<p>As Harvard prepares to stake its future—and at least $1 billion of its funds—on the sciences, undergraduates are fleeing the discipline in large numbers, opting instead for concentrations in the social sciences and the humanities.</p>
<p>According to a cross-analysis of data from the admissions department and the Harvard College facebook, there is a wide gap in the number of students who wish to pursue science at the start of their freshman year and the number of students who actually do.</p>
<p>Between one-third and two-thirds of students who declare their intention to study biology or engineering while matriculating have switched their concentrations away from the sciences.</p>
<p>People bailing out of science, and particularly engineering, is a pretty universal phenomenon. Hardly restricted to Harvard. </p>
<p>I suspect that is why they don’t address the class size problem. They could teach these huge courses in multiple sections, with a different professor leading each section. This would convert a course with 500 to 5 courses of 100 students, or 10 of 50. The faculty would have to be willing to take on the heavier teaching load, but they would probably do this if they thought it would matter.</p>
<p>I wonder how many of the students who complain about the large classes got lower grades in college than they were used to in high school. I have a suspicion that students who were A students in high school freak when they get a C or B in college whereas C students in a competitive high school are comfortable with Cs and Bs in college, tolerate a few average grades, and ultimately succeed. How many change their interests because of academic difficulty (a re-appraisal of abilities) versus a re-appraisal of goals?</p>
<p>If you get through the big intro classes, the upper division classes are almost always much smaller. </p>
<p>Sciences and engineering are tough. Maybe Harvard students aren’t “battle-hardened”. I wonder if the percent who transfer out of sciences and engineering at Harvard is less than or greater than secend-tier schools.</p>
<p>I wonder to what degree the “fleeing” from the sciences at Harvard has to do with the students’ perception of Harvard’s strength in them – most notably in engineering. It’s well-known that’s not Harvard’s strong point, so perhaps that contributes to it. Notice that at Stanford, which is strong in more or less every science/engineering, students don’t shy away in large numbers (to my knowledge).</p>
<p>Either way, I have a feeling this might have much to do with students’ expectations. They come to Harvard thinking that everything will be a dream – from the offerings to the libraries to the events to everything. And then they see that, ohnoes, Harvard has large classes too. (I can’t help but think, also, that many if not most of these students are turned off by large state schools, which are known for such 600-person classes.) Students who intend to go to Berkeley, UCLA, Michigan, etc. seem to expect large classes, so they aren’t as turned off by it.</p>
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<p>…really? Harvard just recently started that? What did they do before that?</p>
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<p>I kind of have no sympathy for these students. Harvard is providing them with small discussions, I hope, along with labs and such, which are small. In fact, I’d be shocked if they didn’t, as even schools like Berkeley do. Thus, most students there don’t seem to care about the large lectures – it’s the small discussions/labs/workshops that matter and can give you a “taste of science.” If the students at Harvard are still turned off, even after all that, well–perhaps their sense of entitlement is a little high.</p>
<p>Well, I don’t know about that. The term ‘fleeing’ implies that there was a large number that existed previously, and that that number is decreasing. With regard to engineering specifically, Harvard has * always* had few students, as the program was (and still is) quite small. In fact, I would surmise that the number of Harvard students earning engineering degrees today may be as large as it has ever been. </p>
<p>With regard to the natural sciences, I don’t think there is any dispute that Harvard is one of the world’s premier schools. </p>
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<p>Well, I don’t know that this is a constructive way of looking at the issue, for I suspect that sciences and engineering courses are not optimally taught at any of the major research universities. Just because some schools run large introductory technical courses doesn’t mean that Harvard or any other school should do the same. Nor do I view students who want to improve the quality of their education as ‘feeling entitled’. What’s so bad about fighting for improvement? </p>
<p>With respect to Berkeley specifically, since you brought it up, I am frustrated not only by the impersonal nature of the courses, but also by the fact that so many students don’t seem to care. Some don’t seem to realize that Berkeley could be improved, others seem not to be interested in having Berkeley improve, perhaps as a manner of expressing ‘chronological fairness’ (i.e. if I had to suffer through an impersonal education, then others after me should have to suffer through the same impersonal education). I don’t believe in that. I think that problems should be fixed so that those coming after you can be better off. </p>
<p>So if Harvard students are pushing for more personal science classes, that’s not an expression of entitlement. They’re doing exactly what they should be doing. Students at any school should be pushing it for improvement.</p>
<p>I’m not saying that. I said that when they do have those large courses, they (should) supplement them with small discussions/labs. And if the students at Harvard are still complaining, well… perhaps they shouldn’t. Sure, improvement is good, but really, it shouldn’t be a huge problem. Harvard has very few courses over 100, and those that are, I assume, are supplemented with smaller discussions. That they still whine about the large lecture says, to me, that they’re expecting too much. Honestly, it’s a lecture; you don’t ask questions, you don’t discuss. The professor simply teaches the material. Now, if you really want to add something to the lecture / ask questions (though infrequently), you can sit at the front. It’s in the discussions that you really learn a lot, because you can discuss, ask questions, debate, etc.</p>
