Regardless of what a student studies, 41 hours of general education courses stand between freshman orientation and graduation for all who pass through the University of Memphis.
The 41 hours do not include upper division humanities, social sciences and foreign language courses that are usually on the same list of general education classes. These courses are in a different category, because different colleges at the U of M require students to take them in addition to the other general education classes.
The required amount of hours of upper division humanities a college requires varies depending on what department a student is in. For example, the University requires students studying for a bachelors of science degree to take 12 hours of additional general education courses, while a bachelor of arts students are required to take anywhere between 9 to 16 hours depending on their major.
Since most majors require students to take 120 credit hours in order to graduate, general education courses usually end up making up a little less than half of most students' college careers. Based on this semester's tuition, that equals roughly $15,000 going directly to courses unrelated to the student's major.
One area of general education courses that several colleges require is a foreign language. The colleges that require this call for six hours of an upper-division language, but students have to work their way up to these upper division courses before they get into the 2000-level classes. This results in students taking 12 hours of a foreign language.
While learning a foreign language can be very important in helping a student appear more valuable to employers, some students feel like the 12 hours are a waste of time.
"I've probably retained 5 percent of everything I was taught in my four years of college," Justin Culley, a U of M alumni, said. "I felt about as confident in my Spanish in my last semester as I did in my first."
Although Culley made all A's in Spanish through college, he said that he doesn't feel like he learned anything that he can actually apply to speaking or understanding the language.
"I basically learned everything I needed to know to read a menu at Los Reyes, and then I can ask you why children are playing in the street," Culley said. "I think it was a waste. What I know now and what I knew for my last test was the same as what I knew when I graduated high school. I learned how to memorize words so I could pass a test."
Some would argue, however, that the amount a student learns is contingent on how much they put into the education.
"If a student studies and reads outside of the classroom, I believe they can be fluent in four semesters - at least to the point that they can go to another country and communicate with locals," Isadora Belmonte, a Spanish undergraduate advisor, said.
The professors in the foreign language program use the communicative approach to teach, so as long as students continue to speak the language while they are taking courses and after they finish, the education will be effective, according to Belmonte.
Several clubs and tutoring services are available for students to go and practice the language they are learning outside of the classroom.
"I think if I did Spanish club or any extracurricular activity, I guess it would have helped in class a bit, but, honestly, who has time for that?" Culley said. "I would have liked to have actually learn Spanish, but when you're as busy as you are in college, it's just easier to float through it and get an 'A.'"
