The academics of Shimer College are based on a Great Books core curriculum. They also include a set of comprehensive examinations and other requirements including semester projects and a senior thesis. Shimer is the only college in the Midwest with an exclusively Great Books curriculum[1], and presently markets itself as "the Great Books College of Chicago".[2]
Shimer College has followed a variant of the Hutchins Plan since 1950. The Socratic, discussion-driven, method is the pedagogical norm, apart from a very few specific electives. The Hutchins Plan was developed by American educator Robert Maynard Hutchins who was President of the University of Chicago from 1929 to 1945 and Chancellor from 1945 to 1951. The Hutchins Plan relies on close readings of original sources, often called Great Books, rather than textbooks, as the basis for its curriculum. The Great Books curriculum at Shimer has been adapted over the years, including by the addition of a social sciences component, and is subject to frequent review.[3] Most courses include contemporary texts, as well as texts by female authors and writers of color. Classes have no more than 12 students and are guided by a faculty member.[4]
Throughout the history of its Great Books program, Shimer has combined an open admissions policy with rigorous educational standards.[5] Rather than seeking out students who performed well in high school, Shimer has sought out students who do poorly in mainstream education.[6][5] Standardized test scores are not required for regular admission.[7] Shimer graduates have exhibited extraordinarily high performance on graduate school admissions tests from the 1960s[6] through the 1990s.[8] Shimer has also ranked extremely highly in rates of continuation to graduate school,[9] and particularly to the Ph.D. level.[10][11]
Core Curriculum
Shimer's core curriculum comprises four courses of study in each of four areas: humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, and integrative studies. The humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences courses are numbered from 1 to 4, while the integrative studies courses are numbered 1, 2, 5, and 6. [7] The curriculum is interdisciplinary throughout, and students are encouraged to make connections among the ideas studied in different courses.[5]
Integrative studies
The integrative studies sequence is discontinuous, consisting of two entry-level courses and a two-part senior seminar. Integrative Studies 1 is a basic introduction to analysis, logic and rhetoric, and students have the option of testing out.[12] Readings in Integrative Studies 1 include Abbott's Flatland, Plato's Meno, and Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. Integrative Studies 2 is a historical survey of mathematics and logic, beginning with Aristotle and Euclid and continuing through Descartes to Gödel's incompleteness theorems. Integrative Studies 5 and 6 are usually taken by graduating seniors, and can only be taken after successful passage of the the Basic Comprehensive Examination.[12] These courses constitute a unified survey of the entire history of Western thought from Sumerian literature to modern times. Integrative Studies 5 begins with the Sumerian Inanna hymns and the Epic of Gilgamesh, and continues through authors including Homer, Sappho, Aquinas, and Dante. Integrative Studies 6 continues the survey with authors including Copernicus, Hegel and Friedrich Nietzsche.
Humanities
In the core humanities courses, topics of study include visual art, music, literature, philosophy and theology.[13] Visual art and music are reviewed in Humanities 1, where readings include Plato's Ion, "A Hunger Artist" by Franz Kafka, and What to Listen For in Music by Aaron Copland. Literature is reviewed in Humanities 2, where the authors read include Homer, Shakespeare, and Dostoevsky. Humanities 3 and 4 form a unified survey of the historical development of Western philosophy and theology. Humanities 3 covers the development of philosophical and theological thought prior to the 18th century, including works by Plato, Augustine, Descartes, and Locke. Humanities 4 covers the development of philosophical thought from the Enlightenment to the present day, and includes works by Kant, Nietzsche, and Buber.
Natural sciences
In the core natural sciences courses, the topics of study include chemistry, physics, and biology. [14] The natural sciences are taught, like the other sections of the core, in terms of the historical development of ideas.[3] Natural Sciences 1 covers the history and development of chemistry; readings begin with the Presocratics and continue through subsequent authors including Lucretius, Francis Bacon and Lavoisier. Natural Sciences 2 focuses on biology and animal behavior, and surveys thinkers including Aristotle, Lamarck, Darwin, Mendel, Konrad Lorenz and Jane Goodall. Natural Sciences 3 covers the historical development of physics, and includes works by Galileo, Newton, and Einstein. Natural Sciences 4 surveys the development of scientific thought in the 20th century,[15] with a focus on quantum physics and molecular biology; authors read include Heisenberg, Feynman and Freeman Dyson.
Social sciences
Shimer varies from the traditional Hutchins plan in including a separate area for the social sciences.[3] In the core social sciences courses, the topics of study include anthropology, psychology, political science and methodology. Social Sciences 1 is an introduction to anthropology, psychology, and political theory;[16] the authors read include Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, Émile Durkheim and Ruth Benedict.[17] Social Sciences 2 covers the history of political thought, beginning with Plato's Republic and continuing through Aristotle, Machiavelli, Rousseau, The Constitution of the United States, and Mary Wollstonecraft. Social Sciences 3 covers modern theories of state and society; the authors read include Alexis de Tocqueville, Hegel, Freud and Hannah Arendt. In Social Sciences 4, participants study the methodology of the social sciences, and read authors including Max Weber, Michel Foucault, Karl Mannheim and Paulo Freire.
