From lee@neural.hampshire.edu Wed Dec 14 21:57:18 1994 Return-Path: Received: from neural.hampshire.edu by hamp.hampshire.edu (4.1/SMI-4.1) id AA06762; Wed, 14 Dec 94 21:57:18 EST Received: by neural.hampshire.edu (Smail3.1.28.1 #1) id m0rI6Vd-00004lC; Wed, 14 Dec 94 22:05 EST Message-Id: Subject: Lee: curriculum discussion memo To: cpkF92@hamp Date: Wed, 14 Dec 1994 22:05:36 -0500 (EST) From: "Lee Spector" Cc: lee@neural.hampshire.edu (Lee Spector), rlbHA@hamp Reply-To: lee@neural.hampshire.edu X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL22] Content-Type: text Content-Length: 3368 Status: RO Chris, I don't think I'll be able to attend the 12/15 curriculum meeting; if it's late afternoon, as I seem to remember (I don't have the announcement with me at the moment), then no Cog Sci faculty will be able to attend as we have our own curriculum meeting (oops). Anyway, the purpose of this note is to respond to some of your comments in the "enclosures" for the meeting that were distributed. I'm not at all wedded to the "inquiry seminar" proposal and I'm not writing to defend it -- the things that I have to say about your memo are independent of any virtues and/or vices of that particular proposal. First, you say that "The proposed division into three 'inquiry areas' is ludicrous." You then dismiss the division as a ruse to redistribute CCS exams, but I don't see any real justification of the original claim. What is it that you think is ludicrous? Is it the division by inquiry areas? Is it the division into *3* areas rather than 4? Is it the particular choice of inquiry areas? The notion of modes of inquiry is deeply imbedded in Hampshire and has been since the beginning -- are you attacking this foundation? In any event you should be less dismissive and provide more of an argument after making such a strong claim. Next, I think that your discussion of CCS Div I exams is based on a premise that is just plain wrong -- that CCS Div I's are repeats of things done in other schools. In my experience this is not correct -- I do not believe that the CCS Div I's in which I've been involved would or should have passed as Div I's in other schools, and I do not believe that many Div I's passed in other schools would be acceptable to me as CCS Div I's. CCS has some problems (a split personality at the very least), but I don't think that repetition at the Div I level is one of them. Of course it is *possible* for a student to repeat the same thing in all 4 schools if s/he wants to, and it is also possible for a student to miss the "point" of any particular school (or even all of them!), but these are separate issues. The last point I'd like to make is that your comments about projects strike me as right-on-target for a world in which all Hampshire students are ideal Hampshire students. But our students have a wide range of abilities with respect to independent work -- this is one of the central problems that the organizers of the current curriculum reform discussions are trying to address. You say that in your plan "Project-work would be increased. That is exactly what Hampshire students need." In the current system you can do 4 Div I projects, a Div II full of as many projects as your committee thinks appropriate, and a major Div III project. Do you really think that the problems that average (or, more to the point, the *below* average) students are having are due to insufficient opportunities for independent work? I'm told by the people who keep numbers on these things that we loose a lot of students because they fail to complete much of anything. Perhaps many students need more pre-project educational activities to bring them to a point at which they can do independent work -- I'm not sure, and I have argued that we should not make changes that mess up the curriculum for the ideal students. You should know, however, that concerns about the non-ideal students are behind much of the current discussion. -Lee From cpkF92 Wed Dec 14 23:53:10 1994 Subject: Chris: Re: curriculum discussion memo To: lee@neural.hampshire.edu Date: Wed, 14 Dec 1994 23:53:10 -0500 (EST) In-Reply-To: from "Lee Spector" at Dec 14, 94 10:05:36 pm From: Chris Kawecki Content-Type: text Content-Length: 6264 Status: RO Lee, Your first comment about "ludicrous" is appropriate. I wrote the memo when Joe showed me his version, 20 minutes before he had to turn it in to Rhonda. I really felt like Joe's comments would be taken (by Rhonda if not by the faculty) as "The Student Opinion". I felt like Joe didn't really propose anything concrete enough. I feel very strongly that the evaluations should be based on projects (this is my #1 concern by far). Rhonda's mission is to get div 