Do you feel lucky?” Michael McWilliams purrs, flicking a pair of dice across a crap table. By day, the associate professor of geophysics mines the mysteries of the earth, studying radioactive decay in rocks. Tonight he’s the mysterious one. Wearing a tuxedo and a tight smile, he beckons a clutch of bewildered freshmen to a table covered with green felt.
Craps is not the only game in the room. A few feet away, assistant professor of petroleum engineering Tony Kovscek, dapper in his own black tie, spins a roulette wheel. And across the room, blackjack dealer and geophysics professor Mark Zoback, MS ’73, PhD ’75, adjusts his cummerbund and cracks open a fresh deck of cards. In the corner, a band sets up. Trombone player Brad Osgood (he does a little math professing on the side) loosens up his slide with some jazz riffs.
As students gather round McWilliams, his croupier patter takes a weird turn. “Now, what’s the probability of my rolling a seven?” he calls out. On a board primed with the basic rules of craps, he dashes off a series of fractions to prove what no Vegas pit boss would ever admit: on the first roll, a player has high odds of either winning or gaining the right to roll again; but with successive rolls, the odds of losing jump dramatically. Craps is “the easiest way in the world for me to take your money,” the professor concludes, as the frosh scribble in their notebooks.
Welcome to Casino Night, where the goal is for every player to win. The demonstration was held last fall to teach students enough mathematical probability to predict the chances of earthquakes occurring. It was hardly your typical statistics lesson -- and that’s exactly the point. Other students in the same pilot program are sampling their own blood to learn about its biochemistry or measuring the speed of light with the help of a TV. It’s all part of an ambitious teaching experiment known as the Science, Math, Engineering Core. The idea: get some of Stanford’s most brilliant scientists to excite nontechnical undergrads about subjects that might otherwise seem irrelevant, intimidating or just plain dull.
Students in the Science Core are mainly freshmen who aren’t much interested in science, engineering or math. To change that, the instructors seek ways to link science and technology to daily life, to weave an interdisciplinary “big picture,” to make every class lively and interactive. “A lot of these students liked science but were turned off by bad teaching in high school,” says Patricia Burchat, PhD ’86, an associate professor of physics who teaches in the Core. “We’re trying to turn them back on.”
Although the new program has converted a few “fuzzies” into “techies,” the aim isn’t really recruitment -- it’s enlightenment. “Raising the scientific understanding of nonscientists is one of the most important duties of scientists,” explains Core instructor Paul R. Ehrlich, Bing Professor of Population Studies. “I want to give students the feeling that science is much more important and much less mysterious than they thought.”
Stanford’s experiment is in the vanguard of a nationwide push to beef up the science and math literacy of American students from kindergarten through college. It’s also part of a major effort to improve undergraduate education at Stanford and increase student access to the best professors. “From our review of what other universities are doing, this is right at the leading edge,” says Ramon Saldivar, vice provost for undergraduate education and professor of English. Other schools are watching with interest, he adds. “It could have a major impact on how science is taught in the United States and help set a pattern for attacking science illiteracy.”
For Sald’var and program director Brad Osgood, the Core also has a “not-so-hidden agenda” to improve the teaching of science majors. “As scientific research becomes more interdisciplinary, experimenting with interdisciplinary teaching is becoming more important,” Osgood says.
Now in its third year, the Science Core remains a work in progress. On many levels, it is already a success: skeptical students have given it high marks, faculty enjoy the teaching challenge and Sald’var praises its pedagogic merits. But enrollment so far has been disappointingly low, leading organizers to rethink the offerings and look for ways to draw more students.
The Core has three thematic tracks: Light, Earth and Heart. Students choose one track, which they can take for just a quarter or stay with for the academic year. (A three-quarter sequence satisfies a student’s overall science/math/engineering requirements.) Classes are team-taught by faculty ranging from biologists to statisticians, psychologists to geneticists, who explore the theme from their different perspectives. The most important concepts pop up in all three tracks. Evolution, for example, figures into an eye’s ability to perceive light, an organism’s adaptations to conditions on Earth and a person’s inherited risk of heart disease.
