about four percent of the failure. But the observed failure was so great that only the institution's behavior could account for it. What an irony, he was the only one to assert that something might actually be wrong with the institution.

Well, these were our findings and, at the time, we believed them. Minority students' failure could be attributed to low income, low motivation, poor academic preparation and lack of family support, all factors, incidentally and conveniently, over which we had no control. Nonetheless, we were interested in how these factors worked. "On which calculus problems did these issues cause trouble?" "When and how do they actually interfere with student success?"

Our initial idea was to interview students. A typical question: "How many hours do you study?" A typical answer: "I put in two hours for every class hour." The students were telling us exactly what we had told them. They weren't being dishonest, they just didn't have an accountant's view of how they organized their time. Our

"Well, these were our findings and,

at the time, we believed them. Minority students' failure could be attributed to low income, low motivation, poor academic preparation and lack of family support . . . . "

Academic Perestroika, Uri Treisman

Now, picture me, if you can, boy-Margaret-Mead, out in the field. We had picked twenty Black and twenty Chinese students. The idea was that we would compare two ethnic groups, one that generally did well in our mathematics classes, and one that did not. We decided literally to move in with the students and to videotape them at work. We wanted to understand what was going on when they studied calculus, got stuck on a problem, etc.

We were struck by the enormous diversity among these students and remembered that not one person on our faculty survey had written to ask us to which minority students we were referring. No one questioned the supposed homogeneity of these groups. Some of the Black students had come from middle-class homes and had many White friends in high school. Others were the valedictorians of all-Black inner-city schools, yet others were from military families and had grown up all over the world. The Chinese students were equally diverse. There is a funny story which demonstrates this diversity.

I should tell you that I had prepared myself for working with the Chinese students by learning some Cantonese. One day, I was going to interview three young women who were deep in conversation. I approached them, greeting them in my toneless Cantonese. One of the students responded in Yiddish, "How are you doing?" It turned out that she was from L.A.'s Chinatown, and her mother, who was a nurses' aide, worked in a hospital with Jewish physicians. She had told her daughter that she could not date until she was a junior in college but when she could

Uri Treisman, Academic Perestroika

date, she could see only other Chinese from certain families and Jewish pre -meds. Her mother apparently had had good experiences working with Jewish physicians. "They are family-oriented people" is what her mother had told her. This kid was 400 miles from home, clearly ready to date and open to exploration. So, she had enrolled in a Yiddish course. One of the wonderful ironies of all this was that we learned that our stereotypical view of Chinese students was exactly society's view of us as mathematicians: no sex, no partying, no sense of humor, and a calculator hanging on the belt.

The study was supposed to take ten weeks, but after four months we still didn't have the understanding we needed. We had gotten to that critical stage of research when one recognizes that one's hypotheses are not helping any.

We had the good luck to run into some of anthropologist John Ogbu's graduate students. They pointed out to us that our ideas were characteristically American, if not Californian, where every pop-psychology idea quickly works its way into educational practice. For example, even after the neurophysiological basis for left-brain and right-brain-thinking had been refuted, workshops on learning mathematics on the left brain or right brain abounded. A small number, about three out of a hundred studies, showing that women visualize differently and describe the spatial relationships of objects differently, have been used to explain the near total absence of women in math faculties in the United

trends and practice."

We were advised to step back and question our hypotheses, which was really useful. Instead of looking at what happens when students get stuck on a problem, we were encouraged to look more globally at their lives. We went up to Lake Tahoe with hundreds of hours of unedited videotape. In a weekend all of our hypotheses fell apart.

Let's look at "motivation." It is not as if our Black students thought to themselves, "Well, there's nothing happening on the streets, so let's go to Harvard, Caltech, Princeton, or Berkeley." These students were admitted to one of the premier research universities in the United States, and we had presumed that their problem was motivation. Students from the inner cities had paid a heavy price to get to Berkeley. Some were the social outcasts, the "Brainiacs," or if they were math majors, the "pervert Brainiacs." They paid a very, very high price. These kids were motivated! In fact, I believe that just about all first -year students in college are motivated for the first few weeks of their freshman term. We had been mistaking "disorientation" for lack of motivation.

The second factor was "academic preparation." We had many years of data from Berkeley that called this hypothesis into question. We found, for example, that black students' calculus grades correlated negatively with their Math SAT scores. Many of the "strongest" students failed early. Black men with high SAT's were often facing academic dismissal. The few successes, on the other hand, came from the second quartile from the bottom. These data forced us to call into question our ideas about the role of high school background in college performance among Black students.

We studied the issue of "family support" by interviewing the families

of our students. We came to appreciate quickly that many of the parents had decided before their children were ever born that their sons and daughters would go to college. There were lots of mothers brandishing heavy kitchen implements, saying "child, you will go to college." Although teachers had helped them, these kids were, in large part, at the university because of the concerted and organized effort of adults who cared about them. We found no parental apathy and quite a few parents who were themselves college graduates.

There is a popular image of the Hispanic girl coming to the university against opposition of her family. There were two or three young women who did face the opposition, but in a large number of cases, the families were extraordinarily supportive and had organized themselves to help their kids make it. These families decided that their children would make it through education, and many had paid a heavy price to make that happen.

At Berkeley we had lots of the "Jack and Jillers," many of whom had grown up in largely White neighborhoods, with White friends. Sometimes their only contact with other Black children was in "Jack and Jill," or when they'd go to spend the summer with their grandparents, back in North Carolina or Louisiana. The families of these students saw college as a necessity. They respected education, and especially so for their daughters.

"Income" correlated negatively. Why? Because many of the Black students had parents who were public school employees. Some were custodians, some were teachers, some were secretaries; in any case, public school employees don't earn much. The next largest group were children of civil service workers. Typically, the parents had degrees from historically Black colleges, moved out to California in the 1950's or 1960's, and couldn't find jobs in their chosen field.

So, what did we find by looking at our students? What did studying math mean for the Black and Chinese students? For the Black students it meant this: You wake up in the morning. You go to class. You take notes. You get your homework assignment. You go home. What do you do? You do your homework religiously. You come to class. You hand it in. A day or two before the test, you study. You put in about eight hours a week for a calculus course, just what the teacher says, and what happens to you? You fail. An important point here is that the Black students typically worked alone. Indeed, eighteen of the twenty students never studied with their classmates. There was the same pattern for many blue-collar Whites and rural students.

What about the Chinese students? They studied calculus for about fourteen hours a week. They would put in eight to ten hours working alone. In the evenings, they would get together. They might make a meal, usually jook, which is a rice soup. Then, they would sit and eat and go over the homework assignment. They would check each other's answers and each other's English. If one student got an answer of "pi," and all the others got an answer of "eighty-two," the first student knew that he or she was probably wrong but could pick it up quickly from the others. If there was a wide variation among the answers, or if no one could do the problem, they knew it was one of the instructor's "killers."

It was interesting to see how the Chinese students learned from each other. They would edit each other's solutions. A cousin or an older brother would come in and test them. They would regularly work problems from old exams, which are kept in a public file in the library. They would ask each other questions like, "How many hours did you stay up last night?" They knew exactly where they stood in the class. They had constructed something like

a truly academic fraternity, not the more typical fraternity: Sigma Phi Nothing.

The best evidence for the power of the Asian students' group work was the contagion factor. If one student had a misconception, they would all leave with it. There is a beautiful story which illustrates this: It is 1:00 a.m., and the kids are listening to loud ethno-pop music (something like "Singing in the Rain," sung in Cantonese, to a disco beat), and they are also watching Perry Mason on television. There is this courtroom scene in which Hamilton Burger, the District Attorney in Perry Mason gives the bailiff a gun, and the bailiff says for the court reporter's record, " Let it be known that this revolver has been entered into evidence." The students picked up the expression, "Let it be known that" and began to use it in their math homework. Instead of writing, "...let X equal..." on their homework, they started writing, "...let it be known that X is..." This usage spread among their friends, and a few days later, when ten or fifteen people already were using this construction, one of them had the error corrected. The usage disappeared almost overnight.

The Black students, on the other hand, didn't have a clue what other students in the class were doing. They didn't have any idea, for example, what grades they were going to get. The exams were like a lottery: "I got a B," or, "I got a C." They had no clue where they stood relative to their classmates. Moreover, these same students were getting A's in "Study Skills," and F's in the calculus class. What they were taught in "Study Skills" wasn't worth a damn in calculus.

At this point it is useful to look at how universities attempt to deal with the problem of minority student failure. In the sixties, the university administration hired people to deal with this problem which was then seen as essentially a political one. This is not to say that the administrators didn't

Academic Perestroika, Uri Treisman

care about these students, but it was necessary to have visible institutional effort aimed at helping these students to survive. Because of the political character of affirmative action, the administration took primary responsibility for minority student programs, even those that addressed academic issues. The political pressure to create these programs was felt on virtually every American college and university campus. If we look at these programs, even NOW, we see first that they are isomorphic. They have little to do with the special mission or history of the institutions in which they exist, which is remarkable given the diversity of American higher education. They are as similar as personnel offices.

Second, they have very little if any connection to the faculty. They are staffed by very caring people, many of whom are minority, and who are devoting their professional lives to helping minority students to avoid failure. But, unfortunately, they see massive failure and this has led to corresponding burnout and anger. In the large, their tutorial programs are disastrous. The tutors see the students the day before the exam; the counselors see them the day after the exam. On many campuses you don't count the Black and Hispanic people who graduate in math and science. There are so few you can just name them. You can carry a photograph of each of them in your wallet.

The individuals who work in the student affirmative action operations, seeing the overwhelming failure of the students they care about, can easily develop a "bunker mentality." The faculty are the enemy. They advise their students to stay away from mathematics and science. This is a scary and depressing phenomenon, very depressing.

An equally disturbing phenomenon is the creation of remedial courses that lead nowhere and preparatory courses that do not

Uri Treisman, Academic Perestroika

prepare students for subsequent courses. On many campuses these courses have high minority enrollments and have become associated with minority students. At Berkeley, for example, we teach a course called pre-calculus. One year, 422 students enrolled in the course, only one of whom, Danny Lescano, went on to receive a grade of B- or higher in second semester calculus. It makes you want to name the course after him. The evidence is overwhelming that few students who take remedial courses ever complete science degrees. Yet the students who start these courses are not aware of this. Truth in advertising should apply to college catalogues. The course descriptions might include the proportion of students who take the course that successfully complete the courses for which it is a prerequisite.

