Independent study often overlooked

  Idan Ivri Ivri is a third-year political
science student just giving his opinion. E-mail your opinion to him
at iivri@media.ucla.edu.
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Choosing a major is a big step for an undergraduate. Almost all
of us change our minds once or twice during our years at UCLA. One
of the most interesting degree choices, though, is almost never
publicized: the independent field of study.

Reserved to a tiny section in the general catalog of courses,
the independent study major holds huge potential. This option
allows students, following some administrative rules, to basically
invent a course of study.

According to the General Catalog: “Highly motivated
students who find that no single major accommodates their specific
interest in a given subject may propose designing their own major.
Proposals are prepared with faculty guidance and sponsorship and
are thoroughly examined “¦ “

Although the administration takes its GE breadth requirements
very seriously, I think the most important part of learning in
college happens within the major. After we decide what we enjoy
learning, the best way for us to do good work and stay interested
is to be specific. Students who aren’t sure what to study
have the option of staying undeclared for a long time, of course,
but there’s no substitute for being interested in a good
topic. The independent field of study is the best assurance that
we’ll graduate having learned something we care about.

The independent major does not consist of students doing outside
research for a limited number of unaffiliated, independent study
classes. It can be a mixture of upper division courses from various
departments. GEs are just an oversimplified version of this program
““ instead of sitting in a broad variety of huge lower
division lectures in many departments, imagine taking smaller
classes that are usually reserved for students in each major.

Imagine an undergraduate student who wants to major in urban
planning or journalism or the history of poetry or even semiotics.
None of those are offered as undergraduate courses of study
here.

Imagine using the independent field of study to mix two upper
division courses from the neuroscience department, another three
from philosophy, two from psychology and five from computer science
to learn artificial intelligence. Obviously I’m
oversimplifying the process for the purpose of this article, but
there are too many possibilities to count. The point is that the
courses at UCLA can be arranged in more ways than the existing
majors suggest. It takes a lot of forethought and a damn good
proposal, but it’s a worthwhile goal.

The problem is that most students probably don’t know that
the option even exists. UCLA doesn’t stand to benefit much
from publicizing it because it would increase the amount of
paperwork flowing through Murphy. But, in the end, the quality of
education here would increase as students grow more passionate
about their work. We would see more senior theses and more big
student projects on display at the end of senior year. The college
would come together as a community where students learn interesting
things from each other, instead of all sitting in the same series
of courses and graduating with the same degree. Who knows, we might
even see higher acceptance rates to grad schools.

This concept is not new. Smaller colleges have offered the
independent field of study for many years. The higher the student
contact with counselors and professors, the more likely students
are to hear about this option. In the College of Letters &
Science, that contact is low, and we’re more likely to follow
the crowd. But it comes down to tailoring your own education:
nobody can tell you what you’re really interested in.

Having decided that, all students should know that we can pursue
our interests if we’re willing to do a little more work.
It’s not common now, but if more people start choosing their
own path, then UCLA will adapt and everyone will win.

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