The core curriculum is the pride of a Jesuit institution like Boston College.
When I applied to this school, my parents had me convinced that a core curriculum would serve as a strong background for anything I decided to study. I believed that I would be learning skills in these classes that would be applicable and relevant to my life and my goals.
In general, I have found the core curriculum at BC beneficial and interesting. Written and verbal communication skills definitely help even the most science-oriented students get by in a world where communicating your findings is just as important as discovering them. A history and social science background is important for understanding the social context of events occurring across the world and in our own communities. Mathematics is an essential tool to have because so much of our world depends on computations. The natural sciences are useful to know for their role in technology and important controversial issues that span many different fields and occupations. Even cultural diversity, a recent addition, is useful for situations and jobs requiring interpersonal skills.
BC, however, is different from most schools in that they have instituted a two semesters of philosophy and theology as requirements of the core curriculum. This is due, in large part, to the Jesuit Catholic roots of this institution.
These courses have their benefits: Students are exposed to new channels of thought that served as ancient foundations of our world. The depth with which philosophy and theology are taught, however, takes too much valuable time away from students' area of specialty.
"I get the feeling that kids in my class resent theology and philosophy because they take time away from studying physics. My grades definitely suffer for it," said one physics major.
While some students lose valuable sleep from these classes, others use them as a time to catch up on sleep.
"I end up sleeping during these classes [philosophy and theology] and I don't get very much out of them," said one student. It would be more beneficial to faculty, students, and tuition-paying parents to let students choose classes in which they would actually apply themselves.
Many students feel we are being inundated with philosophy and theology, and as a result, they avoid becoming fully engaged in these classes. Our school's intense and unique emphasis on these disciplines impose esoteric specialties within a common core curriculum.
By forcing students to focus for a full year in each of these fields, BC gives its students less time to take the interesting electives they have always wanted to take.
It is unreasonable for a school to resist the resentful mentality among the student body, who did not necessarily come to this school to become priests or thinkers. It is also brash of me to expect the school to drastically change by throwing these requirements out the window.
I am calling for a compromise and a trial period; for the school to lower the requirements for both philosophy and theology to a single semester for the upcoming academic year.
If students are not more fulfilled in their college experience, the administration can raise the requirement back to a full year of comparative art of the Virgin Mary and "what would Socrates do?"
Judah Landzberg is a freshman in the College of Arts and Sciences.
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