Can MHC Do Curriculum Reform?
Here’s hoping that the process of comprehensive curriculum reform—so ambitiously spelled out in Section I of The Plan for Mount Holyoke 2010—is proceeding! This gargantuan undertaking was covered in the winter 2004 Quarterly article “What Does an Educated Woman Need to Know?”
Why is rethinking the curriculum important, when the College is doing well as reflected in record applications, large grants from prestigious foundations, and successful capital campaigns? It would maximize use of college assets—its fine faculty, unique global culture, strong physical plant (the campus), and productive administration—and create another one: a rigorous curriculum focused on preparing women to excel.
It would define what knowledge and capabilities MHC grads would have. Targeted outcomes would be made measurable. The college would be more accountable to all constituents: students, parents, faculty members, administrators, trustees, alumnae, and donors. Participants better able to identify what they support would be more willing to commit resources. It is also an opportunity for Mount Holyoke to lead in reform and distinguish itself from competitors.
More ominously, an era of increased measurement and accountability for public and private colleges is dawning. The bipartisan Commission on the Future of Higher Education, organized by Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings, is working on requiring regional accreditation agencies to require colleges to adopt measures of academic proficiency, and compare data from similar colleges. Competition to attract top students may evolve into competition among colleges to demonstrate results.
Developing hardheaded proposals for what capacities graduates should have is exciting but terribly difficult. Harvard, with its enormous intellectual resources, has been struggling with undergraduate curriculum reform since 2002. And what happens when agreed-upon goals require different academic configurations from what exist now?
Implementing major curriculum reform would take years and would be painful. However, ten to twenty years from now, saying “trust us, you’ll get a fine education at Mount Holyoke,” may no longer suffice.
Laura Nixdorf Bernstein ’65
Lincoln, Massachusetts