Comprehensive examinations and other requirements
All students must take the Basic Comprehensive Examination, or "Basic Comp", after completion of the eight freshman-level courses. The Basic Comp is used to assess student skills in logic, rhetoric and analysis.[18]
Students must also take at least one area comprehensive examination before graduation, in either humanities, social sciences or natural sciences. The area examination can only be taken after completion of all four courses in the subject area.[18]
The comprehensive examinations are given at the end of each semester. Students who are not taking a comprehensive examination are required to complete a semester project representing at least 40 hours of focused, independent work on a topic that demonstrates integration of ideas studied in the preceding semester.
In order to graduate, students must complete all core courses, as well as both the basic comprehensive exam and the comprehensive exam for their major. A senior thesis is also required. Thesis writers have the option to present their work in a public thesis defense.
Electives
Electives are primarily taken in the junior and senior years, though many of them are open to first and second year students as well. Students also often take tutorials with their professors, either one-on-one or with up to two other students. At the end of each semester, students must either complete a semester project on a topic of the student's choosing, or take one of the comprehensive exams.
Since its arrival in Chicago in 2006, Shimer has allowed cross-registration with both the Illinois Institute of Technology and Vandercook College of Music. Due to this arrangement, students are able to select from a wide range of scientific and music electives in addition to the subjects offered internally at Shimer.
Admissions
Since its founding in 1853, Shimer College has welcomed all applicants who are ready to learn. In keeping with this tradition, Shimer does not require any standardized test scores for applicants who have completed high school.[7] Shimer had an acceptance rate of 89.8% in the fall of 2008.[19]
In addition to the standard weekday program, since 1981 Shimer has also offered a weekend college program targeted to working adults.[18] In keeping with the Hutchins ideal of lifelong education, weekend college offers Shimer's full core curriculum, but is tailored to those students balancing a college education with full-time employment or family. Weekend college courses meet every third weekend but involve the same academic workload as the weekday program.[7] Thus, weekend students are able to complete their degree in the same period of time as they could in the weekday program.[18]
Shimer College also has an Early Entrant Program, which caters to bright high school students who are not challenged by high school and are ready for college after their sophomore or junior year. To be admitted, early entrants must be in the top quartile by GPA, high school class rank, SAT or ACT.[7] The early entrant program began with a Ford Foundation grant in 1951, and was so successful that it was retained after the grant expired in 1955.[20] Early entrants at Shimer are not separated from the student population in any way, but take the same classes and are treated identically to other students.[20] They generally enter Shimer after the second or third year of high school. Typically early entrants constitute approximately one-fifth of the student population at Shimer.
Alumni of the Shimer College early entrant program include international relations theorist Robert Keohane[21] and pediatric medicine expert Sydney Spiesel. Artist Cat Yronwode was also an early entrant, although she did not graduate.[22]
Shimer in Oxford
Shimer offers a year-long academic program in Oxford, England, for a group of Shimer students who take core courses from Shimer faculty and tutorials from University of Oxford tutors.[23] Shimer began offering organized study abroad programs of this sort in 1961 with a Paris program under professor John Hirschfield.[6] Oxford became the regular site of these programs beginning in 1963.[24]
The Shimer-in-Oxford program is usually offered every other year, and accepts Shimer juniors and seniors.[25] Both weekday and weekend students participate in the program.[26] In the 21st century, the program became affiliated with the Oxford Study Abroad Programme, allowing organized sharing of housing with other American students at Oxford.[25]
Outcomes
Sixty percent of Shimer graduates go on to graduate and professional schools.[8] In the early 90's, the Ph.D. rate for Shimer graduates was the highest in the nation among liberal arts colleges, and the third highest among all U.S. 4-year colleges and universities.[9] Shimer also ranks in the top 1% of the 3,478 U.S. colleges and universities in doctorate productivity.[27] In 1998 data from the Higher Education Data Sharing (HEDS) Consortium, Shimer had the seventh-highest Ph.D. rate across all United States colleges and universities.[10] Subsequent data from HEDS showed Shimer as the top producer of linguistics Ph.D.s for the period 1992 - 2001.[11]
A cooperative "BA to JD" program is offered in cooperation with Chicago-Kent College of Law.[28] In this program, students substitute the first year of law school for 30 credit hours of electives, so that the final year of Shimer coincides with the first year of law school. This allows a juris doctor degree to be obtained in a total of five to six years rather than the usual seven. Students in this program must still complete all core courses, all required comprehensive examinations, and their senior thesis.