Published by the MIT News Office at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Mass.
Published by the MIT News Office at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, Cambridge, Mass.
CURRICULUM CHANGE
By Robert C. Di Iorio
News Office
The nation's most rigorous undergraduate curriculum just got a bit tougher and, in the process, more relevant to today's world.
The MIT faculty, at its May 15 meeting, voted to add modern biology to the science requirement for the undergraduate degree. MIT already requires all its students to take chemistry, physics and mathematics, and eight subjects in humanities, arts and social sciences, no matter what their major. Additional requirements include laboratory experimentation, writing and physical education.
The biology requirement takes effect with the class entering in September 1993. MIT is believed to be the first university to introduce such a requirement for all its students.
The new requirement will introduce the intellectual structure of modern biology. The core material will deal with the definitions of genes, biological coding and information transfer, the structure of proteins, the concepts of biological specificity, the generation of energy in living systems, the structure of cells, the regulation of biological systems, the development of multicellular organisms and biological diversity and natural selection in the evolution of life. The subject will be offered in several versions.
In addition, each of the versions will address a different key area, such as medical genetics, physiology, biotechnology, and ecology/environmental biology.
The Department of Biology, which many international rankings rate as No. 1 in the world and which includes two Nobel laureates, will develop and evaluate the various versions of the new requirement between now and September 1993, consulting with colleagues in other departments.
MIT President Charles M. Vest praised the action of the faculty and the Science-Engineering Working Group, which recommended making biology a requirement. "This action," President Vest said, "constitutes a strong leadership statement by MIT on an educational matter and it stems, appropriately, from our research activities.
"The new requirement is an excellent example of how one builds from a research orientation to bring cutting-edge work into the undergraduate curriculum. A research revolution in molecular biology, in which MIT was among the leaders, has led to a set of academic subjects regarded as part of the core educational experience that we will require of all people who are going to emerge from MIT."
Professor Margaret L. MacVicar, dean of undergraduate education, who was deeply involved in planning the new requirement, says MIT's action amounts to "declaring a new standard of scientific literacy."
"To quote the language of the MIT Catalog about the rationale for subjects included in the science requirement, 'they are an essential part of the background that MIT graduates bring to their roles as professionals and as broadly educated citizens in a world deeply influenced by science and technology.'
"It is important and significant that these requirements now include biology. There have been many significant developments in biology over the last 20 to 25 years and there is no doubt that our students are going to have to deal with this science, both personally and professionally, during their careers," Dean MacVicar said.
Professor Richard Hynes, head of the Department of Biology and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, said the new requirement will be "very valuable for all of our students and invaluable for many of them." Biology has undergone vast changes in the last generation, he said, and it is important "for students to understand the intellectual basis for this revolution.
"Molecular and cell biology are already impacting on society through their effects on medicine and in the biotechnology industry," Professor Hynes continued. "Genetic counseling and genetic engineering will affect all of our lives and an educated scientist should understand this material and have a grasp of its impact on society."