As the discussions on “Designing the Future(s)” of Georgetown proceed, we’re learning more about how students and alumni think about their learning experiences. Some long-lasting lessons they absorb appear to take time; they can’t be rushed. Such learning starts with the presentation of new material, ideally through a structured protocol designed to add sequentially the necessary complexity to the lesson. Next, there’s some expression of the knowledge bit by bit by the student through exercises or homework. Only after time for reflection can there be a synthesis step, where interconnections among concepts are realized.
Other learnings can be faster. The presentation might be more problem-oriented. The goal is solving problems that share a set of attributes. The outcome is more skill-based, arming the student with a tool to use in the future.
Some learning is integrated over several courses, with a design to cumulate specific knowledge to deeper and deeper levels. The knowledge of the prior course is used in the current course.
As we listen to people reflecting on their experiences, it’s difficult not to start questioning why despite the variation in learning outcomes, the vast majority of courses in most schools at Georgetown share the same fifteen-week structure.
For years I taught a course that had the last three class meetings devoted to some loosely connected topics. In honest reflection, those topics were teasers for the next class in the series, but my treatment was inadequate to produce any lasting impact on the students. The course really should have ended a month earlier.
So, as we ponder the future of Georgetown, I wonder whether we should allow ourselves to think more flexibly, to design learning experiences that aren’t limited to the fifteen-week period. (We all know that business and medical schools have already largely moved in this direction.)
The benefit of this move is more efficient use of our collective time. If we could change the “bite size” of our learning experiences, we might be able to quench more fully the thirst to teach more varied courses, reflective of the cutting edge of our fields. In my opinion, the added flexibility could allow a student great depth and greater breadth of learning. With regard to breadth, a student could more flexibly move across fields. This would be of great advantage for fields facing fewer concentrators. Students taking one-credit, topic-specific courses in the field might even be tempted to take more. With regard to depth, a student might take advanced topics advanced topics in an area, with deeper and deeper content.
I’m aware of some impediments, but I think we’re smart enough to manage them. First, there is an orderly structure to the two semester annual model. Well, we could have five-week courses arranged sequentially throughout the term, adding to fifteen weeks each term. This would force the creation of five-week courses in sets of three simultaneously. Second, in many units the coin of the realm is the faculty workload defined by “the course,” where the effort required for each course is assumed to be equivalent. We’d have to recognize that workload metrics would have to reflect the greater variety of work within the unit. (Some units have already done this.) Third, the administrative procedures would have to recognize completion of courses at different points in the fifteen-week semester. To accommodate shorter course modules in some schools, it’s already been handled. Fourth, how would we assure that all faculty would achieve their necessary workload each year? I think we’re smart enough to figure that out, but we could expand the notion of banking courses to include the need to teach somewhat more in a year following below-minimum teaching.
Human knowledge is expanding at ever greater rates. As keen observers of the world, our graduate and undergraduate students want to learn these new areas. We need more flexible course offerings to achieve the excellence we all seek. What courses in your unit would profit from this rethinking?
Very good and thought provoking thoughts which could also take into account the studies that show people have different WAYS of learning. I do think that flexibility and creativity are key to the process of your efforts in designing the future of education on the Hilltop. Ps: wish i had learned to use a better phrase than thought provoking thoughts while i was on the Hilltop but heck I was a Biology pre-med!
I need to mull over this idea of five-week units, in general and in terms of my own subject areas.
But while I do, I recall that I studied, as an undergrad, in a system that moved from two eighteen week semesters, to three twelve week trimesters–or “quarters.” I know I learned much more under the trimester system.
I have also taught in the trimester system, and I often concluded I covered much more in three trimesters than I did in two semesters.
The main unfortunate element was the breathlessness of the pace.
(And the combination of a movable Thanksgiving with Christmas-New year Break meant a choppy, though variable, start to the second trimester.)
Learning came easily to me, so I am not a good example of whether learning under the faster pace is wise overall. As for teaching at that pace, I do not know how to assess what it meant for my students.
I presume the record is mixed. However, I observed that some students (with shorter fuses?) benefited from having three fresh starts a year, rather than only two.
But these are hunches and anecdotes and not data.