From the NYU Abu Dhabi website:

"The NYU Abu Dhabi core curriculum asks students to grapple with profound and enduring questions about the human and social condition while developing essential intellectual skills.

Core classes introduce varied modes of thinking and forms of human creativity, from science and technology to literature and music; improve foundational skills in expository writing, public speaking, analysis, and quantitative reasoning; consider the range of cultural traditions in relation to one another; and probe basic questions about the meaning of life and our place in the world."

 One of the more distinctive elements of the NYU Abu Dhabi curriculum is the core, an assortment of classes from which we as students choose eight, two from each of four categories: Pathways of World Literature; Structures of Thought and Society; Art, Technology and Invention; and Ideas and Methods of Science. If done properly, this structure should pursue its stated goals, and for the most part, core classes tend to fit that description. Yes, there are some exceptions, the rather out there classes that are really just the pet projects of professors who care too much or the throwaways of professors who care too little. But we must understand the core in a broader context rather than just as singular classes. When we seek to understand the core as a unit, I think we quickly become disappointed.

In an ideal world, the core should provide a broad range of methods and frameworks with which to analyze and consider the world. They should help elucidate the great range of human experience and understanding and show students the various ways in which we both quantify and qualify humanity and its structures. The key here is breadth — the core should intend to force students into considering the world in novel and perhaps unnatural ways.

In other words, there should be a great diversity of thought presented. Where there is a course considering and empathizing with the colonized, there ought to be a course considering and empathizing with the colonizer. Where there is a course analyzing religion from a secular perspective, there ought to be a course analyzing secularism from a religious perspective. The current state of the core curriculum does not reflect this diversity. Instead, it is a liberal and academic echo chamber that produces students who simply reflect the thoughts and beliefs of current higher education, rather than students with the ability to critically challenge the status quo from within and without the ivory tower of academia.

Moreover, the core seeks to provide “foundational skills in expository writing, public speaking, analysis, and quantitative reasoning” … Is this a joke? I came across but a single instance of quantitative reasoning in my core curriculum: Foundations of Science 1. This makes sense as it’s a lab core. To my knowledge, quantitative thinking in the core curriculum does not extend beyond the science lab courses — from there on, it’s a qualitative dreamland.

Are we comfortable assigning qualitative reasoning seven times the weight of quantitative reasoning? It seems that the core curriculum has decided as such. There indeed should be equal weight between the two. Conveniently, the courses required to bolster the core with quantitative thought already exist: Introduction to Political Thinking, Principles of Microeconomics and Calculus are equally significant approaches to analysis and thought. It is frankly appalling that these courses are not yet included in the core. Including them would go a long way toward giving quantitative and qualitative reasoning equal share.

The core lacks diversity and equal representation of thought and analytical methods.  Instead of this ideal of diversity, it focuses too broadly on qualitative thought in areas and perspectives that are comfortable to academia but wholly unrepresentative of the range of human experience and thought. This is not even to touch upon the vaguely themed and honestly silly courses — “What is Light?” “What is Man?” and “Maps” as a few examples. The core is quickly becoming a joke: a set of courses addressing altogether similar topics from altogether similar angles. If it has any hope of being as it intended it be, we must reform the core.