Word: core
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...alternative to the current Core is teaching students the specifics of the major academic disciplines. Come Commencement time, such an educational approach would, as Core critics argue, produce better educated men and women...
Harvard's Core, consequently, seeks to impart an education that will last a lifetime. By teaching approaches to knowledge, it tries to provide us with the techniques and tools needed to approach various disciplines. It allows us to reeducate ourselves as disciplines change over the years and thus avoid Henry Adam's predicament. Unfortunately, the Core doesn't work that way. It may be a great idea on paper, but it doesn't translate into reality...
...PROPOSED CORE COURSES must go through an elaborate review process before being accepted. The Core Committee rejects most of the proposed courses it scrutinizes. Consequently, professors are well aware of the intent of the Core and generally understand how their course fits in with its approach...
Teaching fellows, however, are another story. While they are knowledgable in their own disciplines, they are too often ignorant of the Core and its larger purposes. They receive no training in the intent or philosophy of the Core and are consequently likely to view a Core course precisely as they should not--as little more than an introduction or a survey...
Unlike professors, teaching fellows are not reviewed by the Core committee. At the beginning of each semester there is a desperate scramble for graduate students to lead sections in over-subscribed Core courses with courses advertising for TFs on department bulletin boards. Yet these last ditch section leaders provide the only personal instruction students get in large lecture courses. They are actually expected to steer the fine line between teaching a subject and teaching how to approach a subject...