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<p>I agree, the apathy to change the school is frustrating, but that simply comes with the students’ mindset: they think that public schools are public schools and can’t improve. To be honest, I see many of Berkeley’s ‘problems’ (more than just class sizes) slowly going away in the future, when their endowment is large enough to pay for it all. Harvard, though, has a large endowment and still has some large classes. This says to me that some ‘problems’ are inevitable given certain circumstances (such as the status as a large research university).</p>
<p>Then again, Harvard could have the professors teach many lectures of the same course, but they’d also have to hire more professors, which would cost much more money – and Harvard could definitely pay for it. So in this case, a push for change is within reach, methinks. It might even help to get the government off Harvard’s tail about spending more of its endowment.</p>
<p>If they break up the intro classes into multiple professor-taught sections, then they would have to do at least one of the following:</p>
<p>Increase teaching loads for science professors. This would kill their research, and the sorts of people Harvard wants on the faculty would never put up with it.</p>
<p>Shift professors from a large number of upper level classes to divide up the intro courses. This might make it less appealing for the the students who hang on to major in the department, but they might lose fewer people after the first intro course. This would keep the teaching load constant.</p>
<p>Hire more professors. This would be by far the most expensive solution. Science professors require expensive labs. So every time you enlarge your science faculty you have to spend huge amounts of money on infrastructure.</p>
<p>Have some of the intro courses taught by adjuncts. These are not so easy to come by in science and engineering, and the students would strongly object.</p>
<p>Not a trivial problem, but the drop off in science majors is probably expected.</p>
<p>I don’t know whether the proportion of people dropping out of science is higher at a place like Harvard. At other colleges there might be far fewer people who enter thinking they want to major in science or engineering.</p>
<p>Ah, but you could ask questions during “lecture”. You could discuss. These things are indeed possible. In short, lectures don’t have to be lectures, but could instead be free-flowing discussions. I know that’s what I and other students did in my science/math classes in high school, and I don’t think my high school was that avant-garde. If high schools can do that, is it really so unreasonable for colleges to do the same?</p>
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<p>Interestingly, Berkeley already has a model of a public school upon which it can use as a template to improve its undergraduate program and Berkeley doesn’t have to look very far at all to find it: Berkeley’s own graduate programs. Rare indeed is it to find a Berkeley graduate student who experiences giant impersonal classes, and I suspect would complain vigorously if they did. Yet coincidentally (or perhaps not so coincidentally), the graduate programs are considered to be the crown jewels of Berkeley. In other words, the graduate students seem to have very high expectations despite attending a public school. The difference seems to be that while they expect a lot, they also have their high expectations met. </p>
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<p>I think this is by far the best choice. I actually disagree that they aren’t easy to come by in science/engineering. I think a lot of newly minted PhD’s would very happily take adjunct positions at Harvard just to say that they were on the faculty at Harvard. Harvard could even sweeten the offer by saying that the very best performing adjuncts might be considered for a tenure-track assistant professor position. I believe a lot of new PhD’s would be very happy to take that. After all, let’s face it. A lot of new PhD’s, even in science and engineering, don’t exactly have the greatest academic job offers waiting for them. I believe plenty of them would be very happy to work as a Harvard adjunct as opposed to having to take some crappy post-doc or take a faculty position at some no-name school. Sure, science and eng PhD’s can go to industry, but a lot of them want to stay in academic, and a Harvard adjunct position is a pretty good deal for many of them, relative to their other options. </p>
<p>As far as students strongly objecting, well, students seem to be strongly objecting now. Any reforms don’t have to be perfect. They just have to be better than the status quo.</p>
<p>True, you could, and you definitely do when the lectures are small. However, when the lectures are huge, it tends to be for general courses where such isn’t really necessary during lecture. And if you have questions, you can either go in at office hours, ask your peers, ask during a discussion/lab, or look it up yourself. Many students obviously consider large lectures pointless (as the material can sometimes, if not often, be mastered without a lecturer), which is why many don’t bother attending them.</p>
<p>Harvard does not have tenure track assistant professor jobs.</p>
<p>Adjunct jobs do not pay enough to support someone. So this person with a PhD in science or engineering would need a regular job anyway. If it were a full time faculty job elsewhere, their primary college would not approve of them adjuncting at Harvard. If they had an industry job, their employer MIGHT like the idea of them doing something at Harvard, for the contacts and recruiting. BUt they more likely want one of their established employees to represent the firm at the college.</p>
<p>No well-informed newly minted PhD in science or engineering who wanted an academic career would take an adjunct job, anywhere, unless they could not get a regular faculty job. It would be career suicide. The adjunct job would not say to another college “this person spent a year as an adjunct at Harvard, that makes them desirable for our position” Instead, they would think “this person spent a year as an adjunct because they could not get a regular job”</p>
<p>Is nobody here bothered by the fact that a school with an endowment the size of most national treasuries won’t put up the money to hire more tenure track professors in order to provide smaller class sizes to allow for questions and discussion? Look at your suggestions - classroom untested, unproven adjuncts? Hold questions/discussions for grad student run discussion sections?</p>
<p>Please. This is a disgrace. Educating undergraduates should be a priority at every university. The idea that a school this sinfully rich still offers introductory classes with 600 students on a routine basis is absurd.</p>
<p>Uh, I think you meant to say that Harvard does not have tenure-track adjunct professor jobs.
