<p>Looks really cool! (but I'd need both a sex change and a brain reassignment to take advantage of the opportunity....)</p>
<p>all well and good, but not solving a real problem i percieved during my time at smith: that many students are afraid of math (often having had bad experiences with it in high school) and never get over that in college.</p>
<p>most of the students i know who took math classes (in the math dept or other depts) at smith loved them, and many--myself included--went from hating math to majoring or minoring in a quantitative subject. </p>
<p>while i chose smith in part because i'd never have to take a math class, i think a quantitative skills requirement is really in order--and there are a lot of current students, faculty, and alums who agree. jya and postbacs are great, but pretty tangental imho...maybe 20-30 people will take part each year, as opposed to hundreds of smithies who don't take math now and would if required.</p>
<p>I think there are a lot of people--disproportionate numbers of which are women--who, due to early bad experiences or expectations, have brains that momentarily cramp at even the word "math." It's almost like a panic attack.</p>
<p>I think they (and lots of other schools) will get around to the math requirement. But what I think makes this a good move BEFORE doing so, is that it will establish an entire cohort of campus role models. (I think the Engineering program does the same.)</p>
<p>And, related to women studying Math, my D today received official notification that she's off to Budapest in the Spring for the Math program there (administered by St. Olaf College, not Smith). What a terrific opportunity. </p>
<p>And she gets to speak both English and Math while she's there, as well as taking a two-week crash-course in Hungarian plus a regular intensive course in Hungarian. Now...if only they don't make goulash of her schedule.</p>
<p>Very cool, TD : ) How is she liking Washington?</p>
<p>She loves it, LL. Plans on doing a second internship there, with a different office, next summer, using her Praxis money. </p>
<p>She misses Smith, though. She's actually flying up next Thursday for a long weekend there, meeting with profs on Friday about her senior thesis & Budapest & such, and then hanging with friends for the weekend and flying back on Monday afternoon. (Starting next week, her internship is Tuesday-Friday, so Monday is "free", with the Smith seminar class on Monday evening.)</p>
<p>oh TD... one more post and you'll get 4,200! :)</p>
<p>Bah. Only 5,000 merits attention. And that mainly as testament to how much time I've wasted on CC. :)</p>