Well Treated Undergrads Prosper
That's not the title of this New York Times article but perhaps it should be.
The University of Maryland, Baltimore County, opened for business in a former cow pasture not far from downtown just 40 years ago. Still in its infancy as universities go, U.M.B.C. is less well known than Maryland's venerable flagship campus at College Park or the blue-blooded giant Johns Hopkins. But the upstart campus in the pasture is rocking the house when it comes to the increasingly critical mission of turning American college students into scientists.
The students are encouraged to study in groups and taught to solve complex problems collectively, as teams of scientists do. Most important, they are quickly exposed to cutting-edge science in laboratory settings, which demystifies the profession and gives them early access to work that often leads to early publication in scientific journals. At the same time, however, the students are pushed to perform at the highest level. Those who earn C's, for example, are encouraged to repeat those courses so they can master basic concepts before moving on.
The laboratory approach keeps the students excited and prevents them from drifting off into less challenging disciplines. Indeed, according to Science, 86 percent of the Meyerhoff participants have graduated with science or engineering degrees. Nearly 9 in 10 of those graduates went on to graduate or professional programs, with a significant number earning M.D.'s or Ph.D's, or both.
This is quite different from the approach of most universities. A significant number of professors in my undergraduate classes treated the undergrads as though they were nothing more than a distraction from the real business of research and teaching graduate classes. I heard from many graduate students that the graduate classes were both far more interesting and far more competently taught.
U.M.B.C. is taking an entirely different approach: treat undergraduates as though they actually have the capability to learn and succeed. Not surprisingly, it's working. Fully 77% of their students end up in a graduate program. Maybe if America's colleges expected (and demanded) more of America's undergraduates we wouldn't have such a tough time turning out scientists and engineers.
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