Several years ago, I was sitting at my computer doing homework when my mother yelled that I needed to come and see something on TV. She wanted me to watch a news report about David Banh, an 18-year-old who had just graduated from the University of Virginia-in one year. My mother joked that she wanted me to try to graduate from college in a year, or at least as quickly as possible. "It would save us a lot of money," she told me.Although I never thought it likely that I would ever finish college in a single year, when I decided to attend Brandeis, I realized that I was ruling out the possibility that I could graduate even in three years. You see, our University has a requirement that anyone who graduates must complete 112 out of the 128 credits needed to graduate at Brandeis University in either the fall or spring semester. Any credits received in the summer semester or through the Justice Brandeis Semester program cannot count toward this requirement, and a maximum of 16 AP or IB credits may count toward the credits needed for graduation. This means that the earliest any student can graduate from Brandeis is after 3 1/2 years.

The explanation offered for this rather unique policy on the University's Web site is that "Brandeis prides itself on the rigorous academic training that undergraduates receive." It seems rather strange to me that academic rigor is associated with a particular amount of time spent enrolled in the University. Other explanations for this policy include Brandeis' commitment to a broad-based liberal arts education. I think that whatever Brandeis' reasons for forcing its students to stay on campus for seven semesters are, it is at best silly and at worst a disincentive for many bright, goal-oriented students to come to Brandeis.

The first reason Brandeis should drop the requirement to be enrolled for seven semesters is that there are some bright students out there who simply can't afford to pay for four full years at a private university. When my mother made her tongue-in-cheek comment about wanting me to graduate college in one year, she brought up a serious concern for my family: We may not be able to afford four full years of college. If Brandeis allowed its students to graduate in three years or less, it would allow for students whose families cannot afford the financial pressure of four years of college tuition to work a bit harder than their classmates, graduate early and save a substantial amount of money.

Yes, the University is incredibly generous with financial aid (I myself am here on a large scholarship), but for many families, especially in times of economic hardship, college remains tremendously expensive even with aid. Just as students often work harder in high school in order to earn scholarships for college, some Brandeis students would work harder by taking more courses a semester to graduate early and save a great deal of money.

The second reason the University should allow its students to graduate in fewer than seven semesters is that despite the value Brandeis puts on a broad liberal arts education, some people simply don't need time to explore different fields of study. For many students, myself included, the fact that I do not have to declare a major until halfway through my college career in incredibly liberating. It allows students like me to explore new fields of study and discover what we love.

But for many other students, this period of discovery is a waste of time. There are plenty of people who come to Brandeis knowing that they want to be doctors, and from the moment they arrive on campus they pursue the course of study that will get them to that goal. For such people, it may seem ridiculous that they be required to stay on campus for seven semesters so they can have time to discover what they love to study. They already know. Furthermore, the University class requirements for graduating already ensure that students graduating from the University have a basic knowledge of a broad range of fields of study. Students who graduate early ought to be expected to fulfill these requirements just like any other student at the University.

The last and most important reason Brandeis should allow its students to graduate in fewer than seven semesters is that the University ought to trust us to make our own decisions about our academic life. We are adults, and we ought to be trusted to decide how we chart our courses of study in college. The University can and ought to promote a broad liberal arts education for its students, but it cannot force its students to get such an education.

Some may say that students who do not have an interest in getting a good liberal arts education should simply not come to our University. After all, there are other schools that allow their students the opportunity to graduate in three years or less. I believe that Brandeis shouldn't exclude such students from experiencing what Brandeis has to offer. There is a plethora of reasons why someone may want to come to Brandeis, including our family-like community, the phenomenal extracurricular opportunities and the wonderful faculty members that actually care about undergraduates. Perhaps there are many students out there who value these aspects of our University but for whatever reason want to get out of here a bit early. Why should we exclude bright minds who want to come here simply because we judge them to not share all of our values?