Curricular confusion

Last week, the Arts and Sciences Council reviewed a proposal for a new certificate program in “Civic Engagement and Social Change.” The program’s goal is to develop active citizenship and social participation by integrating service and academic work. Although the goal is laudable in some respects, the addition of yet another certificate adds to Duke’s bloated and incoherent curriculum. Just last year, Duke increased the number of certificates to 21 with “Innovation and Entrepreneurship,” which claims to “be complementary to any major and [to] enable students to be innovative and entrepreneurial in their of pursuit of knowledge in service of society.” The Editorial Board expressed its doubts then about the program’s promise.

Duke defines a certificate as a six-course program that “spans multiple disciplines” and allows students to “gain skills and training.” Although some certificates fill gaps in major and minor offerings and thus augment the curriculum, most would be better suited as concentrations within majors. Such consolidation would help resolve the lacking coherence and shared, communal learning experience that pervade certificate programs. It would also reduce numerous personnel and administrative costs incurred with students and resources spread across overlapping major, minor and certificate programs.

Furthermore, standards and requirements vary across certificates. For instance, the Study of Ethics certificate—which advertises that it “provides you with the skills and confidence you need to create and to evaluate solutions to ethical dilemmas”—requires only a gateway and capstone course for all certificate pursuers, who may then choose four out of 85 electives to complete the program. That two students can conceivably graduate with the same certificate while having had two-thirds of their coursework be diametrical neuters the certificate of any uniform substance.

More broadly, Duke’s website boasts that, “students can choose courses in nearly 100 programs,” as if the size of a school’s academic menu is correlated to its prestige. First-years faced with the daunting task of choosing their curricular path are bombarded with 54 majors, 52 minors and 21 certificates—which create more than 435,000 unique degree combinations. Although diversity in offerings benefits students, having too many risks breadth over depth and entices students to fill their three-degree limit. It also makes any curricular-wide coherence impossible. If students within the same program can potentially share only one-third of their classes, the hope for students spread across 100 different programs is nonexistent.