An observer dropping in on Casino Night might think the program is basically a matter of getting faculty to do cartwheels to make some fairly simple concepts fun to learn. But it’s much more ambitious than that. The aim of the Science Core, says Osgood, is not dumbing down the science, but smartening up its teaching. For evidence that this works, he says, come back to watch a class in spring quarter, when the relatively basic subject matter gives way to issues like sophisticated computer encryption or analyses of global warming and government energy policy.
“I am teaching material in this course that I thought I could never teach to students without a background in biochemistry,” says Robert Simoni, a professor of biological sciences and instructor in the Heart track. “I think all science ought to be taught this way: in context.”
The seeds of the new approach were planted five years ago when Stanford’s Commission on Undergraduate Education identified a serious weakness in the curriculum: non-science students weren’t mastering essential scientific concepts and analytical skills. “Whatever their other merits, many [introductory science] courses do not teach students what it means to think scientifically. Too few are both rigorously scientific and generally accessible,” the commission concluded. Indeed, among all undergraduate courses, these were “the ones that students were most likely to view cynically and to try to fulfill as effortlessly as possible.”
In short, the group’s 1994 report fingered the “Physics for Poets” phenomenon -- “requirement-fillers” packed with fuzzies who’ve decided their brains aren’t wired for science and have just given up. The techies, meanwhile, were getting plenty of poetry. In traditional academia, says Simoni, “science students get good humanities exposure, but non-science students get poor science exposure.” So the commission issued Stanford a challenge: “devise ways of teaching science to nonscientists . . . both for our students and as a model solution to a ubiquitous problem.”
For Osgood and other developers of the Science Core, answering that challenge meant looking not only at curriculum but also at the root of students’ attitudes about their own capabilities. It meant addressing questions that have perplexed educators for decades: why do so many bright, tenacious students seem to hit a wall in science and math during high school? Why do they stop enjoying technical disciplines and start fearing, even loathing, them? Poor teaching is at least partly to blame, Osgood’s team concluded. Could a new way of teaching turn the problem around?
Stanford launched the Core in 1996 to find out. The instructors, many of whom have won teaching awards, are committed to a distinct pedagogic approach. First, they strive to link coursework to “real world” events, on the premise that students can appreciate science as something worth understanding when they see how fiber optics is shaping computer network development, for instance, or use their knowledge of experimental method to evaluate a news story on lowering cholesterol. Core faculty sit in on each other’s lectures and often engage in lively exchanges. The program also emphasizes hands-on learning in collaboration with other students. In fact, it carries a substantial lab requirement, a rarity among introductory science courses at Stanford. “Learning science by doing science,” says Osgood, “is fundamental to the program’s success.”
Students generally attend either a lab or a breakout discussion every week. In one lab, they dissect the heart and lungs of a cow and then examine a human heart from a cadaver dissected by medical students. Other labs involve testing sunscreens on bacteria, designing a pinhole camera (see cover) and simulating a tiny earthquake. In breakout sessions, professors meet with small groups of students.
These kinds of interactions are crucial, maintains biological sciences professor Sharon Long, an instructor in the Light track. In looking back at her own experiences, she says, “I realized I had not done well in science until I got out of big lecture courses. That was when something clicked -- when I worked on small problems taught in an interactive way with faculty.”
There also are unusual field trips. Last year, Earth instructor Mark Zoback led a spring break sojourn to Tucson, where students heard anthropologists discuss the mysterious disappearance of a local Indian tribe, learned how bees offer clues to ecological change and visited Biosphere 2, the now-infamous experiment that in 1991 attempted to recreate the planet’s ecosphere in an enclosed facility. The Biosphere trip “was a lesson in science and a morality play about reaching too far,” Zoback says. “To see the students just soak it up was one of the highlights of my 14 years at Stanford.”