So, at the end of our inquiry, what had we learned? 1) Many Black and Hispanic students wanted to major in math and science but very few completed the prerequisite entry-level courses. 2) Our ideas about why minority students failed calculus clearly were wrong. 3) Affirmative action programs were not producing math and science majors. It was clear that they were helping some kids stay in school, but they weren't helping students in our field. 4) Many Black students did not use the services that were designed to help them. This last point is of special importance because many Black students are suspicious of appeals made to them based on ethnicity. These students also dislike the idea of remediation. They see themselves as the tutors, not the tutees. They do not choose to come to Berkeley because they want to learn about being Black. They choose it because they believe in the institution's ideals and its elitism.

When the university sends a letter as ours did, "Dear Minority Student: Congratulations on your admission to Berkeley. Berkeley is a difficult

institution. You are going to need a lot of help and we are here to help you," the students disregard it. Their response is, "Oh, that's for those air -heads over there." They associate "help" with the kids they had known in high school who were in the bottom of their class and in the compensatory programs. They do not relate to such appeals.

In 1978 we began to experiment with solutions. Our idea was to construct an anti-remedial program for students who saw themselves as well -prepared. In response to the debilitating patterns of isolation that we had observed among the Black students we studied, we emphasized group learning and a community life focused on a shared interest in mathematics. The program was essentially a cluster program and was an adjunct to the regular courses. In contrast to the traditional remedial programs that offered reactive tutoring and time management and study skills courses which have a questionable scholarly base, we provided our students with a warm, emotionally supportive academic environment. Most visitors to the program thought that the heart of our project was group learning. They were impressed by the enthusiasm of the students and the intensity of their interactions as they collectively attacked challenging problems. But the real core was the problem sets which drove the group interaction. One of the greatest challenges that we faced (and still face today) was figuring out suitable mathematical tasks for the students that not only would help them to crystallize their emerging understanding of the calculus, but that also would show them the beauty of the subject. Our goal was then (and continues to be now) not merely helping students pass calculus or even to excel at it but, rather, producing mathematicians (or at least students who could pursue graduate work in the field if they chose to do so.) We knew that the program

goals had to be congruent with the goals of the institution, i.e., focused on excellence, of the production of Rhodes Scholars, and the like.

It took a little work to teach the students how to work together. We were able to convince them in our orientation that success in college would require them to work with their peers, to create for themselves a community based on shared intellectual interests and common professional aims. After that, it was really rather elementary pedagogy.

In a sense, the greatest break with the past was to take a genuinely empirical stance. We did not question that minority students could excel. We just wanted to know what kind of setting we would need to provide so that they could. We also recognized early on that we only would be successful if we depoliticized the issue of minority access. We had to link our program with other issues that the faculty cared about, such as producing quality majors, and de-emphasize the purely political characteristics of the program so that it could take hold in academic departments. From the beginning, therefore, we served students of all ethnicities, although the minorities were, in fact, a clear majority in all the sections. The effect was that many middle-class Black and Latino students found it comfortable to participate because it was a way for them to establish quickly the multi -ethnic social environment in which they were most comfortable. For the urban Black and Latino students the workshops, as we called them, were an environment in which they were the majority and the White students the minority, making it easier for cross-ethnic friendships to form. In effect, the workshops provided a buffer easing minority students' transition to the Academy.

The results of the program were quite dramatic. Black and Latino participants, typically more than half of all such students enrolled in

By 1982, more than 200 ethnic minority students were being served in the workshops which were then run cooperatively by a faculty committee, the College of Engineering, and the Student Learning Center. In 1983, however, when our FIPSE grant ended, there was open warfare. The faculty and administration were fighting over control of the program. Unfortunately, the faculty lost and a period of balkanization followed, with small, separate programs proliferating on campus.

But there was a more fundamental change taking place in the mid-eighties that would in any case, have forced the reorganization of these programs. Today, on the Berkeley campus, there is no longer any dominant ethnic group. Fewer than fifty percent of all undergraduates are White and roughly one-third of the incoming freshmen are Black, Latino, or Native American. The time had come when "adjunct" programs were no longer feasible or desirable. It was time to address the efficacy of the introductory courses.

We realized that in the past we had, in effect, been running a program aimed at saving our own victims. We were not trying to address the central reality that our courses were not serving their intended populations. Ultimately, one must realize that the Black and Latino students who make it into higher education are national treasures and must be treated as such. They are rare individuals and their

success will have important ramifications not only for the academic disciplines and professions they pursue, but for the very fabric of American society.

I find it hysterically funny to look at the CSU and UC projections of the California students who will be served in our universities in the years 2005 and 2010. The CSU Chancellor, and the UC President, each say the State needs several new university campuses. What are their enrollment projections based on? They appear to be based on increasing the admission and retention rates of Black and Hispanic students who by then will represent a majority of the California population. No one points out that all the actual minority enrollment, retention, and graduation trends are very far from what they will need to be, if the projected figures are to be realized. Moreover, no one seems to observe that the few minority students who actually do get through the system graduate in only a handful of majors.

Now, let me look at these projections from another view. Last year, I believe that there were at most twelve Black male students who had been students in L.A. Unified who received B.S. degrees in mathematics, chemistry or physics in California public colleges or universities. For each one of those students, using FBI and LAPD data, I estimate that 100 of their peers died by violence. Yes, a Black male elementary student in L.A. is 100 times more likely to die by

"Ultimately, one must realize that the Black and Latino students who make it into higher education are national treasures and must be treated as such."

Academic Perestroika, Uri Treisman

Now, let me look at the issues we faced in reconstructing our workshop program. The first is the abysmally low quality of freshman instruction in large public universities and, for that matter, in many expensive private ones, as well.

Six-hundred-thousand freshmen a year take calculus; 250,000 of them fail. Something is fundamentally wrong. What I find even more amazing than this high failure rate is that calculusnow here comes my prejudice as a mathematicianis by just about any standardliberal arts people, trust meone of the greatest intellectual achievements of western civilization. The stuff drips with power and beauty. It rendered thousand-year -old questions immediately transparent. Calculus is truly amazing. But, how many students who take the course as freshmen look up and say, "Holy shit, that's amazing!" How often, math faculty members, have your students had that experience? I mean, the stuff just sort of goes by. No passion, no soul.

Why do so many students fail these courses? Our initial idea once again was blame the students, albeit in a more sophisticated way than previously. The students, we thought, did not have "higher-order" thinking or problem-solving skillsthey just did not know how to thinkthey did not know how to pull the problem out from the words and find the relevant principles. However, when we tested this idea, we found once again that we were basically wrong. When we looked at students enrolled in first term physics, for example, we found there were some students who couldn't extract the problem from among the words and find the relevant principles.

Uri Treisman, Academic Perestroika

But they were relatively easy to help if they had enough prior exposure to physics. The majority of the students having difficulty fell into two groups. Group one were the kids who had intellectual integrity, but no meaningful prior exposure to physics. They came upon a hard ideainertia, angular momentumthese are hard ideas. If you are not a physicist and you take physics, you'll know that. If you are a physicist, it is a little hard to realize these are hard, but they are hard. The students would spend four or five days trying to figure out the concepts. They had learned not to let anything pass. The result was they would get buried in an avalanche of formulas.

Other kids had really strong math backgrounds. Their response to the massive amount of material that was dumped on them was to treat everything as an isolated, abstract mathematical problem-solving task. They never had a chance to develop the underlying physical intuition (and it was sure as hell true that the standard physics labs didn't help any). They were treating physics as if it were mathematics or logic. The courses contained so much material that students had no time to develop an understanding of the physical concepts, the connections among these topics, or the relationship between the physics they were studying and the mathematics they knew.

Once again, we were forced to deal with the fact that the problem wasn't really the students. Students, in fact, respond to whatever you give them. What they were being given here were courses that had become so compressed, so devoid of life and spirit, that there was no way to really master the ideas at the level necessary to succeed, let alone become a major.

These introductory math and science courses took form at a time when there was a surplus of students interested in science. These courses came to be thought of as service courses. Everybody teaches their

freshman courses for somebody else's major. Now, times have changed. Very few students are interested in math and science. CIRP data from UCLA collected and analyzed by Sandy Astin and Ken Greene indicate that in 1966, 4.6 percent of high school seniors who took the SAT were interested in mathematics as a major. Today, it is about 0.6 percent. We are teaching courses created at a time when filtering was a necessity. Now, freshman courses need to inspire students and invite them into the major.

We recognized that if we were to try at this point to improve instruction for everybody equally we could only make a slight difference. Our resources were relatively limited and we didn't want to lose the minority students. We decided to eliminate the adjunct workshops and instead to strengthen and intensify certain sections of the regular freshman calculus course. Our idea was to construct a hybrid of the regular discussion sections and the "math workshop."

In freshman calculus, when we looked at the issue of problem-solving, we faced difficulties. The first was the absence of genuine problems to solve. What passes for problems in calculus is a set of ritualized exercises that can be addressed by mastering a limited set of algorithms together with a few special cases. The exceptionsindefinite integration, convergence of series of constants, which are fun to teach and really are excellent domains for teaching problem solvinghave unfortunately no place in a contemporary calculus course, as so many in the calculus reform movement have pointed out.

The second difficulty is that we don't have a clue how to teach problem solving in a way that promotes the development of generalized skill. Using state-of-the-art materials, such as those developed by Alan Schoenfeld, for teaching a topic like indefinite integration, we can help students to get very good at one

particular task. Unfortunately, experience has shown that such instruction gives students no advantage in mastering subsequent topics.

