Administrators and faculty members across campus expressed hope that the Medill School of Journalism’s new “global and diverse cultures” requirement will broaden students’ educations. But the large-scale changes see few worries from academic departments.
Approved by Medill faculty in April, the school’s requirement focuses on classes that emphasize global studies and understanding. The creation of this requirement requirement is “just part of a national trend” toward educating college students in international cultures, said Ava Greenwell, Medill’s associate dean for curriculum.
“We believe this is information (students) ought to have,” Greenwell added.
Existing distribution requirements will not be changed. The curriculum addition instead acts as an “overlay” for courses students already must take, said Richard Gordon, a Medill associate professor and co-chairman of Medill’s curriculum committee. Classes that count for the distribution and elective requirements can double count for the global requirement.
Students entering the journalism school next fall will have to complete eight to 11 courses, out of the 45 required to graduate, that fit in the “global and diverse cultures” curriculum.
Medill faculty discussed and decided against counting global journalism classes, such as Reporting Across Race and Culture, toward the requirement, Gordon said. Although the school offers international positions in South Africa and India for its Teaching Media program, the three units earned from the required internship cannot be counted.
Administrators are unsure what affect the new requirement will have on class size in Weinberg and Northwestern’s other four undergraduate schools.
In exchange for what could be more Medill students enrolled in Weinberg classes, Weinberg administrators requested the journalism school develop new courses which will be open to non-Medill students, Weinberg Dean Daniel Linzer told The Daily in an e-mail.
Greenwell said the requirement doesn’t mean more students will be coming into Weinberg classes –“it just means a mix of these classes may change.” She said foreign language classes will be the most impacted by this change, since Medill students will be required to demonstrate proficiency or take three units of a foreign language when at NU.
Franziska Lys, chairwoman of NU’s Council on Language Instruction and a Weinberg professor who teaches German, said she anticipates “more students taking the placement exam.”
In schools such as Medill, where foreign language isn’t mandated, students do not take a language placement exam if they are not continuing their studies in college, Lys said.
Lys said other concerns include how many additional students will enter foreign language classes as a result of the requirement and the popularity of certain languages.
Several other questions about Medill’s requirement must be solved before it goes into effect next year, she added. Medill must decide whether pass/no credit status will be accepted for the requirement and in which classes.
Including a foreign language component in the global requirement creates a “win-win situation” for both Medill and Weinberg, Linzer wrote. When enrollment in foreign language courses increases, the number of sections — not students per section — is increased. This “could actually increase scheduling options for all students,” he said.
Linzer noted that some foreign language classes have low enrollment.
“Increasing student numbers in those courses would be great,” Linzer said. “We already have unused capacity in those classes, and a larger number of students would enhance our ability to offer these courses on a regular basis.”
Even though the foreign language component will be new to Medill’s curriculum, data from Medill’s Office of Student Records show most journalism students could meet the requirement.
Of the students who entered Medill in fall 2003, 88 percent had taken three or more years of a foreign language in high school. And many journalism students have continued learning languages while at NU. Of the graduating seniors in 2002, 60 percent studied a language.
Many Medill students have selected courses that would already fulfill the remaining eight units, Gordon said.
Medill faculty compiled an initial list of more than 300 courses — including classes in African-American studies, art history, performance studies, political science and religion — that will fit the requirement. Greenwell said she expects a complete list to be finalized by January. Medill faculty identified more than 40 history courses as “global and diverse cultures” classes. But Weinberg’s history department does not foresee any problems with an increase in enrollment numbers, said Jock McLane, chairman of the department.
“We have so many journalism students in our classes already that we don’t anticipate, given the large numbers of courses, it’s going to affect the number of students in courses in any major way,” McLane said.
Certain courses in the Schools of Communication, Music, and Education and Social Policy also meet Medill’s requirement.
Susan Dun, assistant dean for advising and student affairs in the School of Communication, said she doesn’t “see there being an issue with students getting into classes if they choose to take them in the School of Communication”.
“At this point, I’m not panicking,” Dun said.
Reach Angela Tablac at [email protected].
