Kothavala Quits Science Center In Policy Dispute

Rustam Z. Kothavala, lecturer on Geology, will resign in June as director of the Undergraduate Science Center, now under construction.

Kothavala, who has headed the center since its inception, attributed his resignation to dissatisfaction with the direction the center is taking. Kothavala said he was appointed by former Dean Franklin Ford because of his reputation as an innovator in education.

"Almost as soon as I was in the job, it became apparent, as always, that more innovations were needed than there were funds available for," he said yesterday.

Faded

"Circumstances have changed nationally, and for this University, so much that the sorts of educational ideas foreseen in 1968 and 1969 have faded beyond recognition," he said.

Among the unforeseen events, Kothavala said, are the financial squeeze and a trend towards professionalization in undergraduate science education. A shortage of $7 million in the fund of theProgram for Science in Harvard College prevented the construction of a $13 million biology-chemistry building and forced the director of the Science Center to be a financial manager and fund-raiser rather than an educator, he said.

The financial crunch is also preventing the science departments from innovating programs in curricula and resources. Rather than concentrating equally on non-scientists and on potential science professionals, the planners of the science center are continuing the trend towards pre-graduate training, Kothavala said.

'A Frill'

"It's really a matter of priorities. If Harvard University, especially with a new President, chooses to take the direction of education for self-actualization, for personal growth, for its own sake at the undergraduate level, a science center as was originally planned would be a top priority. If the concentration of efforts in undergraduate education is preparation for a professional career in the sciences, then this is a frill," Kothavala said.

Dean Dunlop has appointed a task force of scientists to evaluate the purposes and programs of the science center. A successor to Kothavala will not be named until the task force presents its report.

Andrew M. Gleason, Hollis Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy and member of both the task force and the original standing committee the Faculty set up in 1961, said he thought the new task force was "a bit more professional" than the older committee.

Kothavala, however, first tendered his resignation last fall and it became official in February 1971, long before Dunlop organized the new task force.

Frank H. Westheimer '35, Loeb Professor of Chemistry and head of the new task force, admitted that there was some controversy about the best method of undergraduate science education, but emphasized that the task force was concerned with both science and conscience concentrators and had come to no decisions about the center yet.