The final issue, which we are only now beginning to address, is how to make it possible for faculty members who are interested in working on course reconstruction or on the development of minority mathematicians to do so as part of their professional work. In the past the individuals who worked on these, what were then seen as quasi-professional issues, did so as personal work, almost as hobbies: "You play golf," "I work with the Black kids." The scale of the problem now is such that many mathematicians will need to engage in activities that are necessary for the future life of the profession. If this is to happen, such work must become a regular and rewarded part of departmental life. This in turn will require that faculty and administration redefine responsibilities of departments and support these redefinitions by new review and department budgeting procedures.

Let me restate this. It means that the administration has to re-think what the collective responsibilities of departments are. Are departments only responsible for research and for body-count teaching? Or are they responsible, in some way, for the future of the institution and the future of their own disciplines? If the latter is so, one has to think about ways of rewarding departments for playing their proper role. Not that every faculty member should do this, but each department has to be responsible for contributing to solutions to these problems. The rewards for the departments have to be realspace, faculty appointments, support for more graduate assistantships, and so on.

For the most part, at least in the beginning, faculty members who do this work will have to be senior, partly because junior people need to establish research careers, but also because the

If senior people are to engage in this work for the department it is important that they be able to do so in ways that do not lead to stigmatization. A hint: Don't confuse this work with better teaching. If you focus on teaching alone, you lose. It has to be about assuring the future of the profession and the future of our institutions. But it is not only the academic departments that need to change.

When the university works it does so because the faculty plays its proper role and the administration plays its. In student affirmative action, however, the administration does it all, including tasks that are clearly academic in nature. Fixing this is not a trivial matter, because there is a long history of administrative dominance in this area with which we have to contend. But that is ultimately what we will have to do.

An especially important issue will be learning to work with the EOP and minority affairs bureaucracies. They are easily and unfairly blamed by faculty members and administrators for the failures of minority students. It was ludicrous to think that their administratively constructed offices could have even addressed the problem of minority student failure in math and science.

Whereas some of the work is really academic, other parts of it are administrative. These include such issues as housing, financial aid, student organizations, and the like. We have to re-examine the ways faculty and administration work together to help students advance.

What's the bottom line here? The country is fundamentally changing. There are a growing number of schools, where all of a sudden,

extraordinary results are produced. Garfield High School produces 27% of all the Hispanics in the United states and Puerto Rico who pass the AP calculus exam: One high school. I have listed ten high schools that produce relatively large numbers of Black and Latino students who passed the AP calculus exam. Not one is a magnet school. When you go out and look at these schools and you teach in them, what do you find? A group of senior teachers who chucked the remedial courses. They cared about mathematics and wanted to teach real courses. They built a peer group that supported kids' involvement in school work and in mathematics.

Now, instead of talking only about Berkeley, I want to talk about some of the other sites with which we've been working. At the University of Texas at Austin, a group of faculty members and an extraordinary administrator said: "Let's figure out what we have to do in calculus to produce lots of Hispanic and Black mathematics majors." They took our Berkeley idea. They intensified some sections of freshman calculus. They built group work into the course and made it clear to the students that it takes fifteen hours of work, not eight, to excel. They made it possible for the kids to take slightly fewer courses at a much greater depth and level of intensity. They unabashedly advocated for these students to become mathematicians. They set up a system where the kids in the intensive courses could be graded against the curve established by the regular sectionssame exams. What happened? Minorities: 3.53 average G.P.A.; Others: 1.66.

At CCNY, the faculty believed that their students would never become mathematics majors. The students were all working forty hours a week and had little interest in being challenged. Inspired by the Berkeley program, they decided to test their assumptions. A team led by Laura Shapiro interviewed students, and

Academic Perestroika, Uri Treisman

what did they find? Lots of these students had saved up tuition money so they could go to school. The strongest students found the courses uniformly unstimulating and unchallenging. In response, the department set up more challenging "intensive" sections and the result of the first semester was a 3.2 average grade for the minorities against about 1.8 for class average.

Now let's look at another kind of institution and an administrative solution that didn't work. At Oklahoma they have a serious retention problem, the worst in the "Big Ten"or the "Big Eight" or whatever. They changed their admissions requirements and dropped the bottom quarter of test scores from admissions. What happened? Absolutely no change in retention. Retention in large measure is a function of the way students interact with each other and with the institution. It is a measure of connectivity, of the quality of life on campus.

On this campus, you did studies which looked at students' undergraduate experiences. One interesting result: Students study roughly the same amount of time, whether or not they are employed about ten hours a week. It seems to have nothing to do with how much time they spend at their jobs. I believe that, in fact, the amount of energy students put into their studies is more directly related to their perceptions of their chances of succeeding at the university. If students see clear evidence that they can make it, they will use whatever flexibility they have to reduce work hours and increase hours devoted to study.

In conclusion, the time has come to reexamine undergraduate instruction and to make it more responsive to the needs of today's students. We can no longer offer courses that half of our students fail, nor can we lower our standards. The challenge is to re-configure

Uri Treisman, Academic Perestroika

undergraduate science and mathematics education in ways that will inspire students to make the choices we have made. This can only happen if we change the boundaries of faculty responsibility. It is the faculty that must take the lead. p

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represent the first technology and are called "dawn stones" (named as per the dawn of civilization).

Stage Three involved the division of labor. Some time around 35,000 years ago small groups of hunter- gathers started to divide up tool -making tasks into different jobs. At this point early modern humans drew cave paintings, chiseled sculptures, decorated tool kits, sewed clothing, and built shelters. There is evidence of spear points, and primitive bone fishing hooks, stone scrapers for hides, stone knives, and other created tools.

Stage Four began around 8,000 years ago with two key technological developments: (1) working with metals, and (2) the development of agriculture. People could make all sorts of different tools, and could live in one place because they had food for the whole year when they were able to store dried grains from agriculture.

Stage Five is the industrial revolution which began two hundred years ago with the technological development of complex machinery. This permitted the production of more, better, more consistent, and a greater quantity of goods, and helped with the production of food as well: the generation of tools helped the production of food (plows, hoes, rakes

Lynn Waterhouse

Trenton State College

Introduction

Society, Ethics, and Technology is the third course in a sequence of required interdisciplinary courses taken by all undergraduates at Trenton State College. The goal of the three- course sequence is to introduce students to important questions which have faced human beings throughout the development of world cultures. In the first course, Humanity: Ideas and Ideals, students consider our view of our place in the universe, our sense of the value of reason and emotion, individual will, and individualism, and the present and future structure of society. In the second course, Change in Society , students are introduced to the human cultural causes of upheaval and reorganization in human life: migration, trade, invasion, colonialism, war.

In the third course, Society Ethics and Technology, students explore the functions of technology, its powers and limitations, and the ethical questions arising from the options generated by the employment of military, medical, and information technologies. These issues are explored in thirteen lectures, each of which precedes a seminar meeting focused on the topic of the lecture.

The second lecture in the course, Society, Ethics, and Technology , is titled "Technology and Science." This lecture investigates five questions concerning te

chnology and science, each of which helps to extend the definition of technology, sharpening an understanding of what technology does, and why it is such an important part of human existence.

Question One: How did technology and science emerge in human culture?

Our earliest human ancestors have been dated back to three million years ago. Pre-human ancestors of ours probably lived in small groups of twenty to forty individuals. In these small groups, they hunted around for food. From that time until the present there are five stages of culture which are defined in terms of human tool use.

Stage One lasted from three million to one and one-half million years ago. Our hominid ancestors used a rock or stick incidentally. They didn't make any tools, but like modern-day chimpanzees, they might use a stick to hit at some thing they wanted, and they might throw a rock at a predator. Food that was gathered was shared by people. But no tools were made.

Stage Two involved the creation of tools. About one and one-half million years ago people started to knock the ends off big cobble stones and use them to throw at animals. And at each other. People also took stones and sharpened them to cut up big pieces of meat off bigger animals that had been hunted down. Food was butchered and shared. These very first tools

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Lynn Waterhouse, Society, Ethics and Technology

and the like).

These five stages of human culture as defined by cultural anthropologists suggest that technology has been the key element defining human civilization from the very beginning. Incidental tool use, intentional tool creation and use, tool variation and division of labor, metal tools and the technology of agriculture, and finally the machinery to create tools define human beings as HOMO FABER, beings who make things.

Crucial to these five stages is that tool innovation takes place because of human discovery and experimentation which depend on human curiosity and human ingeniousness. There is now a new branch of psychology called EVOLUTIONARY psychology or GENETIC psychology. In this field of study, psychologists conduct research to determine the aspects of the human mind that seem to have evolved over time. The key aspects of the human mind that have evolved have left permanent traces on the structure of our brains. Four examples of such traces are brain areas for language, motor tool use, planning, and imaginative curiosity. First, only humans have language and there are special areas of the brain for language. These brain areas exist in human brains and no other animals' brains. Second, only human beings intentionally create tools, and there is a complex set of brain areas for the control of the hands, and the relationship between what we direct our gaze to, and what our hands are doing. This is called hand-eye coordination with fine motor finger control. No other animals have this.

Third, only human beings have a special area in the brain for planning a complex series of motor behaviors. This planning area controls the planning of speech and gestures, as well as the planning of tool creation and use. Fourth, while chimps are very curious, they are not as curious as we are, and the areas in our brain driving us to explore our environment are

much more developed than those in chimps.

Taken together language, tool creation and use, planning complex activities, and curiosity are the main forces behind the development of human culture.

It's clear to see how technology has developed as part of human culture, but how does science fit into this picture? Modern science is the study of how the world and the things in the world actually work. Science asks the question "how do naturally occurring things function and how can we predict their functions?" Technology is the creation of things that work. Both science and technology are based on creative hypotheses:

(1.) The core hypothesis of technology is that the created object will function as predicted;

(2.) The core hypothesis of science is that the world will function the way it is predicted to function.

Technological thinking and scientific thinking come from the same places in the human mind. Our early ancestors had to figure out which animals could be killed with which sorts of weapons, and they had to observe nature in order to know where those animals would be so they could successfully hunt them. Determining many different animals in daily and yearly patterns is a scientific process of labeling, observation, and prediction. The hunting itself was always both a scientific experiment and a technological experiment. The science "experiment" occurs in that finding the animal tests knowledge of nature, and the technological "experiment" occurs in that the act of killing or capturing the animal is a design test of the tools that have been made. The earliest human beings who survived were both great scientists and great tool makers. Those who failed as scientists and technologists (we assume) would have been less able to survive themselves, and less able to

produce offspring. In a sense, then, we are all scientists and technologists. The early humans who were not died out.

