CUE Debates Proposed Science C Bypass Option

Members of a student-faculty committee yesterday disputed the feasibility of an Undergraduate Council proposal that would allow students to bypass the Science A or B requirement with a mathematics and computer Science C option that would replace the Quantitative Reasoning Requirement (QRR).

While the students argued in favor of the proposal, the faculty members said they objected to it on the grounds that an additional requirement would place further restrictions on humanities majors.

However, Evan J. Mandery '89, chairman of the council's academics committee which wrote the proposal, said that the report suggested Science C as a bypass option, not an additional requirement. The Science C requirement would offer computer science as well as quantitative and statistical courses, Mandery said.

In an interview after the meeting, Mandery said that the faculty members would probably not accept the new option as a bypass for Science A or B and a replacement for the QRR.

"I think I'm worried about adding another constraint to humanities students," said Robert M. Woollacott, chairman of the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology.

"This would really be a binding constraint on humanities students and some social science students," said Dunster Senior Tutor Jeffrey Wolcowitz.

Departmental Subsitution

The faculty members also disputed a proposal for "departmental substitution," which would allow more introductory departmental courses to count for Core credit.

The students argued that this was necessary to augment the current Core offerings which are too limited and often of low quality. "If there were a very vigorous effort to bring lots of courses into the Core then everyone would be satisfied," Mandery said.

But faculty members said they objected to this proposal because it sets up distributional requirements, rather than requirements that force students to learn different modes of thought, as is the current intent of the Core.

Dean of the College L. Fred Jewett '57 said the University had rejected the General Education program, which preceded the Core, because it had become a system of "simply distribution."

"There hasn't been great willingness to do this [add more courses to the Core] because the courses which are often mentioned as substitutes would not meet the Core guidelines," Wolcowitz said.