Administrators at the School of Education and Social Policy know their school isn’t just for aspiring teachers. The problem, they say, is convincing freshmen to disregard the common misconception.
“I think (Education) is the hidden gem of NU,” said Dan Lewis, an education and social policy professor. “If you’re in high school and you hear about (Education), unless you want to be a teacher, it doesn’t register that that’s where you might want to be.”
Education has fewer than 350 undergraduate students. But despite Education being the smallest of Northwestern’s six undergraduate schools, the school has the largest population growth rate, between 250 and 300 percent, during the span of four years because of transfers from other NU schools — suggesting that with exposure, students might be catching on what the school has to offer.
Each quarter about 20 to 35 interschool transfer students join the school, which has a current graduating class of 110 students. It started off with 45 freshmen.
Officials agree that one factor that causes Education’s stigma is that it’s an “unconventional school.” Its multiple programs prepare students for various careers, including law, engineering and psychological services.
“Some incoming students see the ‘School of Education’ and their eyes just stop,” said Mark Hoffman, the school’s assistant dean for student affairs. “They think, ‘I don’t want to teach, I want to do something else.’ I don’t think they think of the social policy part.”
Efforts are being made to provide prospective students with a better understanding of the school’s diverse focus, Hoffman said. Education administrators work closely with the Office of Undergraduate Admission and are discussing the option of including an informational flyer with information sent out to prospective students, he said.
Another factor that contributes to the misunderstandings surrounding the school is its “nontraditional” majors, Hoffman said. Four majors are offered — human development and psychological services, social policy, learning and organizational change, and secondary teaching.
“What ties all of these together is that they look at learning and development across the life span, whether it’s on an individual level or through organizations and communities,” Hoffman said. “It’s really about people who are looking to create change in some aspect. … I just don’t think a lot of high school students think about that.”
The School of Communication also contains a large percentage of interschool transfers, but officials at that school said they can’t identify the specific reason behind the trend.
“Not every student comes to school with that well of a developed sense of where they want to be when they leave here,” said communication studies Prof. Susan Dun.
Students who transferred into Education agree they got a better understanding of the school after they arrived on campus and talked to other students.
Julie Graham transferred into Education after she discovered she had no opportunities to pursue becoming a theater teacher as a theatre major in Communication. As an Education student, the senior will receive her teaching certification for theater in June — after just four years.
“When you’re in high school coming into NU, you can hear the name of the school, you can hear the names of the majors, but it’s not as clear-cut as being an English major in (Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences),” Graham said. “(High school students) don’t really understand the definition of the school, or what the school stands for, and it becomes really appealing later on.”
