Tomorrow, Friday, Nov. 8, faculty members will vote on whether to decrease the credit requirement needed to graduate from 36 credits to 34 credits. Additional changes would allow students to declare their majors later in their Middlebury careers and prevent future classes of students from using AP and IB courses for credit here. The proposal, which originated with the Student Government Association (SGA) last spring and is now being considered by the full faculty, merits more attention by our community than it has received so far.
Our discussion of the proposed changes focused on a variety of different academic proposals at Middlebury, from implementing an A.I. distribution requirement to how we feel about flexibility for seniors who take a third class to balance the job search. We call on professors who will be voting to think about how their decision will affect their students and our ability to choose a unique path in our education. Have an open discussion in your classes today and tomorrow about whether students would support the motion or not, and why. We did not come to one unanimous decision among ourselves, but we urge you to make space for student voices in your classrooms before you cast a vote tomorrow.
Simply put, a credit reduction would likely enable students to have more flexibility in how they navigate their semester-by-semester experience. If a student needs to redirect some of their academic energies to apply to jobs or graduate school, they should be allowed to choose to do so without having all four of their classes suffer. The option to drop down to a course load of three classes for a semester might even allow students to reinvest those spare hours into a course important for their major or post-graduate life, like a senior seminar, which they then might be able to engage with more fully.
Additionally — and as the fall and early winter of 2023 demonstrated quite clearly to us — quick and unexpected bursts of tragedy are capable of fully disrupting the emotional wellbeing of students, especially when it comes to managing stress levels and mental health while working hard on academics. If a tragic event occurs in the life of a student, they should be granted the flexibility to renegotiate their relationship to Middlebury, even if only briefly, in order to take care of themselves while still being committed to the classes and the obligations they can manage.
We believe our classmates have a concrete and sustained desire to make the most out of our time while studying at Middlebury and to take advantage of the opportunities available to us here. We trust that few students would use a reduction in credit requirements to bask in unproductive free time, but would apply it sparingly and in ways we judge to be most conducive to our learning and development. Whether that means focusing on a thesis we can be proud of or changing our academic courseload as needed, this is an important change we should trust students not to abuse.
With the current 36-credit requirement, students must earn one credit for all four J-Terms, although we are only required to be on campus for two of them. Reducing the credit requirement to 34 would provide students with more flexibility in January, especially given the challenges that can face international students who have to coordinate travel to and from campus in between semesters and for students who wish to use this time to complete internships that may not qualify for credit.
In terms of the current distribution requirements and potential new additions focused on climate change or AI — policies under consideration from the Faculty Council as well — we question the college’s capacity to provide sufficient courses to cover such requirements. We have not yet heard a compelling case for any of these additions and how they would improve upon our academic experiences without further restricting our coursework.
We understand the skepticism of certain faculty members who may suspect that Middlebury students want to decrease academic rigor at the college to have time to “take Jell-O shots,” as someone previously claimed. Your fears may be valid: At a time of decreasing attention spans and increasing immersion in the digital world, the concern that college students cannot handle tough classes and heavy readings is not unreasonable. Instead of assuming the worst of student intentions, however, we ask that you give us the benefit of the doubt. Students here by and large chose to attend an academically rigorous institution, and in our experience, many truly do want to learn here.
The reality of this vote is that it is unlikely to lead to a deluge of students dropping classes in order to party in Atwater, network for a job in finance or otherwise ignore their academics. It will most likely grant students who want more flexibility in their schedules to determine the best path for them. We are all in our late teens and early twenties, not high school students with little to no say in our studies. The only way we can prove our readiness to go into the world after graduation as fully-fledged adults is if we are treated like adults in our time at Middlebury.
To faculty, we ask that you include your students in the conversation, give us the chance to prove our independence and, most importantly, keep us in mind when you cast your vote tomorrow on the credit resolution.