1s to be just classes. That's why Penina appointed her. She thinks 3 classes is either "good enough for her" or a transition stage. (I know, I'm just being juvenile when I say stuff like that, but I can't help it yet) I felt like Joe didn't confront that issue directly. It seems to me that "inquiry seminars" have the potential to turn into long classes. Yuck. I realized that if I didn't take this chance, Rhonda might be more able to steamroll her 6-class plan through, and I would have to feel awful for not having even confronted her. Unfortunately I only had 20 minutes. Joe tells me that Rhonda didn't want to send my memo out. She apparently used the excuse that I am not a school member, so his statement encompasses mine. But that didn't stand since I am in CCS and NS. I realize now how counterproductive my attitude was vis-a-vis "ludicrous". Well, I learned something. Next time I'm in a hurry, I most likely won't be quite as stupid. (I hope!) Boy do I feel stupid though. My confusion with the inquiry areas is the same as that of many folks I've talked to. We just don't understand how they're different from schools (aside from that they don't include CCS). I've talked to some profs and some students. I should have replaced "ludicrous" with "same old division". The division into 3 inquiry areas matches schools exactly. It is perhaps also misleading, since it suggests that there is a difference between inquiry areas and schools. The issue of how many div 1s is really only a secondary one to me. However, especially in times of "workload crisis" and "financial crisis" it seems to me that I would like to cut whatever is a duplicate service before I cut a primary service. > CCS Div I's are [not] repeats of things done in other schools. I feel like my CCS exam (teaching a neural net to add) fits in rather naturally to natural science. I'd say that most of the cognitive science stuff I've heard about fits in rather naturally over there. I don't know as much about the video/media stuff but I'd assume that they reasonably fit into HA/SS. I see how that distinction (HA/SS) might be hard sometimes, but so are the CCS/SS CCS/NS and CCS/HA distinctions now. I'd be interested to hear how come you think most of the div 1s you've passed would not be appropriate for NS or one of the other schools. > Of course it is *possible* for a student > to repeat the same thing in all 4 schools if s/he wants to, and it > is also possible for a student to miss the "point" of any particular > school (or even all of them!), but these are separate issues. Yikes! Assuming one project, unaltered, could pass as an exam for all the schools, I would hope the advisor would be aware enough to suggest some alternative ways of looking at whatever is being investigated. I also wonder why a faculty would pass an exam where that faculty felt the student was missing the point of a particular school. One problem I have had (in SS and HA) was that I felt like there was no opportunity for me to do a project that counted as an exam. I've taken 2 classes in each, though I am now working on an SS project because my 2 SS courses were 200-level. An advertisement in the course catalog (like Lynne Miller writes in some of his course descriptions) saying "This is the place to figure out what div 1s are all about and do one" would have been _very_ useful for me in HA and SS. On the other hand, making these "courses" required would have really negatively affected my NS and CCS experiences. I cannot imagine even "below average" students losing out with my plan. I don't meant that last sentence sarcastically. I am trying to imagine. In fact, it seems like the prefect opportunity for them -> to be able to concentrate on one or two serious projects. They can't handle more. At present, I can only handle 2 academic projects at once myself. As I said in my letter, "It gives them confidence, an idea of what div 3 will be like, and provides the opportunity to teach them the skills they need." So, yes, I do think that many of average students' problems are due to lack of opportunity to do _project_ work (I think this is what you meant when you said "independent work"). I think that many of my problems I have had are from that same source. I don't understand your idea of "preparing" for project work. Maybe this is a source of a lot of our disagreement. I would say that 1st graders should be doing projects, 2nd graders should be doing projects...13th graders...16th graders should still be doing projects. Everyone is "prepared" to do projects. If they have missed doing projects for much of their last 4 years, I would like to get them started as soon as possible! Why make it 5 or 6 consecutive years before