Yup. You need a food handler permit to work in kitchen, a driver’s license to drive, but you don’t need any teaching certification to teach a college class.
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There is no incremental value to limiting that class to 33 when the discussions are limited at 35 already. And if the class was only 33 people you would not have the depth and breadth of resources thats available now. It would be a far worse class with a small class size.
I see your point. However, I can only see a negative impact from online courses. Maybe this should be a factor in the rankings.
How many students does the professor know by name in the 1000 person lecture and have a direct relationship with? Yes, the students may have a relationship with the TA, but it would be better to have with the professor that by your description is amazing.
I realize that these smaller class sizes may not be feasible a large R1 public universities and therefore should perhaps not be a factor in their ranking but absolutely disagree that students learn MORE when sitting in satellite class room for a lecture watching a broadcast.
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I think that is a very outdated concept. For specific types of classes, primarily in CS and STEM, online is just as good as in person; especially if supplemented by smaller labs, discussions, office hours and team projects.
The class I mentioned in my responses was named as one of the 5 top CS classes in the world a few years ago. At Berkeley, that class roughly enrolls 1000 people although these numbers used to be somewhat lower. Harvard’s equivalent class (CS 50) at the time the article came out enrolled 900 students, and even Stanford’ version (CS 106A) had 700+ kids. I guarantee you they weren’t have intimate 1:1 conversations with professors during the class.
The professor’s knowledge of individual students is meaningless relative to the educational objectives of this class.
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I don’t think that small=better is necessarily true. Our S at Stanford had many very large classes in his major (CS). They were extremely well run, and yes, questions were asked and answered in class. The only really small classes he had were the humanities type classes required for graduation. Most of the CS classes were also streamed either “live” or on-demand. This was very useful for the occasional missed lecture or to go back over the material. Video was never used as the primary means of delivery (save for his Covid year).
Strangely enough, our son’s favorite CS classes were also the largest (well over 600) and they were taught by big name leaders in their field.
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That’s because CS majors don’t like human interaction 
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Primarily because they choose to interact only with those they consider to be intellectual equals? 
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When I was at UCLA I have a decent number of pre-major courses that had between 200-500 students. The vast majority of those professors ended up knowing me personally. My experience was that was up to the student. They all had office hours, they all took questions in class. Those like me to took an interest, came to those hours and asked questions about the material got to know the professors. They never removed themselves from that process. Of course most students didn’t chose to. To this day I still keep in touch with one of the professors who taught my 500 person Freshman class.
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Well… my son loves human interaction. Hates video lectures and studying alone. He is happy as the proverbial clam in his first semester at UCB. All of his classes this semester are large. He reports that each is well run with engaging lectures given by great professors, plus multiple small labs and discussion sections run by well trained grad students (GSIs). He finds it useful to get the material from different sources (professors and GSIs) since multiple perspectives / teaching styles can sometimes shed light on difficult concepts. Professors and GSIs also accessible in office hours. The homework / problem sets for some of these classes are amazing, creative and funny! Impressed at what he is learning and the quality of the teaching staff. No complaints so far…
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I have son who is getting his second degree in CS area online and prefers on demand mode. On the other hand my 2 DDs (not CS) state that they can’t learn anything online.
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I think part of the issue with “big vs small” is that apples and oranges get discussed without the correct distinctions.
Can a course structured as: lecture given 1-2x/week by the big time prof to 1000 kids, who are then separated into small groups 1-3x/week, run by TAs, be awesome? Sure.
But would it be better if each and every one of those 2-5x/week sessions were given by the prof, to small groups of kids?
I would say yes. If you disagree, then I am happy to agree to disagree.
As it pertains to rankings, I do believe that class size should somehow be factored in. But I understand how they are gamed. And I also understand that different strokes.
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That’s why I suggested small class sizes be used criteria only for private universities. It seems there already is self-selection for those preferring large classes choosing public universities so perhaps makes sense not a criteria for them.
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I went to college well over 30 years ago. My profs were ok, some better than others I suppose. The profs within my major were very good.
My daughter felt that many of her professors were talented and she still keeps in touch with several. It worked for her, it might not for others.
This depends on the student and prof.
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Practically speaking, how would you do this with 500-1000 kids?
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I am a NJ resident, and I think Rutgers is an excellent educational institution. Shadowed by Princeton and other Ivy leagues in the area, I have observed Rutgers making all efforts to catch and stand out. They spent in luring top students and top notch professors. I am very confident if Rutgers continues this way, it’ll become a public university on par with other top public universities such as UCs, UNC or Umich.
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From a 2019 article. Maybe things have changed?
“Besides CS 61A [“2,000 enrolled students this semester” in fall 2019] four other courses in the electrical engineering and computer sciences department, or EECS, have over 1,000 students.”
And those aren’t graduate students leading the lecture sections: “DeNero added that there are 57 undergraduate student instructors, or UGSIs, for the class this semester.”
https://dailycal.org/2019/09/10/CS-61a-course-enrollment-reaches-an-all-time-high-at-2000-students
wait, isn’t your student in Corvalis? Or twins?
He’s at UCB. I will respond privately as this is off topic for the thread. 