Core Curriculum

Ayn Rand makes us examine life and challenges us always to check our premises. The Core should only be so lucky to have Ms. Rand in its graces.

As Columbia College students reluctantly settle back in from spring break, they might be surprised to hear that their predecessors are eagerly signing up for a chance to revisit the Core Curriculum.

Though reforms are under way, Frontiers still falls short of providing first-year students with a foundational understanding of scientific thinking.

Some said it was their “guilty pleasure” while others said they were disappointed, but the majority of students at Wednesday night’s discussion forum had mixed feelings about Columbia College’s Core Curriculum. Hosted by student representatives of the Committee on the Core, the forum allowed about two dozen undergraduates from all classes to voice their opinions and concerns about what the College describes in its mission statement as the “cornerstone of a Columbia education.”

As a GS student, should I have been forced to take Lit Hum at the possible expense of another literature course I might be more interested in? I believe so. In fact, I feel that we should take Lit Hum and another literature course of our choosing.

With reforms to the Core Curriculum’s Major Cultures requirement in the offing, the Department of Spanish and Portuguese—which less than three semesters ago transformed Columbia’s Spanish-language-focused major—is once again expressing an interest in amending the department’s course offerings to complement whatever new requirements emerge.

Of all the criticism lobbed at hunger strikers and their supporters these past few weeks, most troubling is the charge that strikers were myopically and hyperbolically obsessed about a few faculty hires and texts in light of the real world issues like the presidential campaign or the war in Iraq or the human rights violations in Burma.

A move to unify the undergraduate experience and integrate the administrations of General Studies and Columbia College would be a smart one, but the differing needs of students—both curricular and logistical—should not be ignored if such a proposal is enacted.

As I was walking to campus this morning, I stopped by the small grocery store where I usually buy yogurt and carrot juice. The monotony of my daily purchases apparently has had its advantages, because the man at the cashier already knows me and smiles approvingly every time I enter the store.

Now that the strikers and their supporters have gained the administration’s ear, they ought to cease their confrontational course that risks alienating their fellow students and pursue avenues of negotiation that adequately represent the opinions of all students.