The enrollment might go up if the name is changed to Physics for Game
Designers, but some students could suffer in the process.
In the 1970s the professor teaching the Physical Science class for
general-education renamed the course as "How Things Work." He
essentially taught physical science the way he always had, but gave it a
title that was less intimidating to students. Enrollment mostly had
been teacher-education students who were required to take physical
science. Other students primarily completed the science
general-education requirement by taking biology courses. After the name
change, the enrollment in How Things Work went up, and gen-ed biology
enrollments went down.
At some point someone in the State Department of Education discovered
our teacher candidates weren't showing Physical Science on their
transcripts, and they threatened to deny issuance of teaching
certificates to our graduates. It took some time to convince the State
that How Things Work was a legitimate physical science course.
Then we started having problems with our out-of-state students, and also
our in-state students who went to other states to teach and needed
licensed in other states. It became obvious we had to change the name
of the course back to Physical Science.
To some extent we didn't mind, because the name change was partly a 70s
thing. But this example shows that name changes to make a course more
popular can have the desired effect on enrollment, but maybe other
effects that are negative.
Michael D. Edmiston, Ph.D.
Professor of Physics and Chemistry
Bluffton University
Bluffton, OH 45817
(419)-358-3270
edmiston@bluffton.edu