IMPLEMENTATION: WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

Over the past year, the Curriculum Review Committee has attempted to devise a curriculum that would best prepare Duke students for life in the coming century. It has, in its proposal, sought to map knowledge into a framework that reflects the priorities and values of the institution. The task is daunting -- but no less necessary -- and prompts short-term goals and long-term implications.

Short Term Goals: With respect to short-term goals, the Committee recommends that the Dean for Undergraduate Affairs develop a structure to accommodate the implementation and management of the new curriculum. Trinity College currently has effective mechanisms for linking with departments, through its academic deans and departmental Directors of Undergraduate Study, and for the coding of courses and curriculum approval though the Arts and Sciences Councilís Course Committee and Curriculum Committee. What is needed, then, is an elaboration and expansion of these functions, which builds on, rather than replicates, the current organization.

To shepherd resources wisely, the College must devise an efficient and effective process for the coding of courses. We see the designation process as a shared responsibility between the faculty member, the department, and the College. (Appendix/Link 5 provides a plan for Course Designation as well as a Sample Designation Form). The individual instructor will be responsible for determining the intellectual content, learning objectives, and pedagogical approach for his or her course. The department will be responsible for assuring the breadth and depth and coherency among courses within a discipline and field of study. And the College will be responsible for assuring that courses are assigned numbers and classification designations in accordance with college criteria and regulations as legislated by the Arts and Sciences faculty through its various committees.

Specifically, with regard to areas of knowledge, courses might, for example, automatically fall within the areas into which the department or program currently falls, unless the instructor wishes it to be listed differently. With regard to modes of inquiry, focused inquiries and competencies, faculty would propose designations, while considering individual course objectives more closely. Departments and programs, likewise, will need to consider offerings from a broader, more comprehensive perspective. They will need to evaluate how various courses meet designated criteria, and they must critically assess pathways to the major.

These types of focused discussions about requirements for general education and the major may lead to additional related recommendations. For example, the Curriculum Review Committee did not see sufficient argument to justify at this time a change in course credits versus semester hours. While many of our peers employ a course credit system similar to Duke (Brown, Dartmouth, University of Pennsylvania, Princeton, and Yale), others (Emory, Johns Hopkins, UNC, and the University of Virginia) accumulate semester hours, and still others (Cornell, Georgetown, and Rochester) have a combination of credit hours and courses, quarters (Chicago) or quarter hours (Stanford). While the Curriculum Review Committee does not wish to support a change to a credit hours system at the current time, it recognizes that its flexibility might match the structure of the proposed new curriculum. The standing Curriculum Committee or Academic Affairs Committee could, therefore, consider this in terms of flexibility for language study and laboratories, study abroad/internationalization, and comparability with the Graduate School courses. We would urge, however, that this issue be addressed only after the new curriculum has been approved.

In addition, as a part of the consideration related to hours and instructional load, the Curriculum Review Committee recommends that consideration be given to an increase in the number of courses required for graduation from 34 to 36. Because such an increase directly relates to the discussion about courses/semester hours, the Review committee likewise recommends that this question be addressed only after the new curriculum has been approved and appropriate data gathered.

Another issue for future consideration might well be inconsistency in course numbering. Over the years, courses have been numbered for a wider range of criteria (some FOCUS courses, for example, carry a 100-level designation), and the standing Curriculum Committee might recommend that an appropriate committee consider guidelines for the fit between course content and a more consistent numbering system.

Yet another issue is the need for assessment capabilities and, in particular, the Collegeís ability to assess levels of student learning and the effectiveness of courses to produce certain outcomes and objectives. We must significantly enhance our ability to gauge whether we are advancing effectively the goals of student learning. To assist in this endeavor, the newly reconfigured Center for Teaching, Learning, and Writing will work with faculty in the development of new courses, the revision of existing courses, the incorporation of instructional technologies, and the assessment of effectiveness in teaching and learning.

From the beginning the Curriculum Review Committee has seen its recommendations as a part of a complete package. It has offered what it feels is a comprehensive and integrated plan for what would best prepare students for the coming century, and it has endeavored to articulate linkages and connections between its component parts.

Long Term Implications: We believe that the ramifications of Curriculum 2000 extend well beyond what we envision for students entering in 2000. The proposed curriculum serves not only as a blueprint for the kind of education that Duke can and should provide, but as a symbol of its ability to meet the cognitive, developmental, and experiential needs of all its students. It serves as a signpost for organizational and institutional change. Colleges and universities are faced with new challenges and opportunities. Duke will need to meet the educational implications of a changing world and the challenges of emerging fields, the introduction of new instructional technologies and pedagogical techniques, and the expectations of a more diverse cadre of prospective students.

The proposed curriculum looks boldly forward, yet builds on the tradition of excellence that has long characterized Duke as an institution. A recent report of the Boyer Commission of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching is entitled Reinventing Undergraduate Education: A Blueprint for Americaís Research Universities. In that report, the Commission addresses how research universities can best sustain their commitments to undergraduates consistent with their critical role as centers of research and innovation in society. Much of what is proposed in that report is currently underway at Duke; much more will be so, if we implement the proposed curriculum. In advancing their recommendations, the Commission concludes:

Research universities cannot continue to operate as though the world around them is that of 1930 or 1950 or 1980. As everyone knows, it is changing with dizzying rapidity. These universities must respond to the change; indeed, they ought to lead it. Their students, properly educated for the new millennium, will be required as leaders while that world continues to transform itself. (p.38)

The proposed Curriculum 2000 will allow us to meet this challenge. It will also be challenging curriculum on a variety of levels. It will challenge faculty to think further about how they teach their disciplines and to examine what they are transmitting to students in terms of knowledge as well as integrative themes that cut across disciplinary boundaries. It also challenges faculty to focus on students and to address the question of how can we invest them with a broad excitement for learning and best prepare them for the world in which they will have to work and live. It will challenge our undergraduates to do more with, and make more of the opportunities that a Duke undergraduate education can offer. It will challenge us as Duke faculty and administration to assure that the principles of the curriculum we offer are implemented in a way that is consistent with our curricular goals and institutional mission. Finally, it will challenge Duke as an institution to provide resources -- in time and talents -- to make the educational experience provided here fully successful.

Next: APPENDICES