{"id":138825,"date":"2023-12-11T14:07:06","date_gmt":"2023-12-11T19:07:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/?p=138825"},"modified":"2023-12-11T14:07:06","modified_gmt":"2023-12-11T19:07:06","slug":"columbia-students-call-hillary-clinton-class-huge-disappointment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/columbia-students-call-hillary-clinton-class-huge-disappointment\/","title":{"rendered":"Columbia students call Hillary Clinton class huge disappointment"},"content":{"rendered":"

Felt like \u2018late-night talk show\u2019 audience, waited hours to ask questions<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Hillary Clinton\u2019s fall class at Columbia University felt more like being in a \u201clate-night talk show\u201d audience than a college course, one of many complaints from underwhelmed students, according to a Huffington Post<\/em> op-ed\u00a0published Sunday.<\/p>\n

Clinton did not read students\u2019 assignments, attend discussion sessions, or hold office hours, and students complained that their questions about controversial topics were avoided, according to the piece.<\/p>\n

The column<\/a> by student Cate Twining-Ward was headlined: “I Thought Taking A Class Taught By Hillary Clinton Would Be Empowering. I Was Wrong.” Twining-Ward expressed her disappointment about the class and interviewed a few of her peers, one of whom said, \u201cI could have learned everything just from reading her memoir.”<\/p>\n

The class, \u201cInside the Situation Room<\/a>,\u201d taught by Clinton and international relations Professor Keren Yarhi-Milo, focused on “how to analyze and understand the complex interplay between individual psychology, domestic politics, public opinion, bureaucracy, the international environment, and other factors which feed into decisions about foreign policy,” according to the course description.<\/p>\n

But Twining-Ward said it \u201cwasn\u2019t really a class \u2014 it was a production.\u201d<\/p>\n

A filming crew recorded every class, and their equipment tear-down cut half an hour from every session, she wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cTogether in class and on tape, we acted much like an audience at a late-night talk show, distracted by the cameras and yet immersed in the vanity of the production,\u201d Twining-Ward wrote. \u201cWe followed an unspoken script where we were both active and passive at once \u2014 expected to laugh at certain anecdotes, but not encouraged to raise our hands.\u201d<\/p>\n

Every week, students waited in line for hours for a coveted seat near the microphone, all for the chance to ask Clinton a question, she wrote, adding it became known as \u201cthe Hunger Games Q&A.”<\/p>\n

Yet, when difficult topics came up, such as the Israel-Hamas conflict, \u201cthe discourse was often neutralized and students were referred to panels and events outside the lecture hall for answers,\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s more, students had been told Clinton would spend the last day of class answering students\u2019 questions, but two days before the final class, they learned most of the questions would be selected in advance, she wrote. One was: “What\u2019s your favorite Taylor Swift song and why?”<\/p>\n

Although students did enjoy listening to Clinton\u2019s stories and hearing from other prominent guest speakers, Twining-Ward said she and others she talked with felt disappointed.<\/p>\n

The class \u201cmade me question Columbia\u2019s institutional priorities,\u201d she wrote; the university seems to use \u201ccelebrity professors\u201d like Clinton to \u201ccommodify their students, turning them into audience members and then often receding to the ivory tower when the conversation gets uncomfortable.”<\/p>\n

Starting Feb. 6, 2024, the university plans to offer Clinton\u2019s class videos through a platform called Columbia Plus, which Twining-Ward said sounds “more like a streaming service than a scholarly site.\u201d<\/p>\n

In response to the Huffington Post<\/em>, Rachel Szala, associate dean for communications and external relations at Columbia, said they had a high demand for the course, and the videos will make it more accessible to a wider group of students.<\/p>\n

Szala said Clinton and Yarhi-Milo \u201cheld open Q&A for at least 20 minutes at the end of each class\u201d and students\u2019 questions were not pre-screened.<\/p>\n

\u201cDuring the first class after Oct. 7, they offered twice as long as normal (40 minutes) for questions on the conflict or any other topic students wanted to discuss. And in the last class, Q&A was over an hour,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cBoth Secretary Clinton and Dean Yarhi-Milo have been adamant about the need for difficult conversations that challenge individual assumptions, and this is part of what they modeled in class,\u201d Szala told the Huffington Post<\/em>.<\/p>\n

MORE: Hillary Clinton named \u2018presidential fellow\u2019 by Columbia University<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

IMAGE: GregoryHauenstein\/flickr<\/p>\n

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