In the lecture halls of introductory level courses in nearly every subject, there lurks a number of disillusioned and uninvested students who are “only taking this class for the TOI.” Their major is something obviously unrelated to the subject of the course, and as a result they could not care less about its content — in fact, they might even despise it. They resent the professor, the coursework and the University of Connecticut Common Curriculum altogether for the displeasure of the whole experience.
We’re all familiar with these students. Many of us have been these students. In the pursuit of fulfilling our graduation requirements, most of us end up taking at least a few courses that we’re not exactly excited about. Such is the nature of a standardized Common Curriculum like UConn’s.
UConn students are not alone in their struggle with general education requirements. Most colleges in the United States currently employ some form of core curriculum — a certain set of benchmarks that all undergraduates must meet before graduation, generally by earning a minimum amount of credits in a suitably varied array of subjects. We take this for granted and thus feel more comfortable disparaging the Common Curriculum, but it wasn’t always this way. In 1989, it was possible to graduate from 38% of the nation’s colleges and universities without taking a course in history, 45% without taking a course in American or English literature and 41% without studying mathematics. Since the time of that survey, there have been significant pushes to reform the higher education system, and for good reason.
The point of the Common Curriculum, in the words of the UConn Academic Catalogue, is to “prepare leaders and global citizens, who need to be able to communicate with and cultivate compassion with those outside their own majors, disciplines, professions, communities, and cultures and to make connections between their own knowledge and perspectives and those of others.” Basically, it’s designed to make you a better thinker and a better neighbor. By making you take courses in each of the six unique Topics of Inquiry, UConn gives you opportunities to experience many ways of learning, thinking and understanding the world.
Being regularly exposed to different perspectives in this way not only makes you a better problem solver; it also helps you to relate to and connect with others within and outside of your own social groups. Armed with the experiences you’re gaining in the classes you hate taking, you are better equipped to represent your community and have more power to improve your own life and the lives of those around you.
Along with making you a better citizen, having experience in subjects outside of your major will make you a more competitive professional candidate. Having something unique to include in your resumé in addition to the qualifications of your major will help you stand out in a sea of applicants. What’s more impressive is if you can connect your experiences in a seemingly unrelated field to skills that you can apply to your own discipline. This ability to make connections across subjects — part of what UConn’s Common Curriculum aims to cultivate — shows an impressive level of versatility, which is valuable to many employers.
Despite the advantages of leaving your academic comfort zone, I can understand that it is nonetheless frustrating to be forced to invest valuable time and energy into studying a subject that you don’t like, aren’t interested in or feel that you’re bad at. Learning, like many things that are good for you, can be difficult and upsetting at times — or even most of the time. I’m not trying to tell you that you shouldn’t be frustrated on these occasions. I am saying, however, that this frustration doesn’t justify the utter disdain and disrespect I’ve seen people show for fields and classes outside their major.
The professor of your gen-ed class isn’t being audacious in expecting you to put real effort into your assignments, they’re trying to teach you something (which is, in fact, their job). Just because a course doesn’t have an obvious connection to your major doesn’t mean it’s not valuable. Everything you learn here contributes to your understanding of the world; it’s up to you to figure out how and why.
I can’t speak for everyone, but I personally would prefer to live in the future where the CEOs read Karl Marx, the medical professionals analyze health outcomes in marginalized communities and the engineers take archaeology classes. If we all approach college education with a little more respect for the subjects we hate the most, we can learn so much more — and maybe use that learning to build a future that’s just a little brighter.