May/June 2023Vol.XXXV No. 4
Letters

Reflecting as a Student

Christopher Noble

To The Faculty Newsletter:

Concerning Craig Carter’s article, “Never Mind the Firehose, You Can’t Even Lead Them to Water” (MIT Faculty Newsletter, November/December 2022):

I am not an expert at teaching, but I am quite knowledgeable about being a student (McGill Engineering 1977, MIT Sloan 1983, married to an MIT alum 1983 and father of an MIT alum 2017).

My fond recollection of McGill Engineering includes the detail that it was impossible to pass a course without paying attention during the lectures. And the graduating class was about 2/3 the size of the entering class, so this is based on a considerable dataset of observing cause and effect on my classmates.