Welcome & Purpose of the Committee

Welcome to the Caltech Core Curriculum Task Force Blog. All members of the task force are able to post on the blog. Commenting is freely open to anyone.

We'll use this blog to generally update the committee and the entire Caltech community on our deliberations.

As with any committee, we are given an official charge, written in officialese. Here is ours:

Charge to the Core Curriculum Task Force:


The Core Curriculum comprises the Institute requirements for undergraduates for all options and is a defining feature of the Caltech undergraduate experience. A recent study of the Student Experience at Caltech made a convincing argument that a rethinking of the current Core is in order. The Ad Hoc Core Curriculum Task Force will define the purpose and goals of the Core, the desired learning outcomes (what students learn from the Core), and a process by which the success of the Core Curriculum can be assessed. The committee will report their conclusions to the Faculty Board along with recommendations for energizing the curriculum through new content and/or approaches. It is expected that to achieve these goals extensive internal and external consultation will be required.

The scope of the committee’s deliberations should include, but need not be limited to:

1. Formulating the learning outcomes associated with the core curriculum and specifically investigating the possibility that there be a more flexible core that does not require that every student have the same knowledge but that they prepare for each field in similar fashion;
2. Recommending curricula (and how to deliver them) that will support the learning outcomes, with specific attention to how we may capitalize, in a way we have never done before in the Core, on the research orientation of the faculty;
3. Defining mechanisms to assess the level of student achievement (breadth and depth) and the quality of the student experience;
4. Recommending ways of improving professorial teaching in the Core;
5. Recommending ways that research and/or independent activities can be brought into the curriculum at the earliest stages of the Core Curriculum;
6. Recommending ways of optimizing student/faculty interactions (class attendance and mentoring/advising)
7. Considering a restructuring of the academic calendar to improve how the students go about their education and to enhance the student experience;
8. Recommending other changes or innovations to strengthen the Core Curriculum experience, such as trial courses, technology in the classroom, or variations in the pass-fail grading system.


Here are my translations of what these 8 tasks really mean:
1. What should a student learn in the core?
2. What classes should be taught?
3. How do we know it is working?
4. How can we make sure it is taught well?
5. Can research be brought into the core?
6. Can we fix advising?
7. Should we switch to semesters?
8. Anything else?


Finally, here are the Core Curriculum Task Force members. Feel free to track them down and tell them what you think at any time!

Co-chairs: Mike Brown and Scott Fraser

Committee Members:
Pamela Bjorkman, Harry Gray, Mitchio Okamura, Warren Brown, Ralph Adolphs, Fiona Harrison, Danny Calegari, Shuki Bruck, Niles Pierce

Alan Weinstein, former chair Curriculum Committee, ex officio
Paul Bellan, Academic Policies Committee, ex officio

Students: Neal Bansal (Junior)
Thomas Gwinn (Junior)
Andrea Dubin (Senior)