Evidence from early human societies suggests that there was a sharp gender division of labor: men hunted and women were the gatherers. Could women also be great scientists and technologists too? Yes. Why? Because in a majority of hunter-gatherer societies, 70-90% of the group's daily caloric intake came from nuts, fruits, roots, leaves, mushrooms, and berries. These were usually collected by females. Females had to have collecting tools, had to make baskets for collection, had to know about animals to avoid predators, and had to know a great deal about the vegetable and fungus material they were collecting or they would get sick, die, suffer, or be insufficiently nourished to become pregnant. Women who couldn't recognize enough good food to eat as they collected and bring it back to a base camp for their children, relatives, and male partners, would have no more children.

So women from the dawn of civilization also had to be the best producers of tools, and the best scientific observers of their environments. The non-scientists and non-technologists among humans during the first 3 million years of our evolution did not survive. Consequently the ability to make tools and to think scientifically are tied together in every aspect of our mental function.

While it is true that the discoveries of science don't always lead directly to the development of new technology, it is nonetheless true that the set of brain functions that makes us all natural scientists is the same set of brain functions that makes us natural tool creators. There are six basic brain functions that support both scientific thinking and tool creation:

(1) sensory functions (sight, hearing, taste, touch, smell, proprioceptive); (2) basic motor

All six types of functions are controlled by the central nervous system (i.e., the brain, spinal cord, and nerves). And all six contribute to scientific activities and all six contribute to tool creation and the creation of complex systems of technology.

One of the most interesting and amazing things about human cultural development is that human functions are "biological" tools and that we as human beings created tools to extend and add to these specific biological functions. The first tools were sticks, stones, leaves, bones. The first worked tools were chipped cobbles, called dawn stonesused 1,000,000 years ago. Created tools serve the same purposes as the "biological" tools of hands and arms: food gathering and processing, safety, comfort and health, social survival. Although we have invented tools which permit us to do things we have no natural skill for (such as flying), most tools are extensions of, or enhancements of, or replacements for human skills. Most human skills are learned but depend on innate functions. These functions are "tools" that evolved as part of our biological equipment. We understand the world through the built-in "tools" of our organism.

Extensions can be defined as any form of cultural tool which serves to extend normal human functions/skills in time, space, or amount. Enhancements can be defined as any form of cultural tool which helps to bring human functions and skills up to "normal." Replacements can be defined as any form of cultural tool which replaces all or part of a human

function. Some examples of extended functions include:(l) basic sensory visiontelescope, glasses, Braille; (2) basic motor talkingtelephone, thoracic vibrator, computer speech; (3) basic calculationabacus, rope knots, calculator; (4) memoryclay tokens, acetylcholine spray, books; (5) complex motormachinery of all sorts; and (6) creative planning functionplanting calendar, Alzheimer's calendar, computer software.

In fact, the very same human skills that enable us to be tool-makers and scientists are the skills that we want to extend by tools that replace or go beyond our normal functions. However, extending human functions can be problematic because tool use increases our powers but can simultaneously reduce the human emotions which modify many behaviors (fist vs. rock vs. gun; name-calling vs. Libel).

One basic human function that we have extended tremendously is vision. Vision is the most developed sensory system of mammals. It is our most "brain-represented" sense. Our vision has evolved to sense the range of optical light waves because the sun's radiation is of that range.

Scientists believe we have 25 brain areas which keep image fields or maps of everything we see:

Where the image is held:

Specialization of image

(1) retinal image field:

all optical information

(2) occipital image field:

edge, line, form

(3) parietal image field:

movement of forms

(4) temporal image field:

label the object (an ID)

(5) temporal/limbic field:

human face identification

(6) mid-brain image field:

moving threat form

(7) hippocampus image field:

routes/spatial layouts

Society, Ethics and Technology, Lynn Waterhouse

(8) temporal/frontal fields

images in memory

(9) frontal zones:

"mind's eye" images

We have many tools which correct our vision, substitute for our vision, augment our vision, and extend it beyond its normal capacity.

The microscope. The microscope was developed from the telescope during the period 1608-1670. There are three major forms of microscope today: (1) light microscope; (2) transmission electron microscope; (3) scanning electron microscope.

The telescope. Electrons are constantly being released from matter, and as they are released photons of energy are set free in waves. There are many levels of energy of waves. We can see wavelengths only in the optical rangei.e., light from the sun. However, telescopes today are built to explore more than the optical range; they "see" X-rays, ultraviolet, infrared, and radio waves. Computers then translate their "sight" to our optical wavelength.

Question Two: What human needs do technology and science satisfy?

The psychologist Maslow argued that people have four sorts of needs: (1) basic physical life maintaining needs such as food and water and comfort; (2) basic psychological needs such as security; (3) growth needs for beauty, order and justice; and, (4) self-actualizing needs for self expression and self development.

Maslow put these needs in a hierarchy. If we do not have basic physical needs met, we cannot adjust our environment for the basic psychological life needs, and if we do not have both of those needs met we cannot work on growth needs such as beauty, order and justice. And if we don't have all of these three levels of needs met we cannot work to have self actualizing experiencesi.e., to develop ourselves to our fullest potential.

But with the advent of agriculture, the stores of food that were set by allowed people the free time to develop these aspects of life. And the structure of life in larger societies that the storage of food permitted meant that justice and order were a necessity. Technology continued to be developed in order to promote protection of life and property. For example, writing was a technological invention that emerged for the control of trade. The earliest written records were tax bills on grain. Writing then served to support human memory for laws and rules: laws could only be successful if they were maintained independent of individual memory by means of writing.

In early societies, self actualizing needs could only be met for few people within the society. Since the beginning of settled civilization through the industrial revolutionwhich gave horrible work to so many and leisure to a select fewto the present, only a small portion of the population could indulge self-actualizing needs.

Science and technology both arose to help meet the basic physical and psychological needs of human beings. Since that time the other levels of needs have also been addressed by the products of both technology and science.

Question Three: What are the

processes of technology and the processes of science?

There are only four essential steps in the process of science and those steps are the same four steps in the process of technological creation:

STEP ONE: Hypothesis creation;

STEP TWO: Testing the hypothesis in the real world;

STEP THREE: Using the successful product or outcome of those tests to improve some aspect of human life; and,

STEP FOUR: re-testing and fixing the failed products or outcomes of testing.

STEP ONE: Hypothesis creation: Nicola Tesla and Charles Babbage had a great many design hypotheses that were not constructed in their lifetimes. It is interesting to consider how these ideas are generated. In general, the process is going from the known to the unknown. The two famous l9th century evolutionary theoristsDarwin and Wallacecame up with the exact same very important idea at the exact same timethe idea of the origin of the species and adaptation and natural selection.

A computer expertHerb Simonhas argued that everyone having the exact same set of information stored in their minds will come up with the same "creative" idea. Simon believes creativity in technology and science really represent complex pattern recognition which emerges from non-conscious operations which work through the stored bits of information. He has claimed that our creative imaginations do not really go far afield from what we experience. Simon also has posited that great inventors and scientists are always asking questions which trigger pattern recognition in the base of stored information in the brain. He has also argued that scientists and inventors are also always busy acquiring additional information to fill in gaps in the patterns. He has proposed that the

process of testing ideas leads to new ideas. Clearly masses of experience, information, and rational thought are what lead to breakthroughs in both science and technology.

STEP TWO: Testing the hypothesis in the real world. The test of an engineering idea is to make the design and see if it works as it is supposed to. The test of a scientific idea is to run an experiment to see if the causal relationship imagined is turning out as hypothesized. In his essay, "To Engineer is Human," Petroski makes a very important point: there is no absolute proof of the success of a technological hypothesis or a scientific hypothesis. Hypotheses are the search for approximate predictive validity. We want to better predict functions of the natural and the technological worlds, but we never will have the reassurance of absolute proof of our models.

STEP THREE: The use of products and research findings. The best outcomes of science and technology often get used but they do not always get used. Scientists and technologists are optimistic that projects will have value for the society. Some believe that scientists pretend that their projects will have value but they only really care about ideas, and only care about producing information for other scientists. Let me tell you a little about science and technology on my current scientific research project.

We scan brains for subtle damage. We have worked out computer programs to enhance images and move them in 3-D. The company that makes the scan machines is very interested in our computer programs because it helps them to think of how to change their hardware to meet our needs. Is our software scientific experiment or technological invention? It clearly is both. It is part of our experiment that helps us to see the deficits we want to observe, and it is sold now as part of the scan machine packaging as a tool

for others.

STEP FOUR: Fixing things that have failed to work as expected. One illustration of design improvement is the story of the paper clip. I want to tell you a New Jersey story of a great design that has not quite made it to the top. It is a New Jersey paper clip. Papers used to be pinned together with a straight pin. These were called bank pins, as opposed to toilet pins which were longer and were used in sewing and hemming. These straight pins were so difficult to use that in the l9th century some people used wooden clothes pins instead of pins to keep papers together.

At the end of the 19th century steel wire was invented, and machinery that could bend steel wire was also invented. These two separate inventions allowed people to tinker with the invention of forms of paper clips. The paper clips we all use now are the rounded GEM clips made by a British company, GEM limited. The paper clip we use today has several serious flaws: it takes too much maneuvering, it can snag papers as you fasten papers, it can't hold very many papers, and you can hurt yourself, and tear bits of paper off as you remove the paper clip from papers.

Many people tried to make a better clip than the GEM we now use. Henry Lankenau of Verona, NJ applied for a patent on his paper clip, which he called the perfect Gem. He made the fastening end pointy (not rounded) so it could get on more easily and he made the open wire ends longer so they were much less likely to snag papers as they were put off and on.

Today Lankenau's clips are still used. But they are not very much used. They are called GOTHIC clips because they have a pointy end, like Gothic cathedral roofs. Duke University for some reason uses only Lankenau's clips. The reason Lankenau's clips are not much used is that the Gem corporation had market control. Most

people the world over are using a less good paper clip than they could.