Many fuzzies who rave about the program admit they didn’t expect to like it. “I came out of high school with an antagonistic position toward science and math and was dreading the time I’d have to spend doing it at Stanford,” says Yonatan Eyal, now a junior, who took Earth last year. “I have a much more positive attitude now. Even though I don’t see my future in that direction, it’s been demystified.” Another former Earth student, Jessica Lynn Nusbaum, says, “I gained enough scientific background to understand the science-related issues that are important in the world today. . . . I am returning to the fuzzy world profoundly changed.”
Students also seem to appreciate the exposure to senior faculty. “The relationship you develop with these professors is fabulous,” says sophomore Brydie Andrews, who enrolled in Light for three quarters last year.
One thing, however, bedevils students and instructors alike, and not just in this program. It’s the math -- -- especially calculus. “The word ‘calculus’ looms large and fierce,” observes feminist and science-education advocate Sheila Tobias in Overcoming Math Anxiety (Norton, 1994). “Like all great mysteries, it does divide us into those who can and those who don’t even dare.” Fear of math drives some students to narrow their aspirations even before they get to college. For Andrews, a high school calculus class wrecked a previously stellar record in math and science. “No matter how much I studied, I’d go in for a test and I’d just be so off. I got to a point where I said, ‘I can’t wait until it’s done. I’ll make it through and I’ll never look at it again,’ ” she recalls. Though Andrews loved physics, she began ruling out serious science before she arrived on campus: “People told me there’s no such thing as ‘Physics for Fun’ at Stanford.”
“There seems to be a general panic reaction whenever there’s an equation,” says medical student Michael Ennen, a teaching assistant in Heart. Not every student has math phobia, however. In fact, the Core has attracted an unexpected number who don’t fit any particular mold, such as calculus whizzes who just happen to plan on majoring in classics. Yonatan Eyal is a humanities-oriented student with solid math skills. “It wasn’t that I couldn’t do math,” he says, “but I felt so strongly about what I could do in history or English.”
How do teachers reach students at both extremes? “With math, we’re most successful when we move in a different direction from their high school experience, teaching material that no one in the class has seen,” says Osgood, a mathematician and professor of electrical engineering. An example is information theory -- why the world is digital. “This covers a lot of the math that supports the information age; it’s not calculus, but it’s very relevant to our everyday lives.” The point is to emphasize real-world applications of “math in the service of science,” he says. But with calculus, unfortunately, “finding good examples is much harder than we thought.”
While students grapple with complex material, instructors seek new ways to bring it to life. Getting ready to speak to a class “is like preparing for a performance,” says physicist Burchat, who’s constantly on the prowl for clever props. But she and others say they’re enjoying the experiment. “This is the most exciting type of teaching I’ve ever done,” says Virginia Walbot, a professor of biological sciences who teaches in Earth. “The team approach is the very best part. I finally see how Earth fits into the universe and how geological and climate processes from plate tectonics to global warming impact my daily life.”
Besides, “if you can teach better, it’s just way more fun,” says Russell Fernald, Crocker Professor of Human Biology and head of Stanford’s human biology program.
For Osgood, the fun part is playing “designated simpleton” -- interrupting other instructors with questions. This helps to relax the students, if not the lecturers. “One of the pleasures of team teaching,” he says, “is asking my distinguished colleagues all the questions I should have asked when I was a student.”
No observer can miss the enthusiasm these instructors bring to the challenge, or their skill in pulling together seemingly unrelated points to impart a central message. A memorable lecture on light, taught by Burchat and Fernald, exemplifies the kind of teaching that can bring a class to a collective “aha!”
In the lecture, Burchat makes good use of her props, displaying two devices that look like small satellite dishes with their antennae pointing at each other. One “dish” can generate microwaves, and the other, equipped with a light and buzzer, can signal that it has received the microwaves, she explains.
She places various objects -- including a beaker of water and a metal grate -- in front of the transmitting antenna to show how waves can be blocked or reflected. Whenever the waves reach the receiving device, the buzzer rings and the light goes on.
With patience and humor, Burchat walks the class through a review of electromagnetic radiation and how waves travel through space. She even wanders down a few interesting side roads, such as how microwave ovens work and why you should take the wire handles off Chinese food containers before you nuke ’em (electrons concentrate on the metal points and create sparks).
