For those of you fortunate enough to have taken a first-year seminar, you know how meaningful a small, discussion-oriented class about an interesting (and sometimes random) topic can be. While first-year disadvantages are many — the monotony of Lenoir food, constant sickness, not getting into bars on Franklin — the first-year seminars are a wonderful perk to newly minted Tar Heels.
While beginning college life with an intellectually eye-opening encounter is great, it would be equally beneficial to provide seniors the inverse capstone experience.
There are two ways senior seminars could make an impact.
After spending three years of maturing and focusing on one or two specific themes of study, this demographic would appreciate the opportunity to explore a new topic as their now more fully realized intellectual selves. Rather than searching through everyone’s leftovers for classes to fulfill hour requirements, seniors could spend their last tuition dollars on something more meaningful and thought provoking.
These seminars could also go outside the box and develop a classroom experience specifically tailored to the student focused on work after college. Senior seminars could explore specific industries and career paths possibly outside of a student's major. Professors could choose to engage more outside actors or model the class after capstone courses, with students doing classwork for a particular organization or company.
Many seniors are hanging onto their last shreds of freedom from the impending confinement of a nine-to-five job. The options of one last hurrah to explore a new topic or join an authentic community-learning experience could be affirming for students in their last year at UNC.
The possibilities are exciting, and students could take advantage of them if given the option to convene with their fellow seniors to take a last-chance seminar: “LCS’s.”
