SCUE advocates interdisciplinary minors

The Student Committee on Undergraduate Education released its White Paper on University Minors and Minor Programs yesterday. The White Paper, which comes at a time when the College of Arts and Sciences is developing inter-school minors with the School of Engineering and Applied Science and the School of Nursing, points out many problems that exist within minor programs at the University and offers a number of suggestions to rectify them. "The main goal of the paper was to try to create positive relationships between the students," said Brian Toll, co-chair of the University Minors Subcommittee of SCUE. "These types of common intellectual experiences try to break down the barriers between students of the different schools." The core of the paper centers around eight proposed inter-school University minors which utilize different strengths from the four undergraduate schools. The minor proposals such as Consumer Psychology recommend that certain classes be taken from the College and others from the Wharton School. The paper argues that many dual-degree programs presently exist, such as one between Marketing and Psychology, denoting that similar minor programs would be successful and useful to students. Other suggested minors are Health in Society, which pools resources from Wharton and Nursing, and Legal Environment and Technology in Society, which utilizes classes offered in Engineering and the College. "We want to add innovative programs to allow students to do more of what they are doing now on an unofficial level," said Satya Patel, co-chair of the University Minors Subcommittee. Along with the inter-school minors, the paper proposes minors in Business Study and Communications, two majors that do not presently offer minors. The White Paper also points to the fact that students obtain minors by taking six to eight "arbitrarily" selected courses from a field, which at many times prevents intellectual coherence. The four undergraduate schools are also encouraged to allow all students throughout the University to take minors in any school of their choosing. The paper points out other University inconsistencies, such as the inability for Wharton students to obtain credit for minors in the other schools. "We are trying to make this a University-wide central issue," SCUE president Matt Kratter said last night. College Dean Matthew Santirocco said he applauds SCUE's dedication to the matter of inter-school minors. "It's remarkable that SCUE's vision and our's coincide in many areas," Santirocco said last night, speaking on the two inter-school minors that are presently under development. Representatives from the College and Engineering met for the first of many times last Thursday to discuss a computing minor that would be conducive to the needs of College students. Santirocco repeatedly stated that the needs of College students are different than those of Engineering students, thereby making it necessary to create minors that appeal to the needs of College students. "It's a full partnership where faculty and administration from both schools are creating something new," Santirocco said. "The Engineering school has a minor in computing for their students, but we both agree that the interests that arts and sciences students have are different from those of Engineering students." Santirocco said the computing science minor serves as a pilot program and its success could lead to other similar inter-school courses. He also said that he hopes the College be involved in the development of all minors which students in the school will take. Unlike the Engineering minor, the Nursing School developed a Nutrition minor, which it has made available to all University students, on its own. The College Curriculum Committee is currently considering it, but has not approved it.

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