General Education

General education refers to the portion of the undergraduate curriculum that is required for all students. The intent of general education is to provide students with a breadth of knowledge and skills that will enable them to contribute to a democratic society. At many religiously oriented institutions, general education also includes courses that focus on the faith and practices of a specific religious tradition. General education programs developed in the United States in the 19th and 20th centuries as undergraduate majors were introduced into the curriculum, and colleges and universities moved away from a classical model of education. Three curriculum delivery models emerged: a distribution model, an individual development model, and a core liberal studies model. Though most schools use aspects of all three models, this last approach is the dominant model. All general education programs require a breadth of study in the humanities, sciences, and social sciences and focus on the development of skills in areas of writing, communication, and mathematics. General education grew in importance after World War II, diminished in the 1960s and 1970s, and has undergone revitalization since the 1980s. General education curricula, as well as the growing numbers of students entering higher education, affect curricular expectations in high schools and have both directly and indirectly influenced educational reforms in American secondary education.

As American universities began to move away from a classical and religious education at the end [Page 401]of the 19th century, they began to develop distribution requirements. Princeton University moved to this model in the 1880s, requiring students to select classes from a range of discipline-based courses. Some faculty feared that the American universities would follow a German model and emphasize disciplinary specialization. They also thought that the distribution model would result in a fragmented education. They were generalists who believed that everyone should be familiar with great works that had shaped civilization.

Faculty at Columbia University designed the first courses for this generalist model. “War Issues” was designed and taught in 1917 to inform soldiers headed into World War I about the culture they were defending. After 2 years, the course was reti-tled “Introduction to Contemporary Civilization” and was established as a requirement for all entering undergraduates. In 1920, John Erskin, also at Columbia, developed a 2-year course in which students read a series of masterpiece works from a wide range of fields. This course influenced the development of the great books curriculum at St. John's College and the general education program at the University of Chicago.

Robert Maynard Hutchins established the “New Plan” at Chicago in 1931. This plan quickly developed to include 2 years of general education courses that culminated in seven day-long examinations. Only after completing this curriculum did students specialize in a discipline. John Dewey, who taught at Chicago during this period, moved to Columbia, and he and Arthur Lovejoy at Johns Hopkins University began to emphasize the importance of developmental models and to experiment with a structure for general education. These developments at Chicago and Columbia were important, but it was the Report of the Harvard Committee on the objectives of a General Education in a Free Society (1945), often known as the Red Book because of its cover, that set the curricular model for programs throughout the country. The Harvard committee argued that the task of education in America was that of educating the specialist in particular fields and vocations while at the same time providing the education needed for a democratic society. While education could take many forms, they all needed to enable students to share the same common knowledge and accept common cultural values. At both secular and religious institutions, these were Western cultural values. At religious institutions, courses in biblical studies, theology, and philosophy were stressed as part of traditional and universal values. Perhaps because of the cold war and the concern to preserve Western culture and polity, the Harvard theory and model dominated general education in the United States well into the 1960s. Secondary education was influenced by the college curriculum and the entrance requirements established for the general study. High schools developed college tracks that prepared students for the general education curricula.

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