Need Advice on IHUM Courses

Colleges and Universities A-Z Stanford University
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<p>Hey guys, I recently received my IHUM course catalog in the mail and I'm trying to decide which courses I should select for my freshman year. The possibilities are as follows</p>

<p>Can the People Rule?
Humans and Machines
The Poet Re-making the World
Race and Reunion: Slavery and the Civil War in American Memory
Technological Visions of Utopia
Transformations: The Intersection of High Art and Contemporary Culture
Voyages and Visionaries
Word and Image</p>

<p>I'm planning on majoring in Computer Science with a later focus on Artificial Intelligence so I found the Humans and Machines and the Technological Visions of Utopia interesting, but I wanted to know from any current students if there were any courses that are more difficult than others, is it the same selection each year, and if there are any with better professors that would help me to get more out of the course? I really want to get a lot out of my IHUM selection so any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.</p>

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<p>Look at SLE too.</p>

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<p>I wanted to ask for advice on the IHUMs too. The Poet Re-making the World and Transformations: The Intersection of High Art and Contemporary Culture are on the top of my list but I haven’t been able to talk to a person who has taken one of those courses, and I’ve heard that we should not just rely on the course descriptions.
Race and reunion seemed like a substantial course until I looked it up on courserank and found most people to despise the class (due to a particularily lousy profit it seems). I am not too drawn to the 3-hour sit-down final either, :stuck_out_tongue:
I am not a techie but I find Humans and Machines to be rather interesting too.
Word and Image might be too philosophical for my taste and I lack the guts to pioneer and take Can the People Rule.
It would be greatly appreciated if anyone can offer a bit of perspective on these courses. Also, where could we find info on how the courses are graded?</p>

4

<p>

Yes, no, and yes. </p>

<p>Sadly I can’t be much more helpful than that. The thing with IHUM is most people only know about the one they took, maybe a couple more. </p>

<p>My course, and other courses I would recommend, are no longer offered. One that looks most similar is “Can the People Rule.” </p>

<p>Anyways I would not choose based on broad subject, but texts and professors. With the professor you should choose based on Courserank reviews for his or her other classes. You do not necessarily want the smartest professor, or the one with the best research, but the one who communicates clearly and is interesting to listen to. If Rob Reich is still teaching an IHUM I’d strongly recommend it. There aren’t many opportunities to take classes with Rob, so seize them when you can.</p>

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<p>Where is this “courserank” so that I can look at how people like different courses and what does it show me about the different courses? (:</p>

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<p>^google search “courserank stanford” and it should come up. You’ll need a SUID to login, so if you don’t have one yet then I can look stuff up for you. </p>

<p>Even the best IHUMs in my opinion receive negative reviews. It’s inevitable for a variety of reasons. The reviews are most important for finding out about the professors and workload. Don’t put much stock into the TAs. And what someone else may find fascinating you may find boring, so use the texts to determine if you think the class will be interesting. Fiction often leads to more interesting class discussions than nonfiction.</p>

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<p>^ Hi senior, do you know where we could find info on how the courses are graded?</p>

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<p>Thanks Senior, I’ll definitely be looking into all of that. Much appreciated</p>

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<p>Eiswien:</p>

<p>IHUM tries to standardize grades as much as possible. This means (in theory) that all IHUMs have the same grade distributions, and grade distributions within each IHUM are normalized to account for grading discrepancies among TFs. I have no reason to believe that the former standardization (each IHUM has same grade distribution) is not implemented in practice. On the other hand, a report I read from 2007 suggests that IHUM has had trouble normalizing the grades within a particular IHUM. There didn’t seem to be a set strategy for normalizing the grades (just suggestions) and based on the report some TFs were unwilling to adjust their grades to reflect the desired distribution. I don’t know about anything more recent. </p>

<p>As far as grades go, most students I knew got in the B range. A-minuses are not uncommon. A good strategy to get an A is to pick an IHUM with more unmotivated students who collectively have less background on the subject.</p>

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<p>Yeah, B’s are so common in IHUM that some people call it B-HUM. But you can make an A by submitting outstanding written work and by consistently participating effectively in section. Personally, I’m not cynical enough to try to pick a course where I expect the other students would be less motivated–that would make for a boring experience, and I’d rather have engaged classmates even if I didn’t wind up with an A.</p>

<p>Also: to the poster who asked about Fall IHUMs, I thought Word and Image was great. Bobonich is outstanding.</p>

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<p>@Senior, oh I’m sorry…I think I didn’t make my question clear. I was wondering which kinds of tests each IHUM has. I know there are oral finals/sit-down finals/take-home finals, papers, quizzes…Where could we find out which IHUMs have which tests?</p>

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<p>^I figured that might be the case. Anyways if the information is not in the packet, then you can look on Courserank or email the professors and/or TFs. Anyways you’ll have reading and midterm papers at a minimum fall quarter (I think). </p>

