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So who’s teaching freshmen at UI?

The Gazette Opinion Staff

Aug. 11, 2009 12:55 am

Regarding The Gazette's Saturday editorial: “Mason calls the right plays,” which included “... Faculty have volunteered to teach freshman seminars .... Half of Iowa freshmen will have such seminars this year.”

Are “seminars” different from “classes,” perhaps a wondrous add-on, or does one infer correctly that this is the only formal contact that this year's freshmen (half of them) will have with honest-to-god faculty, as opposed to teaching assistants or adjunct faculty, all year?

Once upon a time, freshman classes were taught by assistant professors, I think. Perhaps none can be spared, as UI goes hammer and tongs after research bucks.

Jean Bonner

UI 1961

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