I recently posted about the changes to the first year curriculum while I've been at Olin. There have been a number of other key curriculum changes over the course of my four years here, though, and I wanted to discuss those as well.
Biology
When I got to Olin, almost everyone had to take Olin's intro bio class. (I'd had AP Bio and semester-long biochem and genetics courses in high school. I still had to take intro bio.) It's become a lot easier to get out of that class and take a more specialized biology course, like Microbial Diversity, to fulfill the biology requirement. Getting a 5 on the AP exam now lets you substitute without having to talk to the biology professors, and a 3 or 4 on AP or comparable IB scores will probably let you substitute after a conversation with one of the professors.
There have also been efforts to introduce more options for the intro bio class. There's a class that's still essentially what I took, though it seems like it's gotten even more features (and maybe is suffering some feature creep). There's a flavor of intro bio focused on genetics, a flavor focused on designing drugs, and another focused on disease. There's also Six Microbes that Changed the World, a 4 credit bio, 4 credit AHS course co-taught by a biology professor and a history professor. The best description is this, taken from the course listing: "We will use six influential microbes as a window into a rich study of the interactions between science and societal context." Six Microbes has now run a couple of times, and it's been pretty successful and popular.
Probability and Statistics
Olin has a two credit ProbStat requirement. The average Olin class is worth four credits, so classes fulfilling the ProbStat requirement are either two credit half-semester math courses or four credit full-semester courses in which two credits count as math and two credits count as something else (usually science or engineering). There's been a lot of development on ProbStat options while I've been at Olin. The two credit math class option is just straight ProbStat, with a much heavier emphasis on the prob than the stat. I'd like that to change; a focus on prob is more helpful for the majors that have more integrated alternatives anyway. It would be nice to have a much more stats-y class, and I've heard a number of people mention wanting it; it's just not really anyone's priority.
The four credit options have fallen into three categories: Bayesian Stats, Data Science, and Regional Analysis and Development. Bayesian has been taught both with and without a focus on computation (and I think there's actually been a two credit version of Computational Bayesian). The non-computational Bayesian class is half science credit, half math credit. It lends itself well to a case study structure, which was interesting, but there simply aren't that many topics to cover; I didn't find it to be worth anywhere near four credits. The Data Science class is two credits of math and two credits of engineering and requires Python experience. It's project-based to let people do interesting work with real data sets, and how ProbStat-y this class is depends on who teaches it. With one of the professors, it's very machine learning focused, and while the probability and statistics content is there, it's rather hidden. No one would pull out that content as the central component of the course. Regional Analysis and Development focuses on learning statistics and data analysis through looking at issues of international development. It's the most stats-y of the four credit classes but is very much in the development context, and it's the least computational of the options.
To a certain extent, I'm impressed that there are this many options for a two credit requirement that isn't a pre-req for any other course in the school. However, I don't think Olin has really identified what we want students to know about probability and statistics, so it doesn't seem like there's any kind of common outcome from the courses satisfying the requirement. It feels like the thought process has been, "Well, this needs to be a requirement for the program to be ABET accredited, but we need to do something more interesting." Maybe the classes are accomplishing what we want out of the requirement, but I think it's important to state what that is and factor that into course design.
Materials Science/Chemistry
People sometimes talk about a MatSci requirement, but there's actually a choice. A student can take Materials Science or a chemistry class. The materials science classes are a bit different in structure with each professor but are mostly stable. Chemistry, however, has been in flux during my time at Olin. When I arrived we had a chemistry lecturer who taught an intro chemistry course and two semesters of organic chemistry. He left after my sophomore year, though, and until this January we did not have a chemistry professor. We have a new faculty member this semester with a background in environmental engineering and atmospheric chemistry.
Olin's first major integrated science/AHS course was Stuff of History: Materials and Culture in Ancient, Revolutionary, and Contemporary Times. It ran for the last time when I was a first year, and the materials science professor who co-taught it has since left. There's a new integrated science/AHS course for this requirement, though, titled Chemistry in Context, which focuses on environmental chemistry. It's being offered for the first time this semester.
Investigating Normal
There have been a lot of new classes taught while I've been at Olin but this is one of the most influential and popular of those. Most new elective/depth options don't have a ton of effect on the school, but Investigating Normal is an exception to that. This is a Design Depth, so it's one of the options for the post-UOCD requirement that's effectively a design capstone, and it's taught by Sara Hendren, who has been faculty here for a couple of years now. The course is focused on assistive technology and accessibility, and largely as a result of Sara and this course, there's been a huge growth of interest in these areas on campus. There's a group doing research with Sara now, a couple of other faculty members who had done related work have started framing that work more in the language of assistive tech, and more people are looking for internships/jobs in the field. My class's senior gift is also centered around making Olin more accessible.
More broadly, I think Investigating Normal is the kind of class a Design Depth really should be. It seems like one of the best Design Depths at integrating the user-centered design process and the technical process; a lot of times Oliners get a lot of experience in both realms and less experience in bouncing between the two processes in a single project. We've talked about Design Depths with several of the faculty candidates this year, so I'm hopeful that in the future we'll get more classes that do this integration well.
Seminars
During my sophomore year, Olin added seminars, which are 1 credit, Pass/No Credit classes that don't count towards major or general requirements but can introduce students to specialized topics not covered in courses here. Some of the first ones offered were in hydraulics and power electronics, and in the past couple of semesters I remember product management and musical instrument design seminars. This semester there were seminars in industrial media, embedded software, and product design and engineering in large corporate environments. A lot of these are taught by alumni in the evenings. I think they're a cool way to engage with alums.
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