story | Aunt Norris
Faculty members have unanimously voted to add a new class to the Common Curriculum called Civic Responsibility, following the advice of the Common Curriculum Review Committee. This change will affect all classes joining after AY2017-2018.
The preliminary list of skills to be included in the curriculum include cleaning up after one uses the butteries, not using too much detergent, leaving washer doors open, not leaving food behind in the classrooms, not bringing mud into the suite, not leaving socks in the suite corridors, not throwing glass bottles down the rubbish chute.
“We realise that some of our students are living on their own for the first time and are not equipped with essential life skills such as cleaning up after their own shit,” Hao Gong Min, Dean of Faculty (DOF), said. “Through this class, we hope to equip them with life-skills that will create actually responsible and decent human beings, in Asia for the world.”
This change follows the Student Government survey which found that 75% of people who suite together are no longer on speaking terms. Most students cited incompatible cleanliness standards as the main source of conflict. As a result, class discussion was being negatively affected with academic discussion turning into ad hominem attacks on the state of one’s room.
“It is becoming unhealthy,” Professor Deana Lean said. “No student can talk for more than three minutes before someone brings up the foul smell emanating from their room or their habit of leaving their socks on the common sofa to discredit them. It’s incredibly distracting to the topic at hand.”
Alicia Tay ’19 explained, “I mean, how can I take your argument about Weber’s iron cage seriously if the image of socks in the sink is imprinted in my mind?”
Students also raised concern about the treatment of other common spaces. Disappointed posts about buttery cleanliness and poor use of the laundry rooms have become so prevalent that students created a new Facebook group dedicated to them. The group is called Yale-NUS College Shade.
Freshman Lan Duo Chong agreed that the class would be useful. “I’ve been running out of underwear because my maid is on leave and she can’t pick up my laundry for me,” he said.He said he would appreciate a 5MC course to guide him through the mysterious process of washing one’s clothes.
“Like the homo-economicus, the homo-responsibilius is a myth,” Anthropology Professor Lila Tan said. “Contrary to popular belief, the logic that one should pick up after oneself is neither universal nor self-evident.”
The DOF office is seeking suggestions to add to the curriculum. Please email civicresponsibilityclass@gmail.com