Colleges should focus more on serving needs and less on ineffective preaching. My experience as a TA in 101/102 level courses is that there is no use at all in subject requirements to encourage a breadth of knowledge in students. These only serve to teach students that university is largely bureaucratic bullshit. Give students the freedom to choose the courses they want. Requirements just encourage lowest common denominator behavior in both students and academic departments.
I would argue that allowing anyone to choose whatever courses they want (outside of degree requirements) would not discourage lowest common denominator behavior. It would facilitate that even more (e.g. Accounting + Non-stop PE).
But, since our job is also not to support the LCD but the GCD, I would still support this. I would have taken more Japanese, or possibly another language, if I didn't have to take Geology. I likely would have also substituted more Philosophy for Communications. That would have been a better supplement to my CS coursework and wouldn't have made me a less well-rounded person.
That is my point! I am all for not discouraging Lowest Common Denominator behavior. You can't prevent it. Actively trying to prevent it causes such LCD behavior to leak into and pollute the efforts of GCD students. Instead, universities should focus their effort on serving the needs of those who want to learn. Coercion just backfires.
I could've done a much better job in my Computer Science 101/102 courses if I could just teach the people who really wanted to study the material, and not people who just wanted to get out of the math requirement.
