Dear Editor,
I was happy to see Tim Sacco’s article about a possible future shift in credit models here at the university. Last year, I chaired a faculty work group that looked into the possibility of switching to a new model (for example, a 4-credit system, or even a non-credit system where courses would not be measured by seat time at all). I did want to take issue with one claim that Gene Martin made about switching to a 4-credit model. After doing quite a bit of research on 4-credit systems, I am not convinced that the faculty or student workload would be significantly reduced if we switched to a 4-credit model. In fact, there is probably the possibility that the work could increase in some ways, especially for students. What a 4-credit model would do, I think, is help faculty and students concentrate on working in more depth. Faculty would have fewer classes to prep and fewer overall students each semester, so we could spend more time on course content, less on the managerial and business aspects of maintaining classes, and more time with each student. Students would take fewer classes, and would have fewer balls in the air to juggle. But the bottom line is that a 4-credit system and a 3-credit system ultimately leave students and faculty taking or teaching the same numbers of credits per semester, so though the workload is organized differently, the amount of work is probably about the same in both systems. After more than a year of concentrated research in this area, I am convinced that counting credits is probably an outdated and arbitrary way to organize curricula. But if we were choosing between a 3- and a 4-credit system, I completely agree with Gene that while it will mean a lot of administrative work to make the switch, the change to a 4-credit model would benefit both faculty and students. For students who want to read more about this issue, you can check out the Credit Model Working Group’s website from last year: http://oz.plymouth.edu/~rderosa/CMWGStudents.htm.
-Dr. Robin DeRosa, English Department