<p>Unless you are very uncomfortable in one setting versus another, I would not recommend picking an IHUM on the basis of the final evaluation. I at least find it easier to motivate myself to work on a daunting assignment that I am interested in versus a simpler one that I don’t care about. Also, pushing ourselves into new and challenging experiences is a tenet of the liberal education. Some (many) Stanford students stay in their comfort zones*; sure they excel at what they do, but at what cost? </p>

<p>With that in mind, I say if you find an IHUM (or any class for that matter) that sticks out above the rest in that it greatly interests you, go for it! Many students here, for instance, will refuse to take an art class even though they secretly want to. Their parents, society, or peers often preach that undergraduate is a time for a form of vocational training. Stanford faculty in all disciplines are trying to dispel this notion. As a student, I want to do my part and try to dispel it too. Undergrad is one of the few chances in your life where you can explore without significant drawbacks. With few exceptions, there is no set undergraduate path to a given career. </p>

<p>With IHUM, you have an opportunity where you can greatly expand your horizons with little opportunity costs. Take advantage of this. The worst case is you are somewhat miserable in a class for a quarter and have a refined idea of what you do not want to do in life. The best case scenario is that you are profoundly changed for the better. There is a sizable minority that had such an IHUM experience, including me; I have no doubt that my fall IHUM will be instrumental in shaping the rest of my life.</p>

<p>So go for it! Take a risk! And watch what happens… </p>

<p>**Eiswein, though parts of my post are directed at you, I am not implying in any way that you are someone who only wants to stay in their comfort zone. There are, however, readers out there who will have this perspective, and most of this post is directed at those abstract persons.*</p>

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<p>Great post, Senior0991!</p>

<p>I have noticed that the students I’ve met who want to stay in their comfort zones, or follow a relatively straight-and-narrow academic path, are most often pre-meds. I think it’s probably because med school admissions are so numbers-driven, but I think it’s sorta sad, and in some ways kind of a waste of the academic opportunities that abound here. But I can understand their priorities also, and I don’t mean to sound critical, just sympathetic.</p>

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<p>Thanks for the post Senior! I admit I am afraid of an oral final. I am international and would like a smoother transition to American college life, but I would not mind an oral final in the second or third quater.</p>

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<p>Do most people get their first choice in IHUM?
Also i’ve heard you can petition to change your assignment… how easy/hard is it to do that?</p>

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<p>

80% I believe. </p>

<p>

Don’t know. I’d imagine it’s not terribly difficult though.</p>

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<p>Tech visions of Utopia has some boring lectures, but the readings are all excellent. Check out John Corbally if you want a great and laid back TF with a British accent. Also, oral finals are the best.</p>

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<p>^I would second John Corbally, having had him for Human History my freshman year. I didn’t like the grade he gave me, but everything besides that was bomb. </p>

<p>Oral finals may be the best at the time, but I’m convinced research papers are the most rewarding of all three major formats (oral, sit-down, and research paper final). Research papers give you a chance to study a topic of interest, and it’s great practice for a thesis or assignment in an upper level class. For as much as I like PWR, I often find that its research papers never require much (if any) time in the library.</p>

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<p>I took Humans & Machines and loved it.</p>

<p>Definitely one of the least painful IHUMs. What I remembered was hearing my friends complain about Word and Image and Fate of Reason… and I think Art of Living (I’m not sure all of those are fall quarter IHUMs though), and being pretty thankful that Humans & Machines was laid back so I could spend less time writing papers and more time studying for chem midterms.</p>

<p>You go to movie screenings on Sunday afternoons, and you’ll end up writing a paper synthesizing themes in the films. And, no final - instead, a group project that is graded pretty easily. There are like three “quizzes”, which you should do fine in if you mostly go to lecture and watch the films. But seriously, seriously not anything you need to worry about. I freaked out over these quizzes and papers for no reason. </p>

<p>I didn’t really do much and ended up with an A-. Attended most of the lectures, watched most of the films, went to section. I didn’t spend any time at the Hume Writing Center or revised my papers, which might’ve made the difference between an A and an A-. Note of advice on the papers: talk to your TFs. Be their friends. Go to office hours. No shame in being IHUM kid if it gets you a good grade in the class. Talk to your TFs about your thesis topics before writing your papers. </p>

<p>And, if you actually went to lecture, they were almost always pretty enlightening, or at least entertaining. A lot of people thought it wasn’t that interesting, because I’m thinking that a lot of engineers expected Humans & Machines to be more techie than it actually was. I liked the topics, I like watching movies, and it was an easy class, so it was win-win-win for me. Also, Jon Daehnke was the best TF. Bummer that he’s not teaching IHUM anymore, though. </p>

<p>And a note about SLE: I didn’t really consider it, because everybody told me that it’s isolated from the freshman dorms and a breeding ground for weird artsy humanities kids. Although there’s definitely a lot of truth to that, SLE kids seem to have actually gotten something out of their humanities education, and they don’t have to take PWR (which sucks IMO). Anyway, I wish I had considered it a little bit more - but probably still would have taken IHUM/PWR.</p>