General Education's Problems in the Natural Science

GENERAL Education in the Natural Sciences at Harvard is supposedly defined by two Faculty studies that span 14 years. The latest is the Bruner committee report, brought out early in 1959; the other is the "redbook" of 1945, General Education in a Free Society.

The earlier study created General Education at Harvard and set a pattern for similar plans across the country. Recommendations of the Bruner report, formally known as the Report of the Committee on Science in General Education, for the most part reinforced the redbook. A unanimous vote passed these proposals. with almost no changes at a Faculty meeting a month after the report came out.

To some, the vote meant that the philosophy which shapes the relations between General Education and science at Harvard was complete and satisfactory after 14 years of development. Others found it disturbing that one viewpoint could satisfy so many Faculty members at once. These fears have come home to roost: the last few years have shown that there is a deep divergence of motive among the science departments involved in General Education.

Differences of purpose and opinion are reflected in the conflicting types of recent scientific General Education courses. Eight courses have been offered in the last few years. Some are fixtures and some alternate, so that five or six are available in any one year. Some are outright substitutes for courses that were once given as elementary work for concentrators within Departments; some exist side by side with similar elementary courses; some offer a collation of material drawn from several disciplines, a conglomeration not to be found in the curriculum of any single course or Department.

ALL three types claim to general Education of the in the Bruner report. a very doubtful claim unless that General Education and elementary science in certain integrable, interchangeable, or . General Education came on the assumption that these are true, but one or another for at least one course from the eight. The situation directly challenges General Education as conceived in the redbook.

The variety of methods among the courses does that the program fulfills conception of a General Education. The common purpose has been out while the function of each has become more specialized for an elementary Department, to take in less- students for whom the might be too difficult, or to freshmen who dislike , say. These are , not always explicit, that widen splits in the program.

The lack of unity here reflects partly each have our own definitions of General Education and science and their compatibilities. To ask that to be reconciled is too but we might be asking whether General Education can in so many what it was intended to do.

The writers of the Burner report for a shift in teach- history of science to the modern nature of science. not a radical change; the placed the importance of a par with philosophy and of science and its social Factual instruction and skill would be subordinated the "integrated intellectual formed by these and by among the sciences and scientific and non-scientific of thought. Now, though, the history and these other topics , in view of the disparity the sorts of courses in the program. What was intended by group was that the slant in course be uniformly changed: consensus of the Committee history of scientific disciplines a general introduction to . The present committee urges that the basis for selecting for presentation in a course Science should derive more from the logic and substance itself." What we in fact a number of course offerings toward historical development and others with much less contemporary material. This be justifiable, but it has yet to be justified.

The particular point which has the science program the in Harvard's lowel lower- General Education is in the text Bruner report: ". . . it may be and indeed desirable for some departments to offer a course be suitable both as General Education and as an introductory for prospective concentrators." to be interpreted as a major 1945 Report, unless one science has changed enough two decades to permit that elementary aspects of a or its broad intellectual taught within each other's .

Clearly the future of General Education in science at Harvard depends very much on the interpretation of this point. But there has been no attempt to determine which disciplines should be treated this way. The courses that double as General Education and introductory concentrators' concentration work are tacit recognition of what remains an hypothesis.

The rationale for Natural Sciences 5 and Natural Sciences 10, which double as first courses in geology and biology, respectively, is that the needs of concentrators and non-concentrators are identical here. George Wald, professor of Biology, maintains that biology in a General Education context is the best possible introduction to the subject. The course takes up a study of complex organisms only after following the evolutionary development of progressively higher forms of living and intent matter from the fundamental particles. Wald's conclusion is not that this approach has something for everyone, but the best for everyone. His belief derives from a conversion of values over the last fifteen years: he finds that biology is better woven into the scientific unity of the universe than into simply historical fabric. Thus physics and chemistry come into the course occasionally so that the biology is teachable mainly at the molecular level.

BRUNER'S committee also concluded, however, that students who have taken introductory General Education courses in science have, by and large, been better served than they would have been had they taken introductory departmental courses." Three years ago this distinction was apparently still valid. Nothing as inclusive could be said today, for the lines between the specialists' and the non-specialists' courses have been blurred by the differences of purpose in the General Education program.

