Most every university and college have a core system of classes that all of the students have to take, but how effective is it? UCOR stands for University Core classes; that you are forced to take, unless you surpassed them with completion of Advanced Placement or IP classes in high school. If you’re like the majority who did not have these classes waived for your academics at a college level, you are again with the majority that hates having to take them as part of a college requirement. It is frankly a waste of time and money as they are very similar to a class that you had to take to graduate from high school. It is redundant for an English major like myself to have to take math and science classes if we aren’t going to be needing to know the information after we take the class for our major. In my opinion, most of the UCOR classes that we’re required to take are mostly STEM-centric; pertaining to science, technology, engineering and math centered majors or jobs. This doesn’t help someone like me. I also completely understand that by forcing students to take these classes, it makes and lends for them to be more well rounded as an individual but when we are forced to take a class that is taught on a concept that we don’t have any interest in further pursuing then it becomes more of a burden than a benefit.
It is not only a waste of a class that is replacing something that could pertain to our major, but it is a waste of money. These classes, in my experience, or taught by professors that don’t really care to be there. This is especially prevalent for me right now; in a class that I have to take if I want to graduate. It is supposed to be a theology class… which would be fine if the professor actually taught us theology. Instead, the hour and a half that I have this class, I have to sit and first decipher what he is saying, as English is not his first language, but also what China developing its own ball point pen tip has to do with Christianity. I don’t mind that it is a class where I have to learn about other religions, it bothers me that I am spending around $3,000 for a class where I could be doing something else, or actually learning about what was on the course description. Most of college, I have found is based off the idea that you have to learn to teach yourself a lot of the material but when there is no specific material on a course and a professor that tells you on the first day to drop the class, why do I have to be there. This specific class is a waste for all of my other peers because no one really pays attention or knows how to answer the questions because he never gives us material or work that would benefit in any way towards a discussion or the busy work that he makes us do outside of class. This example might be more a professor problem but going to a private university, I don’t expect to waste my money on a class such as this and be taught by a professor that is constantly off topic in a class that I didn’t want to take in the first place.
If a college or university is going to force its students to take specific classes pertaining to the “core”, then they should try to cater these more to the student’s specific major in a way that is going to help them when they get to the harder classes that are working towards the major itself. This is only the case with some majors, though. For students that are working towards a major in a science or math field, these core classes already help them. It’s the majors like mine that don’t benefit from the math and science classes. I will also hear the argument that core classes are sometimes easy and that these students are okay with it because they will have a GPA booster as it will be an easy A. This still doesn’t appeal to me. I would rather have to work for a grade than have one handed to me.
