Taking Stock of the Educational Enterprise G. A. Crosby Washington State University. Pullman, WA 99164 Reflection is supposedly a fundamental component of the academic life. a t least that is thenonular mvth. Asmost of us in the academic milieu know miy well; however, engaging in reflection is a luxury. There are just too many demands on one's time. Nonetheless, acceptance of an award for service to chemical education carries with i t the ohligation to reflect on the current status of the educational enterprise, where the principal developments appear t o he taking us and what are the portents of the future. In addition, I have seized this opportunity to raise questions about some of our current educational practices and to focus attention on afew very pervasive elements of the university structure that, a t least in my mind, de facto restrict the progress of education in the sciences. Comments on the Curriculum
There is a good deal of uneasiness among chemists concerning the undergraduate curriculum. Most of us have a vague feeling that something is wrong, but we are not certain why or how to fix it. There is a general perception that the best students are not choosing chemistry as a career, that we are losing out to computer science, to medicine, to the preprofessional nroerams in eeneral. Somehow the chemistrv &riculum is-not appealing to students. Our concern man:fests itself in various ways: we charge that the freshman course is too "principles oriented," that there is not enough descriptive chemistry, that the students are heing turned off by our abstract approach to the suhject. Some claim that there is just too much material in the courses, that the books are too thick, the facts too oppressive, the coverage too extensive and suffocating, the laboratories unexciting and irrelevant. One cannot help hut agree with most of these statements. The studv of chemistw has lost out t o comouter science. After all,computer science did not exist as discipline 30 years ago; now we must acknowledge its existence and appeal. There is also little douht that many students look upon the traditional chemistry curriculum only as a stepping stone toward a real career. I see nothing particularly wrong with this development; what concerns me is that chemists often equate teaching chemsitry to preprofessional students and even t o majors in other scientific disciplines as asecondclass activity-the real joh is to teach ourmajors. We should, I believe, rejoice in the knowledge that chemistry is central and important to other disciplines and teach accordingly.
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Glenn A. Crosby is the recipient of this year's ACS Award in Chemical Education, and this paper is based on the address he gave at the Miami ACS meeting when he received that Award. A member of the faculty at Washington State University since 1967. Crosby has a distinguished record both as an educator and a research scientist. His contribution^ to DivCHED include the formulation of long-range proOrammina Dlans and the initiationof the State-of-the-Art Svmoosia and Breaklnrough an0 Perspsct ve Lenures when he sewea as Program Chair n 1978-80 He also war Chaw of me Dw soan m 1982 an0 has sewed on numerous ACS committees. His research imerert is in the field of molecular electronic spectroscopy with an emphasis on inorganic materials, In additlon lo his cunent Award, he has received the CMA Catalyst Award (1979) and the President's Award for Excellence in Instructionat Washington State University.
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We do, however, have problems. Often the freshman course, that first encounter of the student with university chemistry, is stultifying and oppressive. Many times i t is taught by burned out, depressed, defeated faculty who have heen pushed aside by the system and relegated t o freshman teachine as the last staee of a declinine career. Often the indtruci;m is an unvkilledyoungster who'is forced to take his turn before a larae freshman section knowina full well that survival dependson research, and whatever
