Liberal Arts Undegrad at Ivies?

[idad]

<p>Just another point of information about Chicago. The College was established as an interdisciplinary institution almost from the outset. There are no departments in the College, the departments reside in the divisions which are primarily concerned with graduate education. Faculty appointments to the College are made by the Dean of the College. One can be a professor in a department and not have an appointment in the College, and one can have an appointment in the College and not have an appointment in a department or committee (rare). This was done so that College faculty would not have sole allegiance to a department and could create new cross-disciplinary courses. This interdisciplinary focus has been in place at Chicago for decades, and is reflected in its majors as well as the Core.</p>

<p>Also, Chicago takes this all very seriously and continually evaluates and innovates within its curriculum. It also has a center for helping faculty to embrace the Chicago approach to inquiry (or enquiry, as the great Joseph Schwab called it). In 1999, Chicago established The Center for Teaching and Learning, which provides faculty with continual professional development, resources from Chicago and other universities, and a Faculty Guide to teaching at Chicago. Here is a quote from the guide that I think is relevant and sets the tone for the Core at Chicago (and perhaps other places as well):

Chicago has developed a celebrated–some would say notorious–brand of academic civility. It is a place where one is always in principle allowed to pose the hardest question possible–of a student, a teacher, or a colleague–and feel entitled to expect gratitude rather than resentment for one’s effort.

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<p>And there is this from a speech by Donald Levine who gave a brief history of the Idea of the University:

…Chicago’s attempt to cultivate intellectual powers involved more than the selection and organization of materials. It also led to the invention of novel teaching methods. In particular, through trials, errors, and measured successes, the Chicago faculty hit on a distinctive pedagogical approach to which it has adhered to this day, involving a marked preference for original sources in place of textbooks, and teaching by what they have called “structured discussion” instead of through formal lectures.</p>

<pre><code> The quest to devise programs geared to the cultivation of human powers has also led to distinctive forms of examinations. The focal point of this was the Office of University Examiner. Although that office existed from the beginning of the University, it really got going with the appointment in 1937 of an inspired educator, Ralph Tyler, who recruited a bevy of bright young scholars to assist in constructing novel examination forms. The work of this office fit the general project of upgrading liberal learning in two respects: by giving the testing function to professionals properly equipped for the task; and, in removing that function from classroom teachers, by making the latter less menacing and so better able to elicit the affection and collaborative friendship essential for the most effective teaching.

Besides creating distinctive curricula, teaching methods, and examination forms, the University organized periodic attempts to evaluate those elements and experiment with new ones. (“Unity of teaching and research” takes on new meaning in this context.) Of numerous assessment projects of this sort, perhaps the most consequential was that carried out under Benjamin Bloom, one of Tyler’s associates. In the early 1940s Bloom investigated ways and means of assessing the extent to which the curricular practices of the new College attained their stated objectives. Before long, he expanded his study from its original goal of examining the Chicago college only, to studying three groups of matched students elsewhere. Bloom’s studies culminated in a Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, perhaps the most famous schema ever devised for this purpose (Bloom 1954; Anderson and Sosniak 1994). More recent projects of this sort include investigations by the Little Red Schoolhouse writing program, which examined hundreds of student papers with an eye to identifying differences in papers written by first-year or fourth-year students, and determining qualities associated with papers graded as honors.

Finally, consider the rhythm of restless innovation. The quest to find better ways to cultivate human powers has inspired a continuous disposition to invent new courses, new programs, new teaching methods, and new forms of evaluation. One wonders how the University ever won a reputation for stodginess and conservatism; it is, in fact, the university of continuing revolution. Reflect, experiment, reflect, revise–that has been the University’s script for organizing undergraduate education.

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<p>[The</a> Idea of the University Colloquium: Donald N. Levine](<a href=“http://iotu.uchicago.edu/levine.html]The”>The Idea of the University Colloquium: Donald N. Levine)</p>