The Undergraduate Student Government Academic Assembly passed a much-needed resolution Monday night supporting a proposal that changes the current diversity course requirement to an independent or small group study requirement. Under Penn State's academic guidelines, students are required to take a three-credit class with a specific diversity focus. The proposal, on the other hand, advocates changing that course to an more personal study requirement.

D. Josh Troxell, Academic Assembly's diversity special projects team chair, was right Monday night when he said the modification would allow students to take a more proactive approach to diversity education.

Working in small group or one-on-one with a professor to learn about a topic is clearly better than sitting in a lecture hall with 100 other students, where there is little interaction with the professor or the other class members.

The intimate, individualized education this proposal emphasizes will help to make students' university educations more meaningful, and undoubtedly they will come to appreciate their diversity knowledge even more.

One potential obstacle, however, the assembly must overcome is to find enough resources to bring this plan to fruition. If accepted by the University Faculty Senate, Penn State would need to make sure that there is enough faculty participation to sustain the classes.

The Daily Collegian applauds assembly members for coming up with many of the initiatives and ideas themselves. We agree with Troxell's assessment that powerful changes can be made when students take it upon themselves to address their curriculum. The proposal will now be sent to the University Faculty Senate for more consideration. We hope they choose to take Academic Assembly's resolution into consideration.