No curriculum anywhere is completely irrelevant. For there has always been some connection between subjects of study and human concerns. Still, the problem of organizing studies has rarely been handled in a satisfactory way.
The University of the New World has developed its own division of subjects. This division highlights relevance, survival of man, the future, and the paramount needs of our students. It is tentative in the sense that the University Assembly can alter it as new emphases and problems are suggested. Moreover, even before formal changes are made, it is well to remember that every student shapes his own curriculum through personal consultation with his professor. Therefore every student has the right to be his own innovator, his own curriculum authority. Each studio could support a hundred good personal programs.
A Studio is oriented in its own way toward the beneficial construction of the future world. The orientation is conveyed somewhat in its title, usually in its description, and regularly in its operation. The studios may be grouped according to their dominant process, of which there are five: Growing; Making; Meaning; Creating; and Governing. The "ing is stressed because education and learning are active, not passive processes, and because the desired result from such active learning is practical action: doing. This idea is as valid for physics as it is for the dance.
All processes occur in the same person or thing at the same time; therefore they relate to each other. Each studio also has some interest in every process, and hence, in every other studio. The same is true of the subjects pursued in the Studios: there may be one or more subjects per studio. This is the principle of assimilation followed at the University: In every action and in every event there is something of everything.
The "class" flows through varied phases of regroupment. Using the studio as their base, students move out to libraries and field projects; they move into and out of other studio milieus. A student gives to and takes from his studio or studios in accord with his needs and abilities.
Several students may want to work on the same project, like finding out the reasons why Valais has stayed independent for a thousand years. They might together join the Studio on War and Peace, or on Modernization, or on Decentralization. If there were enough interest and the project was long-enduring and important enough, they could begin a new studio, and elect a faculty (with the concurrence of the University Assembly).
KINDS OF FACULTY
A studio faculty typically includes a professor who is studio leader, a professor who is proctor, and a professor-atlarge. The studio leader takes care of members' personal programs, invites visitors from other studios and from the outside world. He schedules the studio.
For example, students of the Modernization Studio, investigating population problems of India, may feel the need for special insights and information on birth control methods and experience, the studio leader may invite a professor from the Life Studio or Health Studio, or bring in an expert from Geneva or Rome, to explore with the students, the various facets of the problem.
A proctor is the professor who, besides his teaching, is responsible for the physical maintenance of his studio -books, audio-visual aids, props, furnishings, field trip equipment, etc.; he takes care of the actual physical communications with members and with making the studio habitable and easy to work in. And for keeping it open from early morning until midnight.
QUALITY OF FACULTY
The University, as a matter of principle, does not extol the authority of its faculty. Biographical data on most of them is available in "Who's Who", "American Men of Science" and other sources including biographical releases available through the University. In general, by the statistical measures of numbers of degrees, research, productivity, artistic
achievements, applied scientific accomplishments, and publications, the University of the New World faculty is on the level of such universities as the University of Chicago, Harvard University, the University of California at Berkeley, and the University of Michigan.
NUMBER OF STUDIO MEMBERS
There are likely to be about two dozen Members in a given studio. At any given time, consequently, there may be half-a-dozen people in the studio, a couple of whom might be gathered around a corner table working on a joint project, another looking at slides, while still another might be consulting the basic library. Still another might be brewing tea before settling down to read, while a professor is posting a notice of a special conference with a visiting author or one about a new piece of equipment.
In the University as a whole, the ratio of faculty to students ranges between 1 to 5 and 1 to 10. This is a highly favorable proportion. Taken together with the other arrangements of the University, it gives a student Member a richness of human communication on an enlightened level that is scarcely to be found elsewhere in the world.
THE STUDIOS
A list of the studios follows. Professors are named after the studio description. The list is partial and, in accordance with the principles of the University, dependent upon the selfgroupment of student Members.
STUDIOS ORIENTED TO GROWING
The search for the ideal of a healthy person; traits of the several ages of life; physiology; diet. (M. van der Stock)
The patterns of cultural determination of character; independence and conformity.
