A random Yale junior named Nick presents his “Semi-Annual Yale University Gut Course Review.” The email was picked up by Gawker, will probably be sent to the course profs and result in the gutting of the guts, dangerously close to the course drop date. Thus Nick will soon be public enemy #1 (right after Coach) to a sizeable contingent of large men in sweatpants, or equally dangerous female softball players.
The secret to a good gut course is that it needs to be under the radar, at least enough not to attract any “official” attention. The second even a willing gut professor gets a little administrative or department heat over the ‘guttiness’ of a course, it instantly becomes a dangerous game of “let’s roll the arbitrary dice of liberal arts paper grading” or a nightmarish “I’m going to single-handedly combat the grade inflation of the entire university in this class” scenario.
After extolling the virtues of classes like “Alcohol and Other Drugs in American Culture,” “Statistics as a Way of Knowing,” “The Hero in the Ancient Near East,” and “Great Discoveries in Archaeology,” Nick sends out a warning to aspiring I-bankers struggling to find relevant classes in a liberal arts degree:
WHAT To Not Take:MICROECONOMICS: I cannot with any clear conscience send out a mass email and not remind everyone on the face of the earth not to take MICRO unless you like awful boring classes that you will end up getting a C+ in. Seriously though, utility curves are cool. So are horrible professors, arbitrarily shitty curves, tedious work, and gleaning no greater of economics whatsoever.... but for the 200 of you who take it... I told you so.
Econ departments are lacking in obvious guts, even though the Econ major at most liberal arts schools isn't exactly considered all that strenuous. Besides, who wants to take a gut-like "Economics of Something Really Cool" when you can learn about the Samurai?
To help out the grade-grubbing future I-bankers of America trapped at liberal arts schools, if anyone knows of any good Econ guts, or just generally hilarious examples of making your parents proud of that $30+k they're blowing, please let the public know.
What Are The Gut Classes At Yale? [Gawker]
Posted by Prof , Sep 07, 2007 2:10PM
Economics History or Regional Economics: Latin Am, Eastern Euro etc are guts
Geology is the mother of guts
Astronomy is close
Womens studies is Abu Graib.
Posted by , Sep 07, 2007 2:12PM
Uh what exactly is the relevance here to Dealbreaker?
Posted by mini ballerette. , Sep 07, 2007 2:17PM
Israeli Culture. Need i say more
Posted by Mister Softee , Sep 07, 2007 2:20PM
The mother of all Guts is Cornell's Hotel School:
-Meet the Dean - its a class on presentation/hand shaking....
-Stealth Gut: Wine Tasting, try getting bombed at every class and remembering nothing, then getting a D
re: 2:12 If it wasnt for Guts 75% of this board would be tranfered to State U. and be in MTA or City of NY Finance Dept.
Posted by , Sep 07, 2007 2:28PM
what the FUCK are guts?
Posted by , Sep 07, 2007 2:28PM
It's not the course _drop_ date that's looming--that comes in the middle of the term. It's the course _enrollment_ date, which falls at the end of the second week of classes. Even after midterm, you can drop a class at Yale up to the last day of classes, although if you wait that long, you get a "W" (for "withdrawn") on your transcript. Trust me. I know.
Posted by Zippo , Sep 07, 2007 2:48PM
2:28
Guts are the bread/butter of most IB'rs. They get into some elite place after being a dweeb for 6-8 yrs in g/jr/h school.
Then they realize dang i aint up for real work but, really want a hitter life & jag/porsche when i graduate and IB is the only route so let me find some brain-gristle waiting station for 4yrs.....then somehow land at a bulge were Cyan v. magenta graphs & using up $25 for din-din will be my daily decisions for 7 yrs.
The only benefit is $1-2M for those who navigate well
Posted by A.Non.E.Mous , Sep 07, 2007 2:52PM
LOL! At MIT, 14.01 and 14.02 (Principles of Microeconomics and Principles of Macroeconomics) were the gut classes for future I-bankers otherwise majoring in engineering. Majoring in Course 15 (Business AKA Sloan School for Undergrads) was an entire gut degree!
Posted by , Sep 07, 2007 2:55PM
7 years? Thats all you're in for? $1-2M???????? No way is it worth it for 1-2M. Gotta at least make MD and pull in $1-2M/year+ for a couple years before calling it quits, lest it all be for naught.
Posted by mini ballerette. , Sep 07, 2007 2:56PM
zippo that was fucking hysterical
Posted by Baffled Brit , Sep 07, 2007 3:06PM
OK, the question remains, for those not au fait with US School terminology, what is a gut, I'm guessing its some form of 'make up the course load' throw away course?
