Sections are a waste of my time, how about yours?

It's not that I dislike talking about my courses; it's just that sections often don't provide anything resembling exciting and satisfactory conversation. It's difficult to get a worthwhile, open exchange started and to keep it sustained for 50 minutes amongst a group of inhibited strangers. Either the TA dominates the discussion—which sometimes makes for a wonderful bonus lecture, but is not why we're there— or a few brave opinionated souls provide safe, dark corners for all the rest to hide in.

What exactly is the premise behind discussion sections? Do graduate students need teaching experience? That's not a compelling reason to mandate section attendance for undergrads. Do we need help processing the information presented in lectures and readings? Personally, I've never sat in a 50-minute discussion that came anywhere close to clarifying the week's material. Furthermore, it should be assumed that we all know how to think analytically.

My biggest complaint, however, is simply the amount of time sections take away from us. Fifty minutes out of a week really is a massive loss, though it may sound small. Consider that I, like many sophomores in the humanities, have three sections per week, and thus lose two-and-a-half hours in sections. And don't forget, as I often wish I could, that many section leaders require added homework such as reading responses and presentations.

The hours that we spend in section and on work for section are hours during which we can't do anything else; thus, we cannot go to sleep earlier at night. And, this being college life, the measure of any activity is whether it's worth losing sleep for. Lots of things that I do are worth missing a week's worth of sleep for; sections just aren't one of them.

Yet sections should not be eliminated. I just wish we could choose when to attend them. If every lecture course allowed students to sign up for sections at the beginning of the semester, stating whether they are likely to attend every week, occasionally, or not at all, professors would know how many sections to create and students could come and go as they felt necessary.

I hardly think that this would result in week after week of empty sections. Most of us will attend a suggested academic activity when we think it will benefit us. Personally, if I read a book that I either loved or didn't understand at all, I would most certainly make it to that week's discussion. But if I don't feel as though it's the most worthwhile way to spend my time, I shouldn't be forced to do it.

Nor do I think it's a tragedy that optional sections would make it more difficult for TAs to give their own assignments. Clearly, we are not languishing for lack of work. And grades based on papers and exams alone are what students who sign up for lecture courses should expect to receive.

Seminars and tutorials are what you take if you're all geared up for class participation. Lectures are what you take if you want to hear a brilliant professor illuminate a topic that you otherwise would know little about. Sections, a bizarre combination of both, shouldn't be a part of either.

Rachel Kamins is a sophomore in Jonathan Edwards.

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