Question Four: What are the ways that science and technology can fail? There are four ways science and technology can fail.

(1.) There are honest failures in which a hypothesis or design simply doesn't prove to work well enough to have any use. Like Howard Hughes' wooden airplane.

(2.) There are what are called pathological hypotheses. Here is the scientist who really believes that what he or she is doing is correct even when others think the hypothesis is wrong. They continue with the idea because they believe in it, even when evidence does not support them. Cold fusion theoryif not outright fraudmay be a case of pathological hypothesis.

(3.) Outright fraud. We all know cases of outright fraud: electric fat shaking off machine, "Our neighbor in Wisconsin, Dorothy, bought one . . ."

The Hubble telescope has a main mirror and many side mirrors. A key side mirror wasn't ground properly and the team responsible for this mirror deliberately altered some test images to make the testing report on the mirror look like it was performing as it should. The Hubble cost 93 million dollars, and this technical failure and cover-up fraud will cost 36 million dollars to fix because they have to send people up to fix it in another shuttle. The failure represents outright fraud in production of a decent design.

(4) Calculated carelessness. A physicist named Richard Feynman had to point out to the government review panel investigating the cause of the tragedy of the Challenger shuttle what went wrong to make the Challenger crash. NASA officials had known that the main rocket O-ring connectors were likely to become brittle and

Society, Ethics and Technology, Lynn Waterhouse

friable in extremely cold take-off conditions. They were warned by responsible and concerned engineers. They operated with calculated carelessness in regard to that design. Similarly, Dr. Gallo, the scientist who said he discovered the AIDS virus, seems to have been careless in a calculated way in procedures using the form of the AIDS virus he had obtained from Dr. Luc Montaigner who runs a French research laboratory. Now the U.S. and French governments are fighting over the profits from AIDS testing worldwide.

Question Five: Why is the current relationship between technology and science so important?

Going back to the first tool use and the first need for "scientific" exploration of the world: early humans needed to be both tool makers and scientific investigators of the world around them to survive. Well, now we need to be able to combine scientific thinking and technological thinking in every area of science, and most areas of technology. Almost all areas of science need technology.

(1.) Without the scientific discovery of DNA, there would be no genetic engineering, no gene-based technology

(2) Without Einstein's scientific discovery of the model of the functioning of the atom, we would not have atomic energy, the nuclear bomb, nuclear energy, and we wouldn't have won World War II

(3) Without Charles Babbage's technological invention of the calculating machine, we wouldn't be able to do the complicated analyses of all sorts of scientific data that we now can do. Most importantly, his invention actually has led to a new interbreed of scientific approach and technology computer simulation.

In computer simulation, we take

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Rudolph H. Weingartner

University of Pittsburgh

Effective Core Curriculum1

am honored to have been

I

of purpose do have consequences. Among the most significant, administratively, is that the components of a core curriculum cannot just be parceled out by specialists. Indeed, simply to turn over this mission to the experts may be exactly the wrong path, since, given our training and the culture of our institutions, specialists think in terms of structure of their own disciplines. The course that was to prepare students for life quickly becomes one that merely readies them for the next course in the sequence of a particular field.

The challenge of formulatingor modifying and improvinga core curriculum must be taken up by a faculty acting corporately. This calls for a major conceptual shift, if not a sharp wrench, in how we regard ourselves. Since the Second World Warand in some institutions since the turn of the centuryfaculty members have come to think of themselves as professionals responsible for a particular subject matter. They are chemists, economists, art historians, etc. If earlier, American professors had thought of themselves as educators, that self image has virtually disappeared even as a secondary role. Subject matter occupies the available mental space available; teaching is perceived as the task of initiating the young into one's own profession.

But the very consideration of a

asked to usher in the second week of your seminar on the topic of the core curriculum. It is an impressive thing to have so many faculty members and administrators devote two whole weeks to this task. Surely there are less strenuous ways to come across air conditioning during a Houston August. Nor do I suppose that a purely scholarly interest in core curricula explains so substantial an expenditure of time, energy, and money; this leaves only one justification for such an undertaking: to help make the education of undergraduates more effective at the institutions here represented.

Your first week was devoted to an examination of types and samples of core curricula, with some attention to the ways in which they are established. This week will be looking more closely at the subject matter components of such curricula. This evening, I want to focus on a number of general principles imbedded in the task of curricular reform.

In doing this, I am likely to duplicate or contradict assertions made by other conference participants. Worse, I will surely say some things that are already known to all. I would avoid the risk if boring you, were I not convinced that failure to attend to a number of simple truths jeopardizes the success of any educational reform.

Our subject matter is a set of required courses at the center of an undergraduate education in which all undergraduates participate. The only reason for imposing this sp

ecies of general education on all students is the belief that such requirements prepare students for all careers and the many aspects of life that go beyond jobs and learningrather than for the specific pursuits in which students differ from one another.

In working out the courses for a core, it is easy to become distracted by demanding coherence. Too much has been made of this objective, for it is unclear how this constraint is relevant to preparing students for life. Moreover, it is unlikely that one could flesh out a philosophical position from which all the components of a core could be deduced. And it is even less likely that one could obtain broad agreement with such a fundamental ideological position. But, even if intellectually respectable coherence could be attained, that trait would exist, at best, in the minds of the curricular ideologues, and not in the minds of the students. That coherence would be pedagogically irrelevant.

What does matter is that the students who are asked to work hard at mastering a core curriculum understand how its components serve their long-range purposesa subject to which we will return. For now, let me sum up by pointing out that pedagogically, biographical coherence beats the ideological kind any day.

If the need for coherence does not follow from the fact that a core curriculum must serve all students, the generality and breadth

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Rudolph H. Weingartner, Some Characteristics of an Effective Core Curriculum

What we have in mind is not as "harmless" as it might seem. After all, faculties usually decide collectively what to require of students. After much discussion, faculties vote to require a year's course in literature, two years of a foreign language, a laboratory science, or some such array. In their discussions, faculties have even been known to rise above the politics of student enrollments and faculty appointments to consider what courses would be good for all students to take.

But in all the faculty meetings devoted to this job, the courses under consideration tend to be treated like wrapped packages and discussions are usually limited to the number and kinds of packets students should be compelled to deal with. Once that determination has been made corporatelyit is left to the specialists to decide what goes into the agreed -upon parcels.

But how a non-professional can best benefit from the wares of a specialty is not merely a professional decision. It calls for some expertise to determine how a citizen can derive the greatest advantage from the study of literature, history, science, or what- ever, but it also requires a good deal of wisdom of the kind not necessarily acquired along with a doctorate. Accordingly, the decision as to the contents of core course packets must be the combined product of the deliberations of a faculty acting as educators as well as the subclasses of faculty members with claims to special knowledge. While experts are needed for specificity, the multiple perspectives of an entire faculty are needed to posit the goals of what all of their students should learn, an exercise that has the additional benefit of educating the faculty to the level that is expected of the students.

You might conclude from these

comments that I don't believe in student participation in the formation of a core curriculum. While more extensive experience is needed than undergraduates could posses to determine what must be learned for the long haul, a dual reason never-the-less suggests that students must be involved in the formulation of a core curriculum.

Only by having faculty members work with students on appropriate curricular committees can the faculty gain an understanding of the beliefs and expectations that students bring to their classrooms. Such knowledge makes it possible to have courses relate to these aspirations. But regardless of whether such substantive links can be made, the faculty's understanding of what students understand can contribute importantly to the "selling" of a curriculum. There is a middle ground between acceding to the demands of customers as they are when they arrive at our institutions and dishing out what the faculty thinks best, on the grounds that "we know that it's good for you."

We ignore what I have called "consumer education" at our peril. Just as an explanation of how the intricacies of an insurance policy contribute to a client's broad goals will contribute to a sale, so does an understanding of how a required course meets life needs, perhaps previously unarticulated, contribute to learning. There is much evidence that learning improves significantly to the degree that learners know why they are studying a given body of material. Psychological coherence does matter.

Curricular discussions that include students will teach the faculty what it takes to be persuasive about the education they propose to offer and enables them to build into the courses they require a rationale that is intelligible to those from whom this work is demanded. Skeptics might add that perhaps it is only in response to prompting from students that faculty

members will think seriously about a rational for what they require.

A curriculum prescribed for all students has to be concerned with "the cultivation of knowledge, skills, and attitudes that all of us use and live by during most of our liveswhether as parents, citizens, lovers, travelers, participants in the arts, leaders, volunteers, or good Samaritans." 2 To this useful formulation by the late Joseph Katz should be added that this non-specialized component of undergraduate education makes a central contribution toward making students fit for a lifetime of work, a period that may well exceed five decades after graduation.

This broad goal, I remind you, is our starting point. It helps us distinguish what must be central in a curriculum from what is peripheral; it helps us become clearer about learning that is truly a means to the ends we aim at, rather than material that shows up in courses merely because it has always been there. Some examples will illustrate the kind of thinking induced by keeping one's eye on the educational purposes in forming a core curriculum.

Conversancy with science is surely a condition for an understanding of our world, for the ability to make thoughtful decisions in private life and discharging responsibilities as a citizen, and for achieving success in many types of careers, including ones that are not in science or engineering.

A recent Supreme Court decision provides a splendid example. It holds, 7 to 2, that at trials in which scientific evidence is introduced, "an expert witness's actual conclusions need not be 'generally accepted' in the scientific community, the 'methods and procedures' used in reaching those results must be valid. The judge should limit the jury's consideration to testimony or evidence that is 'not only relevant, but reliable.'" 3 The decision assigns formal responsibility for conversancy with science to the judges

Some Characteristics of an Effective Core Curriculum, Rudolph H. Weingartner

of our courts. And even this brief summary of Justice Blackmun's majority opinion shows that the conversancy required has both formal and substantive components: a grasp of how scientists think and work, how scientific knowledge differs from other kinds of knowledge claims, as well as broad scientific understanding of the natural worldphysical and biologicalin which we live.

