tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3404081487134867878.post7317444450464604649..comments2024-03-14T01:15:16.516-07:00Comments on UCLA Faculty Association: Two Editorials Skeptical About UC Online Degree ProposalUCLA Faculty Associationhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16529402073844190540noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3404081487134867878.post-20277864977272176012010-07-27T13:12:30.226-07:002010-07-27T13:12:30.226-07:00I think moving the highly impacted, so-called '...I think moving the highly impacted, so-called 'weeder' classes online is not a bad idea. Why? Because the ones that I took as an undergrad were a terrible experience, pedagogically. There were 200+ of us in a lecture hall and some dude behind me talking about how drunk he got the night before. The professor considered the material below him, and it was our fault if we couldn't make sense of it. One professor regularly threw chalk at us to try and illicit our attentions. And half the time I couldn't even get into these classes in the first place. What exactly are we trying to preserve here?<br /><br />I absolutely agree that it is a lot, a lot, a lot of work to put together good online classes, but let's not delude ourselves into believing that the current state of affairs for the large undergraduate intro courses is some idyllic seminar of 12 people. It is also very, very, hard to teach a class of 200+ students.<br /><br />I think both are pretty bad, personally, but given the option between the two, I probably would have chosen the online version myself, especially if it included a live TA to interact with.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com