… the state of Arizona now boasts the largest human-designed chasm in the world.

Gaze in wonder at the gap between the University of Arizona’s students and their professors in redesigned Centennial Hall:

Incoming UA freshmen — already paying the highest tuition in university history — could find themselves sitting in some of the largest classes in the country this fall.

After promising that state budget cuts in the past year would lead to larger class sizes, University of Arizona officials will offer three classes in Centennial Hall, the largest of which will seat 1,200 students.

Officials plan to spend roughly $300,000 to retrofit the 2,500-seat performance hall with Wi-Fi, computers and projection equipment that will have to be mobile to accommodate the hall’s primary purpose of hosting music, dance and other cultural performances.

… Those involved say the courses will be successful despite their large size because of the quality lecturers heading the classes and a new pilot program to help mentor and support students.

However, an administrator who’s helping organize the plan admitted that it’s not ideal.

Another administrator who recently was removed from the project and an outside teaching expert also cautioned there’s a lot that could go wrong.

Chief among their concerns: Centennial’s seats don’t have lap boards, meaning students won’t have a place to take notes. There also is the difficulty of holding the attention of hundreds of laptop-toting students in a large hall, said Joni Finney, a teaching expert and vice president of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education.

“The tendency is to reduce excess expenses and pack them in like a cattle car, and whoever makes it out, makes it,” she said. “That’s really not doing students any kind of service.”

… “My biggest concern [one professor remarked] is not keeping their attention on the lecture, but what they would be doing on their laptops,” she said. [Bit confusing there. If you’re worried about what they’re doing on their laptops, aren’t you worried that their attention is not on the lecture?  Or are you worried that while they’re listening intently they’re also pleasuring themselves?]