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Colgate Earn's"F" for Core Curriculum

The American Council of Trustees and Alumni (http://www.goacta.org) is a non-profit organization based in Washington, DC and dedicated to academic freedom, quality and accountability.

Introduction
At one time, most college students received a broad, general, rigorous education that pushed their knowledge and thinking ability well past those who had only a high school education. Today, however, many student graduate from college with less knowledge about the world, our nation, and our culture than would have been expected of high schoolers 50 years ago*. Our current college graduated often have only a think and patchy education, with enormous gaps of knowledge in fields such as history, economics and literature.

Earning a college degree doesn’t require fewer credits than previously. The problem is that the curriculum has changed. Formerly, most institutions insisted on a rigorous, sequential curriculum that ensured students a broad, general education in addition to the specialization provided by their major. These courses covered the most important events, ideas or works known to mankind—material considered essential for an educated person. Students could make some choices—e.g., which foreign language to take—but for the most part, their studies were dictated by the core curriculum, a learning pathway created to guarantee that all students would partake of subjects regarded as vital to a well-rounded education.

A core curriculum is a set of courses designed for the purposes of general education and required of all students.

Nowadays, virtually every college pays lip service to the importance of a solid general education. Princeton’s current undergraduate catalog, for example, claims that university requirements "transcend the boundaries of specialization and provide all students with a common language and common skills." A Yale publication states that "no student ought to leave college without having studied the history, art, music, philosophy, religion, or literature of both the modern and the ancient world." And the Penn State bulletin affirms the "deep conviction that successful, satisfying lives require a wide range of skills and knowledge," including in its list of essentials, the ability to reason logically and quantitatively and to communicate effectively; an understanding of the sciences; a familiarity with the cultural movements that have shaped societies and their values; and an appreciation for the enduring arts.

In reality, however, few contemporary colleges and universities structure their general education curriculums to achieve these worthy ends. They may give the appearance of providing a core curriculum because they require students to take courses in several subjects other than their major—the so-called "distribution requirements." Colleges typically require from one to three courses in each of five or six distribution areas: physical and biological sciences, humanities, social sciences, writing skills, math skills, and multi-cultural studies.

But a distribution is not a true core curriculum. It is not uncommon to have dozens of courses to choose from within each distribution requirement. Cornell University, for instance, boasts that "there is no course that all students must take, and there are nearly 2,000 from which they may choose."

These long lists of course options frequently enable students to enroll in courses that are outside the stated field altogether. For example, at the University of Iowa, a student can meet the "Historical Perspectives" requirement with such non-historical courses as Asian Art and Culture, Issues in European Politics and Society, or Living Religions of the East.

Moreover, many of the distribution courses are too narrow to serve as the student’s only exposure to a subject. Barnard’s literature requirement, for example, may be satisfied by a course called "Writing Tibet." Some of the course options are faddish, and a few are of questionable scholarly merit.

Benefits of a Core Curriculum
A true core curriculum yields at least three benefits First, in order to participate fully and successfully in our contemporary economy, college graduates must have analytical, writing and quantitative skills. All students should be taking courses in composition and college-level mathematics. Under the distribution system, however, as our study demonstrates, mathematics is no longer required at 62 percent of the examined institutions, and 30 percent do not require a common writing course at all. A core curriculum ensures that all college graduates will have a common foundation of skills – not just to get that first job, but to build a career over a lifetime, a career that may require a range of skills.

Second, democracy requires an educated public: a people familiar with their governing system and aware of their history. Only a few years ago, the American Council of Trustees and Alumni commissioned the Roper Organization to conduct a survey of seniors from the nation’s 55 best colleges and universities. The results, presenting in detail in Losing America’s Memory: Historical Illiteracy in the 21st Century, were deeply disturbing. Four out of five seniors – 81 percent – received a grade of D or F on test questions drawn from basic high school history curriculum. A properly constructed core curriculum could ensure a common foundation in United States history. It would also provide familiarity with the principles of American Government.

Third, a core curriculum provides personal enrichment. Without a core, students are apt to miss out on their best opportunity to partake of the life-enriching elements of our civilization—literature, philosophy, art, music. Of course, it is possible for people to gain that exposure after completing their college studies, but it is less likely that they will do so. College students should experience the greatest works known to mankind, what Matthew Arnold called "the best that has been known and said." Nowadays, a student need only take one or two humanities courses— virtually any humanities courses—to fulfill the distribution requirement. Only 12 percent of the colleges we studied required a survey of significant works by numerous authors of acknowledged stature.

Over and above these benefits, today’s college graduates should understand science and scientific ways of thinking. In an era marked by dramatic developments in the physical and natural sciences, all students—not just those concentrating in science—need to have a working knowledge of the methods that the sciences use to explore the natural world and a facility with scientific measurement and analysis. They should understand what sorts of questions are susceptible of scientific inquiry and which are not; how the physical world works; and the most important results of modern scientific research. Yet 38 percent of the institutions we examined fail to require a natural or physical science.

In addition, to prepare themselves to participate successfully in the contemporary workplace, today’s college students must go beyond the basic skills. It is hard to see how someone can compete successfully if he or she does not understand such fundamentals as the law of supply and demand or how the costs and benefits of diverse courses of action can be evaluated and compared. Whether one is introducing a product, creating a new business, or managing a national economy, understanding economics is no longer optional—it is essential. One of this study’s most extraordinary findings, therefore, was that not one college or university among those studied requires a general course in economics.

