9 courses for college

See the The 9 Courses You Need To Take In College from Business Insider. I agree with most of the list.

• Public Speaking - absolutely! But this one may be hard to score high and what is or is not a good speech is somewhat subjective. My lecturer records my speech and gosh I don't want to watch myself talk. You WIN if you can speak well in public.
• Chemistry - somewhat agree. but a high school level class may do just fine to get a basic understanding...
• Personal Finance - unfortunately my college doesn't offer this, but can probably be an chapter of another class (to understand that power of compound interest)
• Critical Thinking - yes, students should be encouraged to be able to think. But how do you actually teach such thing (going into never ending philosophy debates)
• Calculus - the merit of calculus teaches you break down a complex problem? I beg to differ. More later.
• Professional Writing - absolutely! students need to write!
• Computer Hardware and Science - absolutely! just programming is not enough. Get to know the logic gates and at see a 7-segment little circuit working!
• Foreign Language - yes! so you appreciate English is actually easier than many foreign languages... fewer accent marks, fewer rules, etc.

The little section about calculus on that article I tend to disagree... breaking down a problem into smaller pieces is basically in every subject you encounter... not just in calculus. And estimation? what part of calculus focus on that? oh you mean Newton's (brilliant!) method?

Calculus is a huge leap from any previous high school math courses including the shy pre-calculus curriculum. I am against calling it "college algebra" . "Algebra 2" or even "misc math" sound fine :) That epsilon/delta and boxes of Theorems with names like x.y is just too daunting for most. Besides me, has anyone write a book without naming Theorems chapter.number that give little meaning? I do believe calculus can be offered more informally as an option (omitting glorious details of epsilon delta, and skim on details of some glorious proofs).

Just let them know we are dealing with rate of change and hope people get comfortable with the perhaps daunting notation of dy/dx that looks like a fraction but not really. Did you say it is not a fraction then what the heck are you doing with that dx in that integral with respect to x. Oh why are you letting dv = something in integration-by-part? Lot of comforting assurance of "it is just notation" is needed throughout... But the idea is: let student polish their problem solving skills through calculus. Calculation not rhetoric!

So yes, calculus should be among those courses that students need to encounter in college... because it is such triumphant human intellectual achievement. I wouldn't call someone fully educated if not seen calculus. Through perhaps daunting problem solving you get to use your brain to develop problem solving skills. When the Fundamental Theorem is introduced the class should stand and applause... as it free you from the trapezoid rule and other techniques in collecting the sum of little shapes under the curve.