A true AMERICAN UNIVERSITY not only has a distinctive curriculum with majors and minors and a core of liberal arts courses, it also has a different philosophy of teaching.
Here at AUI-S we believe that students are charged with taking responsibility for their own learning and the completion of their studies. But our aim is not to make you memorize and repeat back in class everything your professor has said, but to encourage you to think for yourself. Our goal is to produce men and women who are educated so well that they can enter the world and think through all issues and problems – and not just repeat what someone once told them.
Towards this end, you will not find large lecture halls at AUI-S packed with hundreds of students all furiously trying to write down every word the professor says. Rather, here you’ll find small classes, classes with students working on problems together, talking with each other, asking questions, and learning from one another. At AUI-S, it’s not strange to find a class of twenty or twenty-five students sitting together with their professor discussing an issue, picking it apart, with everyone – students as well as professor – contributing to dynamic quality of learning.
AUI-S faculty encourage active student participation in each class session, challenge student ideas, and expect students to challenge the materials presented in class. AUI-S faculty bring to the classroom not only their academic and professional expertise, but also the desire to assist students to become masters of their own learning. At AUI-S our aim is not to have you repeat back what someone has said but to understand what you’re studying, to know it inside and out.
At AUI-S we have no hesitation in saying that we accept only the most intelligent and promising students. We look for students who are willing to think and not simply repeat what they’ve heard, students who are inquisitive and imaginative, students who will believe nothing without proof, and students who are eager to know the reasons for things. And we live by an educational philosophy that encourages questioning and deep understanding. The word you will most often hear throughout your years at AUI-S is “Why?” Why do atoms behave that way? Why is that the best marketing plan? Why do you believe that? Why?
So, why do we teach this way? For two reasons. First, we believe that through this kind of education we can most satisfy your desire to know as much as you can – to understand your career, to know good from bad and right from wrong, to know the world around you, and to know how better to act in this world. Second, we at AUI-S have no hesitation in saying our hope is to produce leaders – to make you a leader in your field or career, in your community, and in your country. We hope, at AUI-S, to produce the next generation of leaders of a free and prosperous Iraq.
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