starting projects? I suppose I am very Deweyan in my philosophy that one learns what one does, not what one studies. (You do a social science experiment, you necessarily learn social science... you take a class and you may learn social science if you happen to do it). Perhaps what you are wondering about is motivation. I certainly agree that motivation is absolutely essential to projects. If you start off the first day by doing an exciting experiment making gunpowder and blowing something up, you're more likely to be motivated later than if you spend the first class going over what one must do in order to be evaluated. Somehow we might figure out how to invite new students into ongoing projects. I think CCS ought to sponsor programming contests. I think the Lemelson program should have had "idea contests" about how in the world to spend $2mil. We should try lots of ways to get people excited about projects. So, to sum up my main point, inquiry seminars will degrade into classes. Projects are better than classes. Thanks for your comments, Chris. From lee@neural.hampshire.edu Thu Dec 15 11:19:02 1994 Return-Path: Received: from neural.hampshire.edu by hamp.hampshire.edu (4.1/SMI-4.1) id AA25277; Thu, 15 Dec 94 11:19:02 EST Received: by neural.hampshire.edu (Smail3.1.28.1 #1) id m0rIJ1U-00004lC; Thu, 15 Dec 94 11:27 EST Message-Id: Subject: Lee: Re: curriculum discussion memo To: ckawecki@hampshire.edu (Chris Kawecki) Date: Thu, 15 Dec 1994 11:27:19 -0500 (EST) From: "Lee Spector" Cc: lee@neural.hampshire.edu (Lee Spector) In-Reply-To: <9412150453.AA11852@hamp.hampshire.edu> from "Chris Kawecki" at Dec 14, 94 11:53:10 pm Reply-To: lee@neural.hampshire.edu X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL22] Content-Type: text Content-Length: 5580 Status: RO Hi Chris, Thanks for the thoughts and clarifications. For one thing: > So, to sum up my main point, inquiry seminars will degrade into > classes. Projects are better than classes. Here I'm with you 99% -- I think it's possible that inquiry seminars can be something new and non-class-like, but I don't see quite how this will happen. > My confusion with the inquiry areas is the same as that of many folks > I've talked to. We just don't understand how they're different from > schools (aside from that they don't include CCS). [stuff deleted] > I feel like my CCS exam (teaching a neural net to add) fits in rather > naturally to natural science. I'd say that most of the cognitive > science stuff I've heard about fits in rather naturally over there. I > don't know as much about the video/media stuff but I'd assume that > they reasonably fit into HA/SS. It is indeed difficult to figure out what the "right" modes of inquiry are and how many there should be. I think there's consensus that the schools no longer line up correctly with the modes, but this isn't just a confusion about CCS -- I think a widely held view is that NS is the only school in which there is currently a good match. Why not reshuffle the schools, so that they *do* line up, rather than creating new "mode" groupings? This makes sense but it is probably politically impossible at this time (it was basically tried in the Cultural Studies discussions of the last few years and it failed thoroughly). On Cog Sci and Comp Sci and NS: Indeed I could see a marriage, but the way things are now split I see very different things happening in CCS & NS. To some extent I believe that Cog Sci and Comp Sci are sciences of a rather different flavor than NS sciences. For example in most of my work I don't gather evidence, I don't analyze data, I don't use mathematics, etc. Rather I build computational systems and explore their properties. This is a hard line to draw... and although some of my "modes" differ from those in NS I do think it makes sense to group Cog Sci and Comp Sci in with NS activities in any new "mode" groupings. But the point we were discussing is really more concrete: would most of the Div I's I've passed passed as NS exams with the *current* NS faculty? I doubt it -- nobody over there does software engineering, game tree search, etc. etc. I don't think the students doing div Is with me are repeating things that they could do for Div 1s in the other schools. Even in cases where there is overlap (e.g., Alpern's fractal music thing could perhaps have worked for either Dan Warner or Ken Hoffman) the aspects of the project that I will push (in this case maybe software engineering, algorithmic complexity, relation to human music processing, etc.) will be quite different from those pushed in the other schools, as will be the appropriate methods. > Yikes! Assuming one project, unaltered, could pass as an exam for all > the