Here at Dartmouth there are certain fundamental educational goals that the administration tries to promote. One of these values is a diversity of knowledge. The College furthered the pursuit of this goal when it instituted the new distribution requirements for the Class of 1998. The requirements obligate all students to take a wide range of classes, thus promoting a more diversified liberal arts education.
Furthermore the college seems to believe that the ability to write effectively is also extremely important. This belief is elucidated in the September 1994 edition of the ORC which states that all freshmen must take English 5 unless exempted based on standardized test scores. The justification for this requirement is that the course was established, "...upon the principle that clear thought, intelligent reading and effective writing are interdependent activities..." and that it, "...aims to develop the student's capacity for understanding and using language."
As stated earlier, all freshmen do not take English 5 as many are exempted due to either their Scholastic Achievement Test scores or Advanced Placement scores. However the prevailing opinion in the English department seems to be that every entering freshman should take the class, regardless of test scores. This belief clearly indicates that the aforementioned goals are taken very seriously and are considered to be very important -- which makes sense. Regardless of what field a student at Dartmouth studies, inevitably he or she will need to possess the ability to use words intelligently.
Recognizing that the English department feels that there is a certain skill which it wants to inculcate into each student, it would seem logical that there would be uniformity among the various sections of English 5. However, this is hardly the case. My discussions with other first year students who either took English 5 in the fall or are currently enrolled in the class revealed a tremendous disparity in the types of assignments they received. While my section wrote strictly analytical essays based on short stories, other sections had assignments ranging from essays on entire novels to strictly personal narratives.
Obviously both analytical skills and the ability to relate one's own personal experiences are valuable ones. At the same time, though, they are vastly different skills. The ability to read a story and analyze a specific issue is profoundly different from the ability to relate one's own experiences in a interesting manner.
This inconsistency seems to undermine what the English department is trying to achieve. The department's strong feelings about the merits of the class indicate there are very specific skills they want professors to foster in the class. However, the reality is that among the different professors currently teaching the class there is a wide range of attitudes as to what these skills are.
If every freshman is to acquire the skills that the English department feels are so important, it is essential that the department establish some sort of uniformity among the variety of English 5 sections.