Posted by , Sep 07, 2007 3:15PM
True story. Econ majors at the lib arts school i went to in CNY have to do a senior project rather than a thesis. Senior year, Fin Mkt theory, all that was required for the project was to take this 20 page paper written earlier in the semester, dumb it down to the average liberal's knowledge of economics and cut it to 12-15 pages. Felt bad for my friends who were doing rewrites of their 50 page thesii.
Posted by check signer , Sep 07, 2007 3:15PM
30K for an ivy league?? hahahaha, try more like 60-70 fully loaded, after expenses etc........but cheap compared to the payback after mom or dad hook you up at gs
Posted by uh huh , Sep 07, 2007 3:42PM
hotel school is gut, but it has its benes. my hotelie ex-roomie is loving life now. he's worked around the world, hung out with hot actresses while he supervises setting up their in-room gym, and in general lived a life he'd never want to quit. i can't say he made a bad choice!
Posted by , Sep 07, 2007 3:52PM
I'm still confused and I'm American
Posted by herodotus , Sep 07, 2007 3:54PM
@ Baffled Brit- exactly: its any course you can use to a) bulk up courseload and b) get a decent grade on w/out really trying.
Posted by Softee , Sep 07, 2007 3:59PM
uh huh
You are right; Hotelie's get a bad rap, buy you damn well have to be special to be one.
Every hotelie i met had game
Posted by Baffled Brit , Sep 07, 2007 4:09PM
Thanks herodotus, have a good w/e
Posted by zippo , Sep 07, 2007 4:10PM
2:55
The first day of the ML Assoc. program they said less than 10% of you will be here in 7 yrs (ie, Dir promote cutoff).
Hence, most people will walk away with less than $1-2M. after school, splurges, overpriced condo, bimmer lease, toys and other financial diarhea
Re: MD $1-2M/yr thats a higher cutoff/risk.
You have to navigate your self, group, sector, firm, street, economy minefields.
Few made it from Early 90s abyss, to LTC, Asian, Russe crises, all in time for Dot.-9/11 and now Credit Crunch.
Most see the that its Death of a Salesman in Hermes, and take the CIBC/HSBC/Frog or Kraut guarantee and leave the party ealy but solvent/sane.
True but sad; the devil cuts a mean deal.
Posted by , Sep 07, 2007 4:26PM
Gut Courses: Anything offered by the Education Department of any school
Also, I second the Geology nomination (known as "Rocks for Jocks" at my school)
From my transcript: 'Mathematical Experience'. Got this liberal arts major out of his math requirement by writing a paper about math. Of course, if I had known then I'd end up working in I-Banking, I probably could have used some skills in math, finance, econ, etc. But if had planned that well in advance, I wouldn't have ended up in I-Banking, would I?
Posted by , Sep 07, 2007 4:29PM
What do CIBC/HSBC/Frog or Kraut guarantee ?
Posted by JT , Sep 07, 2007 4:31PM
'Earth, Energy, and the Environment' 100% online class, some "readings" (aka googl'ing answers during the on line "quizzes), and one final that we, GASP, had to actually go to a campus computer lab to hammer out in like 20 minutes. Oh, and the curve put an 'A' at around an 83 (which in that course was like getting a 'D' in any legitimate course).
Posted by Anal_yst , Sep 07, 2007 4:40PM
CIBC, SocGen, HSBC, BNPP, or any of the other global banks or asian banks love higher-ups from BB banks. You can switch over usually with a nice bonus upfront, lower salary, lower bonus than @ BB's but you can actually work a 50 hour week on occassion instead of 80.
Posted by poo , Sep 07, 2007 5:36PM
During my time at Harvard I took... How to Build a Habitable Planet, Cosmic Connections, Documentaries, African-American Humor, the Comic Tradition in Jewish Literature, and many other gems like Libertarian Economics, the Economics of Crime, and Money, Myth, and America. I win!
Posted by poo , Sep 07, 2007 5:37PM
During my time at Harvard I took... How to Build a Habitable Planet, Cosmic Connections, Documentaries, African-American Humor, the Comic Tradition in Jewish Literature, and many other gems like Libertarian Economics, the Economics of Crime, and Money, Myth, and America. I win!
Posted by Eddie Murphy , Sep 07, 2007 6:08PM
African-American Humor. Wow.
Posted by Ryan Bush , Sep 10, 2007 1:32AM
At the University of Chicago the following gut courses are great schedule fillers:
1. Sign Language
2. Ice Age Earth (notoriously dubbed rocks for jocks)
3. Anything that Burt Koehler teaches
Go Bears