schools, I would hope the advisor would be aware enough to suggest > some alternative ways of looking at whatever is being investigated. I > also wonder why a faculty would pass an exam where that faculty felt > the student was missing the point of a particular school. I didn't mean unaltered or even that there'd be just one project -- I meant that a student can enter believing herself to be, say, a dancer, and do 4 div 1s related to dance with minimal engagement with the modes of inquiry. > I don't understand your idea of "preparing" for project work. Maybe > this is a source of a lot of our disagreement. I would say that 1st > graders should be doing projects, 2nd graders should be doing > projects...13th graders...16th graders should still be doing > projects. Everyone is "prepared" to do projects. If they have missed > doing projects for much of their last 4 years, I would like to get > them started as soon as possible! Why make it 5 or 6 consecutive years > before starting projects? I suppose I am very Deweyan in my philosophy > that one learns what one does, not what one studies. (You do a social > science experiment, you necessarily learn social science... you take a > class and you may learn social science if you happen to do it). I see merit in these points, and some of them have been central to Hampshire philosophy for a long time. In some cases it works well -- NS has made it work very well. But in some cases it fails. Some people feel that some students can't do *div1-style* projects when they arrive, and that something else must happen first. I'm not sure what that something else should be (simpler projects?) but that's what the debate is about. > Perhaps what you are wondering about is motivation. I certainly agree > that motivation is absolutely essential to projects. If you start off > the first day by doing an exciting experiment making gunpowder and > blowing something up, you're more likely to be motivated later than if > you spend the first class going over what one must do in order to be > evaluated. Somehow we might figure out how to invite new students into > ongoing projects. I think CCS ought to sponsor programming contests. I > think the Lemelson program should have had "idea contests" about how > in the world to spend $2mil. We should try lots of ways to get people > excited about projects. I personally don't like the use of competition for motivation, and I try to motivate students in other ways (e.g., interdisciplinary connections...). But I'd be happy to be a faculty sponsor for any of these contest ideas that you or anyone else would like to organize. -Lee From cpkF92 Thu Dec 15 11:41:53 1994 Subject: Chris: new name for NS + cog sci + comp sci To: lee@neural Date: Thu, 15 Dec 1994 11:41:53 -0500 (EST) From: Chris Kawecki Content-Type: text Content-Length: 44 Status: RO Natural + Artificial Sciences Added (NASA) From cpkF92 Thu Dec 15 12:27:02 1994 Subject: Chris: Re: curriculum discussion memo To: lee@neural.hampshire.edu Date: Thu, 15 Dec 1994 12:27:02 -0500 (EST) In-Reply-To: from "Lee Spector" at Dec 15, 94 11:27:19 am From: Chris Kawecki Content-Type: text Content-Length: 2336 Status: RO Lee, > > So, to sum up my main point, inquiry seminars will degrade into > > classes. Projects are better than classes. oops, I should have written: Mandatory inquiry seminars, evaluated based on attendence and work through the semester, will degrade into classes. Projects are better than classes. I think you are still with me 99%? I think I understand what you mean vis-a-vis your emphasis for CCS div 1s you've chaired. It sounds like we are studying Artificial Science rather than Natural Science. Maybe math is also artificial and cognitive science natural though? I am wondering what kind of a plan you would propose. You agree with me about the importance of retaining projects, at least for some people, and therefore are not in favor of mandatory inquiry seminars. On the other hand, you seem to disagree with my idea that projects should be the basis of all division 1 exams. > I didn't mean unaltered or even that there'd be just one project -- I > meant that a student can enter believing herself to be, say, a dancer, and > do 4 div 1s related to dance with minimal engagement with the modes of > inquiry. So you do believe that a student can pass a project-based division 1 exam without a serious engagement with a mode of inquiry of the school that exam is in? > I see merit in these points, and some of them have been central to > Hampshire philosophy for a long time. In some cases it works well -- NS > has made it work very well. But in some cases it fails. Hmmm... The cases of failures I know of are when there is noone (faculty) explicitly advertising that they will help you figure out what div 1s are about and do one. I'm all for inquiry seminars, as long as they address that need and don't make me sit there when I don't need to, destroying my ability to do div 1 projects that are better suited to me. Seems to me that those two needs can only be met if the seminars are optional and evaluations are based only on projects. I talked with a woman who was a Hampshrie professor the first couple years. She said that the first year no faculty or students knew what div 1s were really going to be about, and _no student_ did any div 1 in the first year. What a bad foot to get off on! Chris. ps Do you mine if I put this round of letters about inquiry seminars on the web, off my home page? From lee@neural.hampshire.edu Thu Dec 15 17:27:31 1994 Return-Path: Received: from neural.hampshire.edu by hamp.hampshire.edu (4.1/SMI-4.1) id AA11500; Thu, 15 Dec 94 17:27:31 EST Received: by neural.hampshire.edu (Smail3.1.28.1 #1) id m0rIOm5-00004lC; Thu, 15 Dec 94 17:35 EST Message-Id: Subject: Lee: Re: curriculum discussion memo To: ckawecki@hampshire.edu (Chris Kawecki) Date: Thu, 15 Dec 1994 17:35:49 -0500 (EST) From: "Lee Spector" Cc: lee@neural.hampshire.edu (Lee Spector) In-Reply-To: <9412151727.AA29178@hamp.hampshire.edu> from "Chris Kawecki" at Dec 15, 94 12:27:02 pm Reply-To: lee@neural.hampshire.edu X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL22] Content-Type: text Content-Length: 3237 Status: RO Chris, you wrote: > oops, I should have written: > > Mandatory inquiry seminars, evaluated based on attendence and work > through the semester, will degrade into classes. Projects are better > than classes. > > I think you are still with me 99%? I'm not sure that they *will* degrade into classes, but if they do I certainly agree that that would be a real loss. I have my doubts about how the degradation can be avoided, but there may be a way. > I think I understand what you mean vis-a-vis your emphasis for CCS div > 1s you've chaired. It sounds like we are studying Artificial Science > rather than Natural Science. Maybe math is also artificial and > cognitive science natural though? Yeah -- I wouldn't claim that there are crisp lines, or that the current school divisions make a whole lot of sense. My main point on this topic was that I don't see much repetition between the present schools... > I am wondering what kind of a plan you would propose. You agree with > me about the importance of retaining projects, at least for some > people, and therefore are not in favor of mandatory inquiry > seminars. On the other hand, you seem to disagree with my idea that > projects should be the basis of all division 1 exams. I don't have one! I see problems in the current system, and my concern with your proposal is that it doesn't seem to address them. Some of the other circulating proposals seem to address the current problems but at too high a cost. I saw some merit in the idea of interdisciplinary project-based div I projects, but then again I see some merit in most of the proposals... I don't have an answer. > So you do believe that a student can pass a project-based division 1 > exam without a serious engagement with a mode of inquiry of the > school that exam is in? Indeed. It is possible to abuse the system. It may be that this comes with the territory -- it may always be possible to abuse a system with the odd combination of freedom and constraints that Hampshire has... > Hmmm... The cases of failures I know of are when there is noone > (faculty) explicitly advertising that they will help you figure out > what div 1s are about and do one. I'm all for inquiry seminars, as > long as they address that need and don't make me sit there when I > don't need to, destroying my ability to do div 1 projects that are > better suited to me. Seems to me that those two needs can only be met > if the seminars are optional and evaluations are based only on > projects. Indeed I think you're right about how the needs of a student *like you* can be met. But I think you've got it wrong about some of the other students. Everyone is (I think!) told that they should talk to faculty about Div Is early and often. Lots of people don't. Or they don't finish them for a wide range of reasons. I don't think the missing link is advertisement of the fact that people should talk to faculty. I'm not what the root of the problem is OR how to solve it, but we've tried a lot of things with advising, etc. Many people have come to believe that a more radical reform is needed. > ps Do you mine if I put this round of letters about inquiry seminars > on the web, off my home page? No problem -- good idea. -Lee