CUE Meeting

The Committee on Undergraduate Education yesterday reviewed a preliminary draft of a survey of undergraduate instruction that the faculty will distribute in late April--the first such study in almost a decade.

Sidney Verba '53, associate dean of the Faculty for undergraduate education said the survey will assess the strengths and weaknesses of individual courses. Results will be released next fall.

The questionnaire asks undergraduates to evaluate class atmosphere and level of students participator among other factors.

Composition

The survey also examines the gender and ethnic composition of individual classes a factor that the previous study in the early 1970s did not consider. The office of instruction research and evaluation in conducting the survey.

"The committee agreed include questions on class participation after Nathan I. Huggins '62, W. E. B. DuBois Professor of History and of Afro-American Studies, argued that questions need to address whether or when a student feel secure in asking a questions."

Verba said the survey's broader purpose is to try "to find the most effective teacher student situation...that's what one really wants to know."

The committee also informally debated adding a math requirement to the Core Curriculum. Steven Rapkin '83 an Undergraduate Council representative on the Committee said the academic committee of the Council has discussed recommending that the Core require math, logic, and computer scrence.

Verba said the science subcommittee of the standing Core Committee will first discuss the proposal, adding that it will consider expanding the science core requirement to include math and including a core requirement dealing with math and computer courses.