Structured Liberal Education
Encyclopedia
Structured Liberal Education (SLE) is a program at Stanford University
offering an alternative three-course sequence for freshmen to fulfill their Introduction to the Humanities (IHUM) and Program in Writing and Rhetoric (PWR) requirements. With a year-long schedule of nine units in the fall and winter quarters, and ten in the spring quarter, SLE is unique in its intellectual rigor, multi-disciplinary approach, and residence-based structure.
professor Mark Mancall, with political theorist Hannah Arendt
as one of the original proponents of the program's enactment. In some respects, Stanford's SLE is comparable to other notable "Great Books" programs, such as Directed Studies
at Yale University
, the Liberal Arts Seminar at Georgetown University
, the Program of Liberal Studies at the University of Notre Dame
, the Core Curriculum at Columbia University
, the Core Curriculum at the University of Chicago
, the Foundation Year Programme at the University of King's College, and the curriculum at St. John's College
, but owing to Mancall's scholarly interests in East Asia, SLE's reading list is more culturally diverse.
. Most recently, they live in either the all-freshman dorm, Alondra, which is made up of half SLE students and half IHUM students, or in one of the two four-class dorms, Cardenal and Faisan. Many of the upperclassmen in Cardenal and Faisan are former SLE students, which helps maintain an SLE community spanning the different years. In the main lounge of Florence Moore, known as the SLE lounge, students attend lectures given by professors within many departments at Stanford and by visiting guest lecturers. In addition, students participate in small-group sections, in which they discuss the lectures and assigned literature from SLE's extensive, diverse, and ever-evolving reading list. Films, often relating to the material of study, are screened weekly, and student-produced plays are regularly part of the syllabus. Aristophanes' "Lysistrata
" is traditionally performed in the fall. SLE also provides freshman with intensive individual writing tutorials.
Stanford University
The Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University or Stanford, is a private research university on an campus located near Palo Alto, California. It is situated in the northwestern Santa Clara Valley on the San Francisco Peninsula, approximately northwest of San...
offering an alternative three-course sequence for freshmen to fulfill their Introduction to the Humanities (IHUM) and Program in Writing and Rhetoric (PWR) requirements. With a year-long schedule of nine units in the fall and winter quarters, and ten in the spring quarter, SLE is unique in its intellectual rigor, multi-disciplinary approach, and residence-based structure.
History
Structured Liberal Education was the brainchild of Stanford historyHistory
History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...
professor Mark Mancall, with political theorist Hannah Arendt
Hannah Arendt
Hannah Arendt was a German American political theorist. She has often been described as a philosopher, although she refused that label on the grounds that philosophy is concerned with "man in the singular." She described herself instead as a political theorist because her work centers on the fact...
as one of the original proponents of the program's enactment. In some respects, Stanford's SLE is comparable to other notable "Great Books" programs, such as Directed Studies
Directed Studies at Yale University
Directed Studies at Yale University is a selective humanities study program for freshmen. It follows the Great Books of the Western tradition, and resembles Princeton University's Interdisciplinary Approaches to Western Culture, Columbia University's Core Curriculum, The University of Notre Dame's...
at Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
, the Liberal Arts Seminar at Georgetown University
Georgetown University
Georgetown University is a private, Jesuit, research university whose main campus is in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic university in the United States...
, the Program of Liberal Studies at the University of Notre Dame
University of Notre Dame
The University of Notre Dame du Lac is a Catholic research university located in Notre Dame, an unincorporated community north of the city of South Bend, in St. Joseph County, Indiana, United States...
, the Core Curriculum at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
, the Core Curriculum at the University of Chicago
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
, the Foundation Year Programme at the University of King's College, and the curriculum at St. John's College
St. John's College, U.S.
St. John's College is a liberal arts college with two U.S. campuses: one in Annapolis, Maryland and one in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Founded in 1696 as a preparatory school, King William's School, the school received a collegiate charter in 1784, making it one of the oldest institutions of higher...
, but owing to Mancall's scholarly interests in East Asia, SLE's reading list is more culturally diverse.
Structure
All SLE participants live, dine, and attend class in the same residence hall, Florence MooreStanford Florence Moore Hall
Florence Moore Hall is an undergraduate dormitory at Stanford University. Designed by Milton Pflueger in 1956, Florence Moore Hall was initially a women's dormitory. The dorm made headlines for its cost of $2.6 million, of which $1 million was donated by Florence Moore...
. Most recently, they live in either the all-freshman dorm, Alondra, which is made up of half SLE students and half IHUM students, or in one of the two four-class dorms, Cardenal and Faisan. Many of the upperclassmen in Cardenal and Faisan are former SLE students, which helps maintain an SLE community spanning the different years. In the main lounge of Florence Moore, known as the SLE lounge, students attend lectures given by professors within many departments at Stanford and by visiting guest lecturers. In addition, students participate in small-group sections, in which they discuss the lectures and assigned literature from SLE's extensive, diverse, and ever-evolving reading list. Films, often relating to the material of study, are screened weekly, and student-produced plays are regularly part of the syllabus. Aristophanes' "Lysistrata
Lysistrata
Lysistrata is one of eleven surviving plays written by Aristophanes. Originally performed in classical Athens in 411 BC, it is a comic account of one woman's extraordinary mission to end The Peloponnesian War...
" is traditionally performed in the fall. SLE also provides freshman with intensive individual writing tutorials.
Administration
SLE is now under the auspices of the Division of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages, which provides intellectual and academic support and is the base of many of the faculty who participate in the program. The administrative home of SLE is the IHUM Program.Program Directors
- Mark Mancall - 1973--2007 - Professor of Modern History
- Roland GreeneRoland GreeneRoland Greene is a scholar of the early modern literature and culture of England, Latin Europe, and the colonial Americas; and of poetry and poetics from the sixteenth century to the present...
- 2007--2008 - Professor of English and Comparative Literature - Carolyn Lougee Chappell - 2008--present - Professor of Early Modern European History
External links
- Official SLE Website
- Article on SLE culture in Stanford Magazine
- Article in The Stanford Daily touching on the implications of the SLE "nerd" stereotype
- Editorial in The Harvard Crimson imploring Harvard to create a "Great Books" program similar to Stanford's SLE and Yale's Directed Studies programs
- Taiwanese academic journal article describing SLE and citing it as an exemplary American model of how to promote residence-based academic learning
- Berlin's European College of Liberal Arts announcement of Structured Liberal Education, an international summer university emulating Stanford's program
- A SLE Inspired Reading List for Children