I think colleges have gone too much towards a business model where money is far more important than the actual product they are putting out. I don't think their primary goal should be to turn a buck but that's just my opinion. Granted, I'm not entirely sure of the financial aspect of public universities in terms of being able to call it "profit" but their motives and how they operate differ very little from other businesses.
They basically force a shit ton of prerequisites that aren't even relevant to about 80% of the curriculum from there on out. If you removed all the non-essential courses to get a degree you could probably complete a 4 year program in 3 years. Of course, what they should do is cut out all the non-essential shit and give people more classes in their area. Coincidentally tuition always rises even though the ratio of students/teachers decreases. Somehow there's all these extra costs associated with filling some empty seats in class but none of which include more professors. More TAs maybe which is a joke depending on the subject matter. I had a calculus TA who had trouble with English.
My undergrad actually required 4 semesters of foreign language, which is 12 credit hours. I condensed courses 1 & 2 into the first semester by taking the "advanced beginner" course because I had some previous Spanish classes from high school. I ended up taking the 3rd course the following semester and completely blew off the 4th course until later. I took that shit online from a community college and transfered the credits. Ultimately this was a waste of money and time because I can't really speak the language and even listening to native speakers I am only getting a couple of words per sentence. Largely irrelevant to anything I have done since. Only good thing about the course was the instructors. Somehow I had two damn good looking Spanish teachers.....one who took pity on my shitty Spanish and gave me a C to pass.
They required Western Civilization 1 & 2. There's 6 more credit hours. Not entirely shitty as far as the content but just a waste of fucking time in terms of the majority of the students. I kind of liked the material but I haven't really even thought about it since. I certainly couldn't pass the course right now with the knowledge that I have because it's been years and it's not something I actually put to use on a "rarely" basis.
I think I had to have 3 humanities courses, which would be another 9 credit hours. These are courses like Women's studies, Eastern Philosophy, and shit like that. I dropped Women's Studies, took Eastern Philosophy, German Cinema (which may be one of the more enjoyable courses I have actually taken. Night class so once per week and pretty much studied the evolution of German film), and World Religion, I think. Took World Religion online, transferred that shit over.
There's 31 credit hours of classes, only 3 of which I am glad to having been able to take. The others were just nuisance requirements that ultimately I learned enough about to pass tests and write papers but not quite enough to actually put to use or remember beyond the final.
It's just ridiculous that they can say "you must" have any course that isn't relevant to your degree. I had to find some elective credits so I took BOWLING.....TWICE. I have 2 fucking credit hours of BOWLING on my transcript from undergrad. Why? Just to meet some arbitrary number of hours? Least I can keep score. Suppose that will come in handy if I am ever at a bowling alley and the computers go down. Don't know how I'd manage such a catastrophe otherwise for my once-a-year bowling trip.
I realize that part of the reason they do this is to give people time to figure out which way to go in their lives but there are certainly more applicable prerequisites that can fill that space. Giving people more time just gives them more time to be indecisive......which is why I changed my major 3 or 4 times, ultimately ending up with degrees in two different areas.
The prerequisite shit needs to be looked over. I don't care for foreign languages, don't care to study Greek Gods and don't really care about Eastern Philosophy either. I'm sure they are great courses for people with those interests but I am not that person.
I would have much rather taken some lower level courses from an MBA program instead of these things. At least these coures would give me some real life shit I could put to use.