The psychology and physiology of the sexes; women in social and political revolution around the world. (Sally Kempton)
The psychology of sensitivity and encounter; self-awareness and "as others see us"; openness and poise. (Rudyard Propst, Elizabeth Classman, Charles Seashore, George Melhus, and Edward de Grazia).
Spontaneity; invention (natural, social, artistic); biography. (Anne Decker)
Biological processes, evolution, eugenics) the possible vs. the desirable in genetics and gerontology. (Salome Waelsch (visiting), Carl Schildkraut, Annette Tobia)
Their rise and fall their evaluation; their comparison; the world as a civilization. (Michael Kamell)
Rural development and national poverty; methods of balanced change. (Jean-Yves Beigbeder, Nina Mavridis)
The nature of prehistoric
and historic catastrophes affecting mankind, an interdisciplinary approach.
(Immanuel Velikovsky, William Mullen, David Carlyle).
The sources and functions of awe and worship; ritual and naturalness; personality and collective expression. (Matthieu Casalis)
STUDIOS ORIENTED TO MAKING
Time, labor, and leisure in history and today; automation and liberation in the future. (Sebastian de Grazia)
Natural and artificial substances; their chemical composition, qualities and changing uses. (to be announced)
Agricultural practices: beneficial and destructive, and the squeeze of population upon resources. (to be announced)
How people and things are put together in small and large complexes. (Livio C. Stecchini)
Theories of physics and engineering, how they have been socially employed and their untried possibilities. (David Carlyle)
Electricity and electronics; light as force and expression. (Anthony Martin)
The assembly of resources for enterprise; currency, credit, and income. (Gus W. Weiss, Jr., Elizabeth Jacob)
STUDIOS ORIENTED TO MEANING
Basic theories of symbols; grammar; pragmatics; semantics. (Gilbert Davidowitz, Nora Kerr)
Media-assisted, intensive,small group. Learning to hear, speak, read and write. Basic, General, Specialized, and Advanced levels. (Rochelle Leszczynski -Coordinator; Warren Lipton, Mark Blasius)
111. English
112. French
113. Italian
114. Spanish
115. German
116. Russian
117. Modern Greek
Languages of science; operationalism; contributions to rational choice. (Arnaud Henry-Labordere, Richard Huber)
Libraries data collection, storage and retrieval. (to be announced)
Messages and media rhetoric, propaganda, promotion, persuasion. (N. Robert Heyer)
Systems of belief and their conflicts; the formation of new social morale. (Gerard Gibbons)
STUDIOS ORIENTED TO CREATING
Preparation and stimulation of the senses; beauty as part of everything; insuring aesthetic power in public choice. (H. Harvard Arnason)
The working of materials into shapes, colors, movements; what the eye can see. (Robert Motherwell)
From noise to rhythms and tones that communicate; what the ear can hear. (to be announced)
How writers fail and succeed as social designers. The style of creative thought; techniques of creative symbolization. (Herbert Perluck, Elizabeth Bettman, Allen Ginsberg, James McPherson)
Filming and illuminating new worlds; methods of projecting information and ideas. (Louis Allen)
Humanizing the machine. Enlarging theories of efficiency. Graphic arts. (to be announced)
Studios oriented to the new drama and dance; what the body can feel and tell. (to be announced)
The physical expression of personal and social challenge; play and games as education for an alternate culture. (Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi)
STUDIOS ORIENTED TO GOVERNING
Wisdom, intelligence, and judgment in personal and group policies. (Carl Stover)
From metropolis to commune; preserving humanity in closeness. (Reuben de Hoyos)
Influence and coercion, their exercise and control; participation and representation. (John Appel)
Poverty, old and new related to social and personal wealth. (Myron Nalbandian)
The abyss between offense and response, criminology; sanctions. (Edward de Grazia)
War, peace, and revolutions; disarmament, making peace desirable and rewarding (Ithiel de Sola Pool)
The exploration of anti-bureaucracy and anti-hierarchy as human possibilities (Ronald Lipton)
Trends, and their control and redesign with respect to a beneficent and benevolent world (Anthony Weiner)
Total planning and activating of a second University of the New World (Alfred de Grazia)