For as long as there have been classes at Penn State, there have been students sitting in them thinking "this sucks." This can also be interpreted as "How am I ever going to use this in the real world?"

I have been in my statistics class for more than a month, and I wish I could say my bank account is smiling at my choice to invest in confusion conferences in the form of PowerPoint slides I blankly stare at every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

For some reason, my public relations major requires me to suffer through this statistics course. So when your dream career manifests itself as a bunch of slides you will probably never need to mentally refer to for the rest of your life, "this sucks" is fairly accurate.

And somewhere in their studies I can bet that most Penn State students have already or will eventually see one or more of the following syllabi: Economics 002 (Introductory microeconomic analysis and policy), Statistics 100 (Statistical concepts and reasoning) or Communcation Arts and Sciences 100A (Effective speech).

These are all courses that various colleges at Penn State have decided are crucial to our education. But I think they're neglecting an even more crucial part of a college student's education

What about Sociology 119 (Race and Ethnic Relations)?

Haven't heard of it?

Sociology 119 is a course that looks at trends in history and at the situation of all types of racial and ethnic groups today. Issues covered include inequality, competition, social movements and conflict.

Now that's a class that should be required.

Conservative critic David Horowitz has called Sam Richards, the course's professor, "dangerous" in his book The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America. But after I took the class I couldn't help but question why Horowitz came to that conclusion. It's not like Sam teaches students how to create weapons of mass destruction (or how to hide them).

I guess the acquisition of new ways of thinking and the broadening of viewpoints, which have been drilled into our brains via our parents, hometowns and cultures, is dangerous, according to Horowitz

Maybe Horowitz would prefer that these "dangerous" people be illuminated in neon red all day, every day. This way it will be easy for society to identify the hazards, the individuals who have allowed the firm ground they stand on to transform into a quicksand of new ideas.

But I ask: Why not be sucked into a state of open mindedness? The ability to meet people and not judge them should be a required skill.

Sociology 119 is the jet plane that can take students to resorts of awareness and acceptance. For tickets please consult your eLion travel agent come registration time for next semester's classes.

There's no potion that Richards gives you that will suddenly transform you into an infallibly tolerant person. The secret of the class is its structure -- lecture twice a week, discussion once a week.

Classes with more than 300 students for lecture are dissected into smaller units of about 12 students per discussion group.

In lecture Sam nonchalantly offers ideas that are arguably revolutionary, like "We are all in some ways bisexual" and "White people are not the only ones guilty of being racist."

His nonchalance is not a representation of a lack of passion for the race relations issues he covers, but it is a sign of respect to his students.

He's not there to brainwash students with an overzealous attitude -- he's just putting different ideas out there.

Hopefully students will figure out on their own how they want to apply statistics they would have never learned otherwise.

Case in point: Did you know a higher percentage of drug users are white people, yet a higher percentage of people in jail due to drug charges are black?

Sociology 119 discussion groups are like race roundtables where students of all colors and orientation come together with no script and just talk. They talk about everything and anything that comes to mind -- lecture topics, personal experiences, cultural values and religious views. They talk about what is right and what is wrong in society.

Behold the magic of the course: experience.

Suddenly that white girl from a small town where zero percent of the population is non-white gets to listen to the experiences of a black kid who always got good grades and is terrified at the thought of going to jail. This breaks her stereotype that all black males were criminals and uninterested in education.

I realize that media tend to shape the views people have of groups they are not exposed to and people don't know any better. That's fine.

But experiences have the power to change, and enlightenment is revolutionary.

You may not be able to save the world or ban the Klu Klux Klan, but you can raise your children without stereotypes or prejudices -- even if you once harbored them.

I believe if people would just talk more and really listen, there is hope for the future.

How you once thought of other people is not your fault. That's just spilled milk. College students are now in the position to choose how they think and what they choose to teach others.

And these are the lessons our university should value enough to require of its students.