Next, Fernald takes the podium for a quick overview of evolution. He flashes slides of animals, pointing out useful traits that took eons to emerge, and others that arose in short bursts -- such as the color patterns that evolved on moths depending on the amount of pollution discoloring the environment. Then he discusses the light spectrum, showing a chart of wavelengths and pointing to a range dubbed “visible light.”
Moth evolution, wave theory, Chinese leftovers, a beaker of water . . . they all seem unrelated until Fernald asks the central question: why do our eyes see only certain wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation -- the range we know as “visible light”?
He tells students to break into small groups and brainstorm. No one has a clue. But when he finally offers an answer, it ties together virtually every concept the class has learned today.
The theory, Fernald says, is that we evolved from single-celled organisms that lived in water. The “visible light” spectrum we see with our eyes is the only range of light waves that can penetrate water. Thus, we started down an evolutionary path using visible light because it was the only light reaching our primordial ancestors.
When his point hits home, you can see it on some of the students’ faces: a buzzer rings, a light goes on. Suddenly, science seems a lot less remote.
The puzzling thing about the Science Core is that more students aren’t taking it. Earth is the most popular track, with 83 students enrolling last fall; Light and Heart drew only 40 and 33 students, respectively. Winter brought a very disturbing drop, to the 20s and teens. (This is the first year students have had the fall-only option.) Skimpy enrollments make these courses expensive -- and administrators and faculty are worried about what that could mean for the program’s future.
Why hasn’t the Core drawn more students? The lab requirement might have something to do with it. One Casino Night gambler, asked if she’s enjoying the Science Core, rolls her eyes with classic first-quarter-freshman angst and groans, “It has a three-hour lab, I’ll just put it that way, okay?” For students with packed schedules and little inclination toward science, a required lab could be a turn-off. Osgood, however, thinks this isn’t a big factor: “Students don’t seem dissatisfied with the fact that there’s a lab per se, although some are dissatisfied with particular lab activities because they don’t see the relationship with the course material.”
He suspects the latest drop may have more to do with the single-quarter option. “It’s easy in, easy out,” he says. “Given the opportunity, students will shop around.” Indeed, Core courses face growing competition as Stanford expands its undergraduate offerings in a whole range of disciplines, launching more small-group seminars taught by top faculty. Getting freshman fuzzies to invest three quarters in serious science is a lot to ask, even if the experience promises ultimately to be satisfying. As former Light student Ted Carstensen puts it: “It is fun, but you must be willing to get into it.”
Osgood worries, too, that some fall-quarter students may have found the course difficult and confusing. “At the end of the first quarter, some students are confused about how things fit together. We raise different points of view, which students may perceive as disorganized,” he says. That was Brydie Andrews’ experience in the Light track last year: “In the beginning, it was tough to see where things were going, but by the last quarter it all fit together and we could apply, apply, apply.”
Core organizers are reassessing the structure and content of the program and are interviewing former students. They are considering creating a strong incentive for multi-quarter participation and targeting undeclared sophomores rather than freshmen. They also are analyzing course-selection patterns and interests among Stanford’s undergrads. The early findings suggest that “there are 500 students out there who would, could or should enter this program,” Osgood says. “That’s a lot, and that’s what we should aim for.”
For now, the pilot program is funded through an initial $2.2 million raised from the National Science Foundation, William Hewlett, ’34, Engr. ’39, and the Hewlett Foundation. Its future will be determined in the next few years. “We will use what we’ve learned in these first three years as a guide for what comes next,” vice provost Saldivar says. “The importance goes beyond just these courses -- it’s a major, experimental innovation in creating a knowledgeable polity. And that, of course, is what a liberal arts education is all about.”
Coaxing a generation of fuzzies to appreciate science isn’t going to happen overnight. But that hasn’t stopped the Core team from trying a new idea. Sometimes you just have to pick your strategy, put on your tuxedo -- and roll the dice.
Joan O’C. Hamilton, ’83, a Stanford contributing writer, authors a column on high technology for Business Week.