It has been argued that the variety of educational backgrounds which an entering class brings to Harvard forces the college to offer General Education courses that differ in prerequisites as well as content. This is all the more reason for preserving a common element in science instruction. The strongly science-minded student will move directly into course work with a Department; the humanist may not look for a course to waken his scientific interest. Consequently science in the program is most important to freshmen who arrive uncommitted, and particularly for those who come from schools where science was neglected. Their General Education course may leave them unmoved; it can also be an important confrontation.

The fundamental trouble is that thinking about General Education continues to identify the science major's education with learning techniques, and the humanist's education with seeing science in the broad intellectual frame of reference. This attitude is almost inevitable in the face of difficulties on both sides: the undergraduate science major hasn't the time to see how his work fits into intellectual traditions, and the non-scientist has no ultimate use for technique. That is, strictures of time keep the scientists on their side of the divide, while strictures of value are more important to the non-scientist. This suggests, that, given the chance, the science student could get more from a course with a broader outlook on science, than the non-scientist from the strictly technical course.

By now there ought to be a strict ethos of departmental participation in the General Educational program. We have enough definitions of what we want General Education in the sciences to do; we have had almost nothing to say about whether it can be done in the contradictory ways that now mar the internal logic of the program. Harvard can little afford to lag here where she once led.

The variety of methods among the courses does that the program fulfills conception of a General Education. The common purpose has been out while the function of each has become more specialized for an elementary Department, to take in less- students for whom the might be too difficult, or to freshmen who dislike , say. These are , not always explicit, that widen splits in the program.

The lack of unity here reflects partly each have our own definitions of General Education and science and their compatibilities. To ask that to be reconciled is too but we might be asking whether General Education can in so many what it was intended to do.

The writers of the Burner report for a shift in teach- history of science to the modern nature of science. not a radical change; the placed the importance of a par with philosophy and of science and its social Factual instruction and skill would be subordinated the "integrated intellectual formed by these and by among the sciences and scientific and non-scientific of thought. Now, though, the history and these other topics , in view of the disparity the sorts of courses in the program. What was intended by group was that the slant in course be uniformly changed: consensus of the Committee history of scientific disciplines a general introduction to . The present committee urges that the basis for selecting for presentation in a course Science should derive more from the logic and substance itself." What we in fact a number of course offerings toward historical development and others with much less contemporary material. This be justifiable, but it has yet to be justified.

The particular point which has the science program the in Harvard's lowel lower- General Education is in the text Bruner report: ". . . it may be and indeed desirable for some departments to offer a course be suitable both as General Education and as an introductory for prospective concentrators." to be interpreted as a major 1945 Report, unless one science has changed enough two decades to permit that elementary aspects of a or its broad intellectual taught within each other's .

Clearly the future of General Education in science at Harvard depends very much on the interpretation of this point. But there has been no attempt to determine which disciplines should be treated this way. The courses that double as General Education and introductory concentrators' concentration work are tacit recognition of what remains an hypothesis.

The rationale for Natural Sciences 5 and Natural Sciences 10, which double as first courses in geology and biology, respectively, is that the needs of concentrators and non-concentrators are identical here. George Wald, professor of Biology, maintains that biology in a General Education context is the best possible introduction to the subject. The course takes up a study of complex organisms only after following the evolutionary development of progressively higher forms of living and intent matter from the fundamental particles. Wald's conclusion is not that this approach has something for everyone, but the best for everyone. His belief derives from a conversion of values over the last fifteen years: he finds that biology is better woven into the scientific unity of the universe than into simply historical fabric. Thus physics and chemistry come into the course occasionally so that the biology is teachable mainly at the molecular level.

BRUNER'S committee also concluded, however, that students who have taken introductory General Education courses in science have, by and large, been better served than they would have been had they taken introductory departmental courses." Three years ago this distinction was apparently still valid. Nothing as inclusive could be said today, for the lines between the specialists' and the non-specialists' courses have been blurred by the differences of purpose in the General Education program.

It has been argued that the variety of educational backgrounds which an entering class brings to Harvard forces the college to offer General Education courses that differ in prerequisites as well as content. This is all the more reason for preserving a common element in science instruction. The strongly science-minded student will move directly into course work with a Department; the humanist may not look for a course to waken his scientific interest. Consequently science in the program is most important to freshmen who arrive uncommitted, and particularly for those who come from schools where science was neglected. Their General Education course may leave them unmoved; it can also be an important confrontation.

The fundamental trouble is that thinking about General Education continues to identify the science major's education with learning techniques, and the humanist's education with seeing science in the broad intellectual frame of reference. This attitude is almost inevitable in the face of difficulties on both sides: the undergraduate science major hasn't the time to see how his work fits into intellectual traditions, and the non-scientist has no ultimate use for technique. That is, strictures of time keep the scientists on their side of the divide, while strictures of value are more important to the non-scientist. This suggests, that, given the chance, the science student could get more from a course with a broader outlook on science, than the non-scientist from the strictly technical course.

By now there ought to be a strict ethos of departmental participation in the General Educational program. We have enough definitions of what we want General Education in the sciences to do; we have had almost nothing to say about whether it can be done in the contradictory ways that now mar the internal logic of the program. Harvard can little afford to lag here where she once led.

The lack of unity here reflects partly each have our own definitions of General Education and science and their compatibilities. To ask that to be reconciled is too but we might be asking whether General Education can in so many what it was intended to do.

The writers of the Burner report for a shift in teach- history of science to the modern nature of science. not a radical change; the placed the importance of a par with philosophy and of science and its social Factual instruction and skill would be subordinated the "integrated intellectual formed by these and by among the sciences and scientific and non-scientific of thought. Now, though, the history and these other topics , in view of the disparity the sorts of courses in the program. What was intended by group was that the slant in course be uniformly changed: consensus of the Committee history of scientific disciplines a general introduction to . The present committee urges that the basis for selecting for presentation in a course Science should derive more from the logic and substance itself." What we in fact a number of course offerings toward historical development and others with much less contemporary material. This be justifiable, but it has yet to be justified.

The particular point which has the science program the in Harvard's lowel lower- General Education is in the text Bruner report: ". . . it may be and indeed desirable for some departments to offer a course be suitable both as General Education and as an introductory for prospective concentrators." to be interpreted as a major 1945 Report, unless one science has changed enough two decades to permit that elementary aspects of a or its broad intellectual taught within each other's .

Clearly the future of General Education in science at Harvard depends very much on the interpretation of this point. But there has been no attempt to determine which disciplines should be treated this way. The courses that double as General Education and introductory concentrators' concentration work are tacit recognition of what remains an hypothesis.

The rationale for Natural Sciences 5 and Natural Sciences 10, which double as first courses in geology and biology, respectively, is that the needs of concentrators and non-concentrators are identical here. George Wald, professor of Biology, maintains that biology in a General Education context is the best possible introduction to the subject. The course takes up a study of complex organisms only after following the evolutionary development of progressively higher forms of living and intent matter from the fundamental particles. Wald's conclusion is not that this approach has something for everyone, but the best for everyone. His belief derives from a conversion of values over the last fifteen years: he finds that biology is better woven into the scientific unity of the universe than into simply historical fabric. Thus physics and chemistry come into the course occasionally so that the biology is teachable mainly at the molecular level.

BRUNER'S committee also concluded, however, that students who have taken introductory General Education courses in science have, by and large, been better served than they would have been had they taken introductory departmental courses." Three years ago this distinction was apparently still valid. Nothing as inclusive could be said today, for the lines between the specialists' and the non-specialists' courses have been blurred by the differences of purpose in the General Education program.

It has been argued that the variety of educational backgrounds which an entering class brings to Harvard forces the college to offer General Education courses that differ in prerequisites as well as content. This is all the more reason for preserving a common element in science instruction. The strongly science-minded student will move directly into course work with a Department; the humanist may not look for a course to waken his scientific interest. Consequently science in the program is most important to freshmen who arrive uncommitted, and particularly for those who come from schools where science was neglected. Their General Education course may leave them unmoved; it can also be an important confrontation.

The fundamental trouble is that thinking about General Education continues to identify the science major's education with learning techniques, and the humanist's education with seeing science in the broad intellectual frame of reference. This attitude is almost inevitable in the face of difficulties on both sides: the undergraduate science major hasn't the time to see how his work fits into intellectual traditions, and the non-scientist has no ultimate use for technique. That is, strictures of time keep the scientists on their side of the divide, while strictures of value are more important to the non-scientist. This suggests, that, given the chance, the science student could get more from a course with a broader outlook on science, than the non-scientist from the strictly technical course.

By now there ought to be a strict ethos of departmental participation in the General Educational program. We have enough definitions of what we want General Education in the sciences to do; we have had almost nothing to say about whether it can be done in the contradictory ways that now mar the internal logic of the program. Harvard can little afford to lag here where she once led.

The writers of the Burner report for a shift in teach- history of science to the modern nature of science. not a radical change; the placed the importance of a par with philosophy and of science and its social Factual instruction and skill would be subordinated the "integrated intellectual formed by these and by among the sciences and scientific and non-scientific of thought. Now, though, the history and these other topics , in view of the disparity the sorts of courses in the program. What was intended by group was that the slant in course be uniformly changed: consensus of the Committee history of scientific disciplines a general introduction to . The present committee urges that the basis for selecting for presentation in a course Science should derive more from the logic and substance itself." What we in fact a number of course offerings toward historical development and others with much less contemporary material. This be justifiable, but it has yet to be justified.

The particular point which has the science program the in Harvard's lowel lower- General Education is in the text Bruner report: ". . . it may be and indeed desirable for some departments to offer a course be suitable both as General Education and as an introductory for prospective concentrators." to be interpreted as a major 1945 Report, unless one science has changed enough two decades to permit that elementary aspects of a or its broad intellectual taught within each other's .

Clearly the future of General Education in science at Harvard depends very much on the interpretation of this point. But there has been no attempt to determine which disciplines should be treated this way. The courses that double as General Education and introductory concentrators' concentration work are tacit recognition of what remains an hypothesis.

The rationale for Natural Sciences 5 and Natural Sciences 10, which double as first courses in geology and biology, respectively, is that the needs of concentrators and non-concentrators are identical here. George Wald, professor of Biology, maintains that biology in a General Education context is the best possible introduction to the subject. The course takes up a study of complex organisms only after following the evolutionary development of progressively higher forms of living and intent matter from the fundamental particles. Wald's conclusion is not that this approach has something for everyone, but the best for everyone. His belief derives from a conversion of values over the last fifteen years: he finds that biology is better woven into the scientific unity of the universe than into simply historical fabric. Thus physics and chemistry come into the course occasionally so that the biology is teachable mainly at the molecular level.

BRUNER'S committee also concluded, however, that students who have taken introductory General Education courses in science have, by and large, been better served than they would have been had they taken introductory departmental courses." Three years ago this distinction was apparently still valid. Nothing as inclusive could be said today, for the lines between the specialists' and the non-specialists' courses have been blurred by the differences of purpose in the General Education program.

It has been argued that the variety of educational backgrounds which an entering class brings to Harvard forces the college to offer General Education courses that differ in prerequisites as well as content. This is all the more reason for preserving a common element in science instruction. The strongly science-minded student will move directly into course work with a Department; the humanist may not look for a course to waken his scientific interest. Consequently science in the program is most important to freshmen who arrive uncommitted, and particularly for those who come from schools where science was neglected. Their General Education course may leave them unmoved; it can also be an important confrontation.

The fundamental trouble is that thinking about General Education continues to identify the science major's education with learning techniques, and the humanist's education with seeing science in the broad intellectual frame of reference. This attitude is almost inevitable in the face of difficulties on both sides: the undergraduate science major hasn't the time to see how his work fits into intellectual traditions, and the non-scientist has no ultimate use for technique. That is, strictures of time keep the scientists on their side of the divide, while strictures of value are more important to the non-scientist. This suggests, that, given the chance, the science student could get more from a course with a broader outlook on science, than the non-scientist from the strictly technical course.

By now there ought to be a strict ethos of departmental participation in the General Educational program. We have enough definitions of what we want General Education in the sciences to do; we have had almost nothing to say about whether it can be done in the contradictory ways that now mar the internal logic of the program. Harvard can little afford to lag here where she once led.

The particular point which has the science program the in Harvard's lowel lower- General Education is in the text Bruner report: ". . . it may be and indeed desirable for some departments to offer a course be suitable both as General Education and as an introductory for prospective concentrators." to be interpreted as a major 1945 Report, unless one science has changed enough two decades to permit that elementary aspects of a or its broad intellectual taught within each other's .

Clearly the future of General Education in science at Harvard depends very much on the interpretation of this point. But there has been no attempt to determine which disciplines should be treated this way. The courses that double as General Education and introductory concentrators' concentration work are tacit recognition of what remains an hypothesis.

The rationale for Natural Sciences 5 and Natural Sciences 10, which double as first courses in geology and biology, respectively, is that the needs of concentrators and non-concentrators are identical here. George Wald, professor of Biology, maintains that biology in a General Education context is the best possible introduction to the subject. The course takes up a study of complex organisms only after following the evolutionary development of progressively higher forms of living and intent matter from the fundamental particles. Wald's conclusion is not that this approach has something for everyone, but the best for everyone. His belief derives from a conversion of values over the last fifteen years: he finds that biology is better woven into the scientific unity of the universe than into simply historical fabric. Thus physics and chemistry come into the course occasionally so that the biology is teachable mainly at the molecular level.

BRUNER'S committee also concluded, however, that students who have taken introductory General Education courses in science have, by and large, been better served than they would have been had they taken introductory departmental courses." Three years ago this distinction was apparently still valid. Nothing as inclusive could be said today, for the lines between the specialists' and the non-specialists' courses have been blurred by the differences of purpose in the General Education program.

It has been argued that the variety of educational backgrounds which an entering class brings to Harvard forces the college to offer General Education courses that differ in prerequisites as well as content. This is all the more reason for preserving a common element in science instruction. The strongly science-minded student will move directly into course work with a Department; the humanist may not look for a course to waken his scientific interest. Consequently science in the program is most important to freshmen who arrive uncommitted, and particularly for those who come from schools where science was neglected. Their General Education course may leave them unmoved; it can also be an important confrontation.

The fundamental trouble is that thinking about General Education continues to identify the science major's education with learning techniques, and the humanist's education with seeing science in the broad intellectual frame of reference. This attitude is almost inevitable in the face of difficulties on both sides: the undergraduate science major hasn't the time to see how his work fits into intellectual traditions, and the non-scientist has no ultimate use for technique. That is, strictures of time keep the scientists on their side of the divide, while strictures of value are more important to the non-scientist. This suggests, that, given the chance, the science student could get more from a course with a broader outlook on science, than the non-scientist from the strictly technical course.

By now there ought to be a strict ethos of departmental participation in the General Educational program. We have enough definitions of what we want General Education in the sciences to do; we have had almost nothing to say about whether it can be done in the contradictory ways that now mar the internal logic of the program. Harvard can little afford to lag here where she once led.

Clearly the future of General Education in science at Harvard depends very much on the interpretation of this point. But there has been no attempt to determine which disciplines should be treated this way. The courses that double as General Education and introductory concentrators' concentration work are tacit recognition of what remains an hypothesis.

The rationale for Natural Sciences 5 and Natural Sciences 10, which double as first courses in geology and biology, respectively, is that the needs of concentrators and non-concentrators are identical here. George Wald, professor of Biology, maintains that biology in a General Education context is the best possible introduction to the subject. The course takes up a study of complex organisms only after following the evolutionary development of progressively higher forms of living and intent matter from the fundamental particles. Wald's conclusion is not that this approach has something for everyone, but the best for everyone. His belief derives from a conversion of values over the last fifteen years: he finds that biology is better woven into the scientific unity of the universe than into simply historical fabric. Thus physics and chemistry come into the course occasionally so that the biology is teachable mainly at the molecular level.

BRUNER'S committee also concluded, however, that students who have taken introductory General Education courses in science have, by and large, been better served than they would have been had they taken introductory departmental courses." Three years ago this distinction was apparently still valid. Nothing as inclusive could be said today, for the lines between the specialists' and the non-specialists' courses have been blurred by the differences of purpose in the General Education program.

It has been argued that the variety of educational backgrounds which an entering class brings to Harvard forces the college to offer General Education courses that differ in prerequisites as well as content. This is all the more reason for preserving a common element in science instruction. The strongly science-minded student will move directly into course work with a Department; the humanist may not look for a course to waken his scientific interest. Consequently science in the program is most important to freshmen who arrive uncommitted, and particularly for those who come from schools where science was neglected. Their General Education course may leave them unmoved; it can also be an important confrontation.

The fundamental trouble is that thinking about General Education continues to identify the science major's education with learning techniques, and the humanist's education with seeing science in the broad intellectual frame of reference. This attitude is almost inevitable in the face of difficulties on both sides: the undergraduate science major hasn't the time to see how his work fits into intellectual traditions, and the non-scientist has no ultimate use for technique. That is, strictures of time keep the scientists on their side of the divide, while strictures of value are more important to the non-scientist. This suggests, that, given the chance, the science student could get more from a course with a broader outlook on science, than the non-scientist from the strictly technical course.

By now there ought to be a strict ethos of departmental participation in the General Educational program. We have enough definitions of what we want General Education in the sciences to do; we have had almost nothing to say about whether it can be done in the contradictory ways that now mar the internal logic of the program. Harvard can little afford to lag here where she once led.