15 Things You May Not Know About the Good Life Course

by Dana Myers

Author’s note:  Many thanks to Dr. Vicki Rovine with the School of Art and Art History and Dr. Brenda Smith with the School of Music (both of whom are instructors for What is the Good Life? and members of the Humanities Steering Committee) and Professor Andrew Wolpert, the Humanities Common Course Coordinator, for graciously giving their time to talk with me about this course.

Most of us have read the overview of the “What is the Good Life?” course (HUM2305) sent out over the advising listserv, so most of us have a general understanding of the course.  And for those of us involved with Preview, we certainly know the mandatory nature of the course and some of the trickiness involved with creating a schedule for students who have already fulfilled their humanities requirements or who have ambitious plans of double majoring or pursuing pre-health or other majors that have tight first-year curriculums (e.g. art, to name just one).  But as every incoming freshman is going to be taking the class this year, perhaps it’s worthwhile to know a bit more about HUM 2305.

1. The course has lectures taught by 11 different instructors (or combination of instructors) hailing from various UF departments, including religion, architecture, English, art history, classics, music, philosophy, anthropology, planning, theatre and dance, and the Land Use and Environmental Change Institute.  These lectures range in size from 132 students at the smallest, to a whopping 590 students.  The large-group lecture sections meet twice a week for one period and are then broken down into smaller discussion sections led by TAs that meet for an additional period per week.  (I swear I will eventually get to some stuff you won’t likely know already!)

2. The What is the Good Life? course came from UF’s desire to have a rigorous and intellectually honest humanities course that every student would take, one that could not be completed via any accelerated mechanism nor taken prior to enrolling at UF.  UF established the Humanities General Education Task Force some years back to tackle this task.  This group submitted their final report and recommendation in September 2011.  And from that, the Good Life course was created.

3. The Good Life course was originally taught in 2010 as an honors course to 25 students, none of whom were freshmen.  It has subsequently been taught in a variety of formats to a variety of classifications, but has never been required.  In Fall 2010, one section was taught to all freshmen, except one senior.  This senior reported to the instructor that out of all the courses he’d taken over the last four years, this course was the one in which he was most interested.

4. After the Humanities General Education Task Force gave its final report, a Humanities Steering Committee was created to serve as an advisory board for participating colleges and to provide an avenue for assessing the course and making recommendations for the possible development and improvement of the course.

5. The course will be re-evaluated at the end of three years to determine if it is meeting the original objectives and may be potentially revised or possibly even taken out of the curriculum for first-year students.

6. Although the Preview workbook indicated the course would give some Gordon Rule writing credit, it does NOT.  However, the course does require students to write at least 2,000 words, so we can be rest assured that even though a student may come to UF with all 24,000 GR writing words met via accelerated mechanisms, he/she will still have to take at least one course with a writing component.  (Thank goodness!)

7. Professor Andrew Wolpert from the Classics department is the Humanities Common Course Coordinator who oversees the operations of the course (from budget to course planning and development).  While he said he cannot help advisors get particular students into particular sections (darn it, I tried!), he assured me there should be sufficient space for the rest of the freshmen needing the class this spring.

8. The course consists of about 50% “gateway” readings or experiences (some are video or multimedia) and 50% “pillar” readings or experiences.  The gateway readings are required of all sections, regardless of instructor.  Here are a handful (there are many more):  Vivien Sung’s  Five-Fold Happiness:  Chinese Concepts of Luck, Prosperity, Longevity, Happiness, and Wealth; Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha; Martin Luther King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail (1963); and Henry Thoreau’s  Where I Lived, and What I Lived For and Conclusion  from Walden.  The pillar readings are determined by the instructor, so one instructor’s course could look very different from another’s and yet still share the gateway experiences.

9. Some of the instructors were not familiar with all of the gateway readings, so the course actually requires a great deal of prep work.  Additionally, many of the instructors have never taught large-group lectures before so teaching this course is definitely keeping them on their toes!  And some are wondering whether UF can implement a cutting off of Wi-Fi during lectures! (Ack… too many smartphones!)

10. Seasoned HUM 2305 instructors say the course can help students find the right major.  One instructor said that a student who had completed the course sought her out to discuss how good he felt about pursuing his interest in becoming a writer.  (Yay!  This is a good reason for having first-year students take the course.)

11. Many of these faculty are excited about what HUM 2305 can teach students – teaching the students (and themselves) to become more comfortable with ambiguity.  As each lecture section discusses the gateway experiences and readings from different perspectives, students are hopefully led closer to understanding there are multiple truths in this vast world of “good”ness.

12. As to the mandatory nature of the course, some instructors report that students have had mixed responses:  some seem relieved to have not had to pick another course, while others have expressed discontent as they already have several humanities credits from accelerated mechanisms.

13. There are discussions happening about possibly offering Summer B sections of the course, and perhaps even an online version at a later point.

14. Some students beginning this academic year do NOT have to take HUM2305.  Here is a list of those exemptions (taken from Dr. Mair’s UF advising listserve’s post):

• AA transfers from the institutions in the Florida College System and State University System who have satisfied their institutions’ general education program prior to entering UF.
• Students enrolling in the Innovation Academy for the first time in Spring 2013. 
• Students enrolled in fully online degree programs. Students enrolling in these programs in the future will be required to take this course when it becomes available online. 
• Students who matriculated at UF prior to Summer B 2012, and who are required by the university or their colleges to change to the current catalog year. This exemption does not cover students who elect to change to the current catalog year. 

15. And finally… there is a plethora of information on the “What is the Good Life?” course website, including all the syllabi for all the large-group lecture sections.  You may want to check it out!