While few students will become judges, one might think of them as exemplary lay persons with respect to science. When our highest court does not shrink from requiring this conversancy, it has given formal recognition to the essential role such knowledge plays in all our lives.

This educational goal is not likely to be achieved by means of an introductory semester or two in one of the sciences. The orientation of such a course toward the next in a sequence within a particular science prevents it from offering a broad treatment of concepts and theories of the very science the course introduces; such a grasp is envisaged as being gained while studying an entire progression of courses. And needless to say, the introduction to one science cannot be expected to provide any treatment at all of issues that fall outside it.

It does not follow that there is some one correct core course in science. What these brief comments illustrate, however, is that the envisaging of a pedagogic goal necessitates distinguishing what is fundamental from the peripheral. Thus, any course proposal intended to meet the need of conversancy with science must be judged successful to the degree to which it attends to the knowledge that is basic to this broad domain and equips students with an understanding of its fundamental concepts and methodologies. There is probably no more difficult task in the general education curriculum than to discharge this responsibility, but not to do so is to neglect a vital component

of undergraduate education.

Another plausible ingredient in a core curriculum is the study of a foreign language. But no educational mission is fulfilled by simply allocating twelve out of fifty core hours to that purpose, as does the NEH plan by former chairman, Lynne Cheney. 4 The intended goal of such a requirement must be to have students acquire the capability to perform certain complex functionsto speak and understand, read and write a foreign language at a specified level of competency. The goal, in short, is the acquisition of a cluster of proficiencies and courses relevant only to the extent to which they are means to the desired end.

The purpose does not lie in any number of class hours, but in achieving the ability to do something that can and must be demonstrated in the performance of those tasks, conventionally accomplished by means of examinations. It is doubly dysfunctional to formulate a language requirement in terms of presence in a classroom, rather than as a demonstration of competence in handling a language. For not only is the intended goal then rarely achieved, but students' cynicism about their education is fostered when a requirement is "satisfied" merely by saving time.

Two other implications are worth bringing out when self-consciousness about an educational goal reveals that it is the cultivation of a proficiency. First, the recognition that what matters is ability to perform certain tasks frees the mind to consider a variety of possible roads to the desired goal. Not only does that conventional course no longer satisfy the requirement, but there may be alternatives to taking it at all. In the case of languages, intensive summer sessions, at home or abroad, may be effective for some students; for others, self-paced instruction may be appropriate, making use of the tapes, computers,

and video discs, in ever more sophisticated combinations of software and hardware. Require a proficiency and conventional courses may be only one of the means by which it is acquired.

Second, when the educational goal is to have graduates possess a proficiency, further curricular obligations may be incurred. Unhappily, unused skills tend to atrophy, especially when their possessors' hold on to them is less than firm. If a faculty thus proposes to take language proficiency seriously, it must ensure that numerous curricular opportunities exist for students to use the language skills they have acquired in other language courses. The alternative is the exercise in futility that has graduating seniors report that they have already forgotten most of the French or Spanish they had earlier learned.

This brief consideration of language study as part of a core curriculum has shown what can happen when a faculty goes beyond discussing courses as unopened packages. In the case of a proficiency, such as a foreign language, the entire package may dissolve into other entities and activities and other course packages may be brought into the picture.

The abilities to write expository English and to perform basic mathematical and statistical computations are other examples. Taking courses in composition may be the most likely ways students will learn to write clear and forceful prose. But the educational goal is misformulated when stated in terms of passing grades rather than as a demonstration that a student can so perform. And once again, whatever writing skills may have been acquired need to be practiced. The obvious truth is further underlined by the fact that to a degree, writing skills are subject-matter specific. Again, a look at what happens to be a narrowly formulated

The skills needed to perform a variety of basic mathematical operations are too seldom recognized for what they are: proficiencies of fundamental importance for life and work in a world in which mathematics has become a lingua franca. Moreover, when certain proficiencies are required, first the challenge is to develop pedagogical means to their acquisition. And, once again, a much larger segment of an institution is brought into the picture, if one recognizes that without the opportunity to practice such mathematical abilities, those recently acquired skills will wither.

It is even more urgent to open up a course package when a closer look at some fundamental educational goal reveals that we aim to foster what I have called character traits. Take as one example the widespread requirement of history as part of a core curriculum. Lynne Cheney is not alone in advocating required history courses in order to have our adult population know some of the facts of American history, including such mundane information as to just when the Civil War was fought. I was as shocked as the next person when I read how little graduates from high school or even college know about our past, not to mention about the history of other places and civilizations.

Where history is not studied at all, ignorance is of course inevitable. But how much better is it, when students are herded into conversational courses in which lectures and text books try to convey all there is to be known. Some of you are surely familiar with the humorist, Don Novello, in his role as Father Sarducci. In one sketch he genially grants diplomas for completing the course in his Five-Minute University. There one learns only what one would have remembered five years after

graduation from our kind of university. In economics, for example, he hammers in, "Supply and Demand; supply and demand."

A different tack is taken by the Association of American College's report, Integrity in the College Curriculum . It posits the inculcation of historical consciousness as the primary goal of teaching history in college. Let me characterize this trait as abiding awareness of the fact that time stretches and that "in" time, changes are ever ongoing, a sense of the complexity and, often, complicatedness of changes, of the riches, so to speak, of the causality by which things happen.

This is no place for an analysis beyond this summary account; but one observation about it is essential. To have information about a small or large chunk of the past is not sufficient for historical consciousness, though it is necessary. The ability to trace out causes and effects of political events or cultural changes, too, is a part of what is here called for; but still more is wanted. To instill historical consciousness is to affect the way in which students look at the world, inside the classroom and out; it is to foster a certain attitude.

If history is to be part of the core, we must become clear as to why it should be taught. And if the fostering of historical consciousness is an important reason, how history courses

"To instill historical consciousness is to affect the way in which students look at the world, inside the classroom and out;

it is to foster

a certain attitude."

"It's OK to have historic consciousness," might be the reaction to all this, " but it is too peripheral to other more important goals of higher education to be worth much time." But another topic that raises the issue of character traits could not be so readily dismissed. The teaching of critical thinking in colleges and universities has become a veritable industry. Numerous articles, books, and conferences are devoted to it. Some institutions require their students to take a course in critical thinking (under whatever title); many more offer such courses.

There are controversies about critical thinking and its pedagogy. The most significant one raises the question as to whether critical thinking is one or many, whether it cuts across most domains of knowledge so that a single course can provide students with what they need, or whether it is so field -specific as to make such an approach futile. But much of educational practice concerned with critical thinking is a proficiency, that the educational goal is to teach students a cluster of skills.

And, of course, that's true: to think critically, one needs to be able to perform many intellectual operations.

But to engender in students the ability to think critically is not enough; that capacity is of little use unless students also acquire the propensity to do so. In other words, our goal is not even reached even when students pass a course in critical thinking with good gradesbecause they performed well on the assigned exercises and exams for that only shows that they are able to accomplish certain tasks. As educators, we also want to have evidence that those students will as a matter of fact think critically when confronted with issues in their careers, in their personal lives, and as citizens. If the deposition to think critically has not become a character trait, whatever skills were acquired were attained in vain.

It is surely fair to say that we want our students to leave college with a propensity to gather and weigh relevant evidence, to be intellectually disciplined, to have an inclination to suspend judgment to the degree to which the evidence is inconclusive, and to be open to points of view sharply differing from their own.

Perhaps this cluster of skills and character traits can be engendered and instilled at college age and older; or perhaps by then most of them can merely be developed and encouraged. Whatever the case, the goal of fostering critical thinking has broad repercussions for undergraduate education.

Even supposing that one can acquire the ability to think critically in a course devoted to that subject, a student who does well will have gained a bundle of skills, analogous to having learned to speak and understand French. But as already noted, the grasp on complex skills attained during a short period of time is inevitably tenuous. Thus, if students are still to have those abilities when they graduate, the courses they take during their entire college career must consistently provide opportunities for practicing the skills of thinking

Some Characteristics of an Effective Core Curriculum, Rudolph H. Weingartner

critically. This affects the way many courses are taught in fundamental ways. For surely, the opportunity of thinking critically is not furnished when we lecture away at our students and ask them to tell us what we told them on periodic examinations.

All this on the assumption that when we teach critical thinking, our goal is analogous to the one we have when we teach French. But, as I have suggested, that analogy breaks down. For if at the time of graduation, a student can speak French, the faculty can boast about its goal has been achieved, even though he or she mostly will not do so, out of shyness, laziness, superstition, or dislike of the French.

But consider a student who can think critically at the time of graduation, but doesn't in fact do so when confronted by issues or problems where doing so is appropriate. Here we must judge that the faculty has failed in its educational mission. If it is not part of the job of the French Department to overcome the shyness, laziness, or superstition that stands in the way of students actually using their ability to speak French, we cannot make a similar excuse here. Overcoming the laziness, impulsiveness, or whatever that prevents critical thinking is part of our goal. We intend that the graduates we deliver to society will actually think critically, not just that they know how to do so.

The job magnifies and the ramifications spread. Not only must skills be acquired, but attitudes and habits must be shaped and strengthened. An important ingredient in the growth to adulthood is a move from dependence toward greater independence. To acquire critical thinking as an abiding trait of character entails an analogous change in the intellectual realm, namely the acquisition of a certain autonomy of mind. Thus, teaching needs to be regarded as a complex enterprise in which opportunities are provided to

engage in activities that strengthen this autonomy, where such activities are everywhere encouraged and rewarded at the cost of others. And if one believes, as I tend to, that the skill components of critical thinking are so field-specific that they cannot be taught in a single course, it becomes even more obvious that this single educational goal has to be everybody's business.

Enough has been said to suggest that reflection on some educational goals that are not themselves controversial lead to the realization that a faculty must collectively become concerned with the way in which courses are managed and taught. But there is a further, even more fundamental, reason why teaching cannot be separated from curricula and syllabi. It is imperative that educational goals be expressed in terms of what students learn, what students come to know, what students will be able to do.

We are habituated to thinking of education as something that professors do, assuming all the while that learning is a more or less automatic consequence of such professorial activities. And when it doesn't happen, we assume that the responsibility is the students. When students learn, it's because of our teaching them, and when they don't learn, we think they failed in spite of out teaching them. Heads I win , and tails you lose.

But hitching the horse in front of

"It is imperative that educational goals be expressed in terms of what students learn, what students come to know, what students

will be able to do."

We need to become much more familiar with what our students know and are capable of doing when they come to us. We need to know a good a deal about who it is that we are aiming to reach. The shift I propose in the way we think of educational goals deprives us of the convenient picture of students as receptacles into which we pour the wares of our trades. This knowledge about our students must be available to us on the macro level when we are engaged in the formulation of educational goals. Since those goals are goals for someone, the characteristics of these "recipients" must be an ingredient in our deliberations. On the micro level, we need to know more about the particular students in our own classes in ways that are relevant to what we are trying to accomplish there.

Further, we need to know much more than we generally do about how students learn and what techniques are likely to succeed in helping them. Such knowledge helps to shape the curriculum. This is not a case of substituting process for substance, but a consequence of thinking of a curriculum as delivered to students, rather than as a group of words on paper in a course bulletin. In short, information about the road by which students learn needs to be built into a course in the same way as the material we want them to master.

Better knowledge about our students, finally, should help to inform our discussion about undergraduate education with a sense of what can be done, of what is possible. The very introduction of this scheme should lead to more sophisticated decisions about requirements. After all, when we follow the normal practice of leaving

course content to the experts, we are mostly pushing the button that is labeled: "cover the ground, crowd in as much stuff as possible."

In one sense, much less is possible than is conventionally held, and, in another, much more is. Father Sarducci's sketch is a good symbol of the "less." Reasonably able and ambitious students will retain what they need to long enough to give it back on the final exam. But there is a lot of evidence that they give most of it back to us for keeps. That the students themselves are profoundly skeptical about their retentive powers is suggested by the question that was asked in every class I have taught: "will the final examination include questions about the material we studied before the mid-term?"

But we can do much more if we renounce our drive toward wall-to-wall coveragenot because it is evil, but because it is futile. More room must be made in undergraduate education, including in the delivery of a core curriculum, for independent work. A larger number of opportunities must be provided for students to dig deeply into more narrowly focused issues and problems. Such pursuits into particulars may give more effective insights into the general than do surveys that aim at depicting some totality. More important still, learning to marshall information and different methods of investigation in the execution of a project is likely to contribute importantly to a student's learning how to learn: a requisite for survival in our rapidly changing world.

I have tried to make your life more complicated by asking you to consider difficult matters that are often left out when educational policy is made. I did so, because I believe that without looking at details of course content and without attending to the ways curricula are taught, what students learn remains wide of the mark being aimed at. But I will conclude by making a plea on a substantive aspect of a core curriculum

that is very dear to my heart.

A specter haunts American civilization at the end of the twentieth century. Given that we are facing a serious decline of such central arts institutions as art museums and symphony orchestras, we can look forward to a 21st century of philistinism.

Having received my degree from Father Sarducci, I know that directly or indirectly, the support that is available for the arts depends on the demand that exists for it; and audiences are dwindling. Raphael paintings and Brancusi sculptures, Beethoven symphonies and Britten operas are acquired tastes. And what it takes to acquire them is education. Audiences are dwindling, because there is less and less education in the arts.

I agree that arts education at the primary and secondary level is central to the creation of the appetite that builds audiences. Buthere comes Father Sarducci's lesson againit will take demand by parents to get local districts to provide the funding needed to return education in music and art to the schools.

This is where college comes in and my plea to make education in the arts a part of every undergraduate's experience. This topic may well be missing from your conference agenda, because a sizable number of faculty members subscribe to the doctrine of logocentricity, the belief that meaning is to be found only in what is expressible in words, preferably in propositions that are either true or false. Yet, intentionally or not, adherents to this creed make up the vanguard of that philistinism, for by denying that art has significanceand remember that the words "meaning" and "significance" are, at bottom, synonymsthey relegate art to the status of entertainmentfor "those who like that sort of thing."

You'll be relieved to know that I will not try to show here how and why this view is so horribly wrong. I

Some Characteristics of an Effective Core Curriculum, Rudolph H. Weingartner

merely assert that if members of the academy, when explicitly considering the matter, cannot come to recognize that there are painters, composers, sculptors, and architects among the greatest minds the human race has produced, then things really do look bleak for the 21st century.

But if this proposition is accepted, educational consequences follow immediately. Acquaintance with some of the products of these exceptional minds at once becomes a candidate as a pedagogic goal, on a par with past great events that have shaped our lives or discoveries about nature that provide us with understanding about the world in which we live. Moreover, just as it makes no pedagogical sense to try to retail to students detached historical or scientific facts, so in this context, becoming acquainted with works must be embedded in conversancy with how the works are created.

The last few sentences point to an educational assignment of exceeding difficulty: to make undergraduates conversant with the arts, although very few of them bring even elementary knowledge of the arts to college.

But then, what else is new? I am very aware that all of the aspects of undergraduate education I have touched on imply that we should perform tasks that are very hard to carry out, especially in the real world in which we operate. Compromises of every kind are undoubtedly called for. But taking undergraduate education seriously requires full awareness of those compromises when they are made. Because that awareness presupposes clarity about the goals to be pursued. And only by keeping in the forefront the educational goals we mean to accomplish, can we rise above lip service to genuine reform of undergraduate education. p

Notes

1.This talk was not written for publication, nor was it assumed that the audience would be familiar with the speaker's publications. Accordingly, the paper paraphrases from these writings and even quotes from them directly, without identifying use of quotation marks or references. In particular, the author leans on his Undergraduate Education: Goals and Means (Phoenix: American Council on Education/OryxPress, 1992) and "General Education is Not Icing, But the Cake," published in Perspectives 22 (1992).

2. A New Vitality in General Education, p.3.

3. The New York Times, July 4, 1993, Section 4, p.5.

4. 50 Hours: A Core Curriculum for College Students

1994

Texas Seminar on the Core Curriculum

"Faculty at the Core:

New Perspectives on Cultures, Learning,

and Technologies"

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dyard Kipling

t might seem ironic that I would start a talk about education in a multicultural society with a poem by Rudyard Kipling, who is better known as an apologist for English imperialism. Yet in that poem, Kipling captures the essence of the dilemma of multiculturalismits opportunities and challenges, its avenues and obstacles, its possibilities and complica tions. In keeping with the theme of this conference, I want to talk to you about diversity in terms of its place in the larger system, keeping in mind the idea of moving toward whole system change.

The Search for Multiculturalism

After some twenty years of working in the area of multicultural educa tion, I recently decided to expand into an additional searcha search for multiculturalism itself. First I decided to assess how other people have ex plored this issue, but I was shocked to find that there has not been a single book that deals comprehensively with the nature and complexity of multiculturalism in America. There are lots of books on multicultural educa tion, and many others that criticize multiculturalism but do not attempt to

I

Carlos Cortés

University of California, Riverside

analyze what multiculturalism actually is. There are thousands of books on dif ferent racial and ethnic groups, on gender, on immigration, on religion, on language, or on other facets of multiculturalism, but no author has really tried to grapple seriously with the larger concept of multiculturalism in Americawhat it means, how and where it functions, how it ties together different aspects of diversity, how it interacts with unity, and how the dif ferent dimensions of diversity intersect, coalesce, and sometimes come into conflict. In fact, I have found only one book that even attempts to address these issues, a 1993 book called Culture of Complaint by Robert Hughes, an Australian immigrant and currently art critic for Time magazine. In his book, Hughes says many things with which I agree, and some with which I disagree. Yet even though I disagree with some of his assertions, I admire his willingness to plunge into the mo rass and attempt to engage different aspects of multiculturalism in a daring way beyond what anyone else has been willing to do.

Hughes says two principal things that I want to try to connect with the ideas about whole system change that have been raised at this conference. First, he argues that one of the silliest debates going on in America today is, "Should we be a multicultural society?" That isn't even worth talking about because multiculturalism

is a course of destiny upon which we embarked centuries ago. When Europeans came to the western hemisphere, they began to interact with indigenous people, thus launching a multicultural society. When black Africans were brought here as slaves, who strove mightily to maintain and adapt their cultures, we became more multicultural. As the United States expanded west, it took in new lands. And with those lands came people, both Native American and Mexican, with their own cultures, languages, religions, worldviews, and ways of being. And when America opened its doors to immigrants, people (with cultures) came from all parts of Europe, from Latin America, and later from Asia. Today we continue to bring together people of different cultures, and every time a new cultural view or a different language is added, we become more multicultural.

Our history has made us what we are. As Ken Burns, the documentary filmmaker, said, "Our future lies behind us." We've already created it. Hughes is right. We have always beenand will continue to bea multicultural society. The critical question, then, is not, "Should we be a multicultural society?," but "How can we become a better multicultural society?"

Hughes then goes on to say, "America is a collective work of the imagination whose making never ends." Collectivity is not real

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Carlos Cortés, Education in a Multicultural Society

Tensions in a Multicultural Society

Let me make a couple of points about some of the tensions associated with being a multicultural society. First, there is a tension because being multicultural does not necessarily mean being equitable. A multicultural society can be unjust and oppressive. Slavery in the United States was an example of multiculturalism, and it certainly wasn't very equitable. Some people who had certain hyphens (white-skinned) had the right to op press and enslave people who had different skin-color hyphens. This is what I call "vertical multiculturalism," in which people with certain kinds of hyphens can control the desti

nies of those who carry other kinds of hyphens.

One thread of the history of the United States as a system is the slow, but not always steady, movement from the vertical multiculturalism of hy phen-based oppression and hierarchy

toward a more horizontal multiculturalism of greater equality. Of course it has not been a smooth, constantly progressing continuum. Our na tion goes in fits and starts. For example, an event such as passage of the Nineteenth Amendment, which granted women the right to vote, dra matically changed the verticality of our political system. This process of move ment from verticality to horizontality is constantly going on, even though it is not a steady parade of progress.

A second kind of tension arises around the issue of whether or not there can be a common culture in a multicultural society. I've heard many people, including teachers, proclaim that there is no such thing as Ameri can culture, that we're just a collection of different cultures. They use metaphors like "salad bowl" or " stew" or "mosaic" or "crazy quilt ." But such metaphoric rhetoric merely obscures the basic question of how a system operates; when people have significant differences in such matters as race, lan guage, ethnicity, religion, and regional culture.

How does the fact of this complex diversity interact with the quest to find linkages that hold us together? Much of the current debate surrounding multiculturalism is based on the fear of losingor not achievinga com mon culture. But this is the wrong way to look at it. Instead, we should be ask ing, "What has that common culture meant overtime? How has it changed, what has been discarded, and what has been retained as we moved through history? How can we continue to adapt and develop new common ground in the face of the ever-changing dimensions of diversity?"

Certainly there is a common culture in America, bu

t it is often very hard to find. One of the difficulties is that it does not stand still. We can't freeze the American cultural system. We can't identify the fourteen things students need to learn about America, teach them those things, and then say, "Now you know what America is," be cause by the time we do that, the United States has already moved on and has become different.

But as the system changes, it doesn't leave everything behind. One of the reasons is the chameleon-like nature of the U. S. Constitution, the entire text of which you can hold in one hand. Because the United States is based on such a thin but flexibly powerful basic document, we have the possibility of constant self renewal. We enjoy a basic set of adaptable prin ciples upon which we can operate. Among these principles are two com peting imperativesthe principles of unity and diversity. Both are built into the Constitution.

One example: "Congress shall make no law respecting the establish ment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Does that mean that if one of the precepts of your religion is the taking of human life, you could practice it? No, because it conflicts with other American principles. The Founding Fathers put conflicting principles into the Constitution and left history to take care of that conflict. They also set up the U.S. Supreme Court to decide which principles would win out over which other prin ciples in specific situations. In other words, they established the constitu tional basis of continuous whole system change.

The Dog Barks . . .

I ran across an Arabic proverb that I find appropriate for this discussion: "The dog barks, but the caravan moves on." Too often we confuse the woofing with the reality. While we as indi viduals

We need to think about where that caravan is moving and constantly ask ourselves, as we re-organize, "Are we addressing that caravan?" What is our purpose? What are our dreams? We're not in the business of preserving schools just for the sake of preservation, but rather we're trying to help young people become better participants in the caravan of the near and distant future. And if we think of our ecosystem called schools as windows of opportunity for preparing students for this larger, chaotic, multicultural ecosystem called America, then we can more constructively and effectively ad dress the phenomenon of diversity.

Alvin Toffler, the futurist, said, "All education springs from some im age of the future. If the image of the future held by society is grossly inac curate, its educational system will betray its youth " Every teacher, every educator is a conscious or unconscious futurist. We're all connected by our personal or collective visions of the future. In a sense we're in the prediction business whether or not we want to be. Yet, I'm a historian, one of the worst kinds of people to be a futurist, because historians a

re folks who get paid to predict the past, with greater and greater precision. So instead, I've decided to become a "backist," because I'm good at looking at the past and addressing the question, "Where is that past driving us?" By focusing on that question, I can determine which things I can do to help schools connect successfully with the driving forces emanating from the past, and at the same time discover ways to help windows of opportunity, such as schools, influence the caravan of the future.

The Caravan of Future Multiculturalism

I would like to take you on a brief journey into the future, examining how the window of opportunity called schools will be interlocking with the caravan of the larger multicultural ecosystem. Below are some of the things that I see taking place in the larger multicultural ecosystem, all of which have a direct effect on schools.

Demographic Multiculturalism

First, let's look at demographic multiculturalism. During only two days of this conference, 93 out of 100 new babies in the world will be born in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Nothing that you do now in your insti tutions will affect that. Woof, woof, woof. The caravan moves on. It has already happened.

Look what this means in a "backist" sense. In l900, Europe had one-third of the world's population. Yet by l 990, Europe had receded to only one-tenth of the world's population. And even Europe isn't the same old Europe. Why? Because all growth in Europe in the last twenty-five years has resulted from immigration. From where? Mainly Asia, Africa, and Latin America. What does that mean to us? Future immigration will come from Asia, Africa, and Latin America, because that's where people are. While Europe provided 97% of immigrants to the United States in 1900, by 1990, 85% of immigrants were coming from Asia

Education in a Multicultural Society, Carlos Cort és

and Latin America.

What about internal growth? Every group in the United States has de clining birth ratesincluding African Americans, Asian-Americans, and Hispanics. But Anglo birth rates are not just declining; they are plummeting, down to 1.8 children per couplebelow the break-even point. So we know that just about every school and every teacher will have plenty of "them" as students in the years to come.

The Holmes Report projects that by the year 2000, more than forty per cent of all students in American schools will be children of color, while eighty-five percent of all teachers will be white women. The question is, are we preparing teachers for this multicultural inevitability? Or are we ignoring it?

Intergroup Multiculturalism Next, let's look at intergroup multiculturalism as part of this larger system. In the 1890s, the United States declared a state of national emergency: the end of the U.S. frontier. Why? Be cause we had reached the point of having two people per square mile, the 1890s' definition of congestion. At that time there were 90 million Americans. Today there are nearly 260 million Americans. By the turn of the century, we will have three times as many Americans as we had in the "con gested" 1890s, and they will be more diverse.

Space used to be the great American escape valve, but now we can't get away from each other anymore. What does this mean for schools? Because the larger ecosystem of America is becoming more demographically dense and diverse, schools need to focus more consciously on preparing young people to go forth and live with understanding, insight, and respect for people who are different in some respects than they are.

The challenge we have in America is, can we all learn to do a better job of sharing our space with those with whom we

Carlos Cortés, Education in a Multicultural Society

Affinity Multiculturalism

A third dimension is what I call affinity multiculturalism. I'm going to give you what Elizabeth Minnich calls a "BFO"a blinding flash of the ob vious: people like to be around people with whom they have something in common. They tend to cluster around people with whom they share affinitiesit might be ideology, it might be race, it might be politics, it might be religion, it might be language. Every body carries hyphens of connection with multiple groups. Those hyphens influence who you are, but they don't determine who you are.

When teachers and administrators and students come to school, they bring those hyphens with them. They may be gender hyphens or religious hy phens or national origin or racial or linguistic or ideological or economic or avocational hyphens. On school campuses and playgronds, students often self-organize themselves in this hyphenated way. Yet as observers, we also impose our vision of what's taking place.

Visible affinity groups become frightening. Administrators or teach ers usually aren't concerned when groups of Lutherans or Baptists or Mormons or Jews group together on campus, often because we don't rec ognize that grouping. It's the visible racial groupings that cause concern when you can see the differencesor language or cultural groupswhen you can hear different languages or accents.

I'm not saying it's necessarily good that people hang out with their affinity groups, but rather that it will happen. People tend to cluster with people with whom they have something in common. Therefore, one goal

106

in our systems called schools ought to be to work with students to help them discover unnoticed things they have in common with others.

There was never a moment in our nation's history when all Americans were just plain old unhyphenated Americans. This kind of romantic longing for such a nonexistent past of plain old unhyphenated Americanism causes us to look for illusory, escape-into-the-past answers. We should not be wasting our time vainly trying to get rid of hyphens, which have existed throughout human history. Instead we should seek to build new hyphens of connection, connections that help our multihyphenated multicultural ecosys tem work more constructively.

The issue is not how do we get rid of old hyphens, but rather how do we build new hyphens? How do we encourage the building of new hyphens of connections among students? In doing this, we need to realize that not all hyphens are equal. Some hyphens you choose; some hyphens are historical accidents such as by birth; and some hyphens are imposed by others through prejudgments. The question is, can we help kids move through a life in which, when they notice differences (because they are going to notice differences), they do not let those differences divide them?

Societal Curriculum

Multiculturalism

Finally, there is societal curriculum multiculturalism. Suppose we de cided to ban all discussions of diversity from our windows of opportunity called schools. Do you really think that would inoculate students from notic ing differences? Of course not. Study after study show that young people notice differences by the time they reach school. If we in schools never mentioned diversity, students would still learn about it through the societal curriculum. They learn about it at home, in their neighborhoods, from their peer groups, and through the

media. Intended or unintended, teaching about diversity is part of the larger multicultural ecosystem that surrounds schools. The only choice that schools have is to decide whether they want to participate in the process through which students learn about and understand diversity.

If schools avoid teaching about diversity, they opt out of the larger eco system of inevitable societal multicultural education. And if so, we surrender our right to complain about the misfunctioning of our multicultural campuses and communities. Multicultural education will occur in society. The question is, will it also occur in schools? Can we help our schools connect with and deal with students who come from and will live in the larger multicultural education ecosystem that is functioning around us?

Dialogues about diversity need to continue and become richer. Every year, new students will enter our classrooms, and they won't have the ben efit of what we did last year. So when we talk about this ecosystem called multicultural education, we've got to realize that we're talking about an on going, never-ending process.

Historian E.L. Woodward once said, "All good things must be done again, forever." The ecosystem of diversity is a forever thing. By con sciously and constructively connecting with that multi-cultural ecosystem, we have a chance through schools, our window of opportunity, to make this a better world by making a contribution to that "forever." p

Notes

1. Hughes, Robert. Culture of Complaint: The Fraying of America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993). p. 13.

Jack Meacham

State University of New York

at Buffalo

and Curriculum Change1

istory, and science.

You in the audience have come to the University of Houston for the 1994 Texas Seminar on the Core Curriculum because you already know what I have said in my introduction, and because you are interested in and com mitted to the philosophy of liberal education and to general education and core curriculum programs. All of the institutions represented here are in the process of modifying or strengthening their general education programs, in several instances starting over at the beginning of the process of curricu lum design and implementation. You are at the leading edge of the changes that are coming in higher education; you have an opportunity this week to take steps toward designing new programs of immense value for your stu dents and for your campuses.

In order to provide you with an idea of how this week-long seminar can facilitate your efforts to bring about curriculum change on your own campuses, I've asked two people who were present at last summer's Texas Seminar on Core Curriculum to speak briefly about their experience and the impact that t