WHAT STUDENTS THINK ABOUT THEIR MAJOR

Sonia Gamboa and Bruno Lovo

Publicado en Capital Letter No. 3

Mayo de 2003

Capital Letter has been interested in knowing the students' opinion about the curricular program of Philology and Languages, and how the students feel before their subject of study. In order to obtain this information, Capital Letter has carried out a survey and has interviewed some students from III, IV, and VI semesters. The students' opinions show different views about the major among the students. When people start studying this major, they do not know what philology is, different from people that study medicine, architecture, arts, psychology, engineering, and other majors. Many people in this major that are in the first semesters think that they are doing a holiday language course; others have all their interest only in changing to another curricular program, and many of them do not want to work as teachers. For that reason, students who belong to the first semesters do not find some subjects such as Linguistics and Functional Spanish interesting and useful, and they take this branch of  learning as needlework.

But, what happens with the students in III, IV, and V semesters? They are always apathetic to continue their studies, and fail many subjects trying to feel better. Others take as many subjects as possible, trying to finish the major in a short time, but they are not aware of the loss of a huge amount of knowledge. On the other hand, students from superior levels think that the Linguistics area is the most important and that this represents an advantage over other universities. They have a clear idea of working as teachers since they know that the widespread field of work for people from this career is teaching.

The majority of the students are in the mood for finishing the major as quickly as possible, but a few of them are interested in taking this curricular program in the best possible way in order to be skilled professionals. Many think that the professor is not a good one and that he/she has the responsibility of teaching them really well, and that criticize the major searching a guilty one for their own mistakes. Others think that the student has the responsibility of learning. But nobody does anything for changing the thought in people who study this major in order to see the curricular program from another and better point of view.

One student proposed the idea of an induction day for people who start studying the career, and it could be the opportunity for new people to know the main branches of learning in Philology. This induction day could be organized by the students who are in higher levels - as it is done in other majors- and Vicedecanatura de Bienestar with the co-operation of the Foreign Languages Department. This activity can give those new students the opportunity of knowing better the major before they begin it. Maybe in this way we can solve the problem among the students that do not have any idea about the curricular program. All these opinions can make the new students remain in Philology because they want to and not because they have to.