Finally, an increasingly global society demands a study of different cultures and civilizations. Such a study gives students insights into others with whom they will interact. It provides an opportunity to understand differing ideals and traditions as well as our common humanity. But the best window into a culture is its language. The study of a foreign language, therefore, should be obligatory. It should be accompanied by courses in the history, literature and art of the people under study. While most colleges and universities that we surveyed require a foreign language, 24 percent make no such demand upon their students.

The Core Curriculum Survey
To provide insight into the state of general education today, the American Council of Trustees and Alumni sought to measure objectively the existence of true core curricula in a significant sample of American colleges and universities. We selected 50 higher education institutions, including such well known groups as the Big Ten, Big Eight, Ivy League and Seven Sisters. We also included an additional grouping of thirteen colleges to provide institutional and geographical breadth.

Many of the surveyed colleges and universities are highly ranked on the U.S. News Best Colleges list, and are among the most prestigious institutions in America. But, as this survey shows, prestige is not a guarantee of a solid general education curriculum. Time and again we found that many of the top ranked and most expensive institutions are utterly failing to ensure that their graduates are familiar with major fields of knowledge. It is ironic that Hunter College, which costs only about $4,000 a year in tuition, has a solid set of core requirements while Vassar College, charging nearly $30,000 a year, has none.

To determine whether or not each of the colleges and universities surveyed has a true core curriculum, we chose seven subjects that we consider essential to a contemporary liberal arts education. Here is how we defined the seven subjects:

Writing or Composition
Does not include remedial writing. Also excludes courses taught by faculty not trained to reach writing, such as so-called writing intensive-seminars, or writing "for" a discipline (such as business or law), where the instructors are not from the English or composition department.

Literature
Broad course on literature, such as a "great works" course. Does not include narrow, esoteric or single author courses.Foreign LanguageCompetence at the intermediate level, as indicated by more than one year of college work, or three years of high school work, or an appropriate examination score.

American Government or American History
Colleges were credited for requiring either subject. The government course should be devoted primarily to American national government and politics. The history course should be broad enough to give a sense of the general sweep of American history. We excluded courses on one particular era, e.g., the U.S. post-1945, or a single issue, e.g., the history of a particular state.

Economics
A general course, such as macro- or microeconomics, taught by faculty in the economics or business department.

Mathematics
Includes college-level, but not remedial mathematics. Includes advanced algebra, trigonometry, calculus, computer programming, statistics/probability, or mathematical reasoning at or above the intermediate level. Logic courses taught by philosophers, linguistics courses, or computer literacy ("computer science") courses were not credited, as the math content is usually minimal.

Natural or Physical Science
Includes such sciences as astronomy, biology, chemistry, geology and physics. Environmental science counts if taught by faculty in one of the preceding departments.

Psychology , generally considered a social science, was not counted, except for courses on the biological or chemical aspects of the brain.

Having established our definitions, we then examined the latest online catalogs to determine if courses in the seven fields were required, as would be the case with a true core curriculum, or if they were mere options within a distribution. If a course were one of several options, it was not counted as a required core course. We gave credit, however, for a course required of a majority of the undergraduate students at an institution, such as a requirement of the liberal arts school within a university where most of the studentsare enrolled.In keeping with our criteria, only courses with appropriate breadth were credited.

Finally, we assigned a grade to each college and university based on the number of core courses it requires. Our grading scheme is generous, assigning a B for requiring a scant majority of 4 out of 7 core courses, and giving a C for 3 out of 7.

Letter Grade Values:
6-7 core courses A
4-5 core courses B
3 core courses C
2 core courses D
0-1 core courses F

We recognize that we might have added other subjects to the seven that we chose. For instance, one certainly can make a compelling argument for requiring philosophy, art, music, Western and non-Western civilization. In some cases, these subjects were not included because of definitional problems. The component courses of a Western civilization requirement, for instance, are not always perfectly clear. In addition, it was felt that seven courses was a sufficient measure. A general curriculum that fails to require most of these subjects is inadequate, no matter what else it may include.

Colgate University
Not given credit for Writing or Composition because only students with low standardized test scores must take a composition course. Not given credit for Mathematics because the Natural Sciences and Mathematics Division requirement may be satisfied by courses in biology, chemistry, computer science, geology, physics and astronomy, and psychology. Not given credit for Natural or Physical Science because the Scientific Perspectives requirement may be satisfied by courses too narrow to serve as true core courses, such as an entire course on AIDS. Also, the Natural Sciences and Mathematics Division requirement may be satisfied by courses in mathematics and psychology.

Core Curriculum Report Card
Additional Colleges

Core Curriculum Report Card
Big Ten Universities

Core Curriculum Report Card
Big Eight Universities

Core Curriculum Report Card
Ivy League Colleges

Core Curriculum Report Card
Seven Sisters Colleges

ACTA has also published: Becoming an Educated Person: Toward a Core Curriculum for College Students (2003); Degraded Currency: The Problem of Grade Inflation (2003); Teachers Who Can: How Informed Trustees Can Ensure Teacher Quality (2003); We the People: A Resource Guide (2003); Can College Accreditation Live Up to Its Promise? (2002); Educating Teachers: The Best Minds Speak Out (2002); The Basics of Responsible Trusteeship (2002); Restoring America’s Legacy (2002); Losing America’s Memory: Historical Illiteracy in the 21st Century (2000); The Intelligent Donor’s Guide to College Giving (1998); and The Shakespeare File: What English Majors Are Really Studying (1996).Colgate Earns "F" for Core CurriculumColgate University Data on Page 5

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