And that’s certainly true…right now. But the point is, it could. Things can and do change. </p>
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<p>Really? See below.</p>
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<p>Uh, how the heck is that? People who have just finished PhD’s take post-docs all the time. They don’t pay particularly well. Yet somehow all these postdocs are able to “support themselves”. Furthermore, the problems you are talking about with regard to adjunct positions are no different from what happens with post-docs. After all, people don’t take post-docs if they can land tenure-track positions at a top school directly. The problem is that most new PhD’s are unable to do that. Hence, if they want a shot at an academic career at a decent school, they *have * to do a post-doc because they have no alternative. </p>
<p>Hence, right now, you have schools thinking “these guys took postdoc’s because they couldn’t get a regular job”. But that doesn’t seem to stop anybody. So what’s so outrageous about setting up a similar system with adjuncts? </p>
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<p>Well, I don’t mean to defend the practice, but I can see Harvard shrugging their shoulders and asking what the problem is? After all, undergrad applications are at record highs, Harvard still has the best brand name in the business, winning most of the cross-yield battles. Hence, there really isn’t anything pushing Harvard to do better. </p>
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<p>Yeah, but I cringe at how much less I would have learned in high school if I were to have attended large science/math lecture classes back then. After all, those courses are obviously easier than college courses, and hence one could argue that they could also have been taught in a large lecture format. But it was precisely during the free-flowing discussions of these relatively low-level (relative to college science courses) topics that the bulk of the learning was fostered.</p>
<p>One could also argue that those in high school aren’t yet ready to assert themselves in a large environment (then again, so are many college students).</p>
<p>Yeah - what you said in parentheses was going to be my rejoinder exactly.</p>
<p>I mean, honestly, think about it. Those large lecture classes are the intro classes. Hence, the vast majority of the students will be people who are just one or perhaps two years removed from high school. Honestly, how much more mature and assertive are they really going to be, compared to high school students? </p>
<p>If there are any students who I would say have the necessary assertiveness and maturity to fully handle large lecture classes, it would be the graduate students. Yet ironically, they are precisely the ones who get the smallest classes of all. So if anything, research universities are arranging their course sequences exactly backwards: large classes for those students who are least able to handle them, and small classes for those students who don’t need them.</p>
<p>Its my understanding that in a lot of the large classes at Harvard - life sciences, organic chemistry etc that the students are dropping like flies. There are probably several reasons. Some of the courses have been recently revamped to integrate biology chemistry etc. The profs are still in the process of experimenting with what works and what doesn’t - so far a lot doesn’t. There are a lot of premeds in some of these courses who after a while see it isn’t worth the effort to even think about medicine or science for that matter. It is certainly more lucrative and a shorter road to pursue a “Wall street” career which is the fad amongst many students today.</p>
<p>One can also peruse the latest copy of USNews ‘Best Graduate Schools’ and note that Harvard is actually ranked the #23 best engineering program in the country. I think that’s pretty good, considering that there are literally hundreds of engineering programs out there. Harvard is actually ranked higher in engineering than places like Johns Hopkins, UPenn, Duke, Rice, RPI, Case Western, and UNC. That’s right: in engineering.</p>
<p>My question would be is this new? Harvard attracts the best and the best who are really sure they want science and, especially, engineering would opt for MIT wouldn’t they? So those who head to Harvard thinking they might like science or engineering may be put off by the level of commitment these fields require – not just hard courses, but a lot of courses that limit the other electives you can take. There is a natural attrition. One of the problems with the physical sciences, anyway, is that it takes a lot of courses to get to a level of understanding that enables you to really “get” the research your professor is engaged in.</p>
<p>If it is new (and I think it’s not only taking place at Harvard) I’ve seen many mathematically inclined kids swept up in the finance craze. Compare the opportunities versus those in physics, for example. Funding in physics stinks. It will be interesting to see what happens if finance